3 replies to this topic

[orangish]

what would counteract damaging, perhaps mind altering stress encountered during childhood? i find that the helplessness of youth has caused biochemical damage, and have found that glucocorticoid levels are the levels implicated? i mean to say i have significant difficulties focusing and feel this is exacerbated by stress.

[streety]

I'm not sure I understand what you believe the problem to be. An event in childhood has led to a sustained increase in glucocorticoid levels? I'm more familiar with the downstream signalling events associated with glucocorticoids rather than glucocorticoid release but my understanding is that there is a fairly efficient negative feedback mechanism in place to control any changes. That's not to say that sustained, elevated glucocorticoid levels aren't possible just that such an effect is more likely to be a symptom of some other problem rather than the problem itself.

The only work I've done has been on the role of glucocorticoids in downregulating an immune response so I'm not sure if glucocorticoids affect focus. Have you had your serum glucocorticoid levels checked or is it that you believe glucocorticoids are the problem from something you have read?

There are glucocorticoid antagonists but I wouldn't recommend you to take them. They're a very aggressive solution to elevated GC levels and I don't know of any which are specific for glucocorticoids.

[FunkOdyssey]

Glucocorticoids do affect focus & concentration -- elevated cortisol would actually improve your ability to focus. Adrenal fatigue could hamper your ability to focus, but that's not a conclusion I would jump to without proper testing.

If you think you might have stress-related issues from childhood that still plague you, some kind of psychological therapy might be in order.

[orangish]

I guess more along the lines of what I was trying to say is that I had stress in my younger years, and when I was younger I was really helpless against my situation lacking insight and having perhaps the focus problems I still possess today. I feel in addition to focus problems and stress I'm trying to manage now, I might have accumulated years of stress damage--maybe not severe but enough to impede clarity. I don't want to be hypochondriachal, and so wanted to get opinions of others. Research of long term stress led me to find many articles citing elevated glucocorticoids and those causing damage in the hippocampus. Any thoughts? My problem with getting help such as a psychologist is because I have impaired focus I can't focus on anything long enough to have it help, so I am looking for an idea of to get some sort of bridge going, so I can more easily think through things and have them work.