Far 2 Fabulous

Understanding Hormones: Navigating Menopause and Empowering Health

• Julie Clark & Catherine Chapman • Episode 52

Share episode

Episode 52
Hormones are more than just bodily regulators; they are the silent architects of our emotions and overall well-being. What if understanding them could transform your journey through menopause? This episode promises an enlightening exploration into the often-unspoken realm of menopause and hormonal shifts that women encounter in their 40s and 50s. With personal stories and experiences from clients, we unravel the lack of preparation many face due to the silence between generations and society's outdated perceptions of mid-life. We aim to redefine this stage as one of transition and potential, rather than decline, while acknowledging the historical mistreatment of women's health.

Our conversation doesn't stop there; we take a detailed look at the menstrual cycle's impact on daily life. Sharing childbirth stories and cycle tracking experiences, we present practical insights into how women can manage their health more effectively. Teenage families, this is for you, too! By bringing sons into the conversation, we foster empathy, helping everyone understand the emotional and energetic ebbs and flows that accompany menstruation. We also highlight the importance of addressing irregular cycles for young women planning to start families, ensuring they are equipped with knowledge and support.

In the final chapter, we navigate through the complexities of hormonal changes during perimenopause and menopause, focusing on their profound impact on mood and decision-making. With anecdotes that many will find relatable, such as the struggles with meal planning on low hormone days, we offer insights into the balancing act between estrogen and progesterone. Lifestyle changes, dietary adjustments, and stress management become tools for empowerment, allowing us to support hormone balance effectively. Join our Far Too Fabulous Facebook group to connect with others on this journey, share experiences, and find the support you need to embrace your hormonal health.

Got a question or comment? Send us a text message here!

The 90-Day Jumpstart Challenge breaks down your goals into a realistic 3-month plan. 

That way, you can focus on ONE area at a time so everything sticks.

Download HERE.

Thank you for listening.

You can continue the conversation with us in the Far 2 Fabulous Facebook group. Come and connect with other women on a journey to empowered health.

For more information about Julie Clark Nutrition, click HERE
For more information about Catherine Chapman, click HERE

We look forward to you joining us on the next episode.

Speaker 2:

Welcome to Far Too Fabulous hosted by Julie and Catherine, join us on a mission to embrace your fabulousness and redefine wellness. Get ready for some feistiness, inspiration, candy chats and humour as we journey together towards empowered well-being.

Speaker 1:

Let's dive in. Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the Far Too Fabulous podcast. So Katherine and I are going to do a series of linked podcast episodes, and our theme is all about hormones. So we've been talking about doing this for a while, haven't?

Speaker 1:

we yeah, and so we're going to be doing five, maybe more episodes about hormones, the changes in hormones, especially because a lot of our clientele are of a certain age. Yeah, I don't like that term certain age to you. We need to come up with another term, I think we just need to be.

Speaker 2:

We just need to say menopause, don't we? And stop dancing around the name of it and just it's got so many and I'm sure that we will go into this in in future podcasts but it's got so many negative connotations to it and I think we just dance around it and I think we just need to be saying it more and more and more menopause, menopause, menopause yes, yeah, and the fact is is that you know you're in your 40s, I'm in my 50s.

Speaker 1:

We are at different stages in terms of our our hormone changes, but our audience are also of a similar age to both of us, aren't they?

Speaker 2:

absolutely, and and we're going to go into this a little bit. More detail actually in this episode is that we, we don't talk about this. Even for me in my mid-40s, I forget genuinely. That's probably menopause as well, I figure how else do you know?

Speaker 2:

so we I, you know, I've probably been in this phase for maybe like, maybe like four years potentially, and I don't think anybody knows these sorts of things we just it's just not normal to talk about it and and so hopefully these conversations will make it will make it more normal and more normal for our friends, our families, our mothers, like so, looking at generations ahead of us, as well as our daughters and our sons, actually, yeah, exactly so, people that are listening who are older and past their menopause.

Speaker 1:

It could be good to reflect back and have a better understanding of it, because they may be have grown up or gone through that phase in a in a time where we didn't discuss it at all I mean at least it is discussed a bit more now isn't it?

Speaker 2:

I had a client many years ago who went through the menopause and it had very, very shocking symptoms and I think one of her either her auntie and her mum she'd she'd gone around for cup tea or something I don't know, and she'd said this and both auntie and mum laughed and went. Oh yeah, that was like that's every, every woman in our family experiences that and she's like why have I got to 50 something and nobody has told me this? Why is this like? It's like undercover of dark. We go and have our menopause symptoms and then pop up. It's so typical of women, isn't it?

Speaker 1:

let's just hide everything that we're suffering and for this, have this whole kind of instagram ready show on top well, when I talk to my clients um, and we're and we're looking at changes in hormones and things it's very common for you to follow the same sort of pattern as your mum did, yeah, or your grandmother did. But often when I'm asking my clients, like what happened with your mum, they don't have any idea because it wasn't discussed. Or their mum had a hysterectomy because they used to whip out their parts. Didn't they, like back in the day, any, any symptoms that you had in that, in that area?

Speaker 2:

they just used to give you a full hysterectomy, yeah, like an exorcism take it out take it all away, yeah, but I mean I have had some of these conversations with mum. I don't think that mum would have had any conversations like this with my nan, no, and because there was still not as much awareness as there is even now, I don't think that she will realize that lots of the signs and symptoms and things that she would have experienced during her 40s and 50s were to do with menopause. And also, I mean I know that for her life at that point was totally insane, like it is for me and I don't know that's. I think that's probably more a modern life thing, because I think once upon a time we would have been well, we'd been winding down to die actually is what we what we would have been doing in our 40s and 50s.

Speaker 2:

We and I feel now women are at this point. They're in that real transitional phase. Um, maybe maybe young kids, maybe dependent parents and maybe starting to get a bit more freedom, maybe starting to get a bit more freedom, maybe starting to get a bit more money and they want to start living their own lives again. And it's a real because we've got that choice, because we are now mid-age, rather than heading off to die.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I feel sorry for the women back in the day that went through mental health symptoms because of their hormones but because it wasn't recognized, were put in extreme situations I mean a lot of women were sectioned um put on really hideous medication yeah and, yeah, that makes me sad because, as we go through this series of episodes, we're going to learn about the influence of these hormones on our neurotransmitters, and it makes a huge difference to how we feel. Our mood, our emotions are very much linked with these hormones yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2:

So we're going to talk about, well, a normal cycle first of all, aren't we?

Speaker 1:

we're going to start from the very beginning, because it's a very good place to start yeah, we are, because I don't know that everybody fully understands what a normal cycle is and what the phases are. So let's just deal with it straight off, because before we start talking about the changes and what happens, we need to understand what is the initial normal phase of a cycle. So a cycle time can be anywhere between 21 and 35 days. That's considered normal, although normal isn't jumping around from one to the other. Normal isn't having a 21-day cycle one month and a 35-day cycle the next month. It's just whatever your normal is on a repeat. So my normal cycle was always 29 days, always 29 days on the dot, no problem, I just knew where I was with it. It's not now, which we'll come back to, but I was asking you what is a normal, yeah, cycle for you, and so initially what struck me was that huge range.

Speaker 2:

So I would always thought that it was just 28 days was just your normal range? That was that, and so the fact that someone's could be a lot shorter and someone's could be a lot longer and that was totally normal to them was really interesting. I so my reply is that I actually have no idea what my normal is, because I've been on some form of birth control since probably about 19, when I met my husband. God, that sounds funny and and yeah, and I mean, like julia said, we will, we will go into things like birth control, because that was a whole journey on its own. And then, since the children, I've had the Mirena coil.

Speaker 2:

So I do have a cycle. I can, definitely I can see a cycle, and again, it is not normal for me to track it. It is not like part of my, my identity. It's not something that I would do without thinking about. It is to track it. It's more, I am more knowledgeable about it, but it's still as a reaction to a symptom.

Speaker 2:

It's not that I can almost predict what's coming up. It's something happens and then I go, go, oh, that was because I was in in that phase and so it's, it's really it's. It's interesting. It's a little bit annoying to me because I value all of this wellbeing stuff and I know that this is a huge part of it for for women, and it's a shame that I haven't kind of built this knowledge up so it's just a knee-jerk reaction. So I just know, and, because of the way that I've done it, that's what I've passed on to my, my teenage girls so far and, interestingly, since having these conversations about it, I, I intend to, I intend to change that. I really want them to be able to know their cycle and hopefully this is going to help you guys know what your normal cycle is can you remember what your cycle was before you went on to birth control?

Speaker 1:

because initially when we get our periods, we do have a. We do have a, a time where up to about two years where things are pretty erratic. So we can be a bit all over the place when we first get our periods, but then they start to level out after that time and then you would have had a few years where you were doing it.

Speaker 2:

You know a regular yeah yeah, I think it was probably about just a 28 day cycle. Interestingly, um, all of my children were induced and this makes me think that, had I had a better idea of my cycle, I think that potentially, my dates might have been slightly different and I might have been well, I see, I say this every time and I might have been braver than to just hold on by the till so that labor started naturally. However, by the time I am two weeks overdue every single time, I'm like I'm done let's go.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's hard to know, isn't it for sure? What, what that situation is um, but I'm clearly more like an elephant than a human and I I have.

Speaker 1:

I have longer gestation periods yeah, and you might well do. That is quite funny. So you have two teenage girls who have their periods and I've got a new teenager who hasn't started her period. But I'm already speaking to her about this and she's really she's quite inquisitive and asked me lots of questions about it, and so my intention for her is that she does have an understanding of it and she and she will track it. But I've always tracked it. I remember back in the day having an old school diary and I would just put the letter p with a circle round yeah, on the 29th day, because it was on the dot, so that I just knew where I was at.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I definitely, I certainly tracked like when they, when they happened, and I could kind of count forward and back and and say roughly when it, when it was. And I think again, because I don't have periods because I have the um, marina coil and I don't idea, I don't have any periods at all. It's. Then it was a conversation that just didn't happen in our, in our house, and actually I was very aware that when my eldest started her periods it was probably quite a shock because she'd never experienced that. Because that's really is, they don't listen to what you say, they, they look at what you do. That's the way that they do.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that they learn. Sadly learning that this morning. So, yeah, so I was very aware that she had had never actually experienced even like sort of sanitary wear and all of that sort of stuff around around it. So I just wasn't around the house. So it was definitely a big learning curve there and the same for same for the younger one. So, yeah, I think, I think more discussion, more awareness on the cycle is going to be happening in the Chapman household. Sorry, girls.

Speaker 1:

And I think when you do have an understanding of it, you can choose how you're dealing with situations based on where they are in the cycle. And if they understand as well that they're at a point where you know they they're the sugar monster, yeah, then you can just ease off them a bit. When they're going crazy for those things, yeah, or when they're just really tired, yeah, and you think they're just, you know, playing you, yeah, because they can, can't they?

Speaker 1:

yes, yes, they can um, then you know if, if you are keeping an eye on those things, you know when you can push them a bit more, yeah, or encourage them to go a bit a bit further with something, or recognize when they're in their superpower, because we do get that within our cycle. So I think it's beneficial for us to know, as parents, and for them to understand and you've got a son and I've got a son, yeah, I think it's important for them to understand.

Speaker 2:

So the conversations I'm having with my daughter, my son is also involved in those, so that he has an understanding, yeah, so there's we've not taken it on to the next generation, that, oh my god, this you know she's turned into a crazy woman this week.

Speaker 2:

That it's not that conversation, it's not that labeling. That you understand what is what is happening. And I love what you've just said about like knowing the cycle and and knowing and like giving them a break often and the fact that if they know their cycle, they don't work in a kind of a linear fashion like men and we start to create our work life that works for us. So we go and we go and book our powerhouse meetings in a point in our, in our cycle that's going to support us and we don't then go and book all of the networking meetings when we'd rather be under the duvet eating chocolate and I just and I think, yeah, just really embracing that, rather than again, like I've just, like I said earlier, just burying it under the under the duvet and just presenting this. I'm I'm instagram ready 28 days of my cycle, which is just absolutely not true?

Speaker 1:

no, and it's, and it's difficult enough to manage a teenager's emotions anyway. But if you've got an understanding of where they are in their cycle, you can certainly choose to have different types of conversations or be pushing for different things at different times and have an understanding of their reaction. If you haven't realized because there's no point when you've got a change in hormones before you get your period, and you haven't realized, because there's no point when you've got a change in hormones before you get your period and you can't think straight in asking a teenager to do lots of stuff and remember lots of stuff and that's not going to work, pushing for that rationalization when it's just not going to be there exactly, yeah, so I think it's really really good.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, a normal cycle any time between 21 and 35 days, but there should be some form of pattern to it. And if you are kind of below 40, I would suggest, and you've not got what we would call a normal cycle, then that isn't normal and that needs to be addressed and looked at, especially if there are no periods, because this is another thing that I deal with um often in my clinic is women in their 20s that are not having a period and they want to start a family, or they're thinking about that, and then initially they're thinking, well, I haven't had a period, great, I mean, you know I don't get periods, it's amazing.

Speaker 1:

And then when they start to think, oh, hang a minute, what's going on there? And then you've got to look at the reasons behind it. So having a cycle is important on many levels for your health.

Speaker 2:

So interesting. So we're going to start off on your day one, which is the first day of your period, first day of your period, which, for me, is today.

Speaker 1:

Woo Woo, congratulations, thank you, thank you. So, yeah, day one is the day that you start your bleed, your normal bleed, and that can go on for between three days to seven days, depending on the individual yeah, I certainly was very I considered lucky that I had fairly, fairly short, fairly light periods that didn't cause me much problem.

Speaker 2:

Actually I don't know why I was so quick to get rid of them, but I think in comparison certainly to like I remember I remember girls having like days off and yeah and all sorts of stuff and I certainly know that my, my eldest has they were like that.

Speaker 1:

So so you didn't have those symptoms. So, yeah, so that what's happening when you start that bleed is that it's the shedding that's happening because your body's got prepared for a pregnancy that hasn't happened and now it's got to get rid of all that extra thickening of the womb, etc. And progesterone and oestrogen are at their lowest at this point.

Speaker 2:

When you start your period and you're bleeding, I think that's so interesting to to know, isn't it that those, that those, those hormones are right at their lowest point there? And so when you're starting to think about your cycles and then this often in my mind, I I kind of lump the sort of bleeding section of your period all in one go, and it isn't at all like that. Is it because that very first bit, when your hormones are at their lowest and the sort of the lining coming away is triggered, everything is low? But then, even just through that bleeding section, everything starts to change, does it?

Speaker 1:

because I know that you're like our energy and stuff starts to pick up towards the end of that yeah, and I think when, when you have an understanding of what these hormones are doing, and then we go on to the episode to talk about estrogen or progesterone, when you know that that level is low for both of those and you understand what they're doing, it will make more sense as to why you're feeling how you feel at that point. Yeah, yeah, really interesting. So the bleed is is a kind of phase of its own, but it's kind of lumped in with that follicular phase as well. So really we have two phases follicular and luteal but but within that we have the bleed. And we have two phases follicular and luteal, but within that we have the bleed and we have ovulation.

Speaker 1:

So the bleed is in those first few days, but that is also the start of the follicular phase as well. So that can go up to ovulation. And again, it's different for for different people, but approximately, if we're looking at a 28 day cycle, then the follicular phase is going to be up to about day 13, 14. And then we've got oestrogen that's starting to increase over that period. So I think the most important thing to understand in the follicular phase so the first half of your cycle is that oestrogen is the dominant hormone there and oestrogen can be extremely beneficial. When we look at what oestrogen does in terms of our energy, our ability to deal with stress, all of those things can be you can benefit from the fact that oestrogen is rising up to that ovulation time.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely, and you know, you know, you experience, don't you through that? So, towards the end of your period and then coming up towards the mid of your cycle, that that often is a you're feeling good in that, in that part of your cycle yeah, it's the time where your magnetism is supposed to be at its highest, isn't it absolutely?

Speaker 2:

I was listening to a comedian, I think it came up on on instagram or something, and he was. He was talking about females. Who was it? I can't think who it was and um, and he said he said to the whole audience, he said how do you know when a woman is ovulating? And there was this like smattering of giggles from the women and the men just looking utterly clueless.

Speaker 1:

And uh, and he went because she, you, yeah, and it was like because she's, because she's up for it, she's ready yeah, and that is because at the point of ovulation we also have some testosterone that comes in and that really boosts our libido. Because if you think about what the body's doing, it's got itself prepared for the survival of the species and in order to do that, of course, you've got to be feeling good to go, to be feeling good to go, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:

and that's when you'll notice that your, your hair will feel thick and shiny, your skin will feel sort of glowing, you'll be like like very rosy and vascular and yeah, and looking fabulous yeah, you put on.

Speaker 1:

You put on an outfit, don't you?

Speaker 2:

and you think, oh, I look a bit slim in that today yeah, it's glowy and your eyes are sparkle, and it's yeah, and it's absolutely nature's way of going. Let's, let's keep populated yeah, it's so true.

Speaker 1:

So we have that big rise of oestrogen and then it's at its peak, we ovulate and testosterone comes in and it gives us that energy boost and our libido a boost and and we we kind of it lessens that puffiness that we may get because of the influence on the fluids which we come on to as well. So, yeah, everything is good to go ovulation, and then, if we don't support the species, of course, at that point the body's like, oh, okay, and then all these hormones fall off a cliff. Yeah, and I've said, I've said I think on this podcast before that not everybody's falls off a cliff, it does drop, but I know that mine does fall off you have a day, don't I?

Speaker 1:

have a day where I literally cannot be bothered, I can't make a decision, I don't see the point of anything. It's when it's normally the day when I when I say to my husband things like I just don't want to do this job anymore, I'm gonna go work for tesco. Yeah, exactly that. Um. So it's quite funny how that again the influence of the hormones on our mood. Yeah, it's like. Well, what's the point then? If we're not going to have a baby this month, what is the point of anything?

Speaker 2:

hormones on our mood. Yeah, it's like, well, what's the point then? If we're not going to have a baby this month, what is the point of anything?

Speaker 1:

yeah, so our hormones have dropped off and then we're relying on those hormones climbing again. So we've got another period where we've got low hormones. Yeah, so low hormones at the start of our cycle, low hormones just after the ovulation yeah, yeah but isn't it helpful that you know that? Yeah, it is helpful. I know it for me personally, because otherwise, because it's not my general nature, as you know, katherine, to be down- or pessimistic, or you know at all.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I'm the complete opposite of that, aren't I? When I'm in that day where those hormones have dropped off a cliff and I just feel like I literally can't be bothered and I don't see the point of anything, then I can go. Oh yeah, I know where I am.

Speaker 2:

It's that day, that day and the next day is fine. Yeah, and I imagine that that's also helpful for ian and the kids as well. They're like oh, it's that day. Yeah, take cover a little bit or give her a cover.

Speaker 1:

One of the two yeah, please do not let that coincide with sunday's meal planning session, because I cannot do a meal plan on that day, because then it's pizza, pizza, pizza and pizza, is it? No, it's not that, it's just. I can't make a decision. No, I can't think what to have because I can't be bothered and I don't see the point. I can't even muster the ability to do a meal plan for the week oh my god, do you know what you saying that?

Speaker 2:

I think I I can think of those days sat at the table meal planning and then getting cross with everybody else because no one else is kind of no one else does it do.

Speaker 1:

They or their ideas are just the standard ideas, and you don't want those ideas not, especially not on that day, not on that phenomenal ideas. But they're not coming they're not coming, are they no? So at least if you know that you're like yeah, I'm not in the right. You know this is not the day to be doing the meal plan. I'll be all right tomorrow.

Speaker 2:

I'll do it tomorrow we'll go and get a martin spencer meal deal today and we'll do this again tomorrow. Yes, okay.

Speaker 1:

So we've ovulated, you know, around that day 40, around the middle of the cycle, basically, yeah. So, whatever your cycle is, it might be um earlier than that, or it might be later than that, but yeah, the hormones are going to drop off because your body's realized oh you know, we're not gonna, we're not gonna get pregnant now and we need to make some changes. And then we move into that luteal phase.

Speaker 2:

So this is when, this is when um progesterone starts to take. The front of the stage. Is that?

Speaker 1:

right. Yep, progesterone is going to build up because it's going to get ready again yeah and then it has to go back to the start, and then you have to shred all that stuff that it's uh, you know, spent all that time building all that time building.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, making that nice little juicy nest for for baby, that's not coming yeah, so.

Speaker 1:

So progesterone is going to be dominant, but there is still oestrogen there, and that's the same in the first half of the cycle. Oestrogen is dominant, but you've still got some progesterone there. Yeah, and they do act like a seesaw, so the balance between them is very important. And then they kind of tip one way and then they tip back the other way. Yeah, so that it can regulate all the things that it needs to do amazing.

Speaker 2:

it's just. It is so, so helpful to know these and be able to kind of look and see what's happening and plan your life accordingly. So this carries on up until 40, 45, 50-ish. Now the average age of menopause is something like 52 to 55, somewhere around there. Is that right? Yeah, I think you are right. However, you can be in perimenopause for something like 15 years, years Before. So again, knowing this normal cycle is great. So then, what's the definition of menopause? This makes me laugh.

Speaker 1:

So the medical definition for menopause? This makes me laugh. So the the the medical definition for menopause is when you haven't had a bleed for 12 months yeah, exactly 365 days.

Speaker 2:

So if you have it on day 363, you come back to the beginning again.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's weird, isn't it? Yeah, I don't know why. I must look at and see where that's come from that definition.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we did, we did joke that we, we thought that probably a man gave that definition.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, but basically, if you've not had any periods for years, yeah, you know that you've been through the menopause. Yeah, that's fair to say isn't it?

Speaker 2:

yeah, you've. You've stepped into that magical land of menopause, and before then you're in the weird and wonderful world of perimenopause exactly, so what actually happens here?

Speaker 1:

so people can go through this period even in their late 30s and there are people that do go through this earlier, yeah, and it doesn't always get picked up. But of course, we've got to factor in our lifestyles now and and we are we are having a massive influence on our hormones with the types of foods that we eat, the amount of sugar we consume, alcohol, our liver health, our gut health um oh so many things stress fact that it's in our meat, it's in our water, yeah, yeah so this period, I think, of being in perimenopause can easily be driven by some of those things anyway, and it may not be the natural process.

Speaker 1:

So I I can only look at my own experience and the fact that I'm 53 and it's only been in the last, probably, year that I would have said that I've noticed some things. Before then I was having my regular cycle and I think a lot of this comes down to the way that I look after myself. It's got to have, it's got to be a major factor, hasn't it? Yeah, yeah, but I don't know what my own mum's um situation would have been, because she had a hysterectomy really young, so I've got no reference there, interesting, and we don't know what her mum went through because it wasn't spoken about. Yeah, so I've got no reference point. I've got two younger sisters, so they're just seeing what.

Speaker 1:

What's happening with me watching you wow, that's gonna make christmas dinner conversation interesting although we have very different lifestyles, so that is also going to have an impact. So, yeah, I find it interesting that some of the symptoms that you may expect during that perimenopausal phase I haven't really experienced until the last year. Yeah so, but it can happen, for for, like you said, 15 years, you could be having these fluctuating hormones and that's what happens. So what happens is that estrogen goes mental. I think that's the best way to explain it.

Speaker 2:

It has a party and then it hides, and then it has a party, and then it hides, and then it has a party and then it hides.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and you can see that, like when I run hormone testing, if I look over the entire cycle, you can see that it's up and down, up and down, up and down on the chart, whereas it should be a curve that climbs up, drops off, climbs up, and it doesn't do that. You see this line that goes up and down, up and it doesn't do that. You see this, this, this line that goes up and down, up and down, up and down, and at the same time, you can start to get progesterone lower because these two work together and progesterone is the chilled out friend and estrogen is the crazy friend.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and progesterone is going. What is going on here? You know, I normally balance out this friend, but she's gone off the rails, she's gone crazy. I can't keep up with it. And so then you start to see an impact on progesterone, but basically that's what happens, which is why you get these symptoms. Where they're there, then they're not. Then they're there, then they're not. You don't know whether you're coming or going and you feel like you've lost yourself. That, quite often, is a discussion that I have with my clients. They say I don't feel like myself anymore. Yeah, and that's again the importance of these hormones and the impact they have on how you feel and how you behave and your mood and your, even how you feel about yourself, your self-worth.

Speaker 2:

All gets impacted by these hormones, and estrogen just goes absolutely crazy and I think that having having the awareness of what's going on and it's the word accepting or just knowing actually you're not functioning like yourself. You've had these hormones in your life for all those years, supporting far more than just your menstrual, menstrual cycle, yep, malteser cycle, um, and, and now they're not there. So you can imagine that the kind of almost that feeling of abandonment, that the support of those things is not there, and also, uh, the testosterone starts to. It starts to drop off. I think We've read from like 35.

Speaker 1:

It does start to drop off as we age anyway, as a natural decline, but it can really drop when you're in that perimenopausal phase.

Speaker 2:

What's interesting, and I'm sure there is a very obvious link that I just noticed the link between them is that that is about the time that your muscle mass starts to drop down link between those as well and so if you are not maintaining or building, like consciously maintaining or building your it goes down by like a percent a year, every single year, from like 30 to 35, so that's yeah, so we need some testosterone, but we don't want too much, because women that have too much have conditions like polycystic ovaries.

Speaker 1:

They have more facial hair. They have, you know, they have lots of symptoms that is connected with having too much male hormone. Yeah, and that's also not good because it affects the mood in a way we can become more aggressive. Yeah, so you don't want too much, it's just right. It's all a balancing act and you know we will talk about as we go through in detail about the hormones, we will talk about how they're part of this big orchestra and they're not just on their own working. They're involved in in in the hormones that are controlling blood sugar.

Speaker 1:

They're involved with the adrenal hormones, the thyroid hormones. They're all interconnected. So this is why I get frustrated when we generally think we can just put in a hormone and it's going to solve all the issues. And how many women do we know that have gone down that route and they can't get the dosage right, or it's not, it's making them worse. You've got to look at the whole picture you've got to look at all those hormones and see what's happening no, but don't get.

Speaker 2:

Don't get frustrated and stressed, because that's the thing that's gonna send everything out of whack already completely yeah, it's such a difficult one, isn't it?

Speaker 1:

because stress is is such a a contributory factor to so many issues with health. Yeah, but just telling someone to manage their stress, you just can't, can you? Especially when someone is stressed? Yeah, that's the last thing they want to hear. Yeah, before they punch you. Yeah, but you've got to have an understanding of how all these things work. So your estrogen's gone a bit crazy. Your progesterone starts to decline, testosterone starts to decline, and you're in that period of sometimes estrogen and progesterone will be quite nicely working together, and other times they won't. And sometimes it's linked with whether you ovulated or not, because at this point you might be running out of egg supply, yeah, and therefore you may not even be ovulating, yeah, so I've been tracking my ovulation because I'm. I want to do the dutch test on myself, but I need to know you need to do it at a specific point in your cycle, okay, and when I ordered the test in august.

Speaker 1:

So my period then tell us what the dutch test is. So the dutch test measures your metabolized hormone levels with your sex hormones and the nutrients that are involved in them, like vitamin b6 and b12, and this is in your pee right yes, in your urine. So it's different to a blood test, because it's what's happened after the hormones have been used, which is way more relevant than just seeing what levels are in the blood.

Speaker 2:

That's I was going to bring that up when you were talking about, like, um, estrogen going up and down, up and down, up and down, and progesterone looking like you can, just, I can imagine it. Progesterone just looking at oestrogen going. What are you doing? I'm just going to skulk down over here with testosterone, and so you can imagine that when you take that blood test, that snapshot of a blood test Doesn't tell you anything. It could be sky high, it could be down in your boots and, depending on what day it is, you get that one answer and then you, and then you plan everything based on that, which is bonkers.

Speaker 1:

yeah, so I'd been tracking my ovulation order to do this test and I did go through in detail about this test on a previous episode and I am not ovulating, so my cycle time has been a bit all over the place, which makes sense because of my age and understanding what's going on. So, in order for me to do this test, I need to know a specific point in time post ovulation, and I can't actually do that at the moment because I'm using ovulation the sticks that you wee wee on I remember them well yeah, yeah, used for, yeah, knowing if you pregnancy and stuff, but so I'm not ovulating.

Speaker 1:

So I've clearly run out of eggs now. Yeah, and it's just a case of balancing those hormones. So I've got to switch the. The style of testing that I was doing was a one day one, yeah, but I've got to switch it to the mapping, which does the whole cycle time so I can see what's going on for myself. Yeah, but that's what happens is you stop ovulating because your eggs have run out, and when that happens, that has an impact on what's going on with these two hormones as well.

Speaker 1:

So you might find that one month you've ovulated, the hormones have behaved themselves and you actually feel good, yeah, so then you go oh, that must have been a bit weird last month. What was going on? Perhaps I was quite stressed blah, blah, blah. You come up with some reasons, don't you? Yeah, and then maybe next month you ovulate and it's fine, and you might have a few months like that, and then suddenly you have a few months where you didn't ovulate and then you've gone crazy again and you just don't know what's going on. Well, that's what's going on, yeah and what's really exciting.

Speaker 2:

I mean, because that sounds a bit bleak, right what we're going to talk about over this series of podcasts is we're going to look more detail into estrogen and progesterone and testosterone and what part they play in this orchestra and empower you to be able to do things with regards to food, supplements, exercise and be able to just, yeah, look at the signs and symptoms and and know that you are not powerless, know that you can. One, that you can do something and, two, that the knowledge just empowers you full stop, doesn't?

Speaker 1:

yeah, it's not. It's not a disastrous situation. It's a normal change in your body and there are plenty of people that go through this situation without any symptoms and it's fine and we've just got to look at how can we best support our body. Like I said, I haven't really had symptoms myself until the last year where my cycles changed and there's certain things that come with that. But I've been working on that and I was saying to you before we recorded that because I'd just got my period just before we sat down to do this recording.

Speaker 1:

Ironically, I was looking at my data because I track it and it's evened out since I've been implementing some things because it's important to do that. So there are so many things you can do to help yourself, which we will come on to, but I think it's important to have an understanding of how your cycle works, what the hormones are in terms of what's high at certain times, what's low, and then when we do the next episode, where we're going to go into estrogen in detail and you go oh, hang a minute. When I'm in my, when I'm at the start of my period and my estrogen's low, that explains why I feel like this or this symptoms happening, yeah, so that then you can relate it and have an understanding yeah no, it's exciting, and I mean just so from personally, from my point of view, it is interesting.

Speaker 2:

I do still have a cycle, even though I've got the marina coil, and I have definitely been experiencing symptoms from perimenopause, probably for the last year or so, I think. And and so to know that even if you are on some sort of birth control or or the coil or something like that, that these, that that doesn't mean that you're not going to get any of these symptoms, uh, and I think the awareness part of it is really, really important, because I think this point is that people start to just feel like they're going a bit crazy and and you're not, you're not going crazy it's not fun at some points, but it most of it is is normal and that you can do things that will reduce any of these signs and symptoms so that you are able to I was going to say a more normal, so you're able to follow a more normal pattern with your body.

Speaker 1:

So you just get to work with it yeah, there is so much that you can do and it's not all negative. And I think, just to finish off to say that in perimenopause estrogen goes crazy, progesterone starting to drop off, so is testosterone. Then when you go through menopause, all the hormones are going to drop, but they don't go completely. Yeah, there's still some there and it's the balance between them that you can influence with your diet and lifestyle and supplementation. If that is correct for you. It's that balance that you can support because even if you've got low estrogen and low progesterone, you can still be estrogen dominant and have all of those symptoms in menopause without any period if progesterone is too low to estrogen. So you can still get all those symptoms that you would get in an oestrogen dominant picture if levels are high, if they're, if that seesaw has tipped, even when levels are low does that make sense?

Speaker 2:

yeah, no, it makes total sense, isn't it? Because you think that once you've got over that magical 365 days and no period, that you're, like, you know, over the bridge and on the other side and yeah, and actually that's well, that sounds a bit doom and gloom and that's not the case, but it's, yeah, that you still need to be aware of it and still need to help that balancing act yeah, absolutely so.

Speaker 1:

As we always say, you can continue this conversation in the Far Too Fabulous Facebook group If you've got symptoms you're not sure about, or you just want to clarify anything, or you just want to put your hand up and go. Hey, you just described me. Whatever it is, come and have a chat with us. Yeah, definitely.

Speaker 2:

Come and let us know if you've got a regular cycle. Come and let us know if you've ever known you've had a regular cycle or not, like me, um, and perhaps a conversations that you've had with, sort of your mum or your sisters or aunties, and what you're going to do with your younger generation as well. We would love to know. We like to talk we do.

Speaker 1:

We will see you in the facebook group thank you for keeping us company today. If you enjoyed the Facebook group mailing list. You'll find the links in the show notes. Your weekly episode will be delivered straight to your inbox every thursday morning make it a fabulous week and we'll catch you in the next episode.