E204: Your Ashwagandha & Stress Supplements Might be Making Your Chronic Stress Worse

Ever take ashwagandha to "fix" your stress, only to end up feeling just as exhausted (and maybe even worse hormonally)? Friend, I’ve been there too.  

If you’re relying on adaptogens to “fix” fatigue, weight gain, or hormonal chaos but still feel wired-and-tired, here’s what I want you to know: masking stress won’t heal your hormones. The duct-tape approach might help temporarily, but without addressing the root cause, you’re setting yourself up for a crash.  

In this episode, I’m breaking down:  

• The #1 mistake women make with adaptogens, and when they can help vs. when they’re just a band-aid  
• How cortisol hijacks your hormones even if your bloodwork looks normal
• 5 hidden root causes of stress overload (hint: blood sugar crashes and gut issues are bigger culprits than your to-do list)  
• My favorite nervous system tricks to signal safety to your body

If you’re done duct-taping your stressed body together and ready to actually heal, let’s do this together—hit play now. 

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Disclaimer: Nothing in this podcast is to be taken as medical advice, please take informed accountability and speak to your provider before making changes to your health routine.

This podcast is for women and moms to learn how to balance hormones naturally in motherhood, to have pain-free periods, increased fertility, to decrease PMS mood swings, and to increase energy without restrictive diet plans. You'll learn how to balance blood sugar, increase progesterone naturally, understand the root cause of estrogen dominance, irregular periods, PCOS, insulin resistance, hormonal acne, post birth-control syndrome, and conceive naturally. We use a pro-metabolic, whole food, root cause approach to functional women's health and focus on truly holistic health and mind-body connection.

If you listen to any of the following shows, we're sure you'll like ours too!
Pursuit of Wellness with Mari Llewellyn, Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark, Found My Fitness with Rhonda Patrick, Just Ingredients Podcast, Wellness Mama, The Dr Josh Axe Show, Are You Menstrual Podcast, The Model Health Show, Grounded Wellness By Primally Pure, Be Well By Kelly Leveque, The Freely Rooted Podcast with Kori Meloy, Simple Farmhouse Life with Lisa Bass

Transcript

[00:00:00] Leisha: Today I'm talking about one of the biggest mistakes I see women make when it comes to taking things like ashwagandha or other adaptogens for stress. And I'm gonna tell you exactly what you should do instead. So you can actually make a difference in your overall health long term.

my social media was completely cortisol related for a little while, and I know that's my own algorithm, but I also know that you might have some questions about cortisol. Is your cortisol actually high? How do you manage a cortisol imbalance or even adrenal burnout? And I'm gonna answer that today because so much of the time we can lean on a supplement like Ashwagandha or other adaptogenic herbs to help.

Support our stress levels, but there is so much more under the surface and we're gonna talk about all of it.

 Let's just start with a quick overview of stress in the body. When we have an emotional, physical stressor. Our brain is gonna be sending signals to our adrenal glands to make more stress hormones. And those stress hormones like cortisol, like DHEA, are really important and absolutely necessary to sustain life in a situation where there is an emergency.

And that floods our body with essentially the energy and other neurotransmitters that it needs to be able to get your body moving, fight, flight, freeze, something like that, and to get you. In a safe position. So cortisol is really important, and it was made to be a hormone that was used in emergencies.

 In our modern world, a lot of times our bodies think that there's an emergency because we have these chronic stress triggers, like a busy lifestyle like blood sugar imbalances. We're gonna get into all of those things here shortly, and I'm gonna talk about some of those root causes of cortisol imbalance.

Let's just talk about some of the signs and symptoms first, because if you have thought about cortisol and you're like, I think maybe my cortisol or my adrenal glands are not working optimally, let's check in and see if that's really you. Some typical signs of cortisol imbalance would be things like fatigue, weight gain, anxiety, feeling tired, but wired.

But what does that actually mean? If you have ever experienced, like you've had the craziest day. The kids have been, all over the place. You had 14 different activities to take them to. You also needed groceries. Then the dishwasher was full when you needed to fill up the dinner dishes. Then somebody dropped something on the floor.

Then the dishwasher was still full when you turned back around to try to, fill that, it's time to put the kids to bed. You have to run around and chase them. You're just running in circles all day long. And you still have this to-do list just running in the back of your head where you're like, I still have these couple of things to do for work.

I need to answer these 16 text messages that I'm forgetting about. I need to put milk on the grocery list. I really need to wash those dishes. And the dishwasher is still full. And your brain is just going and going and going. But you are also noticing that there are certain times in the day where you're like, crashing.

Especially in the afternoon, you are sitting and trying to get something done on the computer and you just notice that you're just absolutely exhausted. And so you're reaching for maybe an afternoon ice latte. Maybe you're reaching for a little snack. Maybe if you're crunchy because you're here, you're like, I need an adrenal cocktail in you are.

Essentially just trying to bridge yourself over so that you can get to that place where you have the second wind and then you can run around and do all the things . But once , it's time for you to go to bed. You're not only mentally, physically exhausted, but you're also kind of wired at that point because you've gotten past the point where your body is ready to rest and you've gotten a second wind and a second burst of cortisol with the bedtime routine or whatever it is, or the things that you had to do.

Or maybe some binging of love is blind, whatever that looks like for you, you're tired, but wired and at the end of the day, your body desperately needs rest, and you are still self stimulating. You're still trying to listen to one more podcast. You're watching. Like I said, those love is blind episodes.

You're answering text messages, you're scrolling social media, you're doing something to keep your brain going, even though it desperately needs a break. That's what cortisol imbalance looks like. That unfortunately is what is so common, and when everyone else is doing the same things, it feels like it's normal.

But what happens when you have these cortisol imbalances is for a while, you body is able to keep up and it's able to keep making plenty of these stress hormones, making plenty of cortisol and you're at this kind of like high level and that can honestly feel good for a while. But when cortisol is turned on all the time, when you're in that fight or flight response all the time, there are certain things in your body that are actually decreased.

A couple of them that are really important for those of you who are here because your periods are bad, your pmms is bad, your mood is all over the place, the gut. Is suppressed, gut function, digestion, and even fighting infections in the gut. All of that is suppressed when your cortisol is being overstimulated.

Because when you are needing to run from an emergency situation, when there's an emergency happening, digesting your food is just not that important. But when we are overstimulated constantly and we're constantly triggering that cortisol. Your digestion will be decreased all the time. That can lead to low stomach acid.

It can lead to gas, bloating, constipation, and in the long term, it can lead to hormone issues because you're messing with that really big detox pathway of your gut. And then the liver can be involved in different things like that just based on the gut being imbalanced. Another thing that happens when your cortisol is overstimulated and your body is constantly looking for more.

Cortisol to provide that energy and that function that you need is that your hormones like estrogen and progesterone especially, are deprioritized because again, your body wants to keep you safe and it is not a good time to have a baby if you're having an emergency, right? Your body is saying in that moment, Hey, not a good time to prioritize progesterone production because progesterone is to keep you pregnant.

To keep your luteal phase lengthened long enough for you to get pregnant. And if you are not in a good place to have a baby, let's not worry about progesterone, and your body can actually steal some of that progesterone and make it into more cortisol. What does that look like? That looks like your hair is falling out.

Your energy is terrible, your thyroid is struggling, you are having more weight gain. You're just not feeling yourself. You're struggling in your body. You're having irregular cycles, so you have a cycle that is, 24, 26 days or a short cycle versus a longer cycle. That's 28 to 30 days. A lot of times when we see spotting right before your period, when we say a spotting mid cycle, especially in those shorter cycles, your progesterone is suffering, and that can also lead to an estrogen and progesterone imbalance, even if you don't have high estrogen.

It can be in the presence of high estrogen, but even if you don't have high estrogen, your progesterone being stolen to make more cortisol is going to automatically make you estrogen dominant. And then you're gonna have the mood swings before your period. You're going to have the painful periods, the tender breasts, where you're just like, I am a hot mess disaster for this whole week before my period.

I am snappy. Nobody wants to be around me. Nobody knows what to expect. My kids are hiding because. I just can't keep it together. And then you get your period, and then you've got a couple days of those really heavy cramps. You're on the couch with your heating pad, you're just like really feeling miserable.

And then you start the cycle all over again. But when cortisol is the driver of this, we have to figure out how to manage cortisol levels without essentially causing other issues. What a lot of us go to is good old Dr. Google and or Dr. TikTok, and we find out that there are supplements that we can take to help manage cortisol levels.

Now, I do wanna just mention really quick before I go to the supplements. Your cortisol may not be high if you're having these symptoms. It just means that your cortisol is potentially imbalanced. You could have been doing this for long enough that your cortisol is actually on the low side or that you're not even metabolizing cortisol well

just assuming that your cortisol is high and that you need to take an adaptogenic supplement or even like an anti-anxiety medication, an antidepressant medication. It's not really always that's what you need. It's really that we need to look at the why, like why is your cortisol imbalance of why you're having these symptoms in the first place.

So you may not have high cortisol, you could have low cortisol, you could just have imbalance cortisol throughout the day. But when you go to. Adaptogens like Ashwagandha, Rhodiola. There are tons of different adaptogens that you may have gotten suggested to you on TikTok or on Dr. Google because you're looking for a natural stress support.

Now, I'm not completely against these. I think in the big picture when we're looking at everything else that's involved and we need something to kind of bridge over, sometimes they can be helpful. But here's what I also know. Imagine. You walk into your bathroom and there's water all over the floor and you notice that your bathtub is leaking.

There's like a bunch of water coming out the side of your bathtub because maybe your 6-year-old accidentally went in there with power tool and did a little drilling on the side of the bathtub. That has actually not happened in my house, but I couldn't necessarily rule it out because.

Of the kiddos that I have little boys are just their own breed. So imagine that happened, Somehow the 6-year-old got a hold of his dad's drill and drilled a hole through the side of the bathtub. So you're like, okay, there's water all over the floor. gotta clean that up, right? And so you just start cleaning it up.

You're cleaning up the water, you're cleaning up the water, and you're not making any progress. Then you're like, okay. I am going to do something to stop this hole, right? , The first thing you can think of is duct tape. So you put some duct tape on there and it actually works like it's working for now.

And the water stops coming out on the floor. You get it all dried up and it feels like things are probably okay, but what you're ignoring is that the water is still on in the bathtub. Eventually the water is actually just gonna overflow the bathtub. Or your duct tape, little dam is going to break. And this is what we're doing when we're just taking adaptogens and thinking that's going to fix our stress problem.

It's not going to fix your stress problem long term. And since you're actually ignoring the real problem, which is why your cortisol is imbalanced in the first place, you're going to have a bigger mess once that dam breaks and once that duct tape wears off. You may notice that taking an adaptogenic supplement will help you feel better for a little while, but it's like an excuse to keep living the way you're living and not getting to the root cause of what's going on.

Some of the root causes that I see when I work with my clients, and when we do Dutch testing and we actually look at the adrenals and we look at the pattern of cortisol throughout the day and we see what's going on. Cortisol balance and DHEA and other hormones, you know what's actually happening.

What's actually happening with your estrogen , is your progesterone getting stolen? Is your cortisol high? Is it low? Where is it showing up in the day when we have some of these answers, it's really helpful to see that. But again, just knowing those answers doesn't tell us why. That's what I really dig in with my clients on.

When we are working together. I really dig in because I want to know if cortisol dysfunction is from blood sugar imbalances, and we have to look at that really carefully because on paper sometimes it's oh yeah, I'm definitely balancing my blood sugar. I'm eating protein, I'm eating carbs. I'm eating consistently throughout the day.

I'm not eating. A lot of naked carbs. I'm not eating a lot of soda sugary things, and so it's easy to be like, oh yeah, I'm balancing my blood sugar. So much of the time though, when I actually get into those food logs and when I look, it's like your ratios are off or your timing is off, or you're not getting enough fats or enough fiber to actually keep your blood sugar balance.

It can also be gut imbalances. Those can be huge. Because if you have a lot of inflammation in your gut, if you have bacterial overgrowth, parasites, things like that that are causing symptoms like gas and bloating or constipation, those type of symptoms often lead to more of a root cause of gut dysfunction and inflammation.

And your cortisol levels are going to be affected by that because inflammation is stress on the body. And so if your body is constantly fighting an infection. It is going to take more from your nervous system and your stress hormones to keep that under control, that can be a huge cause of dysregulation as well.

Mineral imbalances are huge too because so many of us didn't start with the minerals that we necessarily needed, and then when we've had babies, we lose about 10% of our minerals each time. We're not eating nutrient dense mineral rich foods a lot of the time. The supplements that we're taking are synthetic and they're not replenishing minerals, and we also just don't even understand what we actually need.

I know that sodium has been demonized a lot. It's just not widespread knowledge what your cells actually need to stay balanced and with stress, you're just constantly burning minerals faster and faster. And so it really is so helpful to see what that picture is for you and to start eating and supporting your body in a way that you're actually replenishing those minerals, because that's gonna make a huge difference in your stress levels as well.

And or. Your ability to manage stress essentially in the body. And then circadian rhythm dysregulation is another piece that we work with our clients on and we really look at, are you essentially under artificial lights all the time? Are you telling your body it's daytime? When it's nighttime?

Are you sleeping? Are you getting sunlight at the right times of day? Are you managing that in a. Reliable and consistent way because that can be a really big trigger for cortisol dysregulation as well. If there's a lot of variation in that and there's not a lot of consistency with what your body really needs.

And then of course, it's going to be the emotional stressors in the overscheduled lifestyle that is going to keep your cortisol imbalanced long, TREM two. And so being able to look at that as a whole and not only looking at. Food and your gut and your minerals and your lifestyle habits, all of those things together are what's causing your stress imbalance in the first place.

It's really very unhelpful to just choose to take, a stress supplement when so much of the time there's so much more going on under the surface. And that is why being able to. Work together and be able to look at the whole picture can make such a huge difference in being able to make those changes long term.

, Even if you see improvement from a stress supplement, really taking the time to ask yourself. But like, why is this increased in the first place? And I know that it can feel so easy to just say my life is stressful and it's just going to be stressful because I have kids, because I have to work because.

My life is busy and I understand how true that can feel and I'm there with you. And I also think that it's really helpful to take a step back and just see what is actually true about that and how we can shift perspective or shift some of our habits to start to support your body feeling more safety.

 another thing that we work on together is regulating the nervous system and decreasing the. Feelings of stress even in the midst of a stressful lifestyle because sometimes things can't change right away. And when we're able to support your body and give signals of safety over and over again, we not only see improvement in energy, we start to see that you have better moods and you start to feel like yourself again, and your periods are better and your digestion is better.

And all of those things stack on top of each other and continue to give your body those signals of safety so that your cortisol can be regulated. When we're thinking about this long term, we have to realize that stress is the main driver for chronic disease. Whether that is diabetes, heart disease, stroke, cancer, all of those things like chronic stress can be a huge factor and there is so much power in being able to understand and regulate your own body so that you are more resilient to stress.

Even in the midst of a busy lifestyle, and then sometimes being able to actually change some things about that busy lifestyle so that you don't have to work so hard to combat the stress that you're having. I think that it really is both, I would just encourage you to take a few minutes to think about this today and to consider if you are actually managing this well on your own.

If you need support and if you do need support, we would love to have you join us in nourish your hormones. We would love to coach you. We would love to support you, one of our biggest gifts is being able to help you figure out what the minimum effective dose of support looks like so that you are not adding a ton to your plate and you're actually able to feel regulated even in the healing process because we understand.

How life is and that things need to be realistic, so being able to hold your hand and help you walk through that is something that I absolutely love to do. If that feels like something that might be right for your season, the link is in the show notes for Nourish or Hormones coaching. We can book a call, we can chat about it.

Just considering how long this stress has been going on, what you've tried, what you haven't tried. Then being able to have someone ask you the right questions can be truly life changing. So I would love to chat with you and I will see you next week.