Tag: Stress Management

Coaching for adrenal fatigue

Why Mindset Is The Key To Feeling Better With Adrenal Fatigue

In my practice I particularly enjoy working with clients who are experiencing adrenal fatigue or other auto-immune related illness. Why? Because I’ve been there myself. I understand what it took to full recovery and wish I knew the tools and thought management techniques I know now. Regardless, I am incredibly thankful to share what I know today.

adrenal fatigue coach

 

What I notice happening a lot with people experiencing adrenal fatigue (or other related illness) is a three part phase:

  1. Despair/Breakdown
  2. Determination/Identify Protocol
  3. Maintenance or Plateau

The first phase is clear for anyone who suddenly understands the depth of their situation. It’s a time where you begin to question everything in your life and analyze what lifestyle patterns may have caused adrenal fatigue in the first place. Bottom line: give yourself a good cry. Don’t judge yourself for why you got here or panic about how you can change things. Let it be and give yourself compassion.

The second phase is a re-birth of sorts. You begin to track down some of the best doctors who can help you identify a path to recovery. It’s a time to learn more healthy lifestyle habits to incorporate and if there’s one piece of advice I give to anyone going through this now it’s this: don’t get overwhelmed about the plethora of information out there, this is the opposite of recovery. Trust the information will flow to you; trust the timing and don’t rush it.

The third phase is what I wanted to emphasize in today’s blog post. You see, how you manage your brain will be the KEY to whether or not you can mindfully continue through to maintenance phase or it will be the point it which you plateau completely or retreat back to phase one.

You have to understand that one of the biggest root causes for adrenal fatigue is stress, and stress can only come from one place – our minds.

If we can’t manage our minds to begin with, we will have a much longer time recovering from adrenal fatigue. This is why understanding how your brain works and whether or not it is serving you will be key to achieving peace.

Here are a few questions you can ask yourself to understand whether or not you need to evaluate your current thought process:

  • Do you often feel rushed, anxious, angry, or worried throughout the day?
  • Is there a set of thoughts and/or problem you repeat over and over again in a given day?
  • Do you feel overwhelmed by a thought and/or problem to the point where it starts to cause physical stress?
  • No matter how much you apply will power, do you find yourself using food, drinking, working out, or the internet to avoid/buffer in order to feel better?

If you answered yes to any of the above, chances are you would benefit from understanding why your brain works the way that it does, and how making tweaks to your own internal process can help provide more peace, joy, and personal power into your life.

You see in a nutshell, when you understand your brain and why you have certain thoughts you start to uncover limiting beliefs, habituated thought and behavioral patterns. With this recognition you can now do the work to understand your individual mental model that has been driving your actions until now.

After all, if you’re doing all the work to live a healthier, more mindful lifestyle why not work on the one thing that can help you manage stress to begin with?

Because the good news is it’s completely possible to optimize your very own internal world and THAT, is priceless.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by bruce mars on Unsplash

adrenal fatigue coach

What To Do After Major Adrenal Fatigue Or Burnout

I like to call this phase the i-think-i’m-a-zombie phase.

If you’re the type of person that wants to just move on with your life to the good stuff, chances are you haven’t fully absorbed the meaning behind why adrenal fatigue happened and how you can transform adrenal fatigue to serve you.

You might still be in a daze as to why adrenal fatigue even happened, especially since you’re smart, well intended, and nothing that stressful really happened. Right?

It’s not until we look back and realize just how hard we were working and just how hard we were on ourselves during these times.

adrenal fatigue and stress management coach

If we don’t take the time to understand why our bodies couldn’t habituate to the stress and what was causing the stress in the first place, we just might find ourselves in a similar situation in the near future.

And that is no good.

Anyone who’s ever been through adrenal fatigue would never wish it upon anyone, even their worst enemies.

So what can you do during this zombie phase?

You can start by simply taking the time to reflect on what was driving you so hard to begin with.

What were you so hard on yourself for? What were you afraid of?

Now I’m not talking about things outside our external control.

I’m talking about your internal drivers. What motivates you and why, and why you place meaning behind the things you do.

You see, once we can start to understand the root of what was driving you to do, be, and act the way you did prior to adrenal fatigue, we can begin to build new internal drivers.

This is the most important work you can do for yourself.

This type of investment is the kind of investment no one talks about.

What if you could have invested in yourself THEN so you wouldn’t have had to go through adrenal fatigue?

What if, now knowing this, you can invest in yourself NOW so that you can prevent another breakdown in the future?

What if by investing in yourself now you can live the life you always dreamed of?

Understanding your internal drivers is one of the best things you can do for yourself. If you don’t take action for yourself, who will?

In wellness,

Susan

 

Photo by Alexandra Gorn on Unsplash

Is adrenal fatigue real?

Is Adrenal Fatigue REAL?

Depending on how long you’ve been experiencing adrenal fatigue, you probably know by know that “adrenal fatigue” is a syndrome that is not recognized by conventional medicine, which means you’re working with a naturopatic doctor or other alternative health care practitioner at the time of this writing.

Well, it doesn’t stop there. There’s more research that indicates while the symptoms that collectively fall under “adrenal fatigue” are real, the treatment of our adrenals isn’t truly targeting the root cause.

Adrenal Fatigue Life Coach

What few are now starting to call this is HPA Axis Dysregulation. The HPA Axis is known to be the body’s central stress response system. And for some people, when our body, and it’s hormonal response, is no longer able to habituate to the chronic stressor, symptoms of “adrenal fatigue” begin to emerge until we treat the root cause

Essentially – cortisol disturbance.

So, is adrenal fatigue REAL? HELL YES.

Should it be CALLED adrenal fatigue? I’ll leave that to the medical experts.

What I do know is that the collective symptoms that are now under the naming convention – adrenal fatigue – is absolutely real and debilitating.

Thankfully, there IS a way to peace and finding joy while in recovery.

It wasn’t until I realized my thoughts were causing me more stress than what was actually happening in my life that I was able to regain control.

This is what I tell my clients (adrenal fatigue or not) all day long. You need to pull out the ROOTS (your mis-managed thoughts) in order to FEEL BETTER. Because our thoughts create our feelings, never what’s happening.

It’s a hard concept to grasp at first but when you do, you’ll begin to realize just how IN CONTROL you are of your life 100% of the time.

So, adrenal fatigue? It’s real – at least the collective symptoms of adrenal fatigue.

I hear you. I see you. I feel you. 

How do I know? Because I was right there with you my friend.

Let me know how I can help.

In wellness,

Susan

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Friday Focus – 3/16/18 {It’s All About Appreciation}

This week’s Friday Focus is all about appreciation.

Perhaps it’s a sign of Spring, but these past two weeks have been particularly hectic. As if a budding flower is feeling the sudden heat of the sun, I felt a surge of chaotic energy that felt both good and tiring. And as the bud becomes the flower, basking in the sun, I am now feeling that sweet release and contentment as I gear up for international travels.

Which brings me to appreciation.

Throughout the hectic moments in our lives it can be incredibly easy to forget our true nature. We can get caught up in the small stresses and obstacles that come up. We begin to stare at our to do list or our calendar and begin to wonder, “how is this all going to get done?” or “when will this ever end?”.

That’s when I turn everything around to appreciation.

I begin to appreciate every little thing in my life. From the blankets that keep me warm as I turn to bed to the transportation I am riding to get to my next destination. I begin to truly give thanks and amplify what is already in my life.

And when I do this, suddenly the task at hand doesn’t seem so big. I begin to realize everything is happening for me.

When you can appreciate everything in your life now, then you can appreciate everything that comes. The fear or anxiety that suffocates you in the moments of chaos falls away too, instead of following you to the next thing.

Appreciation is a powerful and real energetic quality we should all invite into our lives. It changes your perspective. It raises you up. It brings you to the truth, your light, your true reality.

May we invite more appreciation into our daily lives and in each and every moment, and watch how our life magically unfolds.

In wellness,

Susan

Photo by Ludovic Gauthier on Unsplash

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Friday Focus – 8/25/17 {When You Can’t Stop The Stress}

“What do you do when you know what to do, but you can’t help but let the stress get to you?”

“The suffering comes when you resist the current situation. What are you trying to change?”

“I feel as if I know enough intellectually not to stress out too much about things, and knowing this should help me in most situations… but I keep stressing and the stressing is stressing me out even more!”

“What is the goal?”

“The goal is to stop stressing!”

“This goal cannot be achieved right now. You are fighting against the current flow of life. Fighting against the flow of life creates even more resistance. Turn your vision around and go with the flow. Stress? What is so bad about stress? It is our identified stories and fears around a situation that creates stress and therefore keep us in suffering. “Stress” is not what is driving you mad, it is your identification to something or someone”

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So much of our suffering comes from desiring a different “current situation”. Can we sit in THIS moment and feel the gratitude of our breath? The sun on our face? The ability to call our loved ones and tell them how much we love them? To hug our beloved dog? To walk outside in nature and feel the beating heart of Mother Earth?

If you find yourself identifying to the student above ask yourself these following questions:

  • What am I needing to change to feel better?
  • Can I have faith that this too shall pass?
  • Can I breathe and with each exhale deepen my faith in the Universe’s ability to handle things perfectly?

No matter the situation, let us find a bit of peace in knowing we are taken care of – always.

In wellness,

Susan

Seeking Confirmation

Why do we do that? Whether it’s out of curiosity or we want to hear something other than what we know deep down inside, it’s as if us humans have an insatiable need to constantly seek confirmation outside ourselves.

On one hand if you have a healthy mindset about it, scratching a particular itch doesn’t hurt. I often find that when you’re honed in on your own intuition and your deepest desires you always know the answer and aren’t as stressed because you already have faith in the unfoldment of what is to be. Instead, what we mistaken as confirmation are really therapeutic experiences; after all as humans we love to be in community and what better way than to share and find a tribe of people who understand what you’re going through?

Where I think it can do more harm than good is when you constantly seek confirmation without giving anyone’s opinion or advice deep thought. When you feel the need to jump from one thing to another, stop and ask yourself, “what am I seeking?” “what do I want to hear?” “what am I afraid of?” “what is the underlying emotion that is driving my actions?”

Whether you’re in one boat or the other, consider relabeling what you are seeking. Rather than seeking “confirmation”, position your thoughts to identify with this activity as a “therapeutic experience” or a “discovery session”. Whether you do this with friends, a tarot/astrology reading, therapist, or life coach, when you identify this as a self discovery process suddenly the desperation falls away. Did you feel the shift? 

When we come from a place of seeking confirmation it implies a yearning for a particular goal, outcome, or indicates an illusory fear.

So the next time you feel the need to seek confirmation, take a moment to re-identify the action from seeking to discovery. It may make a world of difference and save you the stress.

And remember, you already have the answers within ?

In wellness,

Susan