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The endocrine system influences how your heart beats, how your bones and tissues grow, even your ability to make a baby. It plays a vital role in whether or not you develop diabetes, thyroid disease, growth disorders, sexual dysfunction, and a host of other hormone-related disorders.
The University of Washington explains that the endocrine system secretes hormones and other substances into the blood stream in order to control behavioral processes, such as responses to stress. Additionally, the endocrine system controls biological processes, such as appetite, metabolism and growth.
symptoms of adrenal fatigue
- Tiredness, difficulty awakening from sleep need coffee to get going?
- Need to snack frequently to maintain normal energy? crave salty foods?
- To you get fatigued but then get a second wind and can stay up later?
- Headaches, memory issues,
- Dizziness, fainting, lightheaded upon standing quickly?
- Mild depression or anxiety
- Multiple food and or inhalant allergies, immune system seem weak>
- Lethargy and lack of energy
- Increased effort to perform daily tasks
- Decreased ability to handle stress
The endocrine system is made up of glands, including the pituitary gland, and serves many functions, such as fighting infection and secreting hormones. Hormones give directions to other cells on how to function, and our glands secrete fluids, such as sweat and saliva. Endocrine glands are glands of the endocrine system that secrete their products, hormones, directly into the blood rather than through a duct. The major glands of the endocrine system include the pineal gland, pituitary gland, pancreas, ovaries, testes, thyroid gland, parathyroid gland, hypothalamus and adrenal glands.
Adrenal
The adrenal glands sit over the kidneys, where they play a significant role in the body, secreting many hormones necessary for life. The outer tissue or adrenal cortex produces chemically related hormones called corticosteroids that control mineral and water balance in the body. The inner adrenal medulla uses its chromaffin cells and the postganglionic fibers of the sympathetic nervous system to produce a variety of catecholamines, the adrenaline and noradrenaline hormones. Depletion of adrenal reserves in the body due to a poor lifestyle or chronic stress may lead to ill health and adrenal fatigue.
Two catecholamines, norepinephrine and dopamine, act as neuromodulators in the central nervous system and as hormones in the blood circulation. The catecholamine norepinephrine is a neuromodulator of the peripheral sympathetic nervous system but is also present in the blood (mostly through "spillover" from the synapses of the sympathetic nervous system).
High catecholamine levels in blood are associated with stress, which can be induced from psychological reactions or environmental stressors such as elevated sound levels, intense light, or low blood sugar levels.
High levels of catecholamines can also be caused by monoamine oxidase A (MAO-A) deficiency. As MAO-A is one of the enzymes responsible for degradation of these neurotransmitters, its deficiency increases the bioavailability of these neurotransmitters considerably. It occurs in the absence of pheochromocytoma, neuroendocrine tumors, and carcinoid syndrome, but it looks similar to carcinoid syndrome such as facial flushing and aggression. This MAOA gene is one of two neighboring gene family members that encode mitochondrial enzymes which catalyze the oxidative deamination of amines, such as dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin. A mutation of this gene results in Brunner syndrome.
Brunner syndrome is a rare genetic disorder associated with a mutation in the MAOA gene. It is characterized by lower than average IQ (typically about 85), problematic impulsive behavior (such as arson, hypersexuality and violence), sleep disorders and mood swings. It was identified in fourteen males from one family in 1993 and has been discovered in two additional families.
The human body has trillions of cells, each one with a nucleus in which DNA is tightly coiled around proteins called histones, along with epigenetic DNA. Humans have approximately 25,000 genes which contain the codes to produce the various proteins that organisms need to function.
In the study of genetic signaling known as epigenetics believes that the behavior of genes can be modified by environmental influences and that those changes can be passed down through generations. People who smoke cigarettes in their youth, for example, sustain certain epigenetic changes, which may then increase the risk that their children's children will reach puberty early.
Meditation attends to the endocrine system function.