This post is quite personal, but I am sharing it with the hope that it will have a positive impact on at least one reader. The summer of 2005 I began searching for a reason (and a solution) to sudden "female" issues and the onset of crushing fatigue that I couldn't seem to get over.
I had been using Depo for ten years due to uncontrollable and severe periods and PMS, with positive results. However, at thirty-five, I began having strange female issues and concluded that it might be the shot. I finally skipped a round of shots and started having heavy periods every ten days, bleeding so badly that I couldn't work or function. I felt like my body was falling apart but figured it would settle down once the drug was out of my system. It didn't.
After about two months, I went to my gynecologist for help and also saw my general practitioner for a regular physical. I was informed that my blood work was "PERFECT" and told that indeed, everything I was experiencing would get better with time. My regular GP suggested antidepressants for the fatigue, mood swings and body aches. I tried a few different brands over the course of several months and found they made me feel strange and did not change my energy. In fact, from what I remember, they made me more lethargic and sort of mentally numb. As for the bleeding, he said "perimenopause" and that was that.
That's when I turned to a friend who had started walking the "natural hormone" path. I found out where she was going and how she was going about feeling better and thought I'd give it a try.
Problem was, I couldn't work or live a normal life due to the bleeding, so something had to be done rapidly. To my relief, I convinced my gynecologist to perform a hysterectomy nearly a year after the mess had started. A week before surgery, I went to the clinic suggested by my friend and started my evaluation with saliva testing to find out my hormone levels. I knew it would be a good baseline for bioidentical hormone replacement. Surgery went well and I kept one ovary (thank you Dr. Stephanie for begging me to do that).
Meanwhile, my friend recommended I read Suzzane Somers's book, Breakthrough. I was happily surprised by the information contained within (interviews with leading alternative practitioners and their research) and became excited to learn more. Thank you Suzanne Somers! Then I read Dr. Uzzi Reiss's book, Natural Hormone Balance for Women, and my life was forever changed. I finally understood the complex relationship between our many hormones and their vital functions to well-being. I felt a little stupid that I didn't know we have three main estrogens: Estrone (E1), Estradiol (E2), the most potent form, and Estriol (E3), and I was (and still am) baffled that unless you're into Alternative Heath, nobody ever talks about them and their benefits.
Estrogen is our Power House as women. Along with progesterone, it contributes to a healthy cardiovascular system, weight control, energy and SLEEP, a healthy libido, muscle growth, inflammation, memory and brain health, bone density, and our ability to handle stress, depression, anxiety and migraines, as well as hearing and so much more. Wow!
While I was healing from surgery, I couldn't research fast enough and felt excited to start feeling healthy again. My saliva results showed severe adrenal fatigue and lack of thyroid function (rarely shows up in blood work and the span of what's "normal" is huge). I also had too much estradiol and testosterone and too little progesterone. I learned that high estradiol, if left unbalanced, increased my chances of female cancer and was the reason I was so moody and had horrible PMS. I needed to significantly raise my progesterone, slightly raise my other estrogens, lower my testosterone (some estrogen is actually made from an enzyme from testosterone called aromatase), raise my DHEA, and ideally my estrogen would naturally balance, as would my mood, seesawing weight and everything else mentioned above. So about three months post-surgery, off to the compounding shop I went to start bioidentical progesterone. I was lucky -- just adding that one hormone brought my estrogen and other hormones into balance. I also supplemented with adrenal and thyroid glandulars.
Three months after I started on the sublingual progesterone, I did another saliva test and found everything was closer to being aligned as I slowly became a more stable individual. This somewhat easy routine kept me feeling positive and steady for quite a while. My estrogen/progesterone hormones are still well balanced, ten years later.
I will be honest and say, given the nature of my screwed up female system, surgery was a good option for me. I still feel that way, even though the alternative doctors would disagree. There is definitely less worry given my compromised system and my remaining ovary worked beautifully, providing plenty of estrogen until this year, so the only hormone I had to add was progesterone for nine years. Now I've added a tiny dose of bi-est and a little DHEA and feel that natural hormones have been a blessing.
Let's talk about BHRT/Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy and birth control.
This is a SUPER lengthy and controversial topic, but science is proving and has proven that there are so many benefits to NATURAL estrogen and other hormones and so many detriments to not having them that it blows my mind when I hear doctors and the general public calling it hocus-pocus and saying that it has no merit.
The birth control pill has synthetic estrogen and progestin, suppressing a woman's ovarian production of estrogen and progesterone, ultimately causing estrogen deficiency. At sixteen, because of heavy periods and massive PMS for more than half of every month, I started on a low-dose pill (even worse, I now know) thinking that would stop the madness. All it did was whack out my natural balance. My body was stubborn and still tried to make its own estrogen and was so unpredictable that I continued to search for a better solution. More than anything I wanted to control my whacky periods, mood swings and weight fluctuations, so at twenty-five I started using Depo-Provera. OMG! I thought using progestin -- which shut down my female cycle and tricked it into menopause, was the best thing ever. No more periods for the next ten years and I didn't have any of the side effects. Woo hoo!
Guess what? It could be the reason my immune system is so poor. According to Dr. Uzzi Reiss, M.D., from his latest book, The Natural Superwoman, studies of the chemical used in Depo-Provera have shown that it "suppresses cellular immunity, further compromising an already-compromised immunity." Hello adrenal fatigue and auto-immune issues.
Chemically created hormones for pharmaceutical HRT do the same thing. The most common one is Premarin. It stands for Pregnant Mare Urine, and it's altered in a lab for human use. Why would anyone knowingly put a chemical in their body that isn't something molecularly identical to what our own body makes and expect a positive long-term outcome? I know so many women that won't do hormone replacement because of fear of cancer. Instead, they lose their femininity, lack good sleep, and have higher risks associated with cardiovascular issues and bone-loss, not to mention loss of libido and a multitude of other negatives.
Supplementing with BHRT can be tailored to each person to lower the risks and improve the benefits. Bioidentical hormones are just that -- plant-based and molecularly identical to what our bodies make so we processes them easier. And they have the added benefit of being able to be tweaked as our needs change.
Sadly, I have unknowingly done so many things wrong over the years that have culminated in the constant health battle that I now endure. I will probably always live without a fully functioning immune system (though I'll never stop trying to make it so) and I'll never know exactly why, but I certainly didn't do myself any favors following western medicine.
Take my situation as one example and do your own VALID research (be careful -- lots of untrue information out there) and treat your body right. We need our hormones to be healthy and happy and high functioning (women and men). Be armed with the best information available and try not to be coerced by the allopathic medical opinion that natural medicine is hogwash. It is nature's ORIGINAL medicine.
*My mother, who had a full hysterectomy at age twenty-nine, tried quitting Premarin and going to natural hormones after she had been on it for thirty-five years. She couldn't do it. We suspect she went too long without her own hormones. She also suffers from massive immune system issues. Correlation?
Resources:
Dr Uzzi Reiss, M.D.: Natural Hormone Balance for Women (A "MUST HAVE" book)
And his latest, The Natural Superwoman
www.uzzireissmd.com
Suazzane Somers' Breakthrough is great; I think there's been a lot of change in the industry since it was written
Lifeextension.com -- they have reliable research and a thorough explanation of this topic
Mercola.com -- reliable information
Stpetehw.com -- Dr Les Cole, M.D. publishes a lot of beneficial articles
This blog is in no way a diagnosis tool or medical recommendation. Do not use it to make your own diagnosis without consulting an alternative/holistic or eastern medicine practitioner.
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