Your body hormones play a very important role in a lot of different ways. They influence your mental, emotional, and physical health, even more than a lot of external factors.
The pituitary gland, one of the most important glands of your body, also known as the “master gland” controls and influences almost all the hormones in your body.
There are several other processes and functions at different levels and organs that work together to maintain hormonal balance in your body, and help you feel better, organized throughout the day.
However, due to today’s very hectic lifestyle, and no time for self-care, the hormonal imbalance has become very common for both males and females. People are suffering from dramatic hormonal changes like never before, and that’s primarily due to unhealthy lifestyle habits. Some other contributory factors that can affect hormones are pregnancy, stress, obesity, and other prolonged health conditions.
There are, however, some developing signs of hormonal imbalance. They are, unfortunately, not sudden, but if you are careful enough, you can identify them to control your body’s hormonal disturbance before major damage to your overall health.
In this article, we are talking about some common signs of hormonal imbalance, and what you can do to bring back the hormonal equilibrium.
1. Chronic Fatigue
Adrenal fatigue is one of the major symptoms of chronic tiredness. And it may indicate a possible imbalance in your cortisol levels. Sometimes, fatigue, especially with palpitation, is also associated with hypothyroidism. Hypothyroidism doesn’t affect your body energy much in the beginning, but it continuously causes the breakdown and affects your metabolism, eventually, leaves you exhausted, almost all the time.
2. Excessive Irritability
If you get irritated very easily and at very silly things, there is a possibility that you are suffering from hormonal imbalance. Imbalance of neurotransmitters is responsible for disturbing hormone levels. Low testosterone level is usually associated with frequent and surprising mood swings. Some other contributory factors are hyperthyroidism, increased serotonin levels, and menopause, etc.
3. Sleep disturbances
Anxiety and stress are not always responsible for disturbing your sleep pattern. Reduced production of hormones like estrogen and progesterone, especially when approaching menopause, is also a causative factor. Endocrine problems are also linked with sleep disturbances in both males and females. An overactive endocrine gland may overstimulate your nervous system, making it hard for you to sleep.
Also Read: 9 Things No Woman Should Do On Her Period
4. Abnormal Cravings
If your tastebuds demand food all the time, you should take it lightly. There are some more risks associated with it, in addition to obesity. You can think of high insulin and cortisol levels if you feel hungry almost after every meal. Adrenal fatigue is one of the major conditions responsible for excessive cravings for salty and sugary foods.
5. Abnormal bodyweight
Both weight gain and weight loss are linked with hormonal levels along with other health factors. When your hormones jump out of that equilibrium state, you may suffer from both abnormal weight gain and rapid weight loss. It doesn’t matter, how good you are with your diet and regime; your body won’t get that ideal shape! Hormonal imbalances like increased estrogen and decreased testosterone are associated with abnormal body weight.
6. Puffy eyes, especially in the morning
Puffy eyes are the signs of some other conditions like diabetes, obesity, mental stress, and pregnancy etc. But fluctuating hormones are also linked with possible retention of fluid underneath your eyes. In fact, puffy eyes in pregnancy are mainly because of constant changes in hormones. Overactivity of thyroid hormones is also liable swelling of areas around your eyes.
7. Thin eyebrows
This condition is usually rare but can be seen in cases of under-activity of thyroid hormones. If you have noticed thin eyebrows, especially the outer edges are thinned, you should go to check your thyroid hormones level.
8. Belly Fat
Hormonal changes are not directly linked with extra, unhealthy belly fat. Though, it can be a root cause, especially if you usually suffer from anxiety and stress. Overstressed people more often than not, end up eating more than what their body requires. The extra fat consumed through different food sources is stored heavily around your abdomen, and make it distended. Excessive estrogen in your body can also cause an abnormal increase in belly fat.
9. Loss of interest in sex
Women usually end up losing interest in sex due to a dramatic decrease in estrogen levels. An abnormally low level of estrogen can cause dryness of the vagina, and you may find sex very painful or uncomfortable. The disturbed level of testosterone is linked with reduced libido in males.
10. Sagging Breasts
Hormonal imbalance due to different factors like ageing, pregnancy, weight gain, unhealthy diet and regimen, and overdose of birthcontrol pills can cause premature sagging of breasts. Estrogen maintains the elasticity of breasts, and if the estrogen levels are below the normal level, due to any reason, your breasts may start losing elasticity. Hence, there may be premature sagging.
What can you do to balance your hormones?
Fortunately, some changes in diet, regimen, and lifestyle may be very helpful to balance the hormone level in your body and may help you be at your best, again.
Here are some natural and safe ways to balance your hormones again!
Increase Protein Intake from Natural Sources
Consuming adequate protein is important for your body from a lot of different perspectives. Proteins from your diet offer essential amino acids to your body that your body can’t produce by itself.
Proteins also play a critical role in maintaining your muscle, skin, and bone health. What more? Protein also controls and reduces the production as well as the release of a hunger hormone called “ghrelin” and increases the production of hormones responsible for “feel-good-factor” like GLP-1 and PYY /
To maintain good hormone health, you should consume at least a minimum of 20-30 grams of protein per meal.
Food items like meat, poultry, eggs, fish, nuts, seeds, legumes, tofu, milk, yogurt, and cheese, etc. are the best natural sources of protein.
Cut down sugar and refined carbohydrates
If you take a lot of sugar or refined carbs with your diet, you are at high risk of a lot of health problems, mainly hormonal imbalance. Fructose is a major part of sugar, and it can elevate the insulin levels in your body.
Food items with high refined carbs like white loaves of bread, pizzas, burgers, and pretzels, etc. can also increase insulin levels.
Reducing or cutting down sugar and refined carbs can be instrumental in controlling the hormonal activities in your body. And what’s the bonus? Thanks to balanced hormones, your body will perform well to avoid lifestyle diseases like diabetes, obesity, and other diseases.
Consume healthy fats instead
Adding good-quality natural fats to your diet may help you controlling insulin levels and appetite.
Medium-chain triglycerides (MCTs) are very healthy fats and are easily digested by the liver to utilize as energy. MCTs are linked with reducing insulin resistance in obese, diabetic, and overweight people as well.
Some other dairy fats and monosaturated fats from sources like nuts and olive oil are also effective to increase your body’s insulin sensitivity.
Also, studies show that increasing healthy fats in your diet also triggers and controls the hormones that make you feel fuller and satisfied.
Learn to manage your stress
Stress can be extremely dangerous for hormones, and hence, your health. Adrenaline and cortisol are the two main hormones affected by stress.
Cortisol is, in fact, known as “the stress hormone” because it works as a warrior for your body and fights stress. Adrenaline works as “an immediate messenger” and warns your body against possible danger.
These hormones are usually triggered due to excessive fear from animals, or anything severely dangerous. But, these days, experts are finding that excessively overwhelming lifestyles even trigger the hormones.
When you suffer from chronic stress, the cortisol level in your body is elevated uncontrollably, and you are under very high risk of developing lifestyle diseases like obesity.
And abnormally increased adrenaline levels can be responsible for rapid heart rate, high blood pressure, and anxiety.
You must find a way to get out of stress and anxiety. Yes, you can take help from a medical professional, but increasing your mental strength is in your control. Try practicing mindfulness, spend some time with your family and friends. Include enough physical exercises in your daily routine. In short, keep your mind away from everything that builds stress in your mind.
To Sum it Up
Hormones play very important different roles in your body. Both excess and lack of these hormones can be harmful to your body, again, in a lot of different ways. Hence, it becomes very important for your hormones to be in a state of equilibrium, and create a healthy functional state for your body. That’s all about some possible signs of hormonal imbalance in your body, and how you can bring them back to normal levels. All of these signs can be due to completely different health conditions as well. Therefore, it becomes imperative to get proper, professional medical assistance before reaching to a conclusion.
