Busy woman syndrome and adrenal fatigue with Nurse Practitioner Shiree Walker

Are you suffering from Busy Woman Syndrome? Nurse Practitioner Shiree Walker knows only too well how you can push yourself to the brink of adrenal fatigue and has some reassuring tips to help you slow down and heal. 

 This is the third of our three-part special on ‘Women’s Wellness’. 

 A Nurse Practitioner, Shiree’s expertise stretches across 21 years of emergency care nursing and specialist skills in continence and uro-gynaecology, and further post graduate training to become an advanced cosmetic injector. 

“Our bodies are always going from a caveman/cavewoman mode of fight or flight or rest and digest … when we become too busy or stressed it can become a cycle where we stay continually in fight or flight.” – Shiree Walker

You’ll hear:

• Busy Woman Syndrome (1:30)
• Adrenal Fatigue (3:30)
• Pushing our bodies too hard for too long (9:00)
• Bringing the body back into repair (10:10)
• Yoga (11:55)
• Perfectionism (16:00)
• Mental health (20:20)
• Integrated medicine (21:30)
• Signs to look for (23:15)

Duration: 26 minutes.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Find out more and book a timeslot with Shiree Walker (Glow Aesthetics Perth) via Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/glowaestheticsperth/?hl=en
• Shiree's website: http://glowaesthetics.com.au/
• Vital Beat Yoga and Reformer Pilates in Midland https://www.vitalbeat.com.au/

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Thank you!

• Sincere thanks to Jay (Justin) Hill for his expert sound mastering and patience! Jay, together with the incredible Eva Chye, have inspired me through their passion project

Transcript

Shiree Walker: 0:05

A lot of the things that I hear from women is very much from a fatigue level fatigue seems to be the first thing that women kind of begin to twig that something's not quite right where they talk about finding it hard to get out of bed or sustaining their energy being able to last throughout the day. You know, like, sometimes needing a nap in the afternoon, or just crashing out after after lunch, whether they're at work or at home. So that begins to be a bit of a slog that kind of comes along.

Sonia Nolan: 0:36

We're still laughing and learning with Nurse Practitioner Shiree Walker, who's been educating us on issues such as pelvic floors, menopause, and treating sun damaged skin, over chicken sandwiches and cups of tea with lots of sugar. We talked for hours recording these bytes of wisdom, especially for women, busy women, tired women, menopausal women, ageing women. If you're a busy woman, and you're feeling rundown, then take a seat at My Warm Table with Shiree and me. I'm just so pleased to have our nurse practitioner on tap today to tell us more about what we are experiencing in our hormones in our bodies as we go through our daily daily craziness sometimes, which leads me to what we're going to talk about today, which is a busy woman syndrome. Shiree. Thanks for joining us.

Shiree Walker: 1:26

No worries, thank you for having me again.

Sonia Nolan: 1:28

So, you know, is it just me? Or is everybody suffering from busy woman syndrome?

Shiree Walker: 1:35

I think it's everyone.

Sonia Nolan: 1:37

I'm not alone, tell me more about how it looks in other women.

Shiree Walker: 1:41

So it comes in varying degrees, I think as to how busy we are, and how much we're cramming into life. So a lot of the things that I hear from women is very much from a fatigue level. And that like I said, can can vary whether you are not saying you know, children versus no children. But obviously, children are a different thing. It's the equation, the time and effort needed running around with children as well. But the fatigue seems to be the the first thing that women kind of begin to twig that something's not quite right, where they talk about finding it hard to get out of bed or sustaining their energy being able to last throughout the day, sometimes needing a nap in the afternoon, or just crashing out after after lunch, whether they're at work or at home. So that begins to be a bit of a slog that kind of comes along, it can go to more extremes where people talk about more body changes, things like um, hormones, hair thinning, weight gain, or all the side of things, but the fatigue and energy levels seems to be the main thing that people kind of begin to pick up on and go, what I used to do before to help that is not helping, so that gets to be a bit of concern to them. And then that might be the point where they might start going to see a GP or nurse practitioner, or health professional just to kind of get a bit of help. And that's working kind of I think can make or break depending on what what they what help they get or they don't get in some of the cases.

Sonia Nolan: 3:13

Yeah, exactly. So, so describe what's happening in the body. We were talking over our chicken sandwich about adrenal fatigue. So tell me what that is.

Shiree Walker: 3:24

So this is also one of those I will say maybe controversial things depending on what health professional you speak with. There are some camps that don't believe it is a thing or it exists. And then there are ones like myself who who do. And so the easiest way to think about it is, so we've got these adrenal glands that sit on top of our kidneys. And they are really important in maintaining stress levels and cortisol levels in the body. So our body is always going from a very caveman, or cavewoman protective going between a fight or flight mode or rest and digest. So though, that's where we're, we're sitting that's, you know, get up in the morning body's going into fight or flight mode, getting ready for the day going to work. And then you might come home in the evening getting ready for rest and digest sleep. And we're in that cycle going around. When we have very busy lives or stressful lives or just increase in stress adrenals begin to fire and so they're firing and firing and our body gets kind of going into this fight or flight mode, but it becomes a bit continuous. We're not getting, clipping into that rest and digest mode. So what happens is you've got these adrenal glands that are firing, firing, your cortisol levels are going up and up and up, and we're not getting that break and then eventually what happens over time is that your adrenals get fatigued and then you've got no oomph left because then your cortisol levels have gone up and then they've tanked and that is when you find either women or men are in that beginning stages or they're halfway through with a cortisol levels are high or they're at that tank usually is when they're beginning to tank that depending on their resilience in their in their body, like I actually had a client of mine who was a psychologist for a very, very busy company, and we did some testing on her. And so one of the tests that we do is saliva tests where they you collect saliva at four points throughout the day. And that actually measures measures your cortisol and hormone levels at four point so we kind of get a bit of a pattern,

Sonia Nolan: 5:20

can I just go back one step and tell me what cortisol does?

Shiree Walker: 5:24

So cortisol is like a dark is our stress regulator in our body. So it does kind of get up, get up and go and keep going or in times of flux. Every caveman cavewoman in that fight or flight response, cortisol goes up. So your heart rate goes up, your pupils dilate that very primitive response. And then when the threat is passed, you know, like the, we're not gonna go kill the lion that cortisol levels will come down.

Sonia Nolan: 5:51

And cortisol is a hormone in the body produced by the body. Yeah, brilliant. Okay, sorry to bring us right back with my baby knowledge. You were talking about your client, and there were four main types

Unknown: 6:03

Yeah. So we normally in this particular test is called the adrenal cortex and stress hormone profile. And that gives us a pattern of what's happening with your cortisol levels throughout the day. So she did have a pretty busy and stressful life. And when we got the cortisol results back when I actually was interpreting her results, can I swear?

Sonia Nolan: 6:26

Why not?!

Shiree Walker: 6:26

I actually, yeah, I was sitting at home, like I'm interpreting her results and writing up her plan. And I actually got her results and went, my husband is sitting on a couch me and actually went, Oh, fuck, because this lady was red line, like,

Sonia Nolan: 6:40

you hadn't seen that before?

Shiree Walker: 6:42

No, like, normally there'll be like an up and down. But yeah, she was in two in the in the, in the graph, there's like a, you know, there's like a green section, then there's an orange section, then there's a red section, she was like red

Sonia Nolan: 6:53

the danger zone

Shiree Walker: 6:54

all the way through. So she was someone who, yes, was having the symptoms, but was functioning at a very high level and having a stressful job. So I actually swore. And when I saw her again, I said, this is what I said, when I saw your results. And she's like, doesn't surprise me,

Sonia Nolan: 7:10

Wow,

Shiree Walker: 7:10

you're in that fight or flight response. So they're firing, firing, and then they will just tank and then there's nothing left in the tank to give. And then that's when there's lots of other issues that can come on board like the fatigue. For women, it can actually drop our progesterone levels as well. We call it like the progesterone, steel progesterone for women. It's very relaxation, chill pill helping with sleep. So potentially anxiety components related to it. But um, yeah, it's usually that not being able to get out of bed potentially mood changes, because the hormones or progesterone has dropped off, like feeling flat or low, can kind of have this knock on effect.

Sonia Nolan: 7:49

So is that something that you would recommend people do when they talk to their practitioner is have that sort of testing four times a day? Or is that something that you just offer, the people who you suspect have got some sort of adrenal fatigue?

Shiree Walker: 8:00

So I guess, like I said, it is a little controversial in the testing, because it's not necessarily in primary health care to GP land. It's not necessarily something that's recognised or a test they do, unless it's someone who is maybe working in an integrative functional medicine field as well. So that is something sometimes you can do it just on Bloods, because you can do cortisol, blood levels and hormones as well on blood. So that is something they might be able to do. But that just tells test the cortisol level. Usually we'd say get it first thing in the morning, so before eight o'clock, so get that done. And we can get an indicator of that, especially if money and budget is an issue as well. So that's something that can be done bloodwise with a with a GP who is open to that as well. Or you can go down the more integrative medicine where we were looking at doing the saliva testing and getting an idea, because we can kind of see when it's peaking and troughing, or how extreme or are we mid level where things are progressing to.

Sonia Nolan: 8:55

And what happens if you long term if you're sustaining your cortisol levels at that high danger zone for so long, what what happens to your body and your mental health?

Shiree Walker: 9:05

So I feel that you just really just get into this fatigue. And this is where I begin, you know, like, people and I'm not I'm not saying this is the reason but you know, when people are trying to get diagnosed with chronic fatigue, it is a very hard pathway for them to actually be diagnose down that line and the treatment and management is I'm not an expert on that. But, you know, I begin to wonder is if we actually had done some of this testing and seeing what was happening, can we actually stop that diagnosis or maybe reverse some of the reverse some of their symptoms? So I guess it is a little bit of symptom and lifestyle management. But also, yeah, do we look at that testing as to what what is happening and where you're where the cortisol levels are sitting so they're sitting at that high level? Have we got it in the right spot where we can make some lifestyle changes support the body support the hormones to bring it down? Or are the cortisol levels just flatlining? Whether I've actually already gone through that big peak, and then it's just crashed. And now we have a bit of work to do to get that body back into a repair like that rest and digest mode.

Sonia Nolan: 10:08

And how do you do that? How do you bring the body back into repair?

Shiree Walker: 10:11

So definitely lifestyle management, we have to make lifestyle changes, like looking at stress management, stress reduction, which is very hard for some people, because it is just their everyday life.

Sonia Nolan: 10:23

It's the nature of their professional job sometimes,

Shiree Walker: 10:26

yep, yep, and family life and everything that you're the combination of the two. So we really have to do a bit of soul searching and counselling as to that first step. Because, you know, if we put a whole other things in place, like medication supplements, that's great, but that's just going to band aid if we don't get some of the changes. So we would look at that stress reduction factor like is it to the light going on walks, you know, do they grinding, and this is a hard thing, as well as, because if you're in adrenal fatigue, you don't want to be going and doing high strenuous exercise, because you're putting more stress on the body. So, you know, sometimes it is people who have used to run and wait and this and that, and it's not necessarily the best thing for them, their body's not ready to go back into that type of exercise as much as it would be great for them. So we have to look at different things that they can do like walking, meditation, yoga, pilates, that type of where it's going to help bring your nervous system back into a rest and digest mode. So that's one way of thinking, then, you know, not gonna tell people how to run their families, but family, family management, like do you need help outside help or family help just to help that process, having good conversations with partners about sharing the load as and what's happening? And then I think the next step is, do we go down the line of medications, supplements to help with the adrenal fatigue?

Sonia Nolan: 11:50

Want to talk a bit about something that you're really good at, which is yoga? Yeah. And because I think this really fits in really nicely with this understanding of adrenal fatigue, but also changing that sort of one of the first approaches, as you've said, is like really looking at your lifestyle. And the way you were just describing some of the activities, which are positive and helpful, are actually ones that sort of rebalance. Not just like, it's the chemicals in your body, but this sort of rebalancing your mind and soul, and body all at once? Yes. Is that fair to say?

Shiree Walker: 12:21

Yes, definitely. So I mean, the busy brain that I am. So I did my yoga teacher training last year, it was not with the intention to teach yoga, it was more for self reflection. Yeah, just delving deeper in to myself and the work I've been doing on myself, but also wanting to learn a bit more about my Indian heritage and culture, things I did not know anything about yoga, besides the the movement. And you know, in yoga, we learn about the movement and being present, and really how it is affecting your nervous system. And really getting you into that really nice rest and digest mode. And there are different types of yoga, that will get you a bit more into that mode, like yin yoga is very much like nourishing on the body. So it depends on you know, what you like to do, but the yoga really does help. And people kind of have different connotations of what, what yoga is in meditation. So it really sometimes can be foreign for them, or it's the time factor of getting to a studio. So the lucky thing, or unlucky thing with COVID is that the studio that I go to, they did very well, you know, flipping and have done a lot of online yoga. So you can you don't actually have to leave the house, you can stream it, do it from home, do that 45 minute session, one hour session, and you're not having to like go anywhere. So if you do have children, and it's hard, you can just you know, maybe when the kids are gone to bed, put it on, do your yoga, and just get that relaxation going as well.

Sonia Nolan: 13:51

So, yeah, the studio that you're at, though, you were telling me about the reciprocity of it back into the community. So do you mind sharing that?

Shiree Walker: 13:59

Yeah. So I will give a shout out. It's called Vital Beat Yoga and Reformer Pilates in Midland. And Kay is the owner of that studio and is an amazing woman and has really given a lot back to the yoga community. So the one thing with the yoga teacher training, they do offer scholarships for people of colour, because she has identified that in yoga, the representation is of people of colour, Indian descent, and all body types is not there. So she really has changed, I guess, her philosophy as well and the studio and the representation. So her staff are from very diverse backgrounds, different body types, and part of that scholarship is to encourage people of colour to go down the yoga teacher training. And then part of our yoga teacher training once we graduated was they offered us to teach community classes. So they are donation classes so the community or new members can come and try out classes for a donation to whatever charity or foundation we decide to donate for, and also allows us as newbies to teach teach classes as well. So it's a great initiative.

Sonia Nolan: 15:11

That's fantastic. So you So you did the teacher training through a scholarship.

Shiree Walker: 15:15

Yep partial scholarship,

Sonia Nolan: 15:16

partial scholarship. Yeah. And so now you're, you've got a 10 week block or a certain block of time

Shiree Walker: 15:21

So for this month, I'm doing every Sunday, I've got a slot that I'm just doing community teacher training um community classes.

Sonia Nolan: 15:28

So you're doing the community classes, which are at, um, so you don't get paid to do them. People can attend, they give a donation of their choice they choose to give to participate in the class. And then you've chosen the

Shiree Walker: 15:40

Animal Protection Society of WA.

Sonia Nolan: 15:42

So you've chosen that charity to then donate whatever proceeds you make from that yoga class that you teach goes to that charity, what a wonderful system.

Shiree Walker: 15:52

It's amazing. And the other thing is that it's also more people can come and try yoga as a beginner without signup without having to sign up, they can get a feel for whether they like the yoga feel for the studio. And just yet, just the general environment in environment and just to try it out. I you know, I graduated last year from the yoga and I've just been teaching I call it calling a bro yoga, I'm teaching some mates of ours from high school who we're still very good friends with. But that nervousness of going into a studio as one of my one of the boys said, I shouldn't say boys, men, say I didn't want to be the creepy old guy in the back of a class as a beginner. So yeah,

Sonia Nolan: 16:26

so true. And also like, I've also got, you know, a mental block is that, you know, unless I can do it perfectly, I'm actually traumatised from the 1980s aerobics classes, right, where I went along, and I thought I was, you know, participating at my best. Aerobics teacher just looked at me and said, right, we're gonna step and we're not going to sound like an elephant this time. And to this day, I still can't do a grapevine. So look, I'm still traumatised from the 80s Aerobics or maybe the 1990s aerobic classes. So going into any sort of yoga class or anything, and I just feel like oh, my goodness, I'm going to actually not know what I'm doing. And then a friend of mine recently invited me to go and do SUP yoga, and I'm thinking, I can't even stand on the stand up paddleboard let alone to a candle. You know, there's, there's so many extremes and so many opportunities to participate in these amazing classes. But, you know, coming back to busy woman syndrome, there is this thing that, you know, certainly people like myself have, unless we're going to be able to do it well, first time. Yeah, then I'm really I'm really worried and anxious about participating.

Shiree Walker: 17:30

And I was probably the same with yoga. Like, I was a perfectionist and probably bombed at some part of the yoga and the training because I was no needs to be perfect from beginning. And you just have to be that right: I have some faults that I just need to, this is new, this is new to me. And I'm

Sonia Nolan: 17:46

We're allowed to be not good at it yet.

Shiree Walker: 17:48

Yep. Exactly. Exactly. So yeah.

Sonia Nolan: 17:51

Oh, that's fantastic. Look, I'm really excited for that. And, and, you know, so anyone in, in that area in where it's at Midland,

Shiree Walker: 17:57

or if you want to travel, I'm gonna

Sonia Nolan: 17:58

Yeah, brilliant. Okay. All right. So we'll keep that one in our back pocket, we'll put some notes in the podcast notes about about that yoga place, because that that is just such a wonderful contribution to the community. And I love the reciprocity of that, as I said, as we've just been unpicking that, you know, this understanding of having to be perfect at things. And I think that comes back to busy woman syndrome and this understanding that gosh, have you had your eight glasses of water today? And have you you walked your 10,000 steps today?

Shiree Walker: 18:28

Have you had your fruit? Have you have you had your

Sonia Nolan: 18:30

two fruit and five veg? Have you done that? So we've almost got a checklist of how we're supposed to actually live our days every single day. And if we don't achieve all of those milestones, yeah, you know, all of a sudden we're failures. So we push and we push and we push, you know, and again, our system goes into overload to try and do these

Shiree Walker: 18:49

Yeah, exactly. Sonia now's a good time we did things. have a chat about my experience and I guess the reason I'm often happy to share it is because myself as a health practitioner, myself that I didn't pick up the signs of what ended up being adrenal fatigue for myself. So I as I said, busy woman myself was in retrospect now what I've added I kind of got I can't believe that I did that. I was working shift work in the emergency department. I was finishing my master's degree. So part of that was studying as well as doing a 200 hour internship on top of working and my husband was working away at the time so a bit of a all at the same time time but you know, just kind of got on with it. And then graduated finished and then kind of crashed and burned and but what for me the symptoms were I was just getting more and more tired where I used to be able to get up at 530 in the morning, go to my personal trainer, do a one hour two hour session come home be good. I would go the sessions feel great when I was there, come home have my breakfast and just like take like I was gone for The rest of the day, not being able to get out of bed like sweating. But the more I slept, the worse I felt. And then my head was going Am I getting depressed? Is Is there what's happening?

Sonia Nolan: 20:08

I was going to ask that. So how intertwined is adrenal fatigue and, and depression or mental health issues?

Shiree Walker: 20:16

I think yeah, to do with the changes in the hormone. So for women, I think I mentioned before, like your progesterone levels can drop off. Which then progesterone like a progesterone can cause these mood changes, anxiety being one of them. So, or feeling flat or low was maybe more to do with the adrenals? And the cortisol. Yeah, but who can say exactly,

Sonia Nolan: 20:37

exactly. So you were feeling low and flat and worried that you might be down that depression path?

Shiree Walker: 20:42

Yeah, what I did was I asked to take my long service leave, because I thought maybe I just need time off. And then

Sonia Nolan: 20:50

just a little tip, you could have taken some long service leave your time when you're actually doing all that study. Just crazy idea.

Shiree Walker: 20:57

I just wanted to power through it. Because again, yeah, I took my long service leave when and saw my GP and kind of said, you know, I'm really tired. I don't know what's going on. I think we did some bloods everything was normal. So I just got told, go on holiday. And I holiday. Right? Yeah, that sounds like, that's not really gonna not gonna cut it for me. And then I started doing a bit of exploring and found a GP who does integrative medicine and started to see them.

Sonia Nolan: 21:25

So what's integrative medicine?

Shiree Walker: 21:26

So integrative medicine, best way to describe it is because it sometimes gets a bad rap. But it's looking, I think it's looking outside the box is where we do like different testing. And then we will sometimes do things outside the norms of conventional medicine, looking at supplements support, the hormone replacement therapy, doing a deep dive. So we're very much during the testing and not guess guessing what's happening. And then giving you a plan from there and the parameters with integrative medicine as well. Things like your vitamin D, iron levels. So we have you know, like when you get a blood test done, what the parameters should be, or what is normal in normal medicine, we might like it to be a bit more optimised to get the best for someone, right? So I guess that's the best way to Yeah, talking about is that we're kind of looking outside the box, we're looking at the whole person, we're getting levels in the body to be really optimised to function as bit as best we can. So that's why it's so she I want to say like a GP, but did integrative medicine as well. We did a whole bunch of testing. So it wasn't a cheap venture. But I was like, I'm desperate. I just need something to happen. And yet did the saliva testing. So that came back with adrenal fatigue. So my levels were all low. My test, testosterone was next to nothing, my vitamin D was low. So all these things were like

Sonia Nolan: 22:43

all the indicators pushed in the same direction.

Shiree Walker: 22:46

Yep. And and that really made me go right, where am I going? And that very, it's no wonder it wasn't an easy pathway, it was a long pathway out of that. And that's what I do tell my clients is like, it's a, it's a long pathway out, but we can get there. And that was a good couple, that was at least five years ago. So I do have every moments when I'm like getting too busy, and I just get the fatigue and I go, Okay, I got to take a step back, my body's just saying, No, take it.

Sonia Nolan: 23:12

So what sort of what sort of signs do you look for?

Shiree Walker: 23:16

So for me, I just get this tiredness and I can only last through the day, but sometimes I will just need a nap in the afternoon. And that's when I've had like a busy couple of days. So I've very much had to learn on my days off not to plan a whole a whole bunch of things like just and which is what a just a very norm for me was like I need to do this, this I'm going to visit this one and have a coffee and be like no just have to take a take a step back and really again to protect my time. And you really value my time and what I was putting it towards and now I'm really just focused more on myself, my home life, my health, that's where I need to sit in that zone and just take that step back. But it's mainly for me, it's the tiredness, because I don't have great data I'm like and, and I don't do really other strenuous exercise anymore. I will you know, do do my yoga and pilates but walking is is is great because it's low impact but I'm still getting out and about walking the dogs or meeting friends to walk or just walking on my own. But I am also doing a bit of that almost meditation because I do find walking out in nature. So that meditative practice as well

Sonia Nolan: 24:21

brilliant and it's good to know our own signs to what to look for so that we don't fall back into that trap over and over again. And to not think that that's normal. Yeah, and I reckon that our society normalises this busyness because you know how are you are really really busy, you know, instead of the standard response, you know used to be well thank you. Yeah, but now it's it's busy. Yeah, so we do need to go back to well, wellness. I am well and I'm doing everything I can to be

Shiree Walker: 24:48

yeah, definitely to optimise the best I can and well, that is I think the hardest thing for people to do is just to optimise it and say no.

Sonia Nolan: 24:57

Yeah,

Shiree Walker: 24:58

that is that is the That is probably the primary thing say not take anything else on and just say no. And

Sonia Nolan: 25:04

we can flip that, you know, say yes to yourself. Yes. You know say yes to what is actually going to be healthy and cause wellness for yourself. Because then ultimately you can say yes to other things later down the track.

Shiree Walker: 25:17

Yeah, exactly.

Sonia Nolan: 25:18

Yeah. Shiree again, always learning something from you. I really appreciate your time again today. And stay well. Be well don't be busy be well!

Shiree Walker: 25:28

Be well exactly.

Sonia Nolan: 25:32

You've been listening to My Warm Table with Sonia Nolan in Italian a 'tavola calda' is a warm and welcoming table where you can share big ideas, friendship, laughter and life. So much happens around the kitchen table and I wanted to amplify it here in this podcast. My aim is to feed your mind and soul through smart conversations with heart. No topic is off limits for good table manners rule. I hope you'll join us each week as we set the table for my extraordinary guests who will let you feast on their deep knowledge, life experiences and wise insights. Let's keep the conversation flowing. Please subscribe to the My Warm Table podcast and share it with your friends and networks. Perhaps if they are new to podcasting, take a moment to show them how to download and subscribe so they don't miss an episode either. I'd also love you to join our community on Facebook. You'll find the group at My Warm Table Podcast. Your support is very much appreciated.