I’m Feeling Better, But Watching Out for Post-Exertional Malaise

My last blog post was a long account, an “organ recital,” about all the awful things I endured over the winter. These were apparently triggered by having amalgam flecks removed from my gums. I was miserable, but lately I’ve been feeling much better. For now, anyway, I have no pain, no strange anxious thoughts, no crankiness, and bad temper and no overwhelming fatigue dragging me down. I’m even sleeping better. Yay! Have I come out of the feared “dump phase,” or is this just the normal pendulum swing, roller coaster ride of detoxing this ghastly stuff that we got poisoned with in that “breathtaking exercise in criminal irresponsibility,” that Andy Cutler talked about?

I even mowed some of the lawn! And that is a big, heavy mower and uphill, too! I was a tad careful about not overdoing this. Feeling better and immediately going out and overdoing things is something I warn people about. “Post exertional malaise” is a thing. You go out and overdo it and next morning wake up with your adrenals “crashed.”

It is easy to “crash your adrenals” as we put it. Crashing your adrenals happens fast, but recovering from being crashed takes forever. When this happens, people tend to think that they did something that caused them to get re-exposed to mercury, but it is way more likely that they just overdid it and their poor adrenals glands, that are supposed to put out the hormones that handle stress, have started coughing and spluttering and ultimately “gone on strike,” as Andy Cutler used to put it. This “crash” can make you feel so bad that you wish someone would just put you out of your misery (as was reported to me by a client recently.) The main symptoms here, I would say, are crushing fatigue and then anxiety. I think that anxiety is harder to deal with than physical pain. It is something I know a lot about.

It was an epiphany for me, when Andy mentioned in passing, (as though of course everyone just knows this), that anxiety and insomnia are adrenal problems. In Amalgam Illness, on p. 52, there is a chart that shows mercury interfering between the brain and the adrenal cortex in 5 different places. Mercury interferes with your ability to produce cortisol, but the line between the brain and the adrenal medulla is a straight shot. No problems there! Your ability to produce adrenaline works just fine! When the cortex sputters and shuts down, the medulla takes over with the adrenaline and that is where all the anxiety and insomnia come from.

Baby your adrenals, even if you are starting to feel well! Take supplements that support them! If you are having some good days, don’t go out and overdo it! (Especially you men, who tend to go out and do all kinds of physical, manly stuff.) “Post exertional malaise” is a thing, and as I said, it is easy to crash and it happens fast, whereas recovering can take weeks and is no joke.