Master Your Hormones: Uncover The Reality Of Bio-Identical Hormones

Welcome to Day 2 and the truth about hormones 0:00

Hi, ladies. Welcome to day 2 of the summit. I'm your host, Dr. Sharon Stills, and I'm here to chat with you about a really, really important topic. And one of the the guiding topics that made me even want to start hosting these annual summits is the truth about hormones. The truth about bioidentical hormones and what you need to know about them, because there are so many myths out there that are wrong and there's just so much misinformation. So I want to set the record straight. I have been practicing for well over two decades now.

This is something that I've been specializing in since like my first year practicing medicine. So I have been around the block quite a few times. And I know not only personally, but I have watched my patients, some who have been with me for 20 years, thrive on bioidentical hormones. So we're going to spend a little bit of time talking about this now. There'll be lots of opportunities to listen to me more and learn from me more and listening to the different interviews. But I just want to kind of give you some of the basics that I see over and over again are gotten wrong out there, even in the holistic field.

Bioidentical vs synthetic hormones 1:28

So first things first. Apples and oranges. That's what it's like comparing synthetic hormones to bioidentical hormones. So I like apples because they're red and juicy. So we'll say apples are the Bioidenticals and oranges are then synthetic hormones. So pretty much everything you hear about all the scary stuff, you hear about all the studies you hear about, these are all speaking about synthetic hormones, not bioidentical hormones. There's just not a lot of studies on them because there's no money in it for the pharmaceutical companies.

That's just the sad and disheartening truth. But that is how medicine is is delivered in the country these days in the mainstream. It's all pushed by the pharmaceutical companies and what's in it for them and not so worried about what's in it for you. And around here I am very concerned and paying attention to what's in it for you because I want to see you thrive. I want to see you feel amazing. I want you to step into your sacred second act. And I want us women to create a revolution and change the conversation about what aging is, what it looks like to be in menopause, what we're experiencing, what we're creating, what we're doing in menopause.

So I'm in it for you. So synthetic hormones are synthetic. They are not bio biologically identical to what our body produces. So even if I don't say it, bioidentical hormones, when you hear me speaking about hormones, for the most part, I'm speaking about bioidentical hormones. If I'm saying something bad, I'll say the synthetic hormones. But I might forget to say bioidentical when I'm talking about all the amazingness of, like all hell bioidentical hormones and how I want you to have them in your life.

So bioidentical look, they're created at a compounding pharmacy,

How bioidentical hormones should be administered 3:25

and they're identical to what your body was creating, to what your body was producing. So when the bioidentical hormone gets to the cellular receptor site, the cellular receptor site says, Oh, hello, I know you, I've seen you before. Come on, let's party, let's have tea, let's take a nap. But if it's a synthetic hormone, then the cellular receptor site doesn't recognize it. May not let it in. And they block the receptor site. It causes a host of downstream side effects. And so it is a very, very different, like I said, apples and oranges story.

So you want to be taking bioidentical hormones, but you want to be taking the right type of bioidentical hormones. You don't want to be taking them. So let's talk about administration. You don't want to be taking them injected to you into your body in a pellet that stays in your body for three months and you have no control of whether you're being overdosed or under dosed. In my opinion, pellets are not the way to go. You don't want to take oral. Oral estrogens are known to create inflammation to raise your C-reactive protein, a cardiac inflammatory marker.

So if you go to a doctor who's going to prescribe bioidentical hormones for you, I want you to kind of have a checklist so that you can find the right person who actually has studied paid attention and is up with the current science and knows what they're doing. So you don't want someone who is prescribing oral progesterone. So we'll just run down really quickly like the main hormones. So estrogen in a cream, a biased, typically that's 80/20, 80% estriol, 20% estradiol, and estriol is E3, very anti-inflammatory, very protective for the body.

So you want to be taking that in a cream with your testosterone? In a cream, Yes. You ladies need some testosterone, too. It's got a lot of important benefits. And you also want to be taking progesterone in a cream. Now, you can also take progesterone in a capsule. It's like the one hormone, bioidentical hormone that I like in capsule form. And I actually have learned to talk to anyone who's a patient of mine. They know I prescribe cream and capsule of progesterone because my many years has shown me clinically that the capsule has a different effect systemically than the cream does.

So the capsule across the bloodbrain barrier and will have a nice GABA like chill out, help you sleep, get rid of your anxiety kind of effect

Personal hormone journey and symptom relief 6:18

and the cream affects more of the systemic body. So your breasts and your bones and your glucose metabolism and your and your immune system. So I like to combine the both. So some capsules, some cream, and then for DHEA and pregnant alone, I've found through the years that the best thing to do is just sublingual liposomal sublingual drops. Same for melatonin and oxytocin. Nasal spray is the best way it's absorbed thyroid bioidentical, thyroid hormone, bioidentical cortisol. Those can be in capsules. Those are fine.

So that's just a little bit of the way of administration. You can listen to this again if I talk too fast and you can write it down, but that's kind of something you want to know. That's how it should be prescribed to you, because the route it's prescribed and how it's applied is super, super important in your success. You also want to think about bioidentical hormones, not just for I need to get rid of these dang hot flashes and I need to get a good night's sleep. And I agree. You need to get rid of those hot flashes and you need to get a good night's sleep.

And I am all for getting rid of your symptoms. I don't want you to suffer. You may have heard me speak before. Maybe this is your first time being with me because I was working with menopausal women and helping them with bioidentical hormones. Early in my practice, I was in my early thirties. I wasn't really thinking about menopause, but I started thinking about, Hmm, I need to practice what I preach. I'm helping all these women through menopause and they're thriving and they're looking younger and slimmer and the brains are sharp and they're so active.

And I'm sitting here with, like, the worst PMS on the planet, bloated people thinking I'm pregnant because I'm just so bloated, cranky, like three weeks out of the month, not just a day or two, but before my period. So I started pre gaming and I started applying what I was doing with the women in my practice who were dealing with perimenopause and menopause. And I applied it to my PMS. So I balanced my hormones, I supported my liver, I supported other things. We're going to talk about your lymphatic system, your guide, your bioflow, your emotions, your lifestyle, etc.

I supported all those things, so much so that when I went through menopause, I never even had a heart blast. I never had any symptoms except feeling fantastic, actually feeling better now than I felt then. And I went through menopause when I was 48. So sometimes we think, Oh, that's so early. But the average age of menopause is 50, so that means some are going to go a little earlier, some are going to go a little later. So going through menopause at 48 is totally normal, totally healthy.

Hormones for prevention and healthy aging 9:08

That's what my body wanted to do. I'm now 55, so it's been seven years. And the reason why I'm telling you this is because I didn't have symptoms and I don't have symptoms and I still take my bioidentical hormones. They're still the number one thing. If I had to go to a desert island and I couldn't take all my supplements and my tools, you better believe I'm bringing my hormones. So it's not just for symptom suppression, because like I said, I didn't have any, but it is for prevention. And as a naturopathic physician, prevention is like my middle name.

It's like the game. Like if we can prevent something, it's a lot easier then to reverse something. It's not to say we can't reverse things. So for those of you that are listening and are suffering or have been post-menopausal for a long time, it's never too late. So don't don't stress about that. But the prevention that bioidentical hormones provide for healthy lifespan, healthy aging and graceful aging, not just quantity to your years, but quality to years is spectacular. It helps your brain prevent Alzheimer's.

It helps with your bones to prevent osteoporosis. It helps with your gut for your digestion and helps with your glucose metabolism. It helps protect your breast. That's right. Proper bioidentical hormone. I use it for patients who have history of breast cancer or other cancers or family history who even actively have it, because there are different kinds of estrogens and different kinds do different things and some actually treat breast cancer. So saying estrogen causes breast cancer, to me, that's lazy medicine.

That's someone not doing their homework because estrogen is just a title. It's all the different kinds of estrogen and all the different metabolites that have impacts on the body and that we can or can't take and we can take in different doses. So let's see, I talked about the brains, the bones, the breasts, your immune system, your mood, your sleep. Yes, your skin, your hair, your nails. So some of the superficial things for how we look, but those are important to helps with your weight. There's pretty much not a system in the body helps with your genital urinary system, helps with your sex drive.

There's really not a system in the body that really isn't affected by bioidentical hormones and our hormones in general. And so that's why it's so important, because we don't die like our ancestors at 40. We don't just give birth if we've chosen to do that. And then that was our role. That was our mission to be childbearing. And then we kind of fade away. No, we can live to 120. That's what we're biologically made to do, is 120. And because I added in prolong and intermittent fasting, I upped mine to 130.

So to me, let's see, 65 is middle age at ten years till I even get to middle age. So stepping into our sacred second act is something that we're going to step into for a while. Even if we only live to 90, we still are going to spend almost close to half our lives post-menopausal, and we want to do that feeling great. Our cardiovascular system. I didn't mention that, but our cardiovascular system, if we don't have the proper balance and we don't have our estrogen supporting anti-inflammatory, antithrombotic supporting our our cardiovascular system, we're going to put our risks at cardiovascular disease, which is the number one killer of women. So so there's so many reasons you might say, well, I drink my water as prevention or eat healthy or I do all these things and they're all important.

But if you are missing your hormones and it happens to everyone, every woman, every woman is going to go through menopause, just like every human being is going to die. Like, that's the GM. We're born, we live, we die. If we're born a woman. We were born. We go through menopause and then we die. So we want to make sure I want to make sure that you are being protected, that you are feeling phenomenal, that your hormones are balanced. And we're going to talk about other things. I don't just do hormones and the hormones have to go.

I believe in terrain based medicine. I studied my I went to natural Catholic Medical school here in the States, but I have studied from the beginning and continue to study European bio regulatory medicine. And so I learned a lot about the terrain and the terrain of your body. And so it's not just taking the right hormones, it's taking the right hormones and putting them into a body that is balanced, that is detoxing, that's not inflamed, that is flowing, that is energetically aligned. So all of these things are important.

But bioidentical hormone replacement, it's just I don't want you to miss out on it. I've seen so many women come in and once they get on the bioidentical hormones and they're prescribed properly and monitored properly, because you must do 24 hour urine testing, there's like no ifs, ands or buts about that. And I'm going to teach more about that as the summit goes on and past the summit. So stick around. I want you to become a bioidentical hormone expert from the patient perspective so you know what to ask for and how to be treated so you can be empowered and find someone to work with to guide you on your hormonal journey.

So I got a lot more to say, but I'm not going to say it right now. And I look forward to seeing you for the rest of the days. Interviews. You're going to see me so much these seven days and then I'll be back every day with another little mini talk from me. So enjoy the summit, Take a lot of notes, learn a lot, have a great time, Laugh, love, learn, cry that we got a little bit of everything for you. And I'll see as soon.