What Does Pollution Have to do with Hormones?

admin — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 04:17:57 +0000

Estrogen. It’s one of a woman’s two main sex hormones. Men have estrogen too! Too much is bad though, and I’ll tell you why. Read this if you suffer from bad PMS, painful periods, or infertility, or if you have a wife or girlfriend that suffers from these conditions.

Estrogen regulates the menstrual cycle and causes things to grow during puberty. It creates curves. It also stimulates cell growth in preparation for pregnancy. Progesterone opposes estrogen, protecting against its possible undesirable side effects. Progesterone and estrogen exist in a ratio in the body, and progesterone is actually needed to make estrogen. Progesterone is super important because it helps with sex drive, sleep, prevents anxiety, burns body fat, and is the hormone needed to get and stay pregnant. Here’s the thing, though: when estrogen & progesterone become imbalanced, health problems can surface. And more often than not, that means too much estrogen and not enough progesterone. Women (and even men, too) are experiencing massive problems with their female hormones: heavy menstrual cycles, endometriosis, ovarian cysts (remember, estrogen makes things grow, including cysts, endometrial lining, whatever), painful periods, bad PMS, PCOS, infertility, irregular periods, periods in girls starting as early as 8 or 9 years old. What is the cause?

In our food supply, in our environment, in our medications, in our water–we are bombarded by too much estrogen. Synthetic estrogens called xenoestrogens are making this problem worse. They are shaped like our body’s own estrogens and cause our estrogen levels to sky rocket. Xenoestrogens are present in the hormones given to animals so that they fatten up before slaughter. We eat the meat & ingest the hormones. Pesticides on fruit and vegetables & environmental pollution & plastic water bottles & household chemical cleaning agents contain xenoestrogens. Add to that hormonal birth control, which is a hefty dose of estrogen (birth control needs to suppress progesterone, the pro-gestational hormone that allows for pregnancy), and the fact that 2/3 of us are overweight (fat has an enzyme that converts adrenal hormones to estrogen), and we are ESTROGEN DOMINANT.

In addition to those dietary & environmental factors, stress makes this issue worse because it disrupts your other hormones, which in turn affects your estrogen levels. The hormones are a very complex and sensitive orchestrated dance, you see. Very susceptible to stress, diet, lifestyle. So if you are overweight, eating a lot of sugar and non-organic meats and produce laced with pesticides (or no veggies or fruit at all), not getting to bed early or suffering from insomnia, you are prone to estrogen dominance. It’s bad because it leads to the conditions I listed above (period problems, PCOS, fibroids) and can eventually lead to hormonal cancers like breast cancer, uterine, or ovarian cancer. These cancers are a result of too much estrogen.

What to do about it? Clean up your diet. Eat organic. Eat a plant-based diet with organic meats. Get enough greens. Don’t over-booze (booze causes estrogen dominance, too). Address your lifestyle: use chemical-free cosmetics & skincare stuff, natural cleaning products, and balance your hormones! How? Reduce stress, take wild yam or chasteberry if you suffer from any estrogen-dominant conditions, and do a liver cleanse a couple times a year. Your liver metabolizes hormones and if it is congested, your hormonal balance will suffer. We cannot prevent exposure to pollution, but a clean liver will help your body process these toxins. Get a water filter, too. Estrogens coming from meds have been found present in drinking water. Yuck. Contact me if this sounds like you, or even if you are doing everything right and you still suffer from the below symptoms. I help women achieve hormonal balance & overcome estrogen dominance.

Estrogen dominance symptoms:
Breast cancer • Breast tenderness • Cold hands and feet • Decreased sex drive • Mood swings • Dry eyes • Depression, anxiety, irritability • Fatigue • Fibrocystic breasts • Irregular menstrual periods • Headaches • Hypoglycemia • Insomnia • Infertility • PMS • Osteoporosis • Uterine fibroids • Uterine cancer • Water retention, bloating • Weight gain • Hair loss • Fat gain around hips and thighs • Polycystic ovaries • Endometrial cancer • Memory loss, foggy thinking • Thyroid dysfunction • Prostate cancer • Ovarian cancer

Keep Your Balance

admin — Fri, 15 May 2009 05:56:42 +0000

Hormones. Chemical messengers responsible for transmitting communication between cells. This basically means that hormones prepare the body for fighting, fleeing, sex, menstruation or menopause, activation of the immune system, stimulation or inhibition. Feeling stressed? Hormones. Feeling wired or adrenalized? Hormones. Sexy time? Hormones. Mood swings? Well, you get the picture.

Hormones are made from cholesterol, and cholesterol is both synthesized in the liver and consumed via diet. Get plenty of good fats (olive oil, flax oil, coconut oil, butter) and also proteins, and keep a clean liver for good hormonal balance. A clogged liver = a liver that is unable to process hormones and cholesterol = hormonal imbalance. Low cholesterol = not enough raw materials to make hormones.

Let’s get down to business. If you’re a woman, you know that your menstrual cycle and the production of estrogen and progesterone can be adversely affected by stress. This is because cortisol levels (your main stress hormone) rise under stress, and the body diverts all of its hormonal precursor reserves to make cortisol at the expense of other hormones, because cortisol is necessary for most of your metabolic functions and more important to keep the body running than sex hormone production. Make sense? So if you’re chronically stressed, you may have irregular periods or difficult cycles, because your body is not producing the right amounts of sex hormone. Your sex drive can also suffer.

Signs of Estrogen Deficiency
* Vaginal dryness
* Anxiety/depression
* Decreased libido
* Dry Skin
* Foggy thinking
* Depressed
* Difficulty sleeping
* Night sweats

Signs of Progesterone Deficiency
* Breast tenderness
* Insomnia
* Menstrual cramping
* Abdominal bloating
* Water retention
* Premenstrual mood swings

To balance sex hormones, get your stress level under control. Consider testing cortisol levels via saliva test. Most women suffer from too much estrogen and not enough progesterone, and this causes PMS, bad cramping, heavy bleeding, and even fibroids and endometriosis. We are exposed to many xenoestrogens (artificial estrogens) in our environment and food supply, and this is a great contributor to hormone imbalance.

Back to basics: whole foods diet, get enough rest, maintain a regular schedule, cut back on caffeine, exercise, cut down on booze and sugar. Liquid sublingual progesterone can change your life. Chaste berry can work too. I don’t like progesterone creams, which can work initially, but are stored in fat cells and may build up over time.

You can maintain the balance – know your body.

Holistic Nutrition Bytes--San Francisco Nutrition Consultation » progesterone

What Does Pollution Have to do with Hormones?

Keep Your Balance