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Managing Your Man - Part 2: Hormones

3/1/2013

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Hormones drive men just as much as they drive women. You may not see their fluctuations repeat in patterns over the period of time that roughly coincides with the lunar month, but you can be sure those hormones are behind a lot of behavior and patterns you do see.

The "Male" Hormone: Testosterone

You may be surprised to learn that the same sex hormones drive men and women. Testosterone is the big boy, the one everyone thinks of as "the male hormone." But women have it too; men just have about 10 times more of it.
Among its many functions, testosterone supports heart and brain health, promotes the growth of lean muscle mass and strong bones, promotes sexual fantasies and erections, and fuels healthy assertiveness.

Men can run low on testosterone and when they do, they need supplementation. Low testosterone in aging men has been shown to be a strong predictor of Alzheimers. Without enough testosterone, men can lose their interest in everything, they may seem lazy, dull, bored, easily confused or forgetful. Businesses or hobbies they were once passionate about become burdens or simply fall off the radar. If they were hot headed before, they may become passive; if they were passive before, they may become short tempered. They may have difficulty having erections, may not care about sex, or may need more stimulation (from porn, etc.) to get aroused. They may get flabby, break bones more easily, and have cardiovascular problems. 

I'll talk more about supplementing testosterone in another post.

The "Female" Hormone: Estrogen

Yes, men have estrogen too, though less than women have. And this estrogen helps mellow a man's temper. It also works with his other hormones to support heart and brain health, and ensure strong bones and muscles. But they shouldn't have too much, or rather, "too much estrogen relative to their testosterone."

Estrogen-to-Testosterone Balance

What's important is that men have the right proportion of estrogen to testosterone. Sources argue over the ideal testosterone-estrogen ranges, but the Life Extension Foundation (www.LEF.org) suggests that 20-25 pg/mL of free testosterone (measured directly, not calculated from total T) is the optimal T range for most men.

They also quote a study reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) that showed that men with estrogen (specifically estradiol, or E2) levels between about 22 and 30 pg/mL had the fewest deaths--compared to men with either musch lover or much higher E2 levels. 

These numbers suggest that men live longest when they have roughly equal amounts of estrogen and free testosterone in their systems.

The Other Sex Hormone

You wouldn't think men would need progesterone, the hormone thought of as the pregnancy hormone, but they do. It is the third leg of the sex hormone tripod that we all need to keep everything in balance. Men need progesterone because it breaks down into the other sex hormones as well as the adrenal hormones, cortisol and adrenalin.

More important, progesterone is the hormone that modulates a woman's immune system during pregnancy so her body doesn't reject the "foreign object" (the baby) she's carrying in her womb. That same progesterone (in lower amounts) modulates the immune systems in men and women every day. If progesterone is low, or isn't present in the right proportions relative to E and P, a person may have problems with allergies and autoimmune diseases such as arthritis or fibromyalgia.

Anabolic Steriods

You may have felt your stomach clench a little when you read the title of this section. Relax. Although you are accustomed to the word used in the context of athletes doping themselves to bulk up or extend their stamina, the fact is that all your natural sex hormones are anabolic steroids.

Anabolic refers to a hormone's ability to build things. All three sex hormones are anabolic. They build important things like muscles and bones. In women they also build things like a uterine lining every month and both milk secreting (secretory) and milk draining (ductal) cells in the breasts.

The opposite of anabolic is catabolic. Catabolic hormones break down or consume cells and tissues. You need a certain amount of these too. You can't build healthy new bone, for example, without tearing down some old bone. Catabolic hormones, in proper proportions, promone healthy cell turnover and remodeling in your body. However, too much of the catabolic hormones (like the stress hormone cortisol) can damage your body. I'll go into the role of the adrenal hormones in another post.

Men and Hormones

The fact is that men are hormonal creatures, just as women are. They may exhibit different behaviors but they are just as vulnerable to the physical and emotional effects of changing hormone levels and proportions as are women. And they need to maintain ideal levels and proportions to keep their bodies and minds functioning optimally.
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Independence Day -- Celebrating Freedom...with Music

7/4/2011

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Today is July 4, and all around me friends and neighbors are celebrating the independence of our great nation. 

But this day is meaningful to me in another way...because this is the first year in over 12 that I have been free of a crazy affliction that started when my hormones went south at the time of menopause. It is also the first year in over 12 that I have felt truly alive.

This affliction is something I call the broken record syndrome, or auditory memory loops (AMLs). You may know it as simply having songs stuck in your head, or "ear worms." And for most of us, it's nothing but an occasional nuisance. However, for others of us (and I have learned that I'm not alone) it is a maddening and destructive phenomenon that can literally ruin your life.

For one solid year I had multiple songs stuck in my head 24 hours a day 7 days a week. They were so "loud" I couldn't hear my own thoughts. I couldn't get rid of the music...ever. I could only "change the channel" and get a different song stuck when one had become so painfully familiar I thought I might jump off a bridge. They played throughout my waking hours and then filled my dreams with insideous torture.

For one solid year, I never had one minute of quiet anywhere in my world. And I now know that many others have suffered even longer than I did. I honestly don't know how they have remained sane.

I have since hypothesized that this phenomenon may be associated with the stress hormone cortisol. However, my efforts to reduce cortisol with supplements have only provided moderate success.

What worked most effectively for me was to keep my progesterone levels fairly low...lower than I really wanted to. After all, like all women, I needed progesterone to balance the estrogen I was taking (and still making in my adrenal glands and fat cells, even after my hysterectomy). But progesterone can break down along either of two paths: (a) toward the sex hormones like estrogen and testosterone, or (b) toward the adrenal hormones like cortisol and adrenalin/epinephrine. For whatever reason, my progesterone seemed to prefer to break down into cortisol. And the high cortisol seemed to feed the broken record syndrome.

The real breakthrough came late last year when I experimented with a new hormone replacement therapy (HRT) regimen. The hypothesis behind this regimen exploited the fact that during a woman's normal 28-day cycle she experiences a surge of estrogen in the middle of the month. This helps her body prepare for and trigger ovulation. But this surge of estrogen also helps prime her body's cells to accept the progesterone that will be coming along right after ovulation.

Rather than attempt to mimic a full 28-day cycle I tried to do half of that...a 14 day cycle. I have not yet found documentation that tells me just how much E your body needs in order to prepare those progesterone receptors to take in the progesterone. Neither do I yet know exactly what the E surge does. One source says it "creates" progesterone receptors. Another says it "opens up" progesterone receptors.

In any case, my hypothesis has been that perhaps I had plenty of progesterone floating through my system but without the E surge the doors wouldn't open and I couldn't get the P inside the cells. So instead, the P converted to cortisol which powered the crazy jukebox in my head.

Once I started the new regimen, the broken record syndrome went away! Curiously enough, the new regimen also has reduced my allergies, taken away the headaches I'd had, and eliminated a certain pain in my right side that I suspect may have been caused by a bit of endometriosis missed during my hysterectomy.

What's most profoundly important about this new regimen is that along with my ability to enjoy music again, it has given back my aliveness, my passions and creativity. You see, for 12 years I had felt dead inside, sometimes "knowing" a moment or a thing was special but being completely unable to FEEL it. The touch of a dear man's hand on mine a year ago tormented me as I studied it and begged the universe, "Why can't I feel this?"

Now I feel everything again, experience everything in rich detail, and am learning all over again (perhaps with a whole new appreciation I never had before) to savor every moment, to explore every facet of that moment and to be fully present in it. 

So I feel free and today I am celebrating my independence...from lifelessness, from the two-dimensional world that some insisted was to be expected at my age.  I never gave up on that hope of finding myself again, of reawakening the passions in me. And neither should any of you.  

Happy independence day!

For more information about the broken record syndrome, see my other blog at http://brokenrecordsyndrome.wordpress.com/ 

 
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    Author

    Author Pat O'Connell offers a variety of health-related articles for women and men. This information is for educational purposes only.
    NOTE: Please consult a medical professional before implementing these or any other health solutions. 

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