HPA axis dysregulation
Cortisol meant to be high in the morning, low at night. Reverse the curve and you get afternoon energy + 3am wake-ups + the wired-but-tired pattern.
+ Symptom 02
Energy · Cortisol · Anxiety
Wired in the body. Empty in the tank.
You sleep, but you don't wake rested. Coffee gets you to lunch. By 3pm you're done. By 10pm you get a strange second wind. Then 3am wake-ups with a racing heart and a head full of nothing. Your friends say you've always been the anxious one. It didn't used to feel like this.
Burnout isn't a single broken thing — it's a stack. Cortisol curve flipped, ferritin under 70, thyroid running cold, magnesium depleted, blood sugar crashing, B12 borderline. Standard GP fatigue workups test 4-6 markers; functional testing routinely runs 30+. The picture changes once you can see it.
The Picture
If this is you,
it might sound like —
Read these the way you'd read a letter from someone who already knows. If three or more land hard, you're in the right place.
- I sleep 8 hours and wake exhausted.
- My energy crashes around 2-3pm every day.
- Coffee is the only thing keeping me upright.
- I get a second wind at 10pm and can't fall asleep.
- I wake at 3am with a racing heart for no reason.
- I'm wired but tired — body shattered, brain won't quiet.
- Anxious for no reason I can name. Jumpy. Overreactive.
- My TSH is 'normal' and my GP says I'm fine.
+ Key Drivers
What's actually draining you.
'You're stressed' is not a diagnosis. Burnout in your thirties or forties almost always has three or four measurable drivers stacked together — and most of them never appear on a standard GP order.
Subclinical hypothyroidism
TSH inside the GP range can still be functionally hypothyroid. Free T3 is the active form your cells actually use, and it's rarely tested.
Low ferritin (under 70)
'Iron is normal' isn't enough. Fatigue, anxiety and hair loss start under 70 even when iron studies look fine on the headline numbers.
Magnesium depletion
The single most under-recognised driver of anxiety and broken sleep in healthy women. Stress strips it daily; the modern diet doesn't replace it.
Blood-sugar instability
A high-carb breakfast → 11am crash → afternoon coffee → 3am wake. The crash is glucose dipping below baseline and cortisol spiking to rescue you.
B12 + mitochondrial dysfunction
Common in vegetarians, on PPIs, after pregnancy. Cells stop making ATP efficiently — nutrient-deficient or inflammation-driven.
+ Key Tests
How we find the cause — and the fix.
Standard fatigue and anxiety workups test 4-6 markers. Functional testing routinely runs 30+. The picture changes the moment you can see it.
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DUTCH · Cortisol + hormonesFull diurnal cortisol curve in dried urine plus oestrogen, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA. What your stress system is actually doing morning to night, not one snapshot.
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Comprehensive bloods · Full panelFull thyroid (TSH, free T3, free T4, reverse T3, antibodies), iron studies (with ferritin), B12 (active + serum), folate, vitamin D, fasting insulin, HbA1c, inflammation markers.
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HTMA · Mineral panelMagnesium, copper:zinc ratio, calcium, sodium — the minerals your nervous system and mitochondria run on.
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OAT · Organic acidsMitochondrial markers, B-vitamin status, neurotransmitter metabolites (serotonin, dopamine), gut dysbiosis — the upstream chemistry of energy and mood.
+ Foundational Must-Haves
What you can start today.
The floor your body needs before any protocol can work. Six high-leverage daily moves — most clients feel a meaningful drop in baseline anxiety and a lift in afternoon energy inside 3-4 weeks just from these.
- 30 g protein at breakfast within an hour of waking. Stops the late-morning cortisol spike and the 3pm crash before they start — the single biggest energy and anxiety lever.
- Magnesium glycinate 300–400 mg at bedtime. Most-felt single change for anxiety and broken sleep inside 1-2 weeks. Helps the nervous system release the day's tension.
- Switch to Swiss decaf. Caffeine has a 6-hour half-life — even your morning coffee is still in your system at bedtime, fuelling the 3am wake and the next day's edge. Swiss decaf keeps the ritual without the chemistry.
- Morning daylight in your eyes within 30 minutes of waking. Anchors cortisol so it can drop properly at night. Twenty minutes outside resets the curve over a few weeks.
- A real lunch — protein, fats, slow carbs. Skipping it guarantees a 3pm crash. Eating it solves half the afternoon problem.
- One non-negotiable wind-down hour before bed. No screens, low light, vagal-tone work or 5-minute breathing. Your nervous system needs the runway.
+ The Process with How It Heals
Tired and anxious aren't a diagnosis.
Persistent fatigue and chronic baseline anxiety almost always have measurable causes — usually three or four stacked together. Magnesium, cortisol, ferritin, thyroid, blood sugar and gut chemistry account for most of it. None of them respond to trying harder. All of them respond to addressing the upstream cause.
Most clients feel a meaningful lift inside the first 4-6 weeks once the right nutrients are in the right doses. By month three, 'I'm constantly exhausted' usually isn't the first sentence anymore.
+ From the women in front of us
What changed.
Selected from clients who started here — chronically fatigued, baseline anxiety, 3am wake-ups, normal bloods — and worked through the 22-week reset.
I have my afternoons back. I forgot what it felt like to want to do something after 4pm.
J.R. · 38 · New Farm
Magnesium and breakfast. Two weeks. My GP wanted to put me on Lexapro — turns out I needed protein.
C.D. · 41 · Telehealth