Are You Showing Signs of Estrogen Dominance?

Showing signs of estrogen dominance is becoming more and more common. It’s, unfortunately, becoming a prevalent issue among women because of our lifestyle behaviors (can ya say constant stress?) and increasing harmful environmental exposures.

Let’s chat about some natural estrogen dominance treatment tips in case you do find yourself with a hormonal imbalance, you know what steps to take to address it quickly.

What is Estrogen Dominance?

Estrogen is mainly produced by your ovaries (some from your adrenals), then gets shipped off to your uterus and breasts. Estrogen dominance is when your estrogen levels are elevated compared to your progesterone levels.

Suppose you are showing signs of estrogen dominance. In that case, you could either have high levels of estrogen and normal progesterone levels, OR have normal estrogen levels, but your progesterone levels could be low. The thing to look at is the ratio of estrogen to progesterone.

The issue doesn’t stop there. Estrogen dominance, just like any other hormone imbalance, can then impact your other hormones. So estrogen dominance can reduce the amounts of available thyroid hormone in your body, causing hypothyroidism.

Estrogen Dominance Symptoms

One woman may react differently to high estrogen levels compared to another. Estrogen dominance symptoms may also overlap with other symptoms from other underlying imbalances. That’s why it’s essential to work with a functional healthcare provider if you want to address your health issues most optimally.

Signs of Elevated Estrogen

• Heavy periods

• Irregular period

• Painful periods

• Fibroids/Endometriosis

• Weight gain (hips, thighs, and midsection)

• Bloating

• Reduced sex drive

• Mood swings

• Depression/Anxiety

• Swollen breasts

• Tender breasts

• Headaches

• Hair loss

• Bad PMS

What Causes Estrogen Dominance

There could be numerous contributing factors to your estrogen dominance. Many times, multiple issues need to be addressed to successfully address hormone imbalances.

Some Contributing Factors:

• Excess body fat

• Environmental toxins (aka estrogen-mimicking chemicals)

• Stress

• Adrenal issues

• Poor detox pathways

• Poor digestion

• Genetics

• Damaged gut

• Suboptimal functioning liver

• History of hormones and birth control

A combination of these can be the reason behind the cause of your elevated estrogen levels.

Gut Health and Estrogen Dominance

The condition of your gut can significantly impact your hormones. If you know me, you probably know I’m super passionate about gut health! Here’s just another reason why!

Your microbiome, specifically your estrobolome, plays a role in estrogen metabolism and regulation. Your estrobolome is a collection of bacteria that can turn your active form of estrogen into an inactive form, so it can be transported to be eliminated (lowering your estrogen levels).

However, if a particular type of harmful bacteria in your estrobolome is elevated, an enzyme called beta-glucuronidase, will also be elevated. This enzyme can turn that inactive form of estrogen back into the active form. Not good when you’re already dealing with excess estrogen.

So what can cause an unhealthy gut?

• Stress!

• Environmental Toxins

• Poor diet, consisting of high sugar and inflammatory foods

• Lack of variety in your diet

• Antibiotic usage (don’t forget to watch out for your conventionally raised animal products!)

Toxins and Estrogen Dominance

One of the biggest environmental factors that play a role in estrogen imbalance is toxins. Xenoestrogens, which are chemicals that imitate estrogen, are found ALL THROUGHOUT our personal care products, daily products, and yes, even our food and water sources. These hidden toxins are found in make-up, shampoo, lotions, plastics, in our food from pesticides, and our supposedly “safe” drinking water.

Not only do toxins themselves elevate estrogen levels, but toxins can damage your cells, impacting your detoxification pathways and overwhelming your liver, exacerbating your estrogen imbalance issues.

How to Address Estrogen Dominance Naturally

So, what should you do if you are showing signs of estrogen dominance? The first thing to realize is if you want to treat it naturally, you’ll have to make some lifestyle changes. When you do this, you’ll not only balance your hormones, but you’ll encourage your entire body to get back into balance…AND FINALLY, feel like yourself again!

First, you’ll definitely want to check out my previous blog on how to balance hormones naturally. This can give you a great insight into what lifestyle changes you should start incorporating into your daily life. Cycle Soothing Spray by Primally Pure is a great option to feel some relief while combatting period symptoms (Use code TAYLORDUKES for 10% off!)

5 Tips on How to Balance Estrogen Levels

Support Your Liver

Your liver needs all the love it can get! Your liver helps the active form of estrogen get transformed into the inactive form so it can be eliminated from your body. Optimize your liver function to avoid your estrogen level build-up and consider incorporating daily detox practices.

Heal That Gut!

Healing your gut can be a huge step in addressing your estrogen dominance. It’s how you can balance your microbiome (and estrobolome) and heal your gut lining. Incorporate a rainbow of food when creating your meals (and load that plate up with organic veggies!). Sip on some bone broth in the mornings a couple of times a week to give your gut some gut-healing nutrients.

How’s your stress levels?

Stress is one thing many of us Mamas brush off as being part of “normal” life. Unfortunately, stress can not only be inhibiting our body from working optimally, but it can even cause damage. It can send hormones into chaos, cause dysbiosis in your gut, and even impact digestion which is essential to eliminating excess estrogen.

Avoid Toxins

You want to avoid any extra estrogen coming into your body from outside sources. If you are experiencing signs of estrogen dominance, I highly recommend taking a look at all the products in your home. From beauty products to household cleaners to even your water sources. Check my previous article on hidden toxins for more information on this topic.

Get Digestion Moving

It’s important to get digestion moving so you can move those toxins out of your body. If you aren’t having regular bowel movements daily, then those toxins and excess estrogen can get reabsorbed back into the body. To help with digestion, consume a diet high in solube fiber, and drink plenty of water. Consider taking some high-quality prebiotics and probiotics for gut health and digestion as well!

Consider Testing and Supplementation

If you have already implemented the above suggestions, you may want to consider doing targeted hormone testing to not only see your levels, but also see the metabolites. Once you have testing you can do more specific supplementation such as DIM or Calcium d glucurate based off of your levels, symptoms, and history.

Work with a Functional Medicine Provider

If you are showing signs of estrogen dominance, working with a Functional Medicine provider can give you the information, guidance, and tools necessary to address it for good. Since there are numerous potential underlying causes, it’s important to know which ones your body is struggling with.

Using state-of-the-art lab functional lab testing and analysis, along with personalized nutrition and supplementation plans, a functional provider can help you combat your estrogen dominance.