Three years ago, if you’d told me I’d be standing in my kitchen at 6 AM stirring lion’s mane powder into my coffee while a jar of reishi extract steeps on the counter behind me, I would have asked what planet you’d just arrived from. My supplement cabinet used to contain exactly two things: a tub of protein powder and whatever multivitamin was on sale at Costco. That was it. That was the entire stack. But something shifted after I hit thirty-eight. My recovery time from hard training sessions stretched from twenty-four hours to forty-eight. The brain fog that used…
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I’m going to tell you something that would have made my twenty-five-year-old self roll her eyes so hard she’d pull a hamstring. Six months ago, I walked into my nutritionist’s office with bloodwork that showed elevated cortisol, borderline burnout, and the kind of afternoon energy crashes that no amount of cold brew could fix. Her suggestion wasn’t another training tweak or a stricter meal plan. She looked at me and said, “Have you tried ashwagandha?” I nearly laughed. For two decades as a competitive athlete and coach, I’d lumped adaptogens into the same category as crystal healing and moon water…