If you are struggling with PMS, infertility, menopause, vaginal imbalances, endometriosis and more, this is for you. And hey guys – if you are worried about your own hormone balance – although I didn’t list out specifics here for you, these same fives things will do THE SAME for you!
The crazy, fast-paced, easy access world we live in, loaded with products of ALL types to consume or use, sometimes the simple things like hormone balance ruin our days or our lives – especially if we are having trouble with fertility! Let’s look at the basics and by working on these FIVE THINGS, you can start to balance out, and feel better.
Nourish Your Body
One thing most people overlook is the quality and types of foods they are consuming. This is THE WAY to get better hormone balance. The tips below are the additional things we focus on but how those things will happen is through the foods that go into our bodies.
Processed foods are changing the fertility and transitions in life as we age with hormones. Focusing on eliminating those foods, and eating whole foods is the thing that will help most of us with balance. What are we talking about?
Avoid the Following:
Sugar and refined grains: Raise blood sugar and stress the adrenal glands, feed yeast, increases dysbiosis (imbalanced gut) and cause a myriad of serious health problems. These are the typical things you think of… white bread, pastas, white rices, and most packaged breads, and products contain hidden sugars. Including things like salad dressings, commercial yogurts and more! Read the INGREDIENTS (stop worrying about the percent nutrition facts). OR the best thing is to make the item yourself, or just switch to a whole food that doesn’t need a label!
Chemical additives: The average American consumes ten pounds of food additives each year. This stresses the liver and the immune system, and can lead to problems with hormone balance. Some chemical additives mimic our own hormones causing disruption!
Hydrogenated oils and fried foods: Hydrogenated oils promote inflammation and cardiovascular disease, while decreasing immunity and hormonal health. Nerves and brain function are also affected. These are things like canola, vegetable, margarines and more. These are highly processed oils. Switching to oils like olive, butter, avocado, coconut oil, and lards are better options.
Repetitious eating: The foods that one becomes sensitive to are usually those eaten on a daily basis. A simple rotation diet minimizes stress to the immune system from hidden allergies. Try eliminating common allergens such as wheat and other grains, dairy, corn, soy, citrus fruits, chocolate, coffee, and soda. The other great thing that happens then is you get a variety of nutrients coming into the body and that is how your body functions optimally!
Processed and packaged foods: These foods are devoid of real nutrition. Processed and packaged foods create nutritional deficiencies, diminishing one’s health and vitality. They come with a lot of chemicals as well (see above). If you are buying something in a package, first consider if you could make it yourself, and if not, is there a whole food swap instead? If not read ingredients and choose the less processed items.
What can we do instead to promote the best hormone balance possible?
Drink eight 8‐ounce glasses of pure water every day: You need water to eliminate toxins. Not only that but you need water to move hormones through the body, and to create necessary components, and to properly digest foods with those building blocks. Tea and coffee do not count! In fact, for every 8 oz. of those beverages you need an additional 12 oz. of water.
Most of the food you consume (more than 50% by volume) should be vegetables: Vegetables are high in antioxidants, trace minerals, fiber, vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients.
Eat a variety of foods with a balance among fat, carbohydrate, and protein. When we talk about carbohydrates we mean whole food items like lots of vegetables, as well as tubers and other starchy vegetables.
Eat organic whole foods where possible. There is a difference in nutrient value (measured), as well as lacking of chemicals in the food. This is important because you are trying to eliminate anything that might be fooling your body into believing it is your own hormone. Keep this organic to avoid hormone disruptors in your food.
Exercise (according to your practitioner’s suggestions). Movement of the body is important for all aspects of life. You don’t need to run marathons or do hours and hours at the gym, but simply walking, and light exercise will make a difference in balance in your body.
Support Your Digestion
Many people today suffer from GERD, acid reflux, gas, bloating, IBS, Celiac and so much more. These types of symptoms and issues are affecting nutrient absorption – which is essential to create hormones and balance.
By working on the nourishing foods listed above you get a better support for digestion as well. Refined and processed foods create a lot of digestive issues and imbalances. You may need to do even more to support or balance back out your digestion personally. To learn more join the free five day group – all delivered via email as soon as you sign up!
You need to be able to break food down properly to get the necessary components to build hormones. Those include healthy fats, minerals, water, protein. If your body can’t break down the food to extract these properly you will not be able to maintain balance. But the first step is to get the proper nutrients in. This in itself will help alleviate some digestive imbalance and move you toward the direction you want.
Working on more balance in the gut is important. Supplementing may be something along with diet that would help you boost your ability to create and transport hormones. If you are interested in a free consult, click here to learn more.
Regulate Your Blood Sugar
Without proper blood sugar regulation your body is always in a flight or fight response mode. This causes stress on the body, and stress can influence hormone production significantly.
If you ever feel hangry, tired before meals, tired after meals, sluggish or light headed if meals are delayed, wake in the middle of the night and more, you may have some imbalance. None of these experiences should happen if you are eating balanced, and have good sensitivity to insulin and sugar control.
We can start to get better control by eliminating processed food, looking at our sugar and carbohydrate type of intake. Working toward more vegetables less white breads, pastas, rice and processed foods is the first step. Look at your product labels. Start removing things with “ose” after them, or labelled with sugar! You will be surprised when reading ingredients on product labels how many things are filled with sugar. Even things that you would think would have NO sugar.
Be aware of artificial sweeteners as well. These can cause dramatic blood sugar spikes and then lows. These are also very harmful in balance and other ways in your body.
Look at eating enough protein and healthy fats. Healthy fats are another preferred energy source for your body, that also help stabilize blood sugar levels. More on that below.
Control Stress & the Response through Adrenals
Your adrenals are small glands on top of your kidneys that control that stress response. Today that response is triggered by continual daily work stress, not enough movement in our days, as well as stress from food and sugar regulation in our body. The more of it – the harder it is for our body to keep up.
This same pathway is used for hormone balance and control. If it is taxed by controlling sugar levels and our stressful environments, it only has time for so much.
Now sure if you have adrenal overwork… here are some symptoms… fatigue, digestive problems, obesity, depression, dizziness, fainting, allergies and many other problems.
People with weak adrenal glands frequently crave coffee and sugar, as well as salt. Sugar and caffeine stimulate the adrenal glands.
You can work on lowering this load by proper stress management and adjusting your food/nutrient intake. Look at your products, how toxic are those? Are they creating a stress response to remove the chemicals?
Try some yoga, meditation or a hobby or interest of yours. If you don’t really know what you like for exercise, meditation or yoga – try them out and see. Maybe yoga isn’t for you… how about hiking? Wilderness camping? Try different things that help you feel less stressed. Making sure you make time to focus daily on a stress relief technique is key!
Eat Healthy Fat
Fat … one of the biggest most leading macronutrients (well right behind carbs) in our culture here today!
We have been led to believe (from false research and major industry publicity) that fat is our enemy. It is what makes us fat, and we should avoid it and cholesterol all the time – THIS IS FALSE! It is especially false when it comes to hormone creation.
We need healthy fat sources in order to build hormones and have healthy cell and tissue function. It also helps with feelings of joint pain, stiffness and so much more. Again – it also helps balance blood sugar!
Not sure what cooking oils to use? Check this post out.
Beyond that choosing healthy animal and plant sources for fats is important as well. Choosing avocado, coconut oils, coconuts, nuts, fish, seafood, and grass fed and pastured meats is key to getting a nice balance.
Supplementing with a clean source of omega 3 or a blend of 3, 6, 9 is a great addition also and almost nobody has a great balance of omega 3 in their body.
If you want to learn more about eating healthy fats and their importance and what it can do for you – check out this article.
There are other components to healthy hormones. This is for fertility to PMS to menopause to male hormone levels! Important vitamins, minerals, hydration and more!
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