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Confronting Adrenaline Dominance Candid Confessions from a Bold Doctor’s Mind
Manage episode 367861208 series 2914615
Dr. Joel Rosen: Hello everyone and welcome back to another edition of your adrenal fix where we teach exhausted and burnt-out adults the truth about their health so that they can get their health back quickly. And it’s a pleasure for me to be joined by Michael Platt MD, who’s board-certified in Internal Medicine. He specializes in wellness and hormone therapy.
He’s considered one of the leading experts in managing excess adrenaline and the use of high-dose progesterone. He’s the author of three books, the miracle of bioidentical hormones, the Platt Protocol for hormone balancing, and the one that we want to be talking about today is adrenaline dominant. So, Dr. Platt, thank you so much for being here today.
Michael Platt, MD: I’m glad to be here.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Excellent. Thank you. So I always start with hearing maybe your own health journey, and why you may be the Reader’s Digest version of why you got into health care in the first place. And tell us about any health challenges or why you got into this area in the first place.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, I Well, in terms of becoming a doctor, it is just something I always wanted to be and but what actually guided my, my way into anti hormones, was the fact that my mother died of breast cancer at the age of 61, she’s pretty young. And I realized right after she died, that I had inherited her hormones. You know, most people don’t realize that many women have identical hormones, different levels, but the same hormones, and the fact that she had breast cancer, you know, told me that she was low and progesterone to too much estrogen. And, and, and the thing is, at that time when I was driving, I used to have to slap my face trying to keep my eyes open. And, and I thought, well, maybe B is some kind of relationship here.
And, I figured I was putting on too much insulin. And I thought, well, because she’s low. And I said I’m probably low on progesterone, just like my mother is. So I started using progesterone. And since the first day that I’ve done that, I’ve never gotten to sleep in a car anymore. And that got me really interested in hormones. So I, you know, learned as much as I could, and I had a great advantage over a lot of other doctors because I had a good night. I was able to spend at least two hours with every patient.
And let me tell you something, you know when you sit down to talk to a person and find out what their problems are, and then see, see how they react to certain things. You learn a lot. And you know, if you one thing you might notice in my books, there are no references. Because everything I’ve learned, I’ve learned from my patient. You know, that they call that observational-based medicine. Doctors are more comfortable with what the quote was to say.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Like peer-reviewed research base article.
Michael Platt, MD: Yeah. But anyway, so that’s, that’s how I got involved with hormones and.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right, Gotcha. So and you are outspoken about that, maybe we’ll just go into it a little bit in terms of just being dissatisfied with the medical system. And finding out that your mother, you know, passed away with potentially a condition that had she’d been properly worked up, she could have stayed around for longer and have the benefit of having two hours with each patient and asking questions and pulling in relevant information that you can’t glean in a two-minute encounter.
And you’ve mentioned how the idea is unknown in the medical community and Miss diagnosing. So maybe we can start from there in terms of why is that happening? Do you feel?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, something that a lot of people are not aware of is that doctors first of all, get no training in hormones, even though hormones control everything in the body, doctors get no training and hormones. And what’s interesting especially gynecologists, and that women go to get hormone advice. The and the other thing is that doctors are not trained to treat the cause of illness.
It just trained to give out bad days. And a lot of this, of course, is because drug companies have tremendous control over how medicine is practiced. And you know, they control the FDA, they control the medical boards, they control medical schools. And what’s interesting about it Drug companies, have no interest in people being healthy. And that’s who runs our whole medical system. And that’s why, as we speak, the United States is at the bottom of the list of all civilized countries that turn to health care. We have a terrible healthcare system. Been unpopular and people are not aware of it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah, it is. It is discouraging. And I do think it’s sort of like a ship turning in the ocean, it takes a long time to really see progress. But I guess, just glancing out into the future, do you see that ever-changing? Do you see that there are enough doctors I guess, as the older I guess, the older train doctors phased out, and then newer ones changed in that will have some form of medicine 3.0 At some point, or do you see that happening?
Michael Platt, MD: I don’t see. To be honest, I do not see a change.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay. Well, with that, let’s go into the great information that you’ve discovered with just your own observations. And with your patient base. You wrote this book called Adrenaline dominance. So what exactly is adrenaline dominance?
Michael Platt, MD: Well I think most people have heard of adrenaline as both the hormone as well as the neurotransmitter. And what people are not aware of is the fact that this is a very powerful hormone. And, and that has, it has a tremendous influence on our health.
And because, you know, most people think of adrenaline as what they call the fight or flight hormone. And that’s true, you know, when people are in danger, the body pours out adrenaline. But that’s a very rare reason why the body releases adrenaline. What most people do not know is that the brain uses more sugar than any other part of tissue in the body.
And anytime the body detects that the brain is running out of glucose, or sugar, it puts out adrenaline to raise glucose levels. So the main function of adrenaline is to raise sugar levels. And this is something that goes on all day and all night, you know, the body tries to keep sugar levels. And as a result, people can start having a lot of symptoms related to excess adrenaline.
And when people have a number of these symptoms, this is what I referred to as adrenaline dominance. You know, people have heard of estrogen dominance from Dr. John Lee. And this is another type of dominance, just adrenaline them. And we can talk about all the symptoms related to excess adrenaline if you want.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah, let’s do that. Let’s just go parlay right into if someone is dealing with excess adrenaline and dominance, then what would they present as?
Michael Platt, MD: Well. Then there are many people that have what’s called insomnia had trouble staying asleep. Some people have trouble falling asleep. Some people toss and turn, they grind their teeth at night, and they get up at night to urinate.
These are all actually symptoms of excess adrenaline. And again, when people have a lot of adrenaline, they’ll probably notice they carry a lot of tension in the back of their neck. And this tension can cause ringing in the ears, and tinnitus, and then it can cause severe headaches, called occipital neuritis, which are always mistaken for migraines. But every patient that I’ve ever seen who has been diagnosed with migraine actually has occipital neuritis. And that the difference between that and the migraine is that the occipital right is easy to fix and we’ll talk about it.
Again when people have a lot of adrenaline adrenaline is the cause of anxiety. There’s a lot of talk about anxiety nowadays. The other thing is it’s an anger hormone. And you may have heard of road rage and road rage is caused by excess adrenaline. When people have a lot of adrenaline they might notice a lot. They have cold hands and cold feet because adrenaline constricts blood vessels. It’s a survival hormone. So it cuts off blood supply to areas of the body not needed for survival.
And so this is where something called irritable bowel syndrome comes from IBS because it cuts off blood supply to the intestines because they’re not needed for survival. What you know when people are in danger, so So, and there are a lot of conditions that we’ll talk about that related to excess adrenaline. And that’s where the good, the bad and the ugly comes in, you do it in my book. And In each chapter I talk about the good, and what and the bad and, and, and the ugly. And what’s interesting, the only condition that I put into the good category was ADHD. And that might surprise a lot of people.
So your ADHD is terribly underdiagnosed. Anybody who’s intelligent actually usually has ADHD. Because adrenaline is the hormone that gets people in challenges. And later on, we can talk about some of these conditions.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay, no, excellent. So as far as I would like to get into the good and the bad and the ugly, I guess just one of the questions I would have is because of Wi-Fi, and internet and text messaging, notifications and emails, and even just the way that glutamate is in our foods and artificial flavors, and sweeteners and stuff like that, do you see Dr. Platt that the adrenaline dominance is getting worse over time? Not better? Or is it staying at that about the same?
Michael Platt, MD: That’s a very interesting question. I think it’s about the same. Because all the conditions we’re going to talk about are still as prevalent now as they were when I was in medical school.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right? Well, I would just say, I don’t want to go too far down this rabbit hole, because I know glutamate is another major excitatory neurotransmitter. And with glyphosate in our soils, and all of the MSG and the artificial foods that have very high amounts of glutamate, if you ask educators or you ask social workers or any one of them, hey, tell us about your new entry students that are coming in are seeing a difference even within the last five years, or 10 years and 100%. I mean, you look at these school shootings and you look at all of these, these crazy anger rages. Would you at some level connect that to other factors or that it’s that just sort of a prototypical adrenaline dominance presentation?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, there are always other factors involved. But I think the adrenaline is a key factor. Right. Right. Okay. So let’s get into it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: The why ADHD, there are different classifications of it in your book, and how they manifest and the relationship between that and too much adrenaline.
Michael Platt, MD: Yeah, first of all, let me explain to people that ADHD stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and, the thing you know, it’s not a learning disorder. ADHD is an interesting disorder. People with ADHD are interested, they will focus if they’re not interested. They will not focus. And the and what causes ADHD is excess adrenaline.
And adrenaline makes the mind go very quickly. So that’s why it’s hard for them to focus on things they’re not interested in. But what’s interesting is that if we will be talking about treating excess adrenaline, you can actually eliminate ADHD in as little as 24 hours just by lowering your adrenaline. You know, you know, right now, they put children on drugs like Ritalin and Strattera and Adderall, and what a lot of people don’t realize is that one of the side effects of these drugs is sudden death.
And they’re giving these drugs to children. And yet here we are winner position we can actually eliminate THC without drugs. And it’s unknown to the medical community.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right and so maybe we can go into that. So you were noticing that when you were driving, you couldn’t stay awake, and your mother and her premature death from estrogen dominance. And I guess connects the dots for me and the listeners. How progesterone was that puzzle piece that not only helped with the conditions but helps to ameliorate the excess adrenaline.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, progesterone has primarily been known as an anti-estrogen hormone. In fact, that’s all it’s been known for. But What is it what’s on knowing about it progesterone is that not only does it block estrogen, but it also blocks insulin, and it blocks adrenaline.
And it’s really a remarkable miracle-type hormone that is unknown, again to the medical community, for the most part.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So when you say block, do you mean it competes with the receptor site? Or how does it block it? What do you mean by that?
Michael Platt, MD: Okay, now keep in mind that I’m not a scientist or researcher. Okay, I observe. Right? And, yeah, yeah, so I just assumed what it does is it just blocks, the same receptor sites? You know, you know, if it blocks the estrogen and in the adrenaline receptor site.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right, well, what I like about your, you know, with your observation, and you noted in your book, I mean, that’s how we observed penicillin, right? And was, was able to justify that, and if we didn’t have the ability to put together our thinking caps and, and see cause and effect, we wouldn’t be able to have these validations of things that are effective.
So as far as the with the progesterone, I guess, take me through how you like, I like the concept of, of pulsing, and knowing, okay, if I take this, and it helps, then it’s this, if it doesn’t, it’s that so take us through sort of the, the mindset of a clinically seeing these, these causes and effects.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, what’s nice about progression is when people have a lot of adrenaline, and you know, they access anger and they can’t sleep. And you know, when you see people sitting down at their knees going up and down, that’s all adrenaline. Okay, so what’s nice about progesterone is that right after you apply it, basically, within just a few minutes, people feel more relaxed, and they can focus better. You, which means it helps with their ADHD. So anyway, so it, it’s that kind of thing, where if you take when you take a drug and just wait three weeks to see if something happened here, you get immediate feedback. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: And you and you have your own formulation. I’m curious to know about the dosing strategies, what have you found appropriate, starting off and based on your clinical background, and just seeing the impact that it’s having? What’s typically the approach?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, first of all, people need to realize that it’s a very safe hormone to take the and but when it comes to adrenaline, what, and this again, these two observations is that whatever, what I have found is that the ideal strength of progesterone should be five to 5%, cream.
And 5% means that each pump is 50 milligrams, and that’s the exact strength you need to block adrenaline. Most of the canopic restaurants are 2%. So they really don’t even touch adrenaline. And what’s nice about digestion, just to give you an idea of how safe it is, is that I use progesterone to treat babies that have colic. colic is caused by adrenaline.
And these are the babies that when they’re in the womb are the ones that do all the kicking. Thank so am I kicking is just another sign of excess adrenaline. So when but when the baby is in the womb, it gets exposed to incredibly high levels of progesterone, I mean ones that can’t be duplicated. So I can’t come to the conclusion that if a fetus can tolerate huge doses of progesterone, it’s got to be safe for the child.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So you’re doing so suggesting potentially five 5%, which is 50 milligrams, and again, this is just for information purposes, only talk to your provider or your doctor about what’s appropriate for you. But as far as the 50 milligrams, would that be something that you could potentially if you’re seeing a certain HalfLife, where the patient or the person who’s using it starts to feel that adrenaline coming back, you could do like every six hours or something like that.
Michael Platt, MD: Even sooner than every six hours. It’s because you really can’t harm yourself with progesterone. So I usually tell people if they have a lot of adrenaline I probably would have needed it in the beginning four times today. And, then as the adrenaline levels come down, that makes a reduce the dosage, right, but usually get to twice a day. But what but and we were gonna go into this later, you know, the progesterone cream is one of the treatments, it’s not the main treatment you know, the main treatment is to treat the reason why the body’s putting out adrenaline.
And again, remember, we talked about sugar levels, so we’ll talk about that. But while we’re talking about progesterone, one thing, I really have to let your listeners know of it. Probably 90% of the progesterone that are sold today is in the form of capsules, like Prometrium.
And the whole thing about oral progesterone is that it gets in the GI tract and goes straight to the liver, once it goes to the liver, the liver converts it into a different hormone called allopregnanolone. So oral progesterone is not progesterone, and yet that’s the progesterone that doctors are prescribing course.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So whereas you do it from a cream, let’s maybe tell the listener what how more what the effect of that is?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, the cream gets absorbed transdermally. So it goes directly into the bloodstream. And again, when you take it orally goes straight to the liver and converts into different hormones. So that’s the difference between them. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: Just curious, because I do different kinds of sort of outside-the-box testing, is there do you ever I mean, it’s all when you it’s when you present with adrenaline-like symptoms and the laundry list of all the different ways that it shows up in your body?
It’s not really a question of whether it’s a problem or not. But with that being said, Is there ever or have you ever done urinary testing to see what the levels are for pre and post? Or do you ever do testing to see what the progesterone levels are? Or what’s your suggestion for having that as the companion guide to the concept?
Michael Platt, MD: You know, to be honest with you, I don’t ever remember ordering progesterone level. I’ve always picked out more comfortable treating patients rather than lab tests. And the reason for that is you could never go wrong treating a patient, but you go awfully wrong treating labs because lab tests vary. And while we’re talking about lab tests, you know, people have to be very careful about saliva tests. And I know all the arguments, pros and cons, but I also know about adrenaline and adrenaline.
Remember I mentioned it’s a survival hormone? And it cuts off blood supply to certain areas of the body, and one of these areas of the salivary glands because they’re not needed for survival. So again, I don’t trust any of the levels from a saliva test of people because, you know, most of the people I’ve seen have a lot of adrenaline. Not everybody does. But a lot of people have seen it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. And it’s a good segue and I thank you for sharing your observations. As far as you write in your book about the difficulty or the to be aware of the difference between adrenal fatigue per se and adrenaline dominance. And you do mention that with the saliva test, where a lot of the times though saliva test will be low, just to paraphrase what you were saying because of the fact that adrenaline is so high and as adrenaline is so high and it creates constriction of the vessels that create blood flow that cuts off the ability to create, I guess, cortisol in the saliva.
The other thing that I would find to be also going on at the same time because as you mentioned, there’s a lot a host of other things. There’s a cell danger phenomenon where you are in fight or flight survival mode, and your body only has a limited amount of resources to get over the immediate survival for survival purposes. It prioritizes what it does and what it doesn’t do.
So what I’ve seen is that it binds it has more binding protein, so it doesn’t allow that free fraction to be available in the saliva. So that’s one of the ways that could also explain why the saliva levels would be lower. But I agree with you that you have to be Careful with a test to make an interpretation.
Because if that saliva percentage only represents one to 5% of the total, and the amount is the other 95%, I’ve always said it’s like looking at an ocean like this, and saying there are no boats in the ocean, and then taking off the blinders and seeing the 95% of the other part of the ocean. So so I do appreciate that. I guess what would you say then? Is it if you were to say, is it an adrenal fatigue problem, or is it an adrenaline dominance problem? How do you answer that?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, usually what I tell people is that adrenal fatigue is a condition that does not exist. It’s a, it’s basically a naturopath diagnosis because they’re the ones that do the saliva test. And, but so the thing, you know, as you mentioned, you know, the, the, the hormones don’t get into the slide, but because the adrenaline is cutting off the blood supply to the salivary glands, and but they would find, so when they get the cortisol level, in the saliva, it’s going to be on the low side, and based to that, they diagnose adrenal fatigue. But if they did a blood test, for that cortisol level, they would find that the cortisol level is high.
Now, again, they have to be careful. You know, that there’s so much misinformation medical system, you have no idea. But the thing is, is that the way they determine normal levels of cortisol in the blood if they tested medical students in hospitals, he was very readily available, you know, to do studies on and the thing about, you know, doctors, medical students, they all have increased adrenaline.
I can’t say 100%, but it’s probably pretty close to that. And so the, so the normal level of cortisol, they have it down is either 19.4 or 23.4, depending on the laboratory. But you have to remember that they were testing people that had high adrenaline levels. So what I’m saying is that when they do a cortisol level on the blood, and it has to be before nine o’clock in the morning, the the entry level above 13.5, I consider high, even though the normal level goes up to 19.4. So but but again, that’s the advantage I had of being able to spend a lot a lot of times with patient.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right? Yeah, no, I just to recap, I agree with that to an extent. And I’ll just share some of my experiences, that if you’re making a if you’re basing your your standard of what’s normal, in a blood range on people that are exaggerated that than the normal population, and you’re comparing your levels to them, and you’re told that it’s low, then you have to question whether or not that’s true.
Or if there is such a thing as an adrenal fatigue problem, I’ve gone down the rabbit holes of the adrenal fatigue because of my own challenges. And the more I go down the holes, I realize it’s, it’s a supply and demand problem, you have more sub demand and supply and hence you could produce more adrenaline and fight or flight hormones. But what I also find is that 95% of the HPA Axis dysfunction occurs outside of the adrenals.
So how the pituitary signals to make the ACTH or how the cortisol is converted to an inactive form through an 11 Beta HSD enzyme, or how the how the binding proteins bind more proteins, there’s also heat shock protein, there’s a lot of mechanics that go on to and I would say, it’s not really accurate to say it’s high or it’s low, it’s dysregulated.
Nonetheless, but But that being said, as far as the the next step, I guess, you mentioned about blood sugar, and the reasons why the brain would or the the signalers would would detect that the brain needs more support for for energy production, and create a an increase in adrenaline production and create this dominance. So in your book, you talk about a types of dietary approaches, which if doctors don’t learn about hormones, tell me what they learned about nutrition.
Michael Platt, MD: Yeah. Well, well, well, we’re, while we’re talking about this, I should explain where cortisol comes in with regard to adrenaline. And why it’s a good test to do The adrenaline adrenaline actually peaks at 230 in the morning. And actually, a lot of people get at that time to urinate. Because the adrenaline gets people that urge to urinate. In fact, they have a condition called overactive bladder in women that these women that have you know, have to rush to the toilet, otherwise they get leakage.
And but again, that overactive bladder is caused by adrenaline, and just like bedwetting in children is caused by adrenaline. And but the thing is that adrenaline peaks at 230 in the morning, now remember, people usually lying in bed at that time, and adrenaline is a very powerful hormone, you know, and then, so it creates stress to the body and the body responds to stress by putting out cortisol. So now what’s interesting is that remember, the body is putting out adrenaline to raise sugar levels.
And the other thing about cortisol, it also raises sugar levels. And the whole thing about sugar, it doesn’t matter whether you’re eating sugar, or if the body’s making sugar. If you don’t burn it up, the body takes all that sugar that’s not being used and puts it into fat cells for storage as fat. And I think that excess adrenaline is probably the number one cause of weight gain. And nobody ever talks about them but that’s neither here nor there. So the so that’s why cortisol is a good test to do in the morning. Before nine o’clock.
Dr. Joel Rosen: With blood and knowing that if it’s above say you’ve seen 11 was the number that you typically see.
Michael Platt, MD: Actually 13 13.5 Yeah, so So is it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Safe to say then that, really, it’s adrenal glands that produce both the catecholamines of adrenaline and cortisol? That because the baseline being compared to medical students that are stressed and overworked in there in those terms, they’re being cold that it’s low?
And really, the reality is that it’s more of an adrenal dominance, not just adrenaline, but adrenal cortisol and adrenaline, would you? Was that a fair statement?
Michael Platt, MD: And from there? Yes, it is.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay, so. as far as your book, and you do get into brain supplementation as well, which I think’s interesting, I want to get into that. But as far as it’s not just and the progesterone To recap, potentially 5%, which is 50 milligrams starting out at somewhere between about four doses a day until you notice the coughing, do you I guess, before we get into the dietary approach, tell me how satisfying it must have been to see how effective this has been with the people that you’ve used it? Is it just sort of random, like maybe 10% of the people that fit the bill get results? Or? I mean, I obviously can’t put a definitive number.
Michael Platt, MD: Have you seen this? Well, let me perhaps describe a patient that might explain how I feel. This is this was an he’s in my book, I, he said was 47 years old. And the reason he came in to see me is because every morning he would wake up and vomit.
Now, the only thing, the only thing that causes that kind of problem is the journal. So and the other thing is, he had a lot of adrenaline, and he had severe severe fibromyalgia, which again, is another condition caused by adrenaline. So the so I took some progesterone cream, and I put it on his arm, and he wrote these two arms together.
And we started talking again. And after a few minutes, he sat back in his chair. And he looked at me and he said, Doc, and my entire life, I have never felt this good. And let me tell you something, it’s very rewarding to help a patient. And doctors don’t see that very often. And this is what they’re missing. Again, it all comes down to treating the cause of illness. And for some reason, you know, drug companies did not want doctors to know how to treat the cause of illness.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Was not so much for some reason, as you’ve mentioned in your book, you can’t put a patent on a bio-identical would that be accurate in terms of why it wouldn’t necessarily be part of the lexicon, so to speak?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, more definitively. You can’t patent a natural product, a natural product, right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah. Correct.
Michael Platt, MD: So, these bio-identical hormones aren’t natural products.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. So have you seen I guess, just as a side note with the Provera, and the Premarin those be problematic at all? That’s a big, big rabbit hole to go down, right?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, my mother was I Premarin which is a horse estrogen. The body doesn’t even recognize it. And yet at one time was the most, largest-selling drug in the world. And what women never retold, you know, it came from pregnant mares urine that you know, pregnant years mares urine is that when these mares gave birth to their coats or foals, they killed the poles, because they had no need for him.
So I think if women knew what, how they have these remanufacture, they probably would not have. But in any event, these are synthetic hormones, which didn’t, and the only hormones that go to receptor sites, so the natural ones, the ones that the receptor sites recognize. So it’s you can see why there are so many side effects associated with the preparers and Premarin. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. I actually didn’t know that. It makes sense. pregnant mares, Premarin. Yeah, thanks. I didn’t know that. That was how it was coined. So as far as what is the suggested adrenaline dominance diet that you’ve put in your book?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, here’s the thing, you remember we talked about treating the cause of illness, you know, and the reason why the bite is releasing adrenaline is three sugar levels to the brain, okay? So if you know that. And if you provide the fuel that the brain requires, the body doesn’t have to use adrenaline to do it. And so the thing is that the brain uses two different fuels.
Now. One is glucose. And the and best source of glucose for the brain comes from vegetables. Not you don’t think of vegetables being high glucose, but they’re shirt, you know, but they are carbohydrates, and they break down into sugar. But what’s nice about these types of sugars, they don’t produce a lot of insulin.
You know, candy and soda are great sources of glucose, but they produce a lot of insulin, which, which little lower sugar levels defeats the purpose. Okay, so, so glucose is one of the fuels. Now the other fuel is even more important, and those are ketones. And you know, people have heard of a ketogenic diet, which I have never recommended because it’s a hard diet to accomplish.
You know, people want to do what they can, but, but you can get ketones directly from coconut oil, or something called MCT oil, which comes from coconut oil. So if people add coconut oil, or MCT, oil, and vegetables into their meal plan, there’s a significant drop in their adrenaline levels. And this is the main key to controlling adrenaline is, is eating correctly, the progesterone is very helpful, but not as helpful as eating correctly.
So these are things that people can do at home, they don’t need to go to a doctor to, you know, get coconut oil or MCT oil. And progesterone is an over-the-counter product. You know, we have it on my website, you know, the 5% progesterone cream, but I’m just saying it’s available, right? without a prescription. Right. So okay.
Dr. Joel Rosen: To summarize and you’re wanting to get, maybe you could tell us a little more specifically, a low glycemic healthy fiber-based carbohydrate that’s going to deliver a steady fuel supply, but also at the same time removing the high fructose corn syrups and all the sugary foods that spike the glucose and then getting MCT oils and potentially coconut oils. As far as what’s your theory?
And I’m sorry, I didn’t read specifically on I know, and I’m against this where when people say they have this adrenal fatigue thing when it’s dysregulated challenges with too much stress in their body and a demand and supply problem, that they should eat multiple meals more slowly, are sorry, multiple meals frequently throughout the day, which I disagree with 100%. But what’s your thought process on what that diet should look like in terms of just everything else beyond what we’ve already mentioned? What else could they do to stabilize their Adrenaline?
Michael Platt, MD: The, you know, there’s no one size fits all. And the reason for that is that everybody’s different. And, you know, for example, you know, in the book, I talked about creative people. And creative people actually had the most adrenaline and the reason for that is that the creative brain is always a gag thing. So it’s always working and, and uses up a lot of energy.
So So these are the people that have the most adrenaline because they’re using the brain the most. That’s why there are certain conditions that you only see in creative-type people, for example, bedwetting in children, you only see that in creative-type children, women that vomit throughout their entire pregnancy, it’s called hyperemesis gravidarum.
You only see that in creative type women. And, you know, these, and all these conditions are caused by excess adrenaline, which doctors don’t know, by the way. So I mean, how can you get somebody? Well, if you don’t know what’s causing their problem? It just, boggles my mind that, you know, my book, adrenaline dominance, is the only book ever written that talks about adrenaline.
Why is that? You know, I mean, anyway, but so. But if doctors were aware of an alternative approach to getting people well, and they to get their patients feeling well, I think, you know, you probably have a lot more doctors getting, you know, wanting to go into medicine.
Right now, I think doctors are leading medicine. I’m just it’s, it’s not hard to get people well if you treat the reason why they’re not well, it’s as simple as all that.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Well, I mean, I think a big part of it amongst everything you’ve said is that just that interaction that takes you you know, the I look about the old, bring your doctor’s bag and do the house call and be the generalist and listen to the patient and hear what their challenges are. It’s not hard to figure out the Pareto principle of what you could implement the smallest implementation for the biggest return. And it doesn’t have to be a pharmaceutically based approach.
And in this case, it’s sensible, let’s, let’s figure this out, let’s get to the root of the problem. And I think even more, that the root of the problem is not just so much diet, which it’s a huge part. But it’s just all of the stimulants that we have. We’re in fight or flight 24/7 The way that the world is going, when I asked you the question, do you think it’s the same? In my opinion, I think it’s, it’s sort of like, look, look, what is it the sky is falling in terms of the worst of the worst as more? More challenges and stressors, and so forth, create even more demands for adrenaline release besides just sugar.
Michael Platt, MD: Are you familiar with the term long? COVID? Yes, of course. Yep. And that seems to be a big issue nowadays. But a lot of the symptoms of long COVID are actually related to excess adrenaline. Now, the thing is, when you talk about fight or flight, you know, what I have found is that in some people with Lyme disease, where it’s not fully treated, the body is in a fight or flight situation.
And they have a lot of symptoms with excess adrenaline. In addition to the Lyme disease, people that are exposed to mold in their house, I have found very often have a lot of excess adrenaline, because they think the body again, is in a fight or flight. And I think the same thing is happening with long COVID that the virus is still around, and the body is in a fight or flight mode.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah, and I agree with that. I mean, I do feel that, again, what I’ve looked at is try to simplify it as much as you possibly can and realize that with our fast-paced life, and depleted minerals in our soils, and the food quality, and the demands that we have, that we just if we were a bank account, we’d be in the red. And when we’re in the red like that, we got to figure out how to cash in our mutual funds or liquidate our assets and sell our stuff on eBay. And hence, we’re in that adrenaline dominance state, which would you agree with that?
Michael Platt, MD: I would agree with that.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah. Gotcha. So as far as the brain supplements that you recommend, which I picked out, I was intrigued with some of the ones that you had down there. Tell us how you derive those who came up with those.
Michael Platt, MD: Which were going you know, wrote the book quite a while ago say.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay, well, that’s okay. I mean, you have some My adaptogens in there, I really liked that you had Alpha GPC you had in there. So I guess were those just ones that you researched on your own that have L theanine that modulates the adrenaline response and, and stuff.
Michael Platt, MD: You know, again, adrenaline also acts as a neurotransmitter. And, you know, so these are supplements that are actually good for neurotransmitters. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: So are you do you? I didn’t go on your website. Do you have your own nutrients that you recommend as well? Or is it mainly just the dietary approaches and the progesterone?
Michael Platt, MD: Net? Well, we have all the usual supplements, you know, along with their hormone cream.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Gotcha. What’s your next? What’s your next book?
Michael Platt, MD: I don’t know. That’s it. But I think about it all the time. I, you know, I have a lot of anger toward the medical system. And so I don’t know if I should be writing a book.
But, you know, people, don’t you to me, the medical system represents what’s going on with it with our whole political situation right now.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Make sure you release that, because they’re gonna have too much adrenaline dominance if you don’t. And so, yeah, so So I always, I always do like to ask my guess, what you wish you would have? I’m interested to hear your answer.
Now, given what we’ve talked about, what you wish you may have done differently, or what you would have told your younger self looking into the future, knowing what you know now, from the perspective of it would have gotten you closer to your goal before you knew it, or it would have avoided some obstacles or hurdles or would have advanced your health and your wellness. What do you think those pieces of information would have been?
Michael Platt, MD: You know, I had a run-in with a medical board in California. And it’s not because patients complained or your arm somebody, it’s because doctors were upset that when their patient came to see me, I took them off all their medication. It’s true, I did. But again, remember, I approached their problems from the cons. Okay. So they reported me to the medical board, and the medical board is funded by a drug company. So when they heard that the doctor was taking people off drugs, they went after me, probably more aggressively than any other doctor ever in California.
And I, you know, and I finally, finally was forced to surrender my license, even though I’ve never harmed anybody. The but you can’t, you can’t fight the medical board. So but if I had to over again, I would have learned not to antagonize all these doctors or the medical board. I’m just saying.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Would you have taken another profession like another specialty that doesn’t have sort of the front lines are more acute because that what I’ve said is, I’m from, you know, a traditional base family and I’m an alternative based practitioner, and medicine. 1.0 2.0 is great at acute base care. And you know, a heart attack or ruptured spleen, a broken bone.
But when you have a chronic-based problem, or a stress-based problem, or a perfect storm, environmental genetic-based problem, the model doesn’t fit very well unless you’re in the acute-based specialties. So do you think you would have changed the specialty? Or would you have done it differently in terms of just not rocking the boat but being more of a puppet? Or would you have gotten into a different specialty altogether or different professionals together? Just kind of curious.
Michael Platt, MD: I don’t see myself ever doing medicine has always been a passion for me. And it’s very rewarding and getting people well, and I would never want to give that up. I just would have changed my attitude toward you know, the medical boards, experts, read my books.
And, and they all said the same thing that the ideas in these books were so dangerous, that I should never have been practicing medicine. And yet all the book talks about its use your hormones get people well, you know, treating the cause of illness, but I could see where the medical board is protecting the drug companies, and why they would say that, but that’s who they are.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So what do you mean, then you wouldn’t have been, you wouldn’t have been as, as you wouldn’t have written the books or what would you have done?
Michael Platt, MD: I would have, I would have nothing would have changed except, you know, for example, you know, the, I had to take some, some special exam down in San Diego. And, when I was talking to these doctors there, they asked me, how would I approach a certain problem. You know, for example, asthma. I said, Well, you know when we put somebody on progesterone, their asthma disappears. They, yeah, in other words, this is something that is so far removed from the concepts, have you used it? So so they failed me? So I would, I would have learned to be more accessible, and agreeable.
But I said, some someday, I think they’re going to look into the medical boards and see how they treat what are called alternative medicine doctors. You know, they allowed doctors to prescribe opiates and kill people to go on for years before they go after them. And that they don’t have a problem with but using an alternative way of, you know, a natural way healing somebody that will not allow. But anyway, that’s neither here nor there. Okay.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. But so Okay, so you’ve written these books. And you you, I guess what, we don’t know what’s next, necessarily in terms of what book you would write. But I guess maybe what is it that I’m curious that what do you what gives you pleasure? What makes you happy?
Michael Platt, MD: Answer Well, I’d have to think that I would have to think about it for a while.
Dr. Joel Rosen: You already mentioned helping patients, right? So are you still even though you’re not on the frontlines in that way and getting that satisfaction, like when you put the progesterone on that gentleman’s arm, and it was the best thing that he’s ever had? Do you still get to experience feedback from your readers or from people that are getting your help from your product line and so forth?
Michael Platt, MD: You know, people do get in touch with me, you know, the phone numbers and on the website. And I do you know, talk to people about some of their problems. I spoke to a woman this morning, who has a two-year-old son who for four months had colic for months now, almost nonstop calling. And if, unfortunately, if I had spoken to it, you know, can’t you can get rid of colic and five minutes into child five minutes, just by rubbing progesterone cream on the belly.
So I still am reaching out and trying to help people or again, I’m not allowed to practice medicine. I’ve been arrested four times so far.
But okay, it’s medicine, I would not change the way I practice medicine.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. So so it sounds like a love-hate in that you. You’ve got to help a lot of people and discover and go down these different rabbit holes to figure out how you can truly listen and help people but at the same time, we’re sort of vilified for doing it the way that it wasn’t recommended and I’m sorry that that’s what you’ve had to experience for your time on today’s podcast and any other words of wisdom or any other commentary, things that you want to discuss before we sign off here.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, I don’t know when this is going to be shown but you know, we’re kind of up to July 4 weekend.
And a lot of firecrackers can scare dogs and what people don’t realize is that projection is wonderful for dogs and it gets hurt. You know, you may have heard of anxiety you know people leave a separation anxiety in dogs. You can get rid of separation anxiety in about one minute with progesterone cream put into the ear of the dog.
And also it’ll take away the fear of thunderstorms. and firecrackers. So the, you know, I could mention a lot of other things, but what possessing could do, but the people but people if they’re interested, I think we’ll get a lot of information in my book.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. And the book is called adrenaline dominance, as well as the miracle of bioidentical hormones and the Platt Protocol for hormone balance. Your name is Michael Platt, MD, and we will leave links to your websites or your website so that they can check out more information from you. And I appreciate your time today. And thank you for being so candid with your information.
Michael Platt, MD: You’re more than welcome. Thank you
If you want to try Dr. Platt’s Progesterone for lowering your adrenaline, click here and use discount DRJOEL10 to save 10% on your first order
The post Confronting Adrenaline Dominance Candid Confessions from a Bold Doctor’s Mind appeared first on The Truth About Adrenal Fatigue.
127 episodi
Manage episode 367861208 series 2914615
Dr. Joel Rosen: Hello everyone and welcome back to another edition of your adrenal fix where we teach exhausted and burnt-out adults the truth about their health so that they can get their health back quickly. And it’s a pleasure for me to be joined by Michael Platt MD, who’s board-certified in Internal Medicine. He specializes in wellness and hormone therapy.
He’s considered one of the leading experts in managing excess adrenaline and the use of high-dose progesterone. He’s the author of three books, the miracle of bioidentical hormones, the Platt Protocol for hormone balancing, and the one that we want to be talking about today is adrenaline dominant. So, Dr. Platt, thank you so much for being here today.
Michael Platt, MD: I’m glad to be here.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Excellent. Thank you. So I always start with hearing maybe your own health journey, and why you may be the Reader’s Digest version of why you got into health care in the first place. And tell us about any health challenges or why you got into this area in the first place.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, I Well, in terms of becoming a doctor, it is just something I always wanted to be and but what actually guided my, my way into anti hormones, was the fact that my mother died of breast cancer at the age of 61, she’s pretty young. And I realized right after she died, that I had inherited her hormones. You know, most people don’t realize that many women have identical hormones, different levels, but the same hormones, and the fact that she had breast cancer, you know, told me that she was low and progesterone to too much estrogen. And, and, and the thing is, at that time when I was driving, I used to have to slap my face trying to keep my eyes open. And, and I thought, well, maybe B is some kind of relationship here.
And, I figured I was putting on too much insulin. And I thought, well, because she’s low. And I said I’m probably low on progesterone, just like my mother is. So I started using progesterone. And since the first day that I’ve done that, I’ve never gotten to sleep in a car anymore. And that got me really interested in hormones. So I, you know, learned as much as I could, and I had a great advantage over a lot of other doctors because I had a good night. I was able to spend at least two hours with every patient.
And let me tell you something, you know when you sit down to talk to a person and find out what their problems are, and then see, see how they react to certain things. You learn a lot. And you know, if you one thing you might notice in my books, there are no references. Because everything I’ve learned, I’ve learned from my patient. You know, that they call that observational-based medicine. Doctors are more comfortable with what the quote was to say.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Like peer-reviewed research base article.
Michael Platt, MD: Yeah. But anyway, so that’s, that’s how I got involved with hormones and.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right, Gotcha. So and you are outspoken about that, maybe we’ll just go into it a little bit in terms of just being dissatisfied with the medical system. And finding out that your mother, you know, passed away with potentially a condition that had she’d been properly worked up, she could have stayed around for longer and have the benefit of having two hours with each patient and asking questions and pulling in relevant information that you can’t glean in a two-minute encounter.
And you’ve mentioned how the idea is unknown in the medical community and Miss diagnosing. So maybe we can start from there in terms of why is that happening? Do you feel?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, something that a lot of people are not aware of is that doctors first of all, get no training in hormones, even though hormones control everything in the body, doctors get no training and hormones. And what’s interesting especially gynecologists, and that women go to get hormone advice. The and the other thing is that doctors are not trained to treat the cause of illness.
It just trained to give out bad days. And a lot of this, of course, is because drug companies have tremendous control over how medicine is practiced. And you know, they control the FDA, they control the medical boards, they control medical schools. And what’s interesting about it Drug companies, have no interest in people being healthy. And that’s who runs our whole medical system. And that’s why, as we speak, the United States is at the bottom of the list of all civilized countries that turn to health care. We have a terrible healthcare system. Been unpopular and people are not aware of it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah, it is. It is discouraging. And I do think it’s sort of like a ship turning in the ocean, it takes a long time to really see progress. But I guess, just glancing out into the future, do you see that ever-changing? Do you see that there are enough doctors I guess, as the older I guess, the older train doctors phased out, and then newer ones changed in that will have some form of medicine 3.0 At some point, or do you see that happening?
Michael Platt, MD: I don’t see. To be honest, I do not see a change.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay. Well, with that, let’s go into the great information that you’ve discovered with just your own observations. And with your patient base. You wrote this book called Adrenaline dominance. So what exactly is adrenaline dominance?
Michael Platt, MD: Well I think most people have heard of adrenaline as both the hormone as well as the neurotransmitter. And what people are not aware of is the fact that this is a very powerful hormone. And, and that has, it has a tremendous influence on our health.
And because, you know, most people think of adrenaline as what they call the fight or flight hormone. And that’s true, you know, when people are in danger, the body pours out adrenaline. But that’s a very rare reason why the body releases adrenaline. What most people do not know is that the brain uses more sugar than any other part of tissue in the body.
And anytime the body detects that the brain is running out of glucose, or sugar, it puts out adrenaline to raise glucose levels. So the main function of adrenaline is to raise sugar levels. And this is something that goes on all day and all night, you know, the body tries to keep sugar levels. And as a result, people can start having a lot of symptoms related to excess adrenaline.
And when people have a number of these symptoms, this is what I referred to as adrenaline dominance. You know, people have heard of estrogen dominance from Dr. John Lee. And this is another type of dominance, just adrenaline them. And we can talk about all the symptoms related to excess adrenaline if you want.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah, let’s do that. Let’s just go parlay right into if someone is dealing with excess adrenaline and dominance, then what would they present as?
Michael Platt, MD: Well. Then there are many people that have what’s called insomnia had trouble staying asleep. Some people have trouble falling asleep. Some people toss and turn, they grind their teeth at night, and they get up at night to urinate.
These are all actually symptoms of excess adrenaline. And again, when people have a lot of adrenaline, they’ll probably notice they carry a lot of tension in the back of their neck. And this tension can cause ringing in the ears, and tinnitus, and then it can cause severe headaches, called occipital neuritis, which are always mistaken for migraines. But every patient that I’ve ever seen who has been diagnosed with migraine actually has occipital neuritis. And that the difference between that and the migraine is that the occipital right is easy to fix and we’ll talk about it.
Again when people have a lot of adrenaline adrenaline is the cause of anxiety. There’s a lot of talk about anxiety nowadays. The other thing is it’s an anger hormone. And you may have heard of road rage and road rage is caused by excess adrenaline. When people have a lot of adrenaline they might notice a lot. They have cold hands and cold feet because adrenaline constricts blood vessels. It’s a survival hormone. So it cuts off blood supply to areas of the body not needed for survival.
And so this is where something called irritable bowel syndrome comes from IBS because it cuts off blood supply to the intestines because they’re not needed for survival. What you know when people are in danger, so So, and there are a lot of conditions that we’ll talk about that related to excess adrenaline. And that’s where the good, the bad and the ugly comes in, you do it in my book. And In each chapter I talk about the good, and what and the bad and, and, and the ugly. And what’s interesting, the only condition that I put into the good category was ADHD. And that might surprise a lot of people.
So your ADHD is terribly underdiagnosed. Anybody who’s intelligent actually usually has ADHD. Because adrenaline is the hormone that gets people in challenges. And later on, we can talk about some of these conditions.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay, no, excellent. So as far as I would like to get into the good and the bad and the ugly, I guess just one of the questions I would have is because of Wi-Fi, and internet and text messaging, notifications and emails, and even just the way that glutamate is in our foods and artificial flavors, and sweeteners and stuff like that, do you see Dr. Platt that the adrenaline dominance is getting worse over time? Not better? Or is it staying at that about the same?
Michael Platt, MD: That’s a very interesting question. I think it’s about the same. Because all the conditions we’re going to talk about are still as prevalent now as they were when I was in medical school.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right? Well, I would just say, I don’t want to go too far down this rabbit hole, because I know glutamate is another major excitatory neurotransmitter. And with glyphosate in our soils, and all of the MSG and the artificial foods that have very high amounts of glutamate, if you ask educators or you ask social workers or any one of them, hey, tell us about your new entry students that are coming in are seeing a difference even within the last five years, or 10 years and 100%. I mean, you look at these school shootings and you look at all of these, these crazy anger rages. Would you at some level connect that to other factors or that it’s that just sort of a prototypical adrenaline dominance presentation?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, there are always other factors involved. But I think the adrenaline is a key factor. Right. Right. Okay. So let’s get into it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: The why ADHD, there are different classifications of it in your book, and how they manifest and the relationship between that and too much adrenaline.
Michael Platt, MD: Yeah, first of all, let me explain to people that ADHD stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and, the thing you know, it’s not a learning disorder. ADHD is an interesting disorder. People with ADHD are interested, they will focus if they’re not interested. They will not focus. And the and what causes ADHD is excess adrenaline.
And adrenaline makes the mind go very quickly. So that’s why it’s hard for them to focus on things they’re not interested in. But what’s interesting is that if we will be talking about treating excess adrenaline, you can actually eliminate ADHD in as little as 24 hours just by lowering your adrenaline. You know, you know, right now, they put children on drugs like Ritalin and Strattera and Adderall, and what a lot of people don’t realize is that one of the side effects of these drugs is sudden death.
And they’re giving these drugs to children. And yet here we are winner position we can actually eliminate THC without drugs. And it’s unknown to the medical community.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right and so maybe we can go into that. So you were noticing that when you were driving, you couldn’t stay awake, and your mother and her premature death from estrogen dominance. And I guess connects the dots for me and the listeners. How progesterone was that puzzle piece that not only helped with the conditions but helps to ameliorate the excess adrenaline.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, progesterone has primarily been known as an anti-estrogen hormone. In fact, that’s all it’s been known for. But What is it what’s on knowing about it progesterone is that not only does it block estrogen, but it also blocks insulin, and it blocks adrenaline.
And it’s really a remarkable miracle-type hormone that is unknown, again to the medical community, for the most part.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So when you say block, do you mean it competes with the receptor site? Or how does it block it? What do you mean by that?
Michael Platt, MD: Okay, now keep in mind that I’m not a scientist or researcher. Okay, I observe. Right? And, yeah, yeah, so I just assumed what it does is it just blocks, the same receptor sites? You know, you know, if it blocks the estrogen and in the adrenaline receptor site.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right, well, what I like about your, you know, with your observation, and you noted in your book, I mean, that’s how we observed penicillin, right? And was, was able to justify that, and if we didn’t have the ability to put together our thinking caps and, and see cause and effect, we wouldn’t be able to have these validations of things that are effective.
So as far as the with the progesterone, I guess, take me through how you like, I like the concept of, of pulsing, and knowing, okay, if I take this, and it helps, then it’s this, if it doesn’t, it’s that so take us through sort of the, the mindset of a clinically seeing these, these causes and effects.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, what’s nice about progression is when people have a lot of adrenaline, and you know, they access anger and they can’t sleep. And you know, when you see people sitting down at their knees going up and down, that’s all adrenaline. Okay, so what’s nice about progesterone is that right after you apply it, basically, within just a few minutes, people feel more relaxed, and they can focus better. You, which means it helps with their ADHD. So anyway, so it, it’s that kind of thing, where if you take when you take a drug and just wait three weeks to see if something happened here, you get immediate feedback. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: And you and you have your own formulation. I’m curious to know about the dosing strategies, what have you found appropriate, starting off and based on your clinical background, and just seeing the impact that it’s having? What’s typically the approach?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, first of all, people need to realize that it’s a very safe hormone to take the and but when it comes to adrenaline, what, and this again, these two observations is that whatever, what I have found is that the ideal strength of progesterone should be five to 5%, cream.
And 5% means that each pump is 50 milligrams, and that’s the exact strength you need to block adrenaline. Most of the canopic restaurants are 2%. So they really don’t even touch adrenaline. And what’s nice about digestion, just to give you an idea of how safe it is, is that I use progesterone to treat babies that have colic. colic is caused by adrenaline.
And these are the babies that when they’re in the womb are the ones that do all the kicking. Thank so am I kicking is just another sign of excess adrenaline. So when but when the baby is in the womb, it gets exposed to incredibly high levels of progesterone, I mean ones that can’t be duplicated. So I can’t come to the conclusion that if a fetus can tolerate huge doses of progesterone, it’s got to be safe for the child.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So you’re doing so suggesting potentially five 5%, which is 50 milligrams, and again, this is just for information purposes, only talk to your provider or your doctor about what’s appropriate for you. But as far as the 50 milligrams, would that be something that you could potentially if you’re seeing a certain HalfLife, where the patient or the person who’s using it starts to feel that adrenaline coming back, you could do like every six hours or something like that.
Michael Platt, MD: Even sooner than every six hours. It’s because you really can’t harm yourself with progesterone. So I usually tell people if they have a lot of adrenaline I probably would have needed it in the beginning four times today. And, then as the adrenaline levels come down, that makes a reduce the dosage, right, but usually get to twice a day. But what but and we were gonna go into this later, you know, the progesterone cream is one of the treatments, it’s not the main treatment you know, the main treatment is to treat the reason why the body’s putting out adrenaline.
And again, remember, we talked about sugar levels, so we’ll talk about that. But while we’re talking about progesterone, one thing, I really have to let your listeners know of it. Probably 90% of the progesterone that are sold today is in the form of capsules, like Prometrium.
And the whole thing about oral progesterone is that it gets in the GI tract and goes straight to the liver, once it goes to the liver, the liver converts it into a different hormone called allopregnanolone. So oral progesterone is not progesterone, and yet that’s the progesterone that doctors are prescribing course.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So whereas you do it from a cream, let’s maybe tell the listener what how more what the effect of that is?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, the cream gets absorbed transdermally. So it goes directly into the bloodstream. And again, when you take it orally goes straight to the liver and converts into different hormones. So that’s the difference between them. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: Just curious, because I do different kinds of sort of outside-the-box testing, is there do you ever I mean, it’s all when you it’s when you present with adrenaline-like symptoms and the laundry list of all the different ways that it shows up in your body?
It’s not really a question of whether it’s a problem or not. But with that being said, Is there ever or have you ever done urinary testing to see what the levels are for pre and post? Or do you ever do testing to see what the progesterone levels are? Or what’s your suggestion for having that as the companion guide to the concept?
Michael Platt, MD: You know, to be honest with you, I don’t ever remember ordering progesterone level. I’ve always picked out more comfortable treating patients rather than lab tests. And the reason for that is you could never go wrong treating a patient, but you go awfully wrong treating labs because lab tests vary. And while we’re talking about lab tests, you know, people have to be very careful about saliva tests. And I know all the arguments, pros and cons, but I also know about adrenaline and adrenaline.
Remember I mentioned it’s a survival hormone? And it cuts off blood supply to certain areas of the body, and one of these areas of the salivary glands because they’re not needed for survival. So again, I don’t trust any of the levels from a saliva test of people because, you know, most of the people I’ve seen have a lot of adrenaline. Not everybody does. But a lot of people have seen it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. And it’s a good segue and I thank you for sharing your observations. As far as you write in your book about the difficulty or the to be aware of the difference between adrenal fatigue per se and adrenaline dominance. And you do mention that with the saliva test, where a lot of the times though saliva test will be low, just to paraphrase what you were saying because of the fact that adrenaline is so high and as adrenaline is so high and it creates constriction of the vessels that create blood flow that cuts off the ability to create, I guess, cortisol in the saliva.
The other thing that I would find to be also going on at the same time because as you mentioned, there’s a lot a host of other things. There’s a cell danger phenomenon where you are in fight or flight survival mode, and your body only has a limited amount of resources to get over the immediate survival for survival purposes. It prioritizes what it does and what it doesn’t do.
So what I’ve seen is that it binds it has more binding protein, so it doesn’t allow that free fraction to be available in the saliva. So that’s one of the ways that could also explain why the saliva levels would be lower. But I agree with you that you have to be Careful with a test to make an interpretation.
Because if that saliva percentage only represents one to 5% of the total, and the amount is the other 95%, I’ve always said it’s like looking at an ocean like this, and saying there are no boats in the ocean, and then taking off the blinders and seeing the 95% of the other part of the ocean. So so I do appreciate that. I guess what would you say then? Is it if you were to say, is it an adrenal fatigue problem, or is it an adrenaline dominance problem? How do you answer that?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, usually what I tell people is that adrenal fatigue is a condition that does not exist. It’s a, it’s basically a naturopath diagnosis because they’re the ones that do the saliva test. And, but so the thing, you know, as you mentioned, you know, the, the, the hormones don’t get into the slide, but because the adrenaline is cutting off the blood supply to the salivary glands, and but they would find, so when they get the cortisol level, in the saliva, it’s going to be on the low side, and based to that, they diagnose adrenal fatigue. But if they did a blood test, for that cortisol level, they would find that the cortisol level is high.
Now, again, they have to be careful. You know, that there’s so much misinformation medical system, you have no idea. But the thing is, is that the way they determine normal levels of cortisol in the blood if they tested medical students in hospitals, he was very readily available, you know, to do studies on and the thing about, you know, doctors, medical students, they all have increased adrenaline.
I can’t say 100%, but it’s probably pretty close to that. And so the, so the normal level of cortisol, they have it down is either 19.4 or 23.4, depending on the laboratory. But you have to remember that they were testing people that had high adrenaline levels. So what I’m saying is that when they do a cortisol level on the blood, and it has to be before nine o’clock in the morning, the the entry level above 13.5, I consider high, even though the normal level goes up to 19.4. So but but again, that’s the advantage I had of being able to spend a lot a lot of times with patient.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right? Yeah, no, I just to recap, I agree with that to an extent. And I’ll just share some of my experiences, that if you’re making a if you’re basing your your standard of what’s normal, in a blood range on people that are exaggerated that than the normal population, and you’re comparing your levels to them, and you’re told that it’s low, then you have to question whether or not that’s true.
Or if there is such a thing as an adrenal fatigue problem, I’ve gone down the rabbit holes of the adrenal fatigue because of my own challenges. And the more I go down the holes, I realize it’s, it’s a supply and demand problem, you have more sub demand and supply and hence you could produce more adrenaline and fight or flight hormones. But what I also find is that 95% of the HPA Axis dysfunction occurs outside of the adrenals.
So how the pituitary signals to make the ACTH or how the cortisol is converted to an inactive form through an 11 Beta HSD enzyme, or how the how the binding proteins bind more proteins, there’s also heat shock protein, there’s a lot of mechanics that go on to and I would say, it’s not really accurate to say it’s high or it’s low, it’s dysregulated.
Nonetheless, but But that being said, as far as the the next step, I guess, you mentioned about blood sugar, and the reasons why the brain would or the the signalers would would detect that the brain needs more support for for energy production, and create a an increase in adrenaline production and create this dominance. So in your book, you talk about a types of dietary approaches, which if doctors don’t learn about hormones, tell me what they learned about nutrition.
Michael Platt, MD: Yeah. Well, well, well, we’re, while we’re talking about this, I should explain where cortisol comes in with regard to adrenaline. And why it’s a good test to do The adrenaline adrenaline actually peaks at 230 in the morning. And actually, a lot of people get at that time to urinate. Because the adrenaline gets people that urge to urinate. In fact, they have a condition called overactive bladder in women that these women that have you know, have to rush to the toilet, otherwise they get leakage.
And but again, that overactive bladder is caused by adrenaline, and just like bedwetting in children is caused by adrenaline. And but the thing is that adrenaline peaks at 230 in the morning, now remember, people usually lying in bed at that time, and adrenaline is a very powerful hormone, you know, and then, so it creates stress to the body and the body responds to stress by putting out cortisol. So now what’s interesting is that remember, the body is putting out adrenaline to raise sugar levels.
And the other thing about cortisol, it also raises sugar levels. And the whole thing about sugar, it doesn’t matter whether you’re eating sugar, or if the body’s making sugar. If you don’t burn it up, the body takes all that sugar that’s not being used and puts it into fat cells for storage as fat. And I think that excess adrenaline is probably the number one cause of weight gain. And nobody ever talks about them but that’s neither here nor there. So the so that’s why cortisol is a good test to do in the morning. Before nine o’clock.
Dr. Joel Rosen: With blood and knowing that if it’s above say you’ve seen 11 was the number that you typically see.
Michael Platt, MD: Actually 13 13.5 Yeah, so So is it.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Safe to say then that, really, it’s adrenal glands that produce both the catecholamines of adrenaline and cortisol? That because the baseline being compared to medical students that are stressed and overworked in there in those terms, they’re being cold that it’s low?
And really, the reality is that it’s more of an adrenal dominance, not just adrenaline, but adrenal cortisol and adrenaline, would you? Was that a fair statement?
Michael Platt, MD: And from there? Yes, it is.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay, so. as far as your book, and you do get into brain supplementation as well, which I think’s interesting, I want to get into that. But as far as it’s not just and the progesterone To recap, potentially 5%, which is 50 milligrams starting out at somewhere between about four doses a day until you notice the coughing, do you I guess, before we get into the dietary approach, tell me how satisfying it must have been to see how effective this has been with the people that you’ve used it? Is it just sort of random, like maybe 10% of the people that fit the bill get results? Or? I mean, I obviously can’t put a definitive number.
Michael Platt, MD: Have you seen this? Well, let me perhaps describe a patient that might explain how I feel. This is this was an he’s in my book, I, he said was 47 years old. And the reason he came in to see me is because every morning he would wake up and vomit.
Now, the only thing, the only thing that causes that kind of problem is the journal. So and the other thing is, he had a lot of adrenaline, and he had severe severe fibromyalgia, which again, is another condition caused by adrenaline. So the so I took some progesterone cream, and I put it on his arm, and he wrote these two arms together.
And we started talking again. And after a few minutes, he sat back in his chair. And he looked at me and he said, Doc, and my entire life, I have never felt this good. And let me tell you something, it’s very rewarding to help a patient. And doctors don’t see that very often. And this is what they’re missing. Again, it all comes down to treating the cause of illness. And for some reason, you know, drug companies did not want doctors to know how to treat the cause of illness.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Was not so much for some reason, as you’ve mentioned in your book, you can’t put a patent on a bio-identical would that be accurate in terms of why it wouldn’t necessarily be part of the lexicon, so to speak?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, more definitively. You can’t patent a natural product, a natural product, right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah. Correct.
Michael Platt, MD: So, these bio-identical hormones aren’t natural products.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. So have you seen I guess, just as a side note with the Provera, and the Premarin those be problematic at all? That’s a big, big rabbit hole to go down, right?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, my mother was I Premarin which is a horse estrogen. The body doesn’t even recognize it. And yet at one time was the most, largest-selling drug in the world. And what women never retold, you know, it came from pregnant mares urine that you know, pregnant years mares urine is that when these mares gave birth to their coats or foals, they killed the poles, because they had no need for him.
So I think if women knew what, how they have these remanufacture, they probably would not have. But in any event, these are synthetic hormones, which didn’t, and the only hormones that go to receptor sites, so the natural ones, the ones that the receptor sites recognize. So it’s you can see why there are so many side effects associated with the preparers and Premarin. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. I actually didn’t know that. It makes sense. pregnant mares, Premarin. Yeah, thanks. I didn’t know that. That was how it was coined. So as far as what is the suggested adrenaline dominance diet that you’ve put in your book?
Michael Platt, MD: Well, here’s the thing, you remember we talked about treating the cause of illness, you know, and the reason why the bite is releasing adrenaline is three sugar levels to the brain, okay? So if you know that. And if you provide the fuel that the brain requires, the body doesn’t have to use adrenaline to do it. And so the thing is that the brain uses two different fuels.
Now. One is glucose. And the and best source of glucose for the brain comes from vegetables. Not you don’t think of vegetables being high glucose, but they’re shirt, you know, but they are carbohydrates, and they break down into sugar. But what’s nice about these types of sugars, they don’t produce a lot of insulin.
You know, candy and soda are great sources of glucose, but they produce a lot of insulin, which, which little lower sugar levels defeats the purpose. Okay, so, so glucose is one of the fuels. Now the other fuel is even more important, and those are ketones. And you know, people have heard of a ketogenic diet, which I have never recommended because it’s a hard diet to accomplish.
You know, people want to do what they can, but, but you can get ketones directly from coconut oil, or something called MCT oil, which comes from coconut oil. So if people add coconut oil, or MCT, oil, and vegetables into their meal plan, there’s a significant drop in their adrenaline levels. And this is the main key to controlling adrenaline is, is eating correctly, the progesterone is very helpful, but not as helpful as eating correctly.
So these are things that people can do at home, they don’t need to go to a doctor to, you know, get coconut oil or MCT oil. And progesterone is an over-the-counter product. You know, we have it on my website, you know, the 5% progesterone cream, but I’m just saying it’s available, right? without a prescription. Right. So okay.
Dr. Joel Rosen: To summarize and you’re wanting to get, maybe you could tell us a little more specifically, a low glycemic healthy fiber-based carbohydrate that’s going to deliver a steady fuel supply, but also at the same time removing the high fructose corn syrups and all the sugary foods that spike the glucose and then getting MCT oils and potentially coconut oils. As far as what’s your theory?
And I’m sorry, I didn’t read specifically on I know, and I’m against this where when people say they have this adrenal fatigue thing when it’s dysregulated challenges with too much stress in their body and a demand and supply problem, that they should eat multiple meals more slowly, are sorry, multiple meals frequently throughout the day, which I disagree with 100%. But what’s your thought process on what that diet should look like in terms of just everything else beyond what we’ve already mentioned? What else could they do to stabilize their Adrenaline?
Michael Platt, MD: The, you know, there’s no one size fits all. And the reason for that is that everybody’s different. And, you know, for example, you know, in the book, I talked about creative people. And creative people actually had the most adrenaline and the reason for that is that the creative brain is always a gag thing. So it’s always working and, and uses up a lot of energy.
So So these are the people that have the most adrenaline because they’re using the brain the most. That’s why there are certain conditions that you only see in creative-type people, for example, bedwetting in children, you only see that in creative-type children, women that vomit throughout their entire pregnancy, it’s called hyperemesis gravidarum.
You only see that in creative type women. And, you know, these, and all these conditions are caused by excess adrenaline, which doctors don’t know, by the way. So I mean, how can you get somebody? Well, if you don’t know what’s causing their problem? It just, boggles my mind that, you know, my book, adrenaline dominance, is the only book ever written that talks about adrenaline.
Why is that? You know, I mean, anyway, but so. But if doctors were aware of an alternative approach to getting people well, and they to get their patients feeling well, I think, you know, you probably have a lot more doctors getting, you know, wanting to go into medicine.
Right now, I think doctors are leading medicine. I’m just it’s, it’s not hard to get people well if you treat the reason why they’re not well, it’s as simple as all that.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Well, I mean, I think a big part of it amongst everything you’ve said is that just that interaction that takes you you know, the I look about the old, bring your doctor’s bag and do the house call and be the generalist and listen to the patient and hear what their challenges are. It’s not hard to figure out the Pareto principle of what you could implement the smallest implementation for the biggest return. And it doesn’t have to be a pharmaceutically based approach.
And in this case, it’s sensible, let’s, let’s figure this out, let’s get to the root of the problem. And I think even more, that the root of the problem is not just so much diet, which it’s a huge part. But it’s just all of the stimulants that we have. We’re in fight or flight 24/7 The way that the world is going, when I asked you the question, do you think it’s the same? In my opinion, I think it’s, it’s sort of like, look, look, what is it the sky is falling in terms of the worst of the worst as more? More challenges and stressors, and so forth, create even more demands for adrenaline release besides just sugar.
Michael Platt, MD: Are you familiar with the term long? COVID? Yes, of course. Yep. And that seems to be a big issue nowadays. But a lot of the symptoms of long COVID are actually related to excess adrenaline. Now, the thing is, when you talk about fight or flight, you know, what I have found is that in some people with Lyme disease, where it’s not fully treated, the body is in a fight or flight situation.
And they have a lot of symptoms with excess adrenaline. In addition to the Lyme disease, people that are exposed to mold in their house, I have found very often have a lot of excess adrenaline, because they think the body again, is in a fight or flight. And I think the same thing is happening with long COVID that the virus is still around, and the body is in a fight or flight mode.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah, and I agree with that. I mean, I do feel that, again, what I’ve looked at is try to simplify it as much as you possibly can and realize that with our fast-paced life, and depleted minerals in our soils, and the food quality, and the demands that we have, that we just if we were a bank account, we’d be in the red. And when we’re in the red like that, we got to figure out how to cash in our mutual funds or liquidate our assets and sell our stuff on eBay. And hence, we’re in that adrenaline dominance state, which would you agree with that?
Michael Platt, MD: I would agree with that.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Yeah. Gotcha. So as far as the brain supplements that you recommend, which I picked out, I was intrigued with some of the ones that you had down there. Tell us how you derive those who came up with those.
Michael Platt, MD: Which were going you know, wrote the book quite a while ago say.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Okay, well, that’s okay. I mean, you have some My adaptogens in there, I really liked that you had Alpha GPC you had in there. So I guess were those just ones that you researched on your own that have L theanine that modulates the adrenaline response and, and stuff.
Michael Platt, MD: You know, again, adrenaline also acts as a neurotransmitter. And, you know, so these are supplements that are actually good for neurotransmitters. Right?
Dr. Joel Rosen: So are you do you? I didn’t go on your website. Do you have your own nutrients that you recommend as well? Or is it mainly just the dietary approaches and the progesterone?
Michael Platt, MD: Net? Well, we have all the usual supplements, you know, along with their hormone cream.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Gotcha. What’s your next? What’s your next book?
Michael Platt, MD: I don’t know. That’s it. But I think about it all the time. I, you know, I have a lot of anger toward the medical system. And so I don’t know if I should be writing a book.
But, you know, people, don’t you to me, the medical system represents what’s going on with it with our whole political situation right now.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Make sure you release that, because they’re gonna have too much adrenaline dominance if you don’t. And so, yeah, so So I always, I always do like to ask my guess, what you wish you would have? I’m interested to hear your answer.
Now, given what we’ve talked about, what you wish you may have done differently, or what you would have told your younger self looking into the future, knowing what you know now, from the perspective of it would have gotten you closer to your goal before you knew it, or it would have avoided some obstacles or hurdles or would have advanced your health and your wellness. What do you think those pieces of information would have been?
Michael Platt, MD: You know, I had a run-in with a medical board in California. And it’s not because patients complained or your arm somebody, it’s because doctors were upset that when their patient came to see me, I took them off all their medication. It’s true, I did. But again, remember, I approached their problems from the cons. Okay. So they reported me to the medical board, and the medical board is funded by a drug company. So when they heard that the doctor was taking people off drugs, they went after me, probably more aggressively than any other doctor ever in California.
And I, you know, and I finally, finally was forced to surrender my license, even though I’ve never harmed anybody. The but you can’t, you can’t fight the medical board. So but if I had to over again, I would have learned not to antagonize all these doctors or the medical board. I’m just saying.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Would you have taken another profession like another specialty that doesn’t have sort of the front lines are more acute because that what I’ve said is, I’m from, you know, a traditional base family and I’m an alternative based practitioner, and medicine. 1.0 2.0 is great at acute base care. And you know, a heart attack or ruptured spleen, a broken bone.
But when you have a chronic-based problem, or a stress-based problem, or a perfect storm, environmental genetic-based problem, the model doesn’t fit very well unless you’re in the acute-based specialties. So do you think you would have changed the specialty? Or would you have done it differently in terms of just not rocking the boat but being more of a puppet? Or would you have gotten into a different specialty altogether or different professionals together? Just kind of curious.
Michael Platt, MD: I don’t see myself ever doing medicine has always been a passion for me. And it’s very rewarding and getting people well, and I would never want to give that up. I just would have changed my attitude toward you know, the medical boards, experts, read my books.
And, and they all said the same thing that the ideas in these books were so dangerous, that I should never have been practicing medicine. And yet all the book talks about its use your hormones get people well, you know, treating the cause of illness, but I could see where the medical board is protecting the drug companies, and why they would say that, but that’s who they are.
Dr. Joel Rosen: So what do you mean, then you wouldn’t have been, you wouldn’t have been as, as you wouldn’t have written the books or what would you have done?
Michael Platt, MD: I would have, I would have nothing would have changed except, you know, for example, you know, the, I had to take some, some special exam down in San Diego. And, when I was talking to these doctors there, they asked me, how would I approach a certain problem. You know, for example, asthma. I said, Well, you know when we put somebody on progesterone, their asthma disappears. They, yeah, in other words, this is something that is so far removed from the concepts, have you used it? So so they failed me? So I would, I would have learned to be more accessible, and agreeable.
But I said, some someday, I think they’re going to look into the medical boards and see how they treat what are called alternative medicine doctors. You know, they allowed doctors to prescribe opiates and kill people to go on for years before they go after them. And that they don’t have a problem with but using an alternative way of, you know, a natural way healing somebody that will not allow. But anyway, that’s neither here nor there. Okay.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. But so Okay, so you’ve written these books. And you you, I guess what, we don’t know what’s next, necessarily in terms of what book you would write. But I guess maybe what is it that I’m curious that what do you what gives you pleasure? What makes you happy?
Michael Platt, MD: Answer Well, I’d have to think that I would have to think about it for a while.
Dr. Joel Rosen: You already mentioned helping patients, right? So are you still even though you’re not on the frontlines in that way and getting that satisfaction, like when you put the progesterone on that gentleman’s arm, and it was the best thing that he’s ever had? Do you still get to experience feedback from your readers or from people that are getting your help from your product line and so forth?
Michael Platt, MD: You know, people do get in touch with me, you know, the phone numbers and on the website. And I do you know, talk to people about some of their problems. I spoke to a woman this morning, who has a two-year-old son who for four months had colic for months now, almost nonstop calling. And if, unfortunately, if I had spoken to it, you know, can’t you can get rid of colic and five minutes into child five minutes, just by rubbing progesterone cream on the belly.
So I still am reaching out and trying to help people or again, I’m not allowed to practice medicine. I’ve been arrested four times so far.
But okay, it’s medicine, I would not change the way I practice medicine.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. So so it sounds like a love-hate in that you. You’ve got to help a lot of people and discover and go down these different rabbit holes to figure out how you can truly listen and help people but at the same time, we’re sort of vilified for doing it the way that it wasn’t recommended and I’m sorry that that’s what you’ve had to experience for your time on today’s podcast and any other words of wisdom or any other commentary, things that you want to discuss before we sign off here.
Michael Platt, MD: Well, I don’t know when this is going to be shown but you know, we’re kind of up to July 4 weekend.
And a lot of firecrackers can scare dogs and what people don’t realize is that projection is wonderful for dogs and it gets hurt. You know, you may have heard of anxiety you know people leave a separation anxiety in dogs. You can get rid of separation anxiety in about one minute with progesterone cream put into the ear of the dog.
And also it’ll take away the fear of thunderstorms. and firecrackers. So the, you know, I could mention a lot of other things, but what possessing could do, but the people but people if they’re interested, I think we’ll get a lot of information in my book.
Dr. Joel Rosen: Right. And the book is called adrenaline dominance, as well as the miracle of bioidentical hormones and the Platt Protocol for hormone balance. Your name is Michael Platt, MD, and we will leave links to your websites or your website so that they can check out more information from you. And I appreciate your time today. And thank you for being so candid with your information.
Michael Platt, MD: You’re more than welcome. Thank you
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The post Confronting Adrenaline Dominance Candid Confessions from a Bold Doctor’s Mind appeared first on The Truth About Adrenal Fatigue.
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