Many of us are unwittingly contributing to our hormone imbalances without even knowing it. So much of our hormone health is tied to our daily habits, daily rhythms, and, well, how we do life! These micro things that we are doing (or not doing) really do add up, and sometimes --

ALL IT TAKES IS A SIMPLE SHIFT IN OUR EVERY DAY HABITS TO CREATE LASTING, PROFOUND, MEASURABLE CHANGE

First, lets talk about some of the big things that could be harming your hormones. This is not a comprehensive list by any means, but these are some big ones that I see consistently among clients and students with hormone imbalances like irregular periods, PCOS, anovulation, fertility challenges, low energy, low libido, etc.

Mismanaged blood sugar

Not enough natural light

Under Nourishing (not eating enough)

Unabated Stress

Undereating carbohydrates

Lets break this down a little bit.

Mismanaged Blood Sugar

Blood sugar stabilization is the number one step in balancing your hormones. The very first thing that your endocrine system must do is get glucose (sugar) to your brain, your heart, your muscles, and into every single one of your 40 trillion cells that make up your beautifully complex body. Before it can do anything related to a healthy period, optimal fertility, a pain-free/ PMS-free luteal phase, etc, it must take care of blood sugar stabilization to keep you alive. The reason that blood sugar balance is first in any hormone healing protocol is because your body will ALWAYS prioritize YOUR survival over having a healthy period. Or getting pregnant. Or staying pregnant. Or providing you with a juicy, ravenous libido. Or making sure you have optimal energy that lasts all day every day. And getting blood sugar into your cells, so that your brain can think, your heart can beat, and your muscles can run away from a threat, is it’s NUMBER ONE JOB. Everything else comes after that. So if your blood sugar stabilization is out of whack, everything else will be too. Eat breakfast, eat within 90 minutes of waking up, eat protein / fats/ carbs together, eat every 3-4 hours, have a snack before bedtime, fuel extra if you're working out or exerting a lot.

Not Enough Natural Life

Sunlight is an essential nutrient. Our entire hormonal system is governed by our relationship to the natural light outside. And we humans truly are beings of light. You have 40 trillion cells in your body. Every single one of them has a little powerhouse organelle called the mitochondria. Your neurons have up to 2 million mitochondria. The ovum that you will ovulate each month? That cell has 600,000 mitochondria! Mitochondrial health is everything. The photoreceptors inside your mitochondria gobble up the photons from the light, and in response to those light photons, your mitochondria produce more energy, and they do so more efficiently. As an extension, your other cells will work better when the mitochondria produce more energy. This is one reason of how light therapy helps such a diverse range is issues, because mitochondria are found in every cell of the body. Living in our modern world that is filled with artificial light is extremely stressful from a cellular standpoint, and also negatively impacts your circadian rhythm, which governs our hormones. Fertility is increased when we have adequate daily exposure to natural light. Morning light is best for hormone balance. Aim for 10-15 minutes of natural light in your eyes before 10am. If you wear contacts or glasses, simply take them off. Don't wear sunglasses. You want the light to hit your optic nerve which talks to your suprachiasmatic nucleus which resets the circadian rhythm.

Undernourishing

Simply put, this means not eating enough. So.Many.Women are undereating. By and large, in my practice, MOST women I work with have come from a place of restriction like ketogenic or low carb diets and yo-yo dieting over the years. Many have been on weight loss protocols and caloric deficits for a long time. Many have played with fasting and intense cleansing / detoxing that restricts calories. TLDR: we need to be eating more. This is also a nuanced conversation because every woman has her own unique set of needs, depending on the season of life she is in. For example – my nutritional needs as a breastfeeding mother of 2 (after 2 back to back pregnancies pretty close together) are quite different from the gal who is not in the season of bearing children and breastfeeding. We have to look at our unique individuality and determine what our needs are based on where we are in life and what our goals are. I never give blanket suggestions to clients because I don’t believe in a one size fits all approach to healing, but in general, some good rules of thumb to follow are:

• eat every 3-4 hours
• shoot for 3 meals a day and 2-3 snacks as needed
• make sure you’re building your plate that has a combination of protein / fat / carbohydrates to ensure proper blood sugar balance and a complete macronutrient profile
• consume plenty of protein (100g minimum) for adequate liver health and thyroid health
• eat a variety of animal foods from grass-fed / pasture raised sources
• eat a variety of ripe seasonal produce
• make a plan each week for meals and snacks so you’re never standing in your kitchen unsure of what to eat
• utilize the crockpot for easy throw together soups and stews that take only 10-20 minutes to prep and then are easy to make ahead of time
• cook smarter not harder: cook once, eat twice – enjoy leftovers for lunch the next day, and throw an egg on your leftovers at breakfast time (I love leftover soup in the morning with a soft boiled egg in there!)

Unabated Stress

Stress is maybe thee biggest issue in the lives of women with hormone imbalances. This is where, in my practice, I see clients who are doing “all the right things”, taking the “best highest quality” supplements, who are still not seeing optimal results. When we dig a bit deeper, I usually find out that they are not addressing the stressors in their lives. The quick version is this: when you are experiencing stress  (whether it is real actual stress, or merely just PERCEIVED stress), the hypothalamus (your master hormone gland) reduces its signals to your pituitary gland, which reduces production of FSH and LH – the two hormones you need for ovulation. If FSH and LH production are down, you don’t ovulate. If you don’t ovulate, you don’t get the appropriate balance of estrogen to progesterone. When these hormones are off, you may have a late period, or your PMS may be more intense, or you may have quite a heavy bleed because of the hormone imbalances due to lack of ovulation. And it goes without saying that if you don’t ovulate, you don’t get pregnant. Also, when we have excessive amounts of cortisol (one of our main stress hormones) in circulation because of unmanaged, rampant stress, there’s a steal that happens, hormonally speaking. The mother hormone, pregnenolone, from which all other sex hormones are made, will ALWAYS steal resources away from synthesizing sex hormones in favor of cortisol production. This is because cortisol is absolutely a survival hormone, meant to help us in times of danger, famine, and being chased by an axe murderer. You don’t have time to stop for a scone when you’re being chased, so cortisol talks to your fat cells and your stored glucose reserves and gets them into circulation so that you have fuel for your brain, heart, and muscles that are carrying you away from said axe murderer. We NEED cortisol. We LOVE that we have cortisol to save us in these dire times. The problem is this excessive amount of cortisol that we were never meant to be exposed to, day in and day out. You cannot have hormone balance without addressing your stress. Incorporate de-stressing activities every single day, and do your best to curate a life that involves as little stress as possible. Meditation, prayer, gratitude, nature, slowing down, blood sugar balance, hobbies, laughter, dancing, play, organization, knitting, coloring in a coloring book, walking, swimming, baths, music, journaling, calling a loved one, etc. 

Restricting / Undereating Carbohydrates

There is a lot of confusion and noise in the world around carbs. Many women truly believe that carbs are bad, that carbs make us fat, because carbs convert to sugar in the body and sugar is the devil and it feeds cancer and makes us fat etc etc etc. This is a clever way to tell you only *part of the story instead of the whole truth, and sadly I think they want us confused about this issue.  Lets talk about it from a physiological standpoint and just bust the myths once and for all.  Because if you’re a woman with a hormonal imbalance like PCOS, anovulation, infertility, endometriosis, unpredictable periods, PMS, among many other things – trust me you need carbohydrates. Your brain runs on glucose. Glucose is the preferred energy source of our cells. Your brain will either use the glucose you provide it via the carbohydrates in your food, OR it will force your body to MAKE glucose from your tissues, ligaments, muscle tissue, and organs through a process called gluconeogenesis. This process is very taxing on the liver and is our backup mechanism for creating glucose so our brain has energy to run. It is not meant to be used as the primary way we get and utilize glucose. Undereating carbohydrates also impairs hypothalamic signaling. Every single one of your hormonal processes comes from the control center in your brain – the hypothalamus. When we restrict carbohydrates, the hypothalamus does not have what it needs to signal to your pituitary and your adrenals and then your ovaries and the thyroid to do their important jobs. When the hypothalamus is undernourished from restricting or eliminating carbs, point blank: your hormones go haywire. When we restrict carbs (the fuel source for the hypothalamus), follicle stimulating hormone is suppressed, luteinizing hormone is suppressed, and then we don’t ovulate. This is the wisdom of the hypothalamus: when it knows there isn’t enough energy / fuel (aka food) available, it stops ovulation. Your hypothalamus KNOWS that you don’t have enough sustenance to bring new life into the world right now, so it suppresses our ovulation in order to preserve our own body and life and survival. Long story short – STOP RESTRICTING CARBS! My favorite carbohydrate sources are: ripe fruits, fresh squeezed orange juice, root veggies like potatoes, sweet potatoes, turnips, carrots, parsnips, maple syrup, raw local honey, and panela sugar.

Sometimes all we need to do is make a few practice changes to the way we are living our life, and massive change follows. I'm all about simplifying these days; bringing it back to the basics, the tried and true tips that we KNOW yield health and vitality, and just staying consistent with these things as opposed to doing 487646 things, taking 98648 supplements, and spending a pretty penny on gadgets that may or may not be totally necessary.

Keep it simple. Work on your blood sugar, get outside in the morning, eat enough food, manage your stress, eat ample carbohydrates (balanced with protein + fat, of course!), and let me know how your health improves!

Which of these areas do you have challenges with? Let me know below!

Yours in Abundant Health,

xoxo

Emily 😊