In otherwise healthy people, Dr. Cheesman says cortisol levels are “usually under tight control by an organ in your brain called the pituitary gland,” which sends a signal to your adrenal glands when you experience any type of stress or when you wake up in the morning. It’s possible for cortisol to be too high and even lead to medical risk, but this is typically due to disease.
Common signs of pathological high cortisol—meaning high cortisol due to a medical condition—include weight gain in the abdominal area, facial rounding, dark purple stretch marks, and a fatty hump on the back of the neck. In one medical condition called Cushing Syndrome, cortisol levels become too high as a result of a non-cancerous tumor in the pituitary or adrenal glands, explains Dr. Isaacs. Cushing Syndrome can also cause major fatigue and muscle weakness, especially in the upper legs. High cortisol from Cushing Syndrome can also increase the risk of serious medical issues like high blood pressure and cholesterol and type two diabetes, explains Dr. Isaacs. But that’s an extreme case.
Physiological high cortisol, or high cortisol levels due to normal physical processes like stress, can also cause high cortisol levels that negatively affect your body—but likely only temporarily, and less severely (for instance, Dr. Cheesman says, high cortisol levels caused by stressful experiences might make it difficult to get a good night’s sleep) than in a medical condition like Cushing Syndrome.
Can stress cause high cortisol?
Experiencing chronic stress doesn’t mean your cortisol levels are so high that it’s dangerous, or that you even need to do anything about it. “The stress of day-to-day life does not cause chronic pathologic cortisol elevation that would show up as a positive screening lab,” says Dr. Tan.
Some companies sell cortisol tests or dietary supplements to help manage cortisol, but according to Dr. Cheesman, there’s no approved or well-studied diagnostic tool or treatment for chronically elevated cortisol levels from stress: “Don’t go and buy some crazy product or overthink about this. You don’t need them to tell you that someone under chronic stress will have abnormal cortisol levels,” he adds.
But should you stress about your cortisol levels?
All of this is to say: Try not to stress about being stressed, at least when it comes to managing your cortisol levels. Scientific evidence is clear that any kind of stress, especially in the long-term, isn’t good for your well-being—stress itself can make you feel bad physically, along with increasing your risk of coping with potentially unhealthy behaviors. “People need to care about their stress levels, but probably not their cortisol levels,” says Dr. Isaacs, who suggests taking all the easier-said-than-done steps to manage day-to-day stress, including prioritizing sleep, proper nutrition, physical activity, and getting support from loved ones or a therapist when you need it. Dr. Isaacs adds, “Stress is bad for the body; it makes people feel bad. But cortisol is not the major factor in why stress is bad.”