Most people are aware that cortisol is a hormone produced by the adrenal glands and that it has something to do with the person’s energy level. But did you know that cortisol is also responsible for ALL of these essential body functions?
- Maintaining mood and emotional balance
- Helping us to be resilient to stress
- Preventing excessive loss of sodium in the urine
- Suppressing parts of the inflammatory response
- Increasing coagulation to prevent untoward bleeding
- Stimulating glycogen production in the liver and conversion of amino acids to glucose
How Does the Body Know to Carry Out a Perfect Cortisol Activation Response?
With cortisol participating in so many functions, it makes sense to keep it in a perfectly balanced place. In fact, when we wake up in the morning, we are supposed to produce our highest level of cortisol within the first 30-45 minutes. This is supposed to help us to cope with the demands of the day. This “burst” production of cortisol is called Cortisol Activation Response (CAR). The cortisol is then produced at gradually lessened levels and reaches its lowest level at night.
This action is initiated in the brain in an area called the suprachiasmatic nucleus. This area gets activated when the light enters the eyes upon awakening. A healthy CAR, for example, is considered a sign of resiliency.
Waking in the morning is like a mini stress test for the body, so an abnormally low CAR is an indication that the person is not producing enough cortisol rapidly and therefore is not mounting an appropriate physiologic response to stress. They feel sluggish upon waking, have difficulty getting out of bed, and take a long time to wake up, maybe resorting to a lot of coffee just to function.
Other abnormalities in CAR have been associated with depression, metabolic syndrome, and type two diabetes mellitus, to mention a few illnesses. A list of undesirable conditions.
How Do We Holistically Restore a Healthy CAR?
I would recommend starting your day by getting immediate exposure to bright daylight. If you have dark shades, open them right away when you wake up. Better yet, if you live in Florida—go outdoors and enjoy the natural daylight in abundance. If early mornings are very dark where you live, get a bright full-spectrum light box that you can turn on as soon as you wake up.
Additional holistic tips for keeping your CAR healthy are to have good sleep hygiene, wake up at the same time each day, and try to incorporate movement into your morning routine (yoga, walking, tai chi, or even just a lymphatic drainage self-massage).
Sometimes, a holistic doctor can recommend supplements to augment the CAR while you are incorporating lifestyle modifications into your daily routine. And while there are many different labs that offer testing for it, I generally recommend speaking with your doctor about what would be an appropriate test for you.