Hormones are chemical messengers that travel throughout the body coordinating complex processes like growth, metabolism, and fertility. Hormones exert a powerful influence over all physical, intellectual and emotional behavior. Problems with weight, memory, sleep, digestion, blood pressure, high cholesterol, cravings, addictions, sexual dysfunctions, and problems associated with the immune system, are all influenced by the endocrine system.

Hormones can be broken down into adrenal and sex hormones.

Adrenal Hormones:

The adrenal glands produce two primary hormones, DHEA and cortisol. Both are considered the major shock absorber hormones in the body. They buffer us to stress and the negative impact it can have on both mental and physical function.

Sex Hormones:

Sex hormones determine our gender, how we age, how long we live, and define our femininity and masculinity. The sex hormones found throughout the body are estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone. While both males and females have all of these hormones present in their bodies, females produce predominately estrogen and progesterone; while males produce mainly testosterone.

Hormonal effects on the body

Your body uses hormones to adapt to specific situations. Whether it is running away from an angry dog or reading a book by the fireplace, your body utilises hormones to best prepare you for whatever situation you find yourself in. Your body is well equipped to deal with extreme situations that can range from physical stress to emotional stress. But your body functions at its best when such experiences are brief, and there is enough time in between stressors to recuperate.

When stressors on the body exist for prolonged periods of time, hormonal imbalances can occur. The normal mechanisms your body uses to adapt to these challenges become depleted

and clinical side effects begin to appear. Because hormones effect so many different aspects of the body, the outward symptoms can be varied and nonspecific.

Adrenal Fatigue:

As you are exposed to stressors, whether they be physical emotional or intellectual, the adrenal glands play an important role in helping your body carry on. Cortisol, the primary hormone that is released in times of stress; provides a temporary boost of energy, a lower sensitivity to pain, and increased mental alertness. Unfortunately, the modern lifestyle most Americans live exposes us to chronic stress. Under the constant bombardment of stressors, your body begins to use up its stores of cortisol and the adrenal glands eventually start to burn out and shrink.

When your adrenal glands cannot meet the needs of the body, Adrenal Fatigue begins to set in.

At first you may experience a general fatigue that does not go away. It may be hard to get up in the morning and you may have a general sense of malaise. In the beginning, you might try yo mask this with stimulants such as coffee or energy drinks. But overtime, covering up these symptoms becomes harder and harder.

Another important stress hormone produced by the adrenal glands is DHEA. DHEA is a pro-hormone which can convert to a number of different hormones. Namely the sex hormones estrogen, progesterone and testosterone. Under normal conditions, your adrenal glands produce enough DHEA to ensure that your sex hormones are adequate and in balance with what your body needs. But if you are exposed to chronic stress, DHEA levels begin to plummet and your body cannot produce enough sex hormones to meet demand. At this point the

Sex Hormones:

Although adrenal fatigue is the beginning for most people who have hormonal imbalances, it is when the sex hormones come out of balance that people begin to notice the most significant side effects. Estrogen, Progesterone, and Testosterone serve important functions in both men and women.

Estrogen:

Estrogen refers to a group of female "sex" hormones, produced primarily in the ovaries, and to a lesser extent in the body's fat cells. There are three main types of estrogen that a woman makes: Estrone (E1), which accounts for 80% of her estrogen, Estradiol (E2), and Estriol (E3), each accounting for 10% of the remaining estrogen. Estrogens have wide-ranging effects throughout the body in both sexes.

Estrogen contributes to the development of secondary sex characteristics, which are the defining differences between men and women that don’t relate to the reproductive system. In women, these characteristics include breasts, a widened pelvis and increased amounts of body fat in the buttock, thigh and hip region. Estrogen also contributes to the fact that women have less facial hair and smoother skin then men.

The woman's transition towards menopause is called perimenopause. This can last from two to eight years and is associated with significant physiological and emotional changes. Estrogen levels begin to decline and may continue to fluctuate in the year after menopause.

Symptoms include:

• Hot flashes—a sudden sensation of heat in your face, neck and chest that may cause you to sweat profusely, increase your pulse rate and make you feel dizzy or nauseous. A hot flash typically lasts about three to six minutes, although the sensation can last longer and may disrupt sleep when they occur at night.

• Irregular menstrual cycles

• Breast tenderness

• Exacerbation of migraines

• Urinary stress incontinence

• Mood swings

Progesterone:

Progesterone is a vital hormone in the body. Progesterone serves as a precursor not only to DHEA, testosterone and estrogen, but also to the stress hormone cortisol. Progesterone has the unique ability to change its structural form to become other hormones, allowing it to be converted and utilized by the body to the point of depletion. This makes it instrumental to many core biologic functions.

Progesterone plays an important role in using fat for energy, facilitating thyroid hormone action, and helping to restore one's sex drive. It is also a natural antidepressant, aids in normalizing blood clotting, helps to initiate sleep and is a natural diuretic along with many other vital functions.

In perimenopause, there is often too little progesterone in a woman's body.

it can result in symptoms such as anxiety, breast tenderness, headaches, sleeplessness, weight gain and more.

Testosterone:

Testosterone is responsible for much more than defining sexual characteristics in men or influencing sex drive. Testosterone is essential for life since it helps to regulate basic metabolism. Testosterone also facilitates protein synthesis and the building of body tissues.

Testosterone is produced by small groups of specialized cells within the testicles and is also secreted, to a lesser extent, by the ovaries. With age, blood levels of testosterone slowly decreases.

Estrogen Dominance:

Estrogen dominance affects about half the women in the United States, and is caused by an imbalance between the stimulating hormone estrogen and the calming hormone progesterone.

It is not so much the decrease in hormones that produces the uncomfortable symptoms but rather the changing ratio between estrogen and progesterone.

Estrogen dominance is a primary cause of almost all female health problems including PMS, mood swings, chronic or episodic depression, anxiety, headaches, fibrocystic breast disease, excessive bleeding, infertility, and a decreased sex drive. Estrogen dominance is also also common in men and can lead to the symptoms of low sex drive, impotency, enlarged breasts, weight gain, and prostate cancer.

Being estrogen dominant carries with it a momentum that makes the problem harder to reverse the longer it goes on. Estrogen is a powerful hormone that when unopposed by progesterone begins to change the body significantly. As people gain weight, the extra fat on their body converts testosterone to more estrogen. The extra estrogen influences the shape of the body and the accumulation of even more fat on the belly, hips, arms, thighs, and buttocks. This sets in motion a cycle that persistently increases both estrogen and body fat.

Signs you may be suffering from adrenal fatigue: (Put in box)

• You awaken feeling groggy and have difficulty dragging yourself out of bed

• You can’t get going without that first cup or two of caffeinated coffee or tea.

• You not only rely on sugary snacks and caffeine to get through the day but find you actually crave sweets, particularly in the late morning or afternoon.

• Your thinking is foggy and you have memory problems

• You suffer from recurrent infections, headaches and depression

• At night, though exhausted, you have trouble falling asleep as the worries of the day replay in your head and you suffer from insomnia

• Ordinary stresses have an impact that is out of proportion to their importance.

• You wonder what happened to your interest in sex

se of hormone imbalances (put in a box)

· Digestive problems

· Increased serum cholesterol

· Severe weight gain or loss

· Diarrhea or Constipation

· Menstrual problems

· Sleep disturbances

· Decrease in sexual arousal

· Impotence

· Hair loss

· Increased urination

· Chronic nonspecific pain

· Sensitivity to smells, light or sound

· Hypoglycemic Symptoms

· Dark Circles under the eyes

· Dizziness upon standing

· Poor immune modulation

· Brittle hair & nails

· Exhaustion

· Inability to calm down

· Panic attacks or anxiety

· Depression

· Mental frustration

· Memory loss or inability to think

· Irritability - rapid mood swings

· Chronic fatigue

· Bloating & Fluid retention

· Bone loss

· Low back or sciatica pain

· Inflammation, joint pain

· Poor toleration for exercise

· Feeling weak

What can trigger hormone imbalances?

There are many factors that can affect hormone levels in our bodies.

As we age, the hormone levels in our bodies change. In women the amount of progesterone and estrogen gradually decreases with age as they approach menopause. In men, research conducted by the National Institute of Health has shown a 2% reduction in testosterone levels per year from age 30 to age 70.

But it is not aging per se that is the root cause of declining health. It is most often the cumulative physiological effects of stress and the deterioration of our coping mechanisms that eventually compromise overall health.

One of the biggest factors contributing to hormonal imbalances is the accumulation of body fat.

The reason for this is that body fat is not inert, it is biologically active. Excess body fat increases the conversion of testosterone into estrogen. This excess estrogen causes the body to accumulate even more body fat, which in turn increases the amount of estrogen in the body.

Body fat is also a store for toxins. It is in your fat reserves that the body stores what it cannot eliminate through the kidney or metabolize through the liver. These toxins act as hormone like chemicals that send out signals that interfere with the balancing act the body performs. Everything from appetite, to metabolism, to insulin resistance can be effected by what your body is storing in its fat cells. Studies have shown that BPA, the xenoestrogen found in plastic water bottles, has been shown to act like the hormone estrogen and bioaccumulates in fat cells.

Neurotransmitters are small molecules made up of amino acids that carry information from the end of one nerve to the beginning of a second nerve. Much like hormones, neurotransmitters transmit signals that help control mechanisms such as mood, sleep, concentration, weight, libido, and outlook. (How do NT’s throw off hormones?)