Hormonal Balance

Welcome to iHormones Lite.  My name is Robert Kress, I am a registered pharmacist and a board certified clinical nutritionist.  This is your lite version of WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT HORMONES; to help you cut through the confusion, empower yourself, and make the right decisions for your health, happiness and wellbeing.

The Full Version of iHormones will additionally provide you with:

  • All the Functions, Benefits, Signs and Symptoms of each individual hormone.
  • What testing is needed, the difference between blood testing and saliva testing.
  • How all the hormones work and 'communicate' together for proper hormonal and nutritional balance, health, and wellbeing.
  • A full Nutritional Database of what vitamins and nutrients work to support your hormonal status...for men and women.
  • Food Charts- Find out what foods have the most and the least pesticides, what fish has the most and the least mercury, what foods will alkalanize and acidify your body, the glycemic index and amounts of sugar in the foods you eat, a shopping chart, how to figure out if what you are buying is genetically modified, organic, or standard...all important for your hormonal balance.
  • Hormone Myth's- There has been a lot of confusion about hormones and its not fair to the patients, so I outline many of the popular hormone myths that might be preventing you and your loved ones from getting the best care they can get.
  • A Complete Reference Section- The facts are, natural hormonal balance is back by science, orignating from nature.  Here I provide you with many of the reference sources that I have used to gain all of this information.
  • Resources- Want to know what to do or where to go next?  I provide you with the leading resources in the world of natural hormonal and nutritional therapy; from testing companies, to books to practitioners to educational institutions.
  • More Hormones as well!

 I have owned my own "Longevity Pharmacy" where we concentrated on customized medications,  nutritional and anti-aging therapies.  And one of the reasons I do what I do, and what I find to be one of the most understood areas of our health care system is hormones.

Personally, I learned very little about functional medicine as well as the in's and out's to nutritional and bio-identical hormone therapy in pharmacy school.  This is a consistency which I find true in other professions; such as medical doctors and nursing students.

To step into the realm of functional medicine, one must posess the quality of being a consumate learner, stepping out on ones own to expand ones knowledge in these areas.  In the resource section you will find some of the most advanced teaching institutions in the realm of functional medicine, hormonal and nutritional balance.

Hormone History

Pharmaceutical companies have been creating “hormone” medications under the ability to patent unique chemicals.  This is why only until recently the study and practice of our bodies natural hormonal balance has really begun to take off.  The artifical hormone  chemicals that are created by drug companies are similar enough to exert a an effect on the hormonal receptor, but different enough to not provide the full benefits of natural hormones as well as come with their own bag of side-effects.  This is where we find the true benefit of bio-identical hormones with nutritional support; why not work with what we have been given?

...And hormones are a big deal.  We all have them, we all have to deal with them.  Why not use them to our benefit?

It has been said that it is impossible to achieve optimum health without hormonal balance; and I agree, and would like to add to that being nutritional sound is as important as well.

I have worked with countless individuals who thought how they were feeling was "normal", or were told that it was "all in their head."  The fact is, people have forgotten how it feels to feel really good, or even normal for that matter.

The problem is that due to many issues of today; ever increasing stress, increasing toxins in our environment, and food sources that are drastically lacking nutritional relevancy soaked in pesticides and artificial hormones, and on top of that being genetically modified - our hormonal systems are going through hormonal exhaustion while at the same time being confused by medications and environmental toxins mimicking but not matching what our hormones should be doing-  at times its a hormonal hell for people.

Well, it doesn’t have to be that way, and there are many things we can do to feel great and be healthier.

Fortunately more and more practitioners are taking the steps to understand the importance of proper hormone balance; doctors, pharmacists, physicians assistants, nurses, and the lay public realizes that it is important to take back their health, and to learn what is needed to gain back control of their own health.

Pharmacies are specializing in the original art and science of pharmacy compounding, where customized medications is all that they do; shunning the one size fits all approach and providing prescribers and patients alike custom solutions to fit their needs.

And it's still common to hear a practitioner new to functional medicine and natural hormonal balance ask "where's the research?"  Every day we are learning more and more about the benefits of natural hormonal balance as well as the dangers of the synthetics, and this is why I have added both a recent news and clinical reference section to this application.  Everything I share with you is backed by clinical medical science...stemming from the roots of what nature has given us.

Hormones are our body’s biological communicators.  Everyday more men and women are entering what is called Menopause for Women and Andropause for Men.  In both cases there are physical and emotional issues related to a decline in the production of one’s hormones.

Over the last decade or so that we have realized, hormonal balance is not a one-size fits all approach and what works for one person might not work for another.

Fortunately we are now at a time where we are being more pro-active with our health.  We are not just treating symptoms anymore.  All a symptom is, is a call from our body telling us, “Hey, something’s going wrong, time to fix it before things get really bad.”

In fact, you will learn how even the food choices you make can affect your hormone health; from pesticides that can mimic, but not duplicate hormones in your system, to heavy metals that can block your detoxification pathways.  For this I have added in the Food Chart section to aid you in making the best choices for your dinner table. 

We are now realizing the down falls to synthetic hormonal therapy.

Much of this has come as a result of a major on-going study known as the Womens Health Initiative study.

In 2002, the Women’s Health Initiative Study halted on estrogen and progestin (a synthetic form or progesterone).  This combination can be found in the drug Prempro(R)

This was halted three years early due to an increased risk of breast cancer in women on these hormones.

Some other findings of this study included:

  • Women taking Prempro had a 41% stroke rate.
  • Women taking Prempro had double the rate of blood clots.
  • There was a 26% increased risk of breast cancer for those taking Prempro.
  • There was a 22% increased in heart disease for those taking Prempro.

So the reaction from a lot of practitioners was to suddenly take their patients off of these hormonal preparations, with much of the result being women with symptoms of hormonal imbalance being just as bad as they began.

The result of the Women’s Health Initiative Study changed the way we look and treat with hormones.  We have gone from just treating ones symptoms, not realizing the side-effects involved, now looking at it as hormonal restoration therapy, a customized natural approach with the goal to increase ones overall health and quality of life.

Aside from the estrogens and progesterone, for many years the common form of testosterone that has been given to both men and women is a synthetic form known as methyltestosterone, and word of caution: this has been suggested to be carcinogenic to your liver.

This application has been created as a point and shoot reference for you; highlighting what each hormone does, what are the signs and symptoms of too much and too little, what can cause too much or too little of these hormones, provide you with resources and references as well.

Before we continue, I will be using the terms synthetic hormones and bio-identical or natural hormones.  Bio-identical or natural hormones are hormones that are identical to the hormones that the natural body creates.  Synthetic will refer to non-bio-identical hormones, designed and created in a lab, as well as horse derived hormones used in a drug called Premarin.(R) (I wanted to make this point clear, because where the estrogen in Premarin is not bio-identical to a human, it can be called bio-identical to a horse.)

Lastly, this application should in no way, nor is it intended to act as medical advice.  Any questions or concerns that you have in regards to all measures of your health and hormone balance and therapy should be directed towards your primary health care practitioner.

 

SYMPTOMS OF HORMONAL IMBALANCE

Hormonal imbalance can mean different things for different people.  And where men and women both experience hormonal changes and often suffer imbalances, the experience can be different for each and everyone.

Many times people may not even realize that the symptoms they are experiencing are even hormonally related, or even that an illness they are suffering from  has its hormonal roots.

Where below I offer symptoms related to what is known as menopause (for women) and andropause (for men), that does not mean that you have to be ‘at that time in life’ to experience such symptoms.

Remember, decreasing hormones is a natural part of aging, its the progressive exhaustion of the hormones we seek to balance for our health, happiness and overall well being.

Where the definition of menopause is when there is no menstrual cycle for 12 consecutive months, there are many symptoms involved related to the time of peri-menopause and menopause.  Here are a few of them, where the more symptoms you are positive for, the greater the potential for hormonal imbalances and exhaustion.

  • Hot flashes
  • Night sweats
  • Vaginal dryness
  • Mood swings
  • Irritabillity
  • Insomnia
  • Depression
  • Loss of sexual Interest
  • Panic attacks
  • Painful intercourse
  • Osteoporosis
  • Aching ankles, knees, wrists, shoulders, heels
  • Weight loss
  • Palpitations
  • Varicose veins
  • Urinary leakage
  • Memory lapses
  • Frequent urination

Where Andropause is not as concrete to diagnose as Menopause (no menstrual cycle for 12 consecutive months), there are many symptoms that follow along with the deline of male hormones such as:

  • Decreased energy
  • Decreased mental quickness
  • Decreased desire for physical activity
  • Decreased or loss of sexual interest
  • Decreased muscle tone
  • Increase in body fat especially in the mid section
  • Night sweats
  • Trouble sleeping
  • Irritability
  • Panic attacks
  • Depression
  • Loss of eagerness and enthusiasm for life