Hormonal Imbalance
“I think I have a hormonal imbalance.”
I hear this from patients all the time. Usually the person in referring to hormones related to their menstrual cycle, but the phrase “hormonal imbalance” could mean so many different things. Hormones influence your health and healing in a wide variety of ways. Here are a few categories of hormones relevant to your well-being:
Stress hormones cortisol and adrenaline
Sex hormones estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA
Metabolic hormones insulin, ghrelin, leptin
Thyroid hormones T3 and T4
Brain hormones ACTH, LH, FSH, GnRH, TSH, growth hormone, and others
As you can see from this (incomplete) list, your body produces many different hormones, each playing a crucial role in how your body functions. Deficiencies and excesses of each hormone will cause a different set of symptoms.
What causes hormonal imbalance?
Hormonal imbalances are triggered by a long list of causes, and it’s going to be different for everyone.
These include (but are not limited to) poor sleep, malnutrition and nutrition excess, insufficient detoxification pathways, lack of movement, genetics and epigenetics, stress, trauma, digestive disorders, infections, aging, loneliness, and others.
It’s necessary to take into consideration your symptoms, health history, and lab testing to best understand what’s causing symptoms related to hormonal imbalance.
Treatment for hormonal imbalance
Treatment will address 1) the type of hormonal imbalance is causing your symptoms, and 2) the underlying causes that are triggering the deficiencies or excesses.
Depending on the imbalance, you may benefit from hormonal replacement therapy (HRT). For example, hormone replacement is a common treatment for under-active thyroid, low estrogen and testosterone, and diabetes. But for each of these three conditions, if symptoms or imbalances are mild, non-medication treatments are likely an option.
Hormonal imbalances, in general, respond well to a holistic, integrative treatment plan, even when HRT is most effective option. Recommendations for nutrition, herbal medicine, and lifestyle changes can help to support your body’s ability to produce healthy levels of hormones within the normal range.
You can rebalance your hormones!
With a root cause investigation and a holistic treatment plan, your body has the capacity to find hormonal balance. Naturopathic medicine shines when it comes to hormonal health. If you’d like to learn how to take care of your hormones so that you rest more deeply and feel more vibrant, click the button below to talk with Dr. Savannah about working together.