Estrogen is a powerful and important hormone, and it sure needs to be respected. But it’s not the only hormone out there, and can be quite misunderstood taken out of context.
It seems like even the functional medicine space is still under the spell of the estrogen money making industry. They have been bamboozled beyond belief. When you look at the history of it, that s**t is daaarrrrk. There's a lot of $$$ in it. Unfortunately, at women's expense. Always at women's expense.
It is much easier for the female body to make estrogen than any other hormone, especially if we have enough body fat. All sex hormones are built from cholesterol, including estrogen. Unlike progesterone, we can make estrogen in our tissues and fat cells. The placenta makes it too when we're pregnant. DHEA, an adrenal hormone, can turn into estrogen. We can also turn testosterone and progesterone into estrogen via a process called aromatization.
What is estrogen?
Estrogen is a powerful, anabolic (growing/building) hormone and plays a large role in maintaining and building proper tissue structure.
The 3 main types:
Estrone (E1) Is primarily made in the tissue and fat cells. Often considered the “medium strength” estrogen.
Estradiol (E2) Is the most powerful form of estrogen made in the ovaries during reproduction.
Estriol (E3) Is primarily made during pregnancy by the placenta and fetus. Often considered the weakest strength estrogen.
Female physiology naturally creates more estrogen because there are seasons we need to harness cellular proliferation and growth, including but not limited to:
Pregnancy
Egg maturation and ovulation
Uterine (endometrial) lining growth
Glandular tissue growth during puberty
Fat (fuel) storage for breastfeeding in hips and thighs
Now let’s introduce an interesting fact Dr. Hans Selye discovered. Dr. Selye is a scientist, and, in his experiments, he noticed that when he induced stress, estrogen would increase exponentially. It showed that estrogen can be a hormonal response to shock and stress. Science and therefore most health practitioners including alternative practitioners continue to ignore this discovery to this very day.
Estrogen has a purpose. It builds things. It grows things. It protects against break down. There's a time, a place, and a context for this. You can see how too much building, too much growth can lead to not-so-great things. In addition, we live in a world that is BOMBARDED by estrogen. If it's not the food, it's in the products. If it's not in the products, it's in the packaging. If it's not in the packaging, it's in the clothes. If it's not in the clothes, it's in the air. If it's not in the air, it's in the water. Almost like it's... intentional??
I am going to stray from the main topic to make my point.
Beer, makeup, plant based everything, seed oils, cleaning products, plastics, beans, 100,000 chemicals introduced monthly, grains, seeds, perfume, red dye no. 5, birth control, nuts, gasoline fumes, nut milks, cannabis, laundry detergent, clothing dye, synthetic clothing... I can go on and on. These all promote estrogen.
Have you noticed? Men acting less like men and more like whiny little babies with boobs and no motivation to do anything?
If men, who make way less estrogen than women are being affected, how do you think WE women are being affected?
This leads to the following ways Estrogen can be out of balance:
1. Estrogen Dominance:
We are making too much estrogen or turning other hormone into estrogen.
2. Estrogen Dominance:
Estrogen levels are in range, but not enough progesterone to balance it out.
3. Exposure to too many environmental estrogens
Like xenoestrogens which are synthetic chemicals and phytoestrogens which are in plants.
4. Estrogen accumulation:
This is where tissue estrogens increase and get “stuck”.
How does estrogen get accumulated?
Let’s take a deeper look…
Checking your hormones via the blood stream is just a snapshot of what the body is moving that day. It’s a highway, not the destination. We can have more than 5-50x more estrogen in our organ cells and tissues than we do in our blood or saliva.
Estrogen is powerfully effective at protecting against oxidation. Tissues will make more of it in the presence of metabolic stress, heavy metals (like iron), and free radicals.
To move estrogen from the tissues into the system we need? Yes you guessed it, a good metabolic function, proper thyroid functions, juicy progesterone levels and minerals, and nutrients to move estrogen from the tissue. Unfortunately, these tests are misleading. It is possible to have low estrogen on a blood or saliva test and still be estrogen dominant.
Here are some of signs of
estrogen dominance:
Mid cycle spotting, Fibroids, Ovulation Pain, Endometriosis, Ovarian Cysts, Mood Swings, Weight Gain, Fatigue, Cellulite, Bloating, Water Retention / Puffiness, Insomnia, PMS, Migraines / Headaches, Constipation, Candida Overgrowth, Irregular Periods, Hot Flashes, Heavy Menstrual Bleeding, Large Clots, Breast Tenderness, Infertility / Miscarriage, Acne, Hypoglycemia, Varicose Veins, Skin Problems, Hair Loss, Brain Fog, Goiter/Enlarged Thyroid, Joint Pain, Chronic UTIs, Anxiety, Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, Histamine intolerance, Mold Intolerance, Gall bladder issue, Poor Libido, Hashimoto’s, Allergies, Autoimmune Issues, Breast Cancer, Mole Growth.
Yes this is a long list and estrogen dominance is a very common root cause to a lot of your symptoms.
Estrogen needs to continuously be broken down and excreted by the body once it’s used. It goes through 3 phases:
Phase 1: LIVER DETOX
Here potential fat-soluble toxins get initially broken down into less powerful forms.
Phase 2: LIVER DETOX
In this phase toxins get further broken down into water soluble forms and bound to bile and other substances.
Phase 2.5: ELIMINATION STAGE
Urine
Stool
Lymph
To detoxify Estrogen, you need the following nourishment:
Bioavailable proteins like eggs, milk, meat
Nutrients dense saturated fats like butter, tallow and coconut oil
Energy – rich carbs like white rice, fruits, starchy vegetables
As well as nutrients like Magnesium, Potassium, Sodium, Copper, Vitamin E, B Vitamins, Vitamin A (retinol), Iodine, Selenium, Vitamin C (whole food derived), and Zinc.
When you start nourishing your body with these nutrients daily you will start to detox hormones and toxins which may make you feel a bit worse before you feel better. This is why at Dynamic Wellness, we focus on BALANCE. We want enough estrogen to do the jobs we need in the season of life we're in, but we want enough PROGESTERONE to balance it out so it can give us life. Progesterone is the Yin to estrogen's Yang.
Stay tuned for part 2.
References:
Carla Rothenberg, The Rise and Fall of Estrogen Therapy: https://web.archive.org/web/20060905132706/http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/data/711/Rothenberg05.pdf
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