Learning About Hormones – An Evening On Women’s Health

I recently got to attend a really interesting talk on hormones, hosted by Dr Megan Maycher & Dr Annie Savage of Bay Wellness at Hervana Vancouver. The two women gave us so much great information, and had a huge spread of food & drinks!

• Doctors Annie & Megan see low progesterone a lot in women (this affects brain clarity, sleep etc)
• When you’re stressed, your cortisol is through the roof
  • This causes sugar and carb cravings
• Estrogen dominance: an imbalance between estrogen and progesterone (this causes heavy periods, PMS, weight gain)
• There is more diabetes & colon cancer than there used to be
• When you lose muscle mass your metabolism slows
• Acne is typically a gut issue

• “Escape Fire” – a documentary on US Netflix that everyone should watch
  • it shows how doctors have to do certain things in order to bill patients – mainly, they have to refer companies (so the companies get something out of it, and of course, it’s biased on the physician’s part). Watch the trailer and you’ll see what I mean:

• You’re never too old to start improving your health, and remember, people depend on you, so it’s important. This was a big one for me, we think we need to be strong and not make a fuss about things, and not take time to be good to our bodies or eat the right foods. Yet if we were to get sick or immobilized then our loved ones would have to take care of us, which would be a greater strain on them. That’s not something I ever want to be the cause of, so it’s time to start taking care of our bodies!

• This is part of nervous system & endocrine system
• It’s your fight or flight response (remember from high school bio? ;))
• Adrenal levels fluctuate – they are high in the morning and low in evening
• The body is not equipped for a lot of constant stress
• Heavy depression is when your cortisol is depleted (same with low sex drive & crying)

• Pop turns into formaldehyde during digestion!
• Splenda disrupts gut flora – which can cause food to come up
• Mr Clean – we’re actually absorbing these types of chemicals!

• Megan does detoxes 1-2 times per year to get rid of preservatives, alcohol, coffee, etc
• Toxins are stored in fat

• Wheat – it is bad here in North America; it seems to be a lot better in England & EU
• Soy – it robs you of your sex drive
• Coffee – it’s acidic (which feeds cancers), hard on the adrenal glands — so have it in moderation
  • decaf – avoid this too because it’s very processed
• Alcohol – have in moderation

This image shows the different body types depending on what’s wrong. From left to right, the bodies are issues with: 1. estrogen 2. adrenal (cortisol) 3. thyroid 4. liver.

Hormones & more:

• Too much testosterone – you see acne
• Low estrogen – laxity in the skin, small hairs will grow (#1 of the image above is high estrogen)
  • Beer has a lot of estrogen – did you know that?
• When cortisol is high, you can’t handle stress
  • A big belly can be an adrenal is – when cortisol is high (#2 of the image above)
  • Saliva test four times a day is the best way to look at cortisol, since it changes throughout the day (high in am low in pm)
• Hypothyroid – water retention (#3 of the image above)
  • to test your thyroid – do both T4 and T3 tests to really know for sure
• Fluid, fat around organs – this is over taxing the liver – this is from too much alcohol, prescription pills (#4 of the image above)

PRP (platelet-rich plasma)

This is a procedure where they take some of your blood out, mix it, then put back into your body

• The plasma is like a natural Botox!
• It helps for pigmentation and skin dropping
• They either do the procedure with needles or a micro pen that has mini needles

Last bits of (super important!) info:

• Sugar is as addictive as cocaine!!!
• If there’s inflammation of the gut you only get about 50% absorption!