MY HORMONAL JOURNEY I struggled with hormonal issues throughout my 20s. Every month I wondered whether this one would be just difficult or a truly grueling ordeal. All too often, I felt like an alien had taken up residence inside me, bringing with it bloating, nausea, ravenous appetite, low energy, and terrible cramping. Usually I enjoyed life but not when this other entity paid its monthly visits. When I became a nurse-practitioner, I discovered that I was far from alone. Many of my patients struggled with difficult PMS, painful periods, or challenging perimenopause, the transition into menopause that typically begins in the early or mid-40s and continues until menopause finally takes over. My patients were also dealing with endometriosis, fibroids, polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), and premature ovarian failure (POF) and other fertility issues. Many women felt, as I did, that hormonal issues were playing far too big a role in their lives. We all longed for a straightforward solution. As I continued my practice and began reading the literature in the field, I learned a great deal about healing both my patients and myself. To my amazement, I discovered that the right foods could keep our hormones in harmony, especially when aided by deep, restful sleep, energizing exercise, the right herbs and nutritional supplements, and, if necessary, some gentle bioidentical hormones. I found out the best ways to avoid environmental toxins that mimic the effects of estrogen and disrupt our hormonal balance. I learned how psychological stressors of all kinds--from everyday challenges to our family histories--affect our adrenal glands, and how our adrenals, in turn, are one of the keys to hormonal balance. (I even wrote a book on the topic: Is It Me or My Adrenals?: Your Proven 30-Day Program for Overcoming Adrenal Fatigue and Feeling Fantastic Again.) Having grown up with a father who was a psychologist and a mother who was a social worker, I was very much aware that psychological issues affect us, but I never fully appreciated their physical implications until I started working with women and their hormones. Most important, I learned how crucial it was to listen to our bodies--hormones and all--and to respect the messages they give us. Eventually, my partner and I joined Christiane Northrup, M.D., and her partner to start a new practice. We kept the name I had first chosen, Women to Women, which I'm proud to say has become a national leader in the field of women's health. Drawing on the new perspectives we were all discovering together, Chris went on to write a landmark book, Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom, which has helped transform the way women's health issues are regarded in this country and around the world. Our groundbreaking work crystallized around the two key ideas I've mentioned: first, that our hormones are deeply affected by diet, lifestyle, and environmental influences--including the many toxins and pollutants in our food, air, and water--and second, that our understanding of the world and our place in it plays a hugely important role. A woman who rarely exercises and eats a diet high in sugar and the wrong kinds of fats is far more likely to have a challenging menstrual cycle than a woman who gets the right kind of exercise and eats a healthy balance of protein, carbs, healthy fats, and fiber. Similarly, a woman who has learned from her earliest childhood that her own needs must take a backseat to the needs of others is likely to experience an additional barrage of daily stress in her life--stress that has a powerful effect on her body chemistry, including her hormones. The exciting news was that we could do a great deal to help these women, which became a lifelong passion for me. We could treat our patients' hormonal issues naturally, safely, and effectively, with near-miraculous effects on their overall health. It was amazing to see a woman whose month had been shadowed by mood swings, bloating, and cravings come into my office glowing, happy, and peaceful after just a few weeks of treatment. It was incredibly gratifying to hear our patients tell us, "Finally, I have periods without cramping" or "For the first time in a long time, I feel sexy and sensual again." Many of the approaches we took were truly pioneering. We could see from our own experience the huge impact that nutrients had on physiology, even before there was widespread scientific evidence to back up that perception. Now, several decades later, such scientific support abounds. For example, the Harvard scientist Walter Willett, M.D., has shown clearly how deeply our bodies are affected by what we eat. Articles in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine attest to the biochemical effects of stress upon our bodies and to the medical importance of relieving stress and/or transforming our responses to it. This cutting-edge work is wonderful validation for the medical approaches we developed and the exciting results we've achieved. And so, finally, I began to make friends with my monthly cycle. I ate foods that were right for my body, slept a refreshing eight hours a night, and got moderate but vigorous exercise. I took herbs and nutritional supplements that were helpful for my particular biology. I explored the psychological issues that were adding unnecessary stress to my life and found new ways to get the support I needed. To my surprise, I discovered that my menstrual cycle was hormonally designed to include a creative, fruitful time in midcycle and then a quiet, peaceful, inward-turning time as my cycle reached its end. After balancing my hormones, I could finally enjoy the ebb and flow of my monthly cycle, appreciating its rhythms and shifts as women have done for generations. My own experience brought home the huge role hormones play in how we feel. Now when I see women every day with concerns, questions, and frustrations about their hormones, I really get it. And when I hear women tell me that their hormonal struggles shape their lives--that they plan their months around mood swings and cramps, or that perimenopause is making them feel old before their time--I get that, too. This suffering is simply not necessary. That's why I have written this book: to provide you with a simple, clear, accessible, 28-day program that can help you balance your hormones and make you feel like yourself again. We all deserve no less. FUNCTIONAL MEDICINE: AN INTEGRATED APPROACH This book comes out of a branch of medicine known as functional medicine: a holistic, integrated approach to the body and health. Whereas conventional medicine often tends to zero in on individual symptoms, make a diagnosis, and prescribe a treatment specifically targeted to that symptom or to the condition that immediately produced it, functional medicine casts a wider net. Our focus is less on symptoms and more on systems as we try to keep the entire matrix of the body in sight. As a functional-medical practitioner looking at hormonal health, for example, I look at a patient's endocrine system (which produces all the body's hormones); neurotransmitters (biochemicals that affect mood, energy, and mental focus); the cardiovascular system; nutrition; lifestyle (exercise, sleep, and amount of stress); and psychological issues. As I consider information about all of those systems, I begin to piece together what interventions might be needed. Instead of looking "downstream" at the symptoms and how to treat them, I look "upstream" at the causes and how to transform them. After all, unless they've been in an accident of some kind, people do not go in a single day from perfect health to significant illness. Wellness and illness are a continuum we travel, with many factors affecting where along that continuum we fall. One of the most important factors in health--perhaps the most important from a functional medicine point of view--is food. Accordingly, I view food as medicine, and one of my first concerns--as you'll see in this book--is to make sure that my patients are eating the foods that can make them well, and avoiding the foods that can make them sick. Sugar, refined carbohydrates, trans and hydrogenated fats, preservatives, and artificial ingredients can be particularly toxic and are often implicated in hormonal issues as well as in many other health concerns. My functional-medicine colleagues and I understand that we can literally use food to shift a patient's biochemistry, often with dramatic results. In these pages, then, I'll talk you through the basic science of how hormones affect your body, mind, and emotions. I'll show you how to overcome hormonal symptoms, including weight gain, cravings, irritability, mood swings, and depression. I'll explain how rebalancing your hormones can help you lose weight and how it can do wonders for your skin, your hair, and your overall sense of vitality and well-being. I'll show you how to come to terms with the intense feelings associated with PMS and perimenopause so you can regain your emotional balance and learn the hidden significance of these psychological storms, as well as strategies for dealing with endometriosis, fibroids, and PCOS. I will also help you understand the effects of the "body burden" of toxins and hormonal disrupters. This burden includes poor diet, lack of exercise, insufficient sleep, and psychological stress, but it also includes environmental toxins. These are pollutants that can be found in our food, water, and air. They are also present in many household cleaning products and such beauty care products as shampoo, moisturizer, and cosmetics. I'll show you how to relieve yourself of as much of that body burden as possible, which could make a huge difference in your hormonal health. Finally, I'll help you restore your sensuality and sexuality so you can reclaim this important aspect of your identity and take pleasure in your body. Sex is such a wonderful part of life! Yet many of us face hormonal and psychological obstacles that keep us from fully enjoying our sexuality, our sensuality, and our intimate relationships. I'll show you how to rediscover your own vitality and sensuality and offer some suggestions for how to communicate more effectively with your partner. Then, at the end of this book, you'll find a complete 28-day plan for rebalancing your hormones so you can once again enjoy the full experience of your life--every day of the month. I'll talk you through a hormone-healthy diet and lifestyle, with 28 days' worth of meal plans and recipes. So welcome to your wonderful new world of hormonal health! No matter what your age, your weight, your medical condition, or your history, you can reclaim your body, your emotions, your energy, and your sex life. All you need is the right information and the willingness to begin. And how exciting is that? Excerpted from Is It Me or My Hormones?: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly about PMS, Perimenopause, and All the Crazy Things That Occur with Hormone Imbalance by Marcelle Pick All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
