I have been feeling gradually worse the last 8 years. I have a wide range of symptoms and different issues, but one thing seems to really stand out, and that is that I have more symptoms similar to Addison's than anything else. It may very well not be, but if that is the case it is very very likely endocrine related and similar. But now it has been suggested to me that I am displaying symptoms of fibro?? The argument to that is that I do not have the typical debilitating stiffness/joint pain.... however I do have all the rest of the problems... at equal severity. I can't possibly have hypoglycemia or addison's disease, but I may very well have chronically low blood Sugar like between 60 and 70, and I am not sure how that would effect me. Moreover, I am about 99 percent sure I have adrenal fatigue, which is a step prior to addison's disease. I do believe that addison's and fibromyalgia do not set in overnight, and that it is a gradual process. I have heard recently that some speculate that adrenal fatigue can often be the origin of people suffering from fibromyalgia. I wish I could get insurance, I would see a naturopath/endocrinologist specialist who is less hostile towards alternative medicine. Some people praise prednisone, or ADD and SSRI medication, but I believe the side effects of these pharma drugs are far too severe and counter productive. In fact the idea of using a corticosteroid to help deal with adrenal problems, and to add ADD meds in to deal with mental function, knowing the amphetamine will further atrophy and damage the adrenals, is nearly insane.
I have tried to get help from my university's clinic, and I get the complete run around. I really do need the help of a considerable specialist in alternative and clinical medicine if I am going to go to a doctor at all. It may be years before I can afford insurance, for what I can tell. But, maybe I need to look more.
The issue with traditional doctors, is that they will not dx and recognize a serious illness until it has progressed so badly it shows clearly on blood tests, but by then debilitating symptoms may have been occurring for months or years.

I am trying to research information and tests that I need to be familiar with as well as medication, so that I will be properly informed should I decide to go to a specialist. I do not have insurance, and it will be very very costly and difficult to find a reputable one in my area. Most likely I would have to go to Houston. I do not want to do this without more information. I am aware that I will have to continue to give people considerable amount more information, and I do not intend for this post to make it seem like I expect answers. I know this is only the beginning, and I hope to engage in these forums and provide some insight.

What follows below is my attempt to explain it, reader beware, this is a long read, you may want to avoid unless your avidly concerned. I would endlessly appreciate anyone who did read and respond. I have tried to be as detailed as possible. I swear to my full honesty, it is not random symptoms of day to day feelings or hypochondria, [i][b]everything mentioned is a daily symptom I have experienced for years.[/b][/i]
1) Fish pills are the only reason I am still kicking most likely – just to get that point out front.
2) Sporadic luck with ashwagandha, rhodiola, shizandra, cordyceps, and other things.
Basically I have a pretty high gpa in college, im a student, a junior, my gpa is about a 3.25. I even have a very successful research project on my resume. But, there is a catch to my success, and it is one that is ruining my life.

I have almost non stop intense brain fog, lack of motivation, and ADD, (and up till recently, uncontrollable Depression and anxiety). In high-school I almost always procrastinated things Because of this, I am unable to learn material in the class during the day when I am so fatigued mentally and physically. I cannot reliably pay attention and deal with customers/etc. It is so severe I am unable to talk to or meet people at school during the day; I am just too out of it. I make up for this by spending a great deal of time outside of class relearning. My brain only seems to turn on at about 8:30 pm at night. My brain especially seems normal if I get up at about 5 am, I feel great clarity, until my extreme fatigue hits at 8 a.m. Because of this over the last 10 years, I have always resorted to doing my important assignments during the night. Once again though, that creates problems for having day classes, and day jobs.

It is perhaps by the grace of God that I am intelligent to begin with, because it has allowed me to get by, where someone else with this level of debilitating ADD would have suffered greatly. I truly am thankful to have the level of cognitive function I have, but I am finally coming to realization of what I am about to face. An angry employer for a 40-60k a year job, asking me why I get 45 minutes of work done between 9 am and 5 pm.

I get by, by with a great deal of caffeine and last minute cramming, but I feel like I never retain this information, as if I never learned it. I did this on a daily basis for a while, but it really wore on my health. I can write well because it organizes my thoughts, but listening to people in detail or trying to speak to people or learn math requires my brain to be sharp and able to bring all the information to the front of my mind at once. Yet, I feel like I constantly forget things mid-sentence...

I believe one reason I have ADD, is because I have less dopamine receptors, a commonly held theory, but I also suspect other influences. There is a high prevalence throughout my family of prescription pill abuse and alcoholism, which suggest some underlying genetic defects in our reward systems. I suspect I have low levels of serotonin/endorphins/oxytocin, or blockages in the way they work within the brain, but some things "unblock" this. I have found that in the past a combination of white table sugar, large amounts of coffee, rhodiola, and exercise, and being out in the sun in the early morning, seem to "open" my creativity/drive.

I am wondering, does anyone seem to have ADD, that decides on certain times of the day to be so severe? I am also trying to find natural and herbal alternatives to adderall/ritalin, because I do not believe they are a working long term solution. Just herbal supplements and no medication. The only thing I have read that I predict would help is an extended release of adderall known as focaline.

So far I have spent about the last six months trying to research herbal supplements and reading the medical literature on them. The herbs that seem most effective on me are all shown in the literature to exert changes on the endocrine system, cortisol, DHEA, hormones, the HPA axis, the pituitary gland, the thyroid, anti-fatigue anti-inflammatory effects, and considerable effects on the mood portion of the brain to deal with my depression/GAD/behavioral issues/ADD.

A background story for me is essential:
1) morbidly obese entire life up until 19 – I go from 340 to 165 in 12 months. Weighed roughly 175 last 18 months to present.
2) I have very severe IBS. Certain foods will trigger painful inflammatory reactions lasting hours/days. Avoid key foods, have incredibly unprocessed whole food diet to avoid flare up.
3) Severely Gluten intolerant, severely intolerant to cereal grains and legumes. I am gluten-intolerant especially, it torpedoes my immune system badly. Cannot eat without enzyme/HCl/Ox bile supplementation. I cannot eat grains or legumes whatsoever because of my IBS, my body simply will not digest them, it causes me phenomenal pain.
4) I have essentially been on a Atkins-esque diet for 3 years. The only way I can eat enough starch to keep me from having severe bouts of hypoglycemia is to take a digestive enzyme with Ox Bile. So I eat some red potatoes, yams, etc.
5) Battled intense Antibiotic resistant staph infection for 8 years, body wide infections. Diet that started weight loss completely sent it into remission.
6) Gluten triggers resurfacing of staph and no other single food/substance to date does otherwise.
7) Severe Clinical depression/said above brain problems for over a decade
8) Severe fatigue/intense GI problems last 8 years, increasingly became worse up until October 2010 when I began to eat 10 to 30 GRAMS of fish pills a day.
9) Discovered April 2010 that eating grassfed beef significantly reverses depression/adrenal fatigue/sunken eyes/etc
10) I long suspected diabetic related issues because I use to be so overweight and am now half my size. But it does not seem to be the case at all because I bought a home diabetic test kit and consistently never had blood Sugar over 100. In fact, quite often It was never over 70. Unless I ate a carbohydrate containing meal, it stayed between 60 and 70, and that was what I tested over a year ago, and my symptoms are more severe now.

To describe my symptoms they are daily, and down right punctual like clock work. between 8 am and about 2 pm I am miserable, I perk up for about an hour and thirty minutes at 2, then at 3:30 pm I crash again and may or may not perk back up again after 6. I almost certainly will be wide awake at 10 pm until 1 am unless I am very sleep deprived. I do not sleep in a deep sleep.

Consistently, in the mornings at college, If I tried to eat lunch I had brought with me I would become hypoglycemic, my food would not digest, I would have to lay down in the library. I often resorted to energy drinks to get me through afternoon labs. These would leave me shaking and exhausted, eventually I became unable to tolerate them, and started to take nodos caffeine pills.
In the past before I discovered that taking between 7 and 30 GRAMS DAILY of fish oil could control my morning anxiety and IBS, I had severe "crashes" in the morning, muscle spasms, intense OCD, intense depression, intense anxiety, intense IBS, what I perceived to be high prostaglandin and high cortisol; Since taking at least 7 grams daily Fish Oil, I don't have THOSE particular issues. I still have the following:


1. It has caused me to drop and fail classes the last year. I would physically not be able to stay awake in the mid morning.
2. I get these very, very sunken eyes, frequently urinate, water clear urine, my veins on my hands stick out greatly.
3. High disproportionately prone to IBS in the morning, after a bowel movement, the hypoglycemia would be very severe the rest of the day. Caffeine would cause this with a vengeance.
4. I have intense brain fog, inability to do math, recall things, very severe cognitive dysfunction associated with these inflammatory attacks, which use to happen daily.
5. I have learned to keep inflammatory attacks to only about 4 or 5 times a month, but still get painless IBS loose bowel in the mornings daily,-which causes the above brain problems, hypoglycemia, fatigue, low blood pressure, etc.
6. Preventing all symptoms ( I am finding it able to do 2 to 3 days a week with the supplements, allows me to have normal functioning brain)
7. Prone to be misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder, the normal brain function associated with prevention of symptoms makes me complete/absolute different/better person. Positive, productive, extroverted, etc.
8. Abusing said above OTC stimulants results in near Addisonian crisis like symptoms, had a few close calls. Body cannot [b] Produce enough cortisol, does not have enough cortisol that it need, cannot handle forced cortisol production, cannot handle high levels or cortisol[/b]
9. Thus so far unable to work. Find intense difficulty passing classes.


I have no energy to exercise. I cannot tolerate heat or cold. I shake violently during the winter, I cannot seem to get warm. When I do exercise, I often get sick. I cannot handle more than walking, despite being a normal weight. Approximately 18 months ago, I was able to run for nearly a mile 2 or 3 times a week. This was the best I ever felt in my life. The exercise above all else reduces all these symptoms, but because of school and the weather and other things outside of my control I was not able to stay in shape. I also crave salt, but not as badly as what other posters seem to crave. In particular I crave pickles at the end of the work/school hours.

There is some kind of a tie between 3 things:
1)High Cholesterol high fat foods from Grass fed and wild animals and fish make me feel better than ANYTHING.
2)Something is not right with my circadian rhythm, my cholesterol is most likely VERY low, my pineal gland, leptin, melatonin are all wrong.
3)Comorbid condition of Adrenal Fatigue WITH; – Major issues with the limbic reward system in my brain, the analgesic system (related to endorphins and inflammation), and my adrenergic system (related to adrenalin) (You may think any adrenalin is bad for adrenal fatigue, but in fact proper adrenalin sensitivity in the body is somehow necessary for proper cognitive function and physical endurance, I.e people with extreme sensitivity to stimulants are often weak and brain foggy)

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Thank you for reading so much, I really thank you if you could stand it. Once again, I am aware that these symptoms have to correlate with the correct tests, I am just not educated (yet) about which tests. I am hoping someone will recognize a connection.