Functional Medicine - Funmeddev

🧠 The Importance of the Adrenal Glands (2/4)

Cortisol, the main glucocorticoid produced by the adrenal glands, plays a central role in energy regulation, metabolism, stress response and hormonal balance.
When cortisol levels are insufficient, symptoms can vary greatly from one person to another, which often makes diagnosis difficult — and frequently misunderstood.

⚠️ Common signs of low cortisol include:
• Persistent fatigue, sometimes progressing to severe exhaustion
• Weight changes (gain or, in advanced cases, loss)
• Difficulty concentrating, brain fog, memory issues
• Dizziness, confusion, or paradoxical over-agitation
• Worsening symptoms under stress, regardless of the time of day

Because many of these symptoms overlap with thyroid dysfunction, adrenal and thyroid weaknesses often coexist.

⏰ Clues that help differentiate:

• Morning fatigue (difficulty getting up) → more often thyroid-related
• End-of-day fatigue, aggravated by stress → more typically adrenal-related

🚨 More specific warning signs of cortisol deficiency:

• Hypoglycaemia with sudden malaise and craving for sugary foods
• Orthostatic hypotension (dizziness when standing up)
• Evening palpitations or tachycardia, especially at bedtime
• Cold, clammy skin
• Hyperpigmentation (dark patches on elbows, knees, palms, stretch marks) — a strong indicator of low cortisol
• Unusually rapid tanning

Some patients may also develop cravings for salt, strong spices, caffeine, to***co or other stimulants, instinctively trying to compensate for low cortisol levels.

🔬 Cortisol can be measured:

• In blood
• In saliva
• Or via its metabolites in 24-hour urine collection (17-hydroxysteroids)

👉 To learn more, visit www.gmouton.com

You’ll find a detailed PowerPoint presentation (202 slides, English) in:
Conferences → Functional Hormonology → Adrenals

👨‍⚕️ Dr Georges MOUTON – FunMedDev
📧 [email protected] | +32 4 221 52 12
📧 [email protected] | +33 1 87 65 00 75
📧 [email protected] | +352 2690 3183
📧 [email protected] | ‭+44 20 3807 7094‬
📧 [email protected] | ‭+34 919463245‬
📧 [email protected] | +41 91 6990105‬
🌐 www.funmeddev.com‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

🔥 THE IMPORTANCE OF THE ADRENAL GLANDS (1/4)

Why your adrenal glands matter more than you think

We often talk about the adrenal glands—but it’s time to dive deeper into why they are
absolutely vital for your health.
These small glands play a major role in your hormonal balance and are inseparable from thyroid function.

👉 A key principle:
You should never treat adrenal weakness without evaluating and correcting thyroid function—and vice versa. Both systems are interconnected. Hospital medicine acknowledges this, yet this rule is often ignored in everyday practice.

🦋 Thyroid treatments often fail… because the adrenals are ignored

Many patients undergo a thyroid evaluation, yet their adrenal function remains unassessed—even though both are equally essential.
This oversight explains why so many thyroid treatments fail to deliver the expected results.

🧬 Understanding the complexity of the adrenal system

The biochemistry of the adrenal glands is undeniably complex.
Here, we will focus on the adrenal cortex, which surrounds the medulla (responsible for adrenalin and noradrenalin—important but not discussed in this part).

The adrenal cortex produces three major families of hormones:

1️⃣ Mineralocorticoids
Produced by the zona glomerulosa (outer layer) — involved in regulating minerals and blood pressure.

2️⃣ Glucocorticoids
Produced by the zona fasciculata (middle layer) — mainly cortisol, the well-known stress hormone.

3️⃣ Androgens
Produced by the zona reticularis (inner layer) — contributing to metabolism, energy, and vitality.

👉 Deficiencies in glucocorticoids or androgens can slow down metabolism, cause weight gain (except in severe deficiencies), and trigger profound fatigue.

⚡ Cortisol: The turbo-charger that keeps you alive

Glucocorticoids—especially cortisol—play a fundamental role.
They allow your body to respond instantly to acute stress via the famous:

✨ “Fight or Flight” response

Whether you choose to confront the danger (fight) or escape at full speed (flight), cortisol activates the necessary metabolic “turbo.”

This system is designed for short bursts of acute stress, not for constant activation.

😓 The tragedy of modern life: chronic stress

Today, stress is rarely acute—it’s chronic:
• pressure at work
• noisy neighbours
• constant multitasking
• family overload

Chronic stress → continuous cortisol production → eventual adrenal exhaustion.

👉 Results:
• fatigue
• unstable blood sugar
• hypoglycaemia
• sugar cravings
• weight gain

We will detail how to evaluate these issues in part 2 of this series.

👨‍⚕️ Dr Georges MOUTON – FunMedDev
📧 [email protected] | +32 4 221 52 12
📧 [email protected] | +33 1 87 65 00 75
📧 [email protected] | +352 2690 3183
📧 [email protected] | ‭+44 20 3807 7094‬
📧 [email protected] | ‭+34 919463245‬
📧 [email protected] | +41 91 6990105‬
🌐 www.funmeddev.com‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬

🌙 ADVICE FOR SLEEPING BETTER (3/3)

Why going to bed earlier is one of the best investments for your health

To close our series on sleep, let’s look at why falling asleep earlier — ideally around 10:30 pm — is so beneficial.

🌑 1. Early sleep = better use of darkness
Darkness is the strongest signal for deep, restorative sleep.
Sleeping earlier allows you to benefit from this natural window, especially since we typically sleep around 7.5 hours and waking up near 6 am aligns with natural daylight.
Near the equator, day and night each last 12 hours. In Ethiopia, when someone says “let’s meet at 6”, they mean midday, not midnight — because nighttime is for sleeping… and they’re right.

🧬 2. Early night = peak hormone production
The first hours of the night are when the body produces crucial hormones:
• growth hormone
• adrenal hormones
• s*x hormones
Interestingly, recent scientific studies even suggest that thyroid hormone replacement can be taken just before bedtime for better efficiency.

🌿 3. Ancient wisdom meets modern science
Ayurvedic medicine — with more than 4,000 years of experience — identifies 11 pm as the beginning of a powerful energy cycle.
If you pay attention, a natural wave of sleepiness appears around 10:15–10:30 pm.
👉 That’s your biological cue to go to sleep.
Miss it… and things change.

⚡ 4. If you push through, you trigger the “second wind”
Ignore your sleep signal and suddenly you feel more awake, more alert, almost energised.
Check the time: it’s usually 11 pm on the dot.
This “restart” keeps you awake until 1 am or more — the notorious second wind.
Yes, it can boost creativity and mental clarity.
But the cost shows up the next morning.

😴 5. The next morning: slow, tired, unproductive
While the world wakes up at full speed, you struggle under the duvet.
This is one of the hidden consequences of the second wind.

🔥 6. The second wind = adrenaline… and adrenal stress
This late-night boost is driven by adrenaline.
But your adrenal glands — two small “hats” sitting on your kidneys — are not meant to produce this surge every night.
This mechanism exists for emergencies, not for habit, boredom, or nightly resistance to sleepiness.
Over time, this repeated stress contributes to:
• fatigue
• hormonal imbalance
• mood fluctuations
• decreased resilience

💡 Your body knows the right time. Trust it.
Going to bed around 10 pm aligns with your natural biological cycle.
It reduces stress on your adrenal glands, improves hormonal balance, and supports truly restorative sleep.
Why fight your biology when it is already guiding you?

👨‍⚕️ Dr Georges MOUTON – FunMedDev
📧 [email protected] | +32 4 221 52 12
📧 [email protected] | +33 1 87 65 00 75
📧 [email protected] | +352 2690 3183
📧 [email protected] | ‭+44 20 3807 7094‬
📧 [email protected] | ‭+34 919463245‬
📧 [email protected] | +41 91 6990105‬
🌐 www.funmeddev.com‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬