Has Anyone Seen My Hormones
Because they sure as hell aren't with me. I've been dealing with chronic fatigue the past two weeks (six weeks if you count the denial), courtesy of a well orchestrated conspiracy by the players in my endocrine system. Adrenals: you suck. Thyroid: you suck too. Thanks to their little game I have the energy of a 90-year-old woman. I noticed last month that I wasn't recovering from my workouts as well as I should have, but I wrote it off as dehydration or not using one of those fancy racer recovery drinks. But now I see it was a precursor of what was to come, total adrenal fatigue and now I'm struggling just to ride to work. I've commuted to work three times in the past two weeks and each ride left me exhausted at work and struggling to keep the cranks moving towards home. When I got home I collapsed on the couch and wanted nothing more than to sleep for a few days. I've had to drive to work because of the lack of energy, and I still collapse after a day of sitting on my ass. I've had smaller bouts of fatigue the past few years from my Hashimoto's disease, but this is the grande dame of fatigue and it came without warning - no stress, no epic dramas, no reason to pull the plug. Yeah your body really does hit the fan once you turn 30. Yippie! Just in time for summer!
Oh and racing. Can forget about that. My last workout was over two weeks ago and I couldn't even finish it. Hills look like Mt. Everest. The thought of a track workout makes me ill. Right now it would be a miracle if I could pedal around at more than eight m.p.h. The first Wednesday night race is this week, but I won't go. It will be too depressing to see everyone chomping at the bit, so near the top of their game, while I sit around as miserable as if I had the flu. My one doctor told me today that I can expect to take two days to recover for every one day I've been off. Great. Maybe I'll be back in action in time for CX season.
But the hormones. Yes it's all their fault. My adrenals have crashed, my cortisol levels in the toilet en route to the great sewer system in the sky. My thyroid isn't talking to my mitochondria so energy production is at a stalemate. T3 and T4 hormones have abandoned my metabolism and gone to Tahiti. Add a touch of anemia and hypoglycemia and my system is short wired. Thanks guys. Feeling great here. No need to hurry and return system to normal. I'll just sleep through this whole endocrine disaster, ok?
I'll sleep through it all and take the 19 pills each day (yes that's 6 doses of a hypoallergenic multi-vitamin, 6 cortisol pills, 4 tyrosine pills, 1 iron pill, 1 cytomel, and 1 levoxyl. Yum.) plus one DHEA spray every day and wait until you come back from your little hiatus. Feel free to send a postcard: "Wish you were here." Yeah I wish you were here too.
