All About Hormones - Part 2
Perimenopause
Physically, perimenopause is puberty in reverse. The hormones that our body started to produce in our early teens slowly start to wane over about a 10-year period.
But, perimenopause is much more than just a hormonal transition, it’s a major life transition (much like puberty was).
We become much more sensitive to stress and intolerant to things we were at least kinda tolerant to before. Many hormone experts believe that this is a time our whole body is asking us to shift into the lives we’ve always dreamed of. By listening carefully to how we feel during these years we can shake up our lives and create something really special. If you’d like to know more about the emotional transition of perimenopause, check out the writing of Dr. Christiane Northrup (OB/GYN). Her book The Wisdom of Menopause is fantastic.
Let’s dive into what’s going on physically, since that’s what causes so many symptoms.
Low progesterone –
Low progesterone is a common issue throughout our menstruating years, but becomes much louder during perimenopause. Cortisol, a stress hormone, and progesterone share the same precursors and our adrenals decide which hormone is made. Lots of stress = lots of cortisol and little progesterone. Lots of relaxing = lots of progesterone and little cortisol. Low progesterone is a sign of high stress.
Symptoms of low progesterone –
Breast swelling and tenderness
Mood swings
“Fuzzy thinking”
Irritability
Trouble sleeping
Water retention
PMS
Weight gain
Low estrogen –
At first, many perimenopause symptoms are due to relatively high estrogen (mostly because progesterone is low), and eventually, estrogen begins its decline and new symptoms pop up –
Hot flashes
Night sweats
Vaginal dryness
Decreased energy and ambition
Depression or mood swings
Dizziness
Headaches
Mental confusion
Urinary incontinence
Recurrent urinary tract infections
Increased susceptibility to vaginal infections
Low adrenals –
Your adrenal glands play a HUGE part in helping with this transition. A lot of symptoms improve once they’re happy, which is why they’re a part of the hormone pathway.
What to do -
To balance your symptoms of perimenopause, follow the Hormone Pathway carefully. Each step helps the body with this hormonal transition and is important to keep your body in balance.
Herbal helpers –
Sometimes, it’s nice to get a bit of support, especially if your symptoms are really loud. I’ll take you through some of the major players in the herbal world for hormone help, and you’ll find many of these combined into great herbal blends. Taken alone or in combination can be really helpful.
Dong Quai – This herb is also known as female ginseng and is great for an energy boost and to clear foggy thinking. It also helps balance our periods, including irregular periods and excessive bleeding.
Chastetree Berry (a.k.a. Vitex) – this herb helps support progesterone production and reduces estrogen production. This is great for PMS symptoms and during the early years of perimenopause. It helps with irregular periods and hormonal mood swings.
Black Cohosh – this herb is great at balancing estrogen and helping with hot flashes (although the jury is still out on its effectiveness), night sweats, depression, and mood swings.
Sage – this herb is great for hot flashes and night sweats (well, it helps a lot of people, but not everyone). You can drink it as a tea or have a more concentrated form in a capsule.
Ashwagandha – This is an adaptogenic herb that helps the body handle stress, and through that can help balance hormones. It’s also a great sleep aid :)
Tea vs Tincture vs capsule - which is better?
In a nutshell - they each have their place, and we need to choose what’s right for us and our lifestyle.
Tea - This is a weaker form of the herb and can be really effective for mild symptoms or those who are very sensitive to herbs. It can be a good place to start if you’ve never taken a herbal product.
Tincture (liquid herb) - This is the traditional way of processing a herb and it pulls out the essence of the whole herb. Tinctures are usually fast acting and the dose can be adjusted to suit your own constitution. This is my favourite way of taking a herb, but it can be hard to get in the right dose each day. And sometimes…the herbs don’t taste very good.
Capsule - Most supplements and herbal combinations are dry herbs inside capsules. This is the easiest way to take a herbal product. Always look for “standardized extracts” in a capsule to be sure it’s strong enough (sometimes listed as 1:20 or 1:100 depending on the strength). Capsules can take longer to work, so give them 2 - 4 weeks before judging if they’re working for you.
Now it’s time to Head over to Part 3, or head straight to the Hormone Balancing Pathway!
Got any questions or comments? Jump to our private Facebook Group or the Ask Lisa page :)