I've been working on increasing my cortisol sensitivity but I am a little confused in regards to caffeine. One side of me says it's going to increase cortisol which is a bad thing + it can burn out adrenals over time, other side of me says it will increase metabolism thus increasing the need for cortisol which would improve it's sensitivity?
caffeine and cortisol
- Thread starter JDD
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mattyb
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Caffeine actually doesn't upregulate cortisol all much, nor increase it's sensitivity. Any increases in cortisol is mostly a by-product of it's metabolism-raising effects that can deplete glucose (the glucose depletion stimulates cortisol).
Caffeine puts pressure on the dopamine-norepinephrine-epinephrine pathway, upregulating all three but shifting this pathway predominantly to it's end-product, epinephrine. And that isn't that great, especially if you have low COMT activity (degrades these molecules) and/or high PMNT activity (PMNT causes conversion from norepinephrine to epinephrine).
Caffeine puts pressure on the dopamine-norepinephrine-epinephrine pathway, upregulating all three but shifting this pathway predominantly to it's end-product, epinephrine. And that isn't that great, especially if you have low COMT activity (degrades these molecules) and/or high PMNT activity (PMNT causes conversion from norepinephrine to epinephrine).