What is your hormonal imbalance telling you?
Hormones are special chemical messengers that are made in the endocrine glands. We have around 50 different hormones.
We commonly associate them with sexual function, mood and metabolism, however, they actually control most of the major bodily functions.
These include hunger, digestive function and how we obtain energy from the food we eat, reproduction, heart rate, temperature regulation, mood and emotion, growth and development.
Symptoms of hormonal imbalance MAY include:
🔶Low energy
🔶Brain fog
🔶Anger
🔶Mood disturbance
🔶Weight gain
🔶Pain and inflammation
🔶Autoimmune issues
🔶Low immunity
🔶Low libido
🔶Sexual Dysfunction
🔶Low motivation
🔶Depression
🔶Eating disorders
🔶Food cravings
🔶Allergies
🔶Trouble sleeping
🔶Poor concentration
🔶Any digestive issues.
Anxiety can be a common symptom women experience leading up to their period.
Anxiety can feel different for everyone, some may describe it as fear over ‘little’ things, racing thoughts, rapid heartbeat, nervousness, a disconnect from their body, desire to completely avoid social situations, unfounded worries, feeling shaky, fear of speaking up, and so forth.
There are many reasons why you may be experiencing anxiety. Imbalances in estrogen, progesterone, thyroid, DHEA and cortisol can all contribute to anxiety.
Hormonal imbalances can be multifaceted, but here are some things that may help:
🔶 Magnesium – Can be a wonder mineral when it comes to anything PMS related. For helping anxiety, it enhances progesterone and GABA activity. Progesterone is a ‘calming’ hormone, it reduces inflammation and improves your mood by also enhancing GABA. GABA is the primary inhibitory neurotransmitter that promotes relaxation and sleep. Low GABA and progesterone is known to cause anxiety. Magnesium also reduces inflammation and improves the stress response. It really is an amazing mineral!
🔶 Vitamin B6 – Is essential for the synthesis of both progesterone and GABA, it reduces inflammation, and helps with the detoxification of estrogen.
🔶 Zinc – A huge player in period health and PMS. Zinc is anti-inflammatory, regulates your stress response, nourishes ovarian follicles to promote healthy ovulation and progesterone. It is essential for the synthesis, transport and action of all hormones.
🔶 Reduce/eliminate coffee – Caffeine can exacerbate anxiety. People with anxiety have found significant improvements after eliminating or reducing their caffeine intake.
🔶 Reduce alcohol – it disrupts the gut microbiota and can impair estrogen detoxification.
Reduce inflammatory items – eliminate/reduce dairy (generally a main contributor to many PMS related complaints), wheat, refined sugars, vegetable oils (incl. canola, sunflower, soy, cottonseed etc) & high histamine foods. Incorporate more fresh vegetables and some fruit, and clean sources of omega-3 fatty acids such as walnuts, chia seeds, flaxseeds, hemp seeds, wild caught salmon and mackerel etc. Less inflammation improves ovulation and therefore progesterone, and also helps support the detoxification of estrogen.
🔶 Exercise – helps improve mood, stress & anxiety. Even better if you can do it outside in nature. Find something that you enjoy doing!
🔶Improve sleep – go back to see our previous blog on how to optimise your sleep.
🔶 Herbal medicines – there are amazing herbs available to support HPA-axis, anxiety, and a healthy menstrual cycle
As you can see numerous things can have an impact on your hormones! Book in a consultation for in-depth hormonal testing, nutritional testing, case history and individual prescribing ✔️
