No one can fight this away. Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of Find Your Model Health, the official podcast for those looking to optimize their long-term health and weight goals. And understand how their body really works. I am your host.
I am Shmeen Lini. I am a nutrition and hormone therapist, certified aerodologist and podcaster, obviously. I hope you're all really, really well. Welcome back.
It's time for a solo episode. I felt it was time. The topic of this episode has popped up a lot recently. And as much as I thoroughly enjoy the conversations with the specialists and guests I have on, like a lot, I was saying to my friend last night that when I get to speak to these experts and these doctors that I'm able to kind of bridge that gap between them and my followers and my community and help ask questions that are on people's minds and really support, especially my community.
I know there's a lot of people that listen to the podcast, but especially my community really support them in ways that they may not be getting locally. So I absolutely love all those conversations so much. But this topic of this podcast, I felt needed a solo episode. Because this topic about estrogen and estrogen detoxification, it's not really, I don't believe it's mainstream right now, although if you go deep and you look down the rabbit hole, you will find it.
But it's not something that seems to be trending around the feeds lately. We're seeing a lot around hormones and perimenopause, but not so much about managing estrogen and estrogen detoxification. There's a lot on the other side about how good estrogen is for you and increasing your estrogen and why you should use estrogen, but there's not a lot on detoxifying estrogen and managing excess estrogen. But I do get a lot of questions and I have done several posts on this and I've discussed it in some of my conversations with my guests, but alas, I felt it needed a little bit more.
And I've discussed in the past how I am super sensitive to estrogen, even when I was using red clover and pregnant alone, as I discussed with Dr. David Rosensuite, my body is super sensitive and I metabolize estrogen at a high rate and express it in a negative way, which is not fun. But a lot of women do and I think this information is needed. So before I go on, I must remind you that the information in these podcast episodes is for informational purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice.
Please consult your health practitioner before making any changes. This is just information that I have to share that I'm aware of and what you do it is totally up to you. Okay, so let's talk about estrogen metabolism or estrogen detoxification as a lot of people speak about. So estrogen metabolism is the healthy removal or detoxification of estrogen from your body and it's pretty much a two step process.
First, your liver inactivates estrogen by attaching a little molecule or what I will refer to as like a brick to that estrogen molecule and this is called conjugation. To do this effectively, your liver needs a couple of things, especially nutrients like folate, B6, B12, zinc, selenium, magnesium and then protein. Another reason why protein is very, very, very, very important for women, especially women in perimenopause. For some reason, a lot of women still believe that protein is only for people who want to build muscle or go to the gym and maybe there's an element for fat loss there.
But there's so, so, so many benefits to protein, including hydrochloric acid production, mental health. But this is one of them and Dr. Ray Pete spoke about this a lot and he would speak about how if a body was protein deficient, the liver was less capable of metabolizing and detoxifying estrogen properly. So basically the process was downregulated.
It just was not happening. So your liver also needs to be pretty much free from as many toxins as possible. So endocrine disruptors and I've done posts on that. Maybe that's another solo episode with our posts on that on my Instagram page and then alcohol.
Even one drink per day can increase your blood level of estrogen. I was speaking about this with a client earlier and she's like, but I don't have one drink a day. I might just have a couple on a Friday or a Saturday and I'm like same thing, same thing. It is affecting estrogen on many levels and then inflammation.
If the liver is very inflamed or has some sort of scar tissue or damage, that is going to affect how you metabolize and detoxify estrogen. Then the second step of estrogen metabolism or detoxification is the elimination of this conjugated estrogen. So that estrogen molecule that has a brick attached to it and this happens through your gut. Now, in simple terms, the reason why the liver attaches this brick to the estrogen is because by the time that estrogen gets to the gut, the brick is so big and heavy that it stops that estrogen from being recirculated or getting truth the intestinal wall and being recirculated where we think of leaky gut.
So there's a couple of things required to help with this process of detoxification. One is having a healthy microbiome. So those good bacteria are those healthy intestinal bacteria. If you have any sort of SIBO or dysbiosis there or higher levels of bad bacteria, that is going to affect how you detoxify the estrogen.
When healthy bacteria are present in your gut, they assist with the removal of these conjugated estrogens via your poop or your stool. And when unhealthy or what we would refer to as bad bacteria are present, they impair estrogen metabolism by making an enzyme called beta-glugranidase which decongerates the estrogen. So it takes off that block or the brick off the estrogen molecule. Not only does it do that, it also reactivates the estrogen.
So the estrogen gets recirculated and goes to work again about messing stuff up. So this reactivated estrogen, once it gets passed through that gastrointestinal lining, it gets recirculated in a process that's called enterohepatic recirculation, which basically means gut liver recirculation. And then that will contribute to estrogen excess or estrogen dominance. So to prevent this on the level of the gut, we obviously want to maintain a healthy gut.
Now I want to go into a little bit more detail on these steps. I don't want to get too science-y, but I do want to help you understand a bit more how each process works. So if you just stopped it there and now, like the podcast, please don't. But if you did, you'd have a good idea of how it works.
Okay, I got to support my liver and I got to support my gut. Well, let's look at it in a little bit more detail. We'll start with the liver because that's the first step there. So we've discussed how estrogen primarily happens in the liver in regards to metabolism and the binding there of that block to the estrogen molecule.
So there's three phases that are involved here. Phase one is called hydroxylation. And this is where these enzymes get produced and then they get pushed down certain pathways. So the estrogen molecule then gets pushed down either our 2OH pathway, which is what we would consider our protective, quote, clean or good estrogen.
Or it can get pushed down our 4OH pathway and this can form reactive quinones, which damage our DNA and can be a factor in cancer. And then there's a lot of people here about a lot. So the third pathway is 16 alpha OH and this is more biologically active in regards to causing more damage and more, for lack of a better term right now, more badness, more negativity to the body. This pathway, the 16 alpha OH pathway is also linked to cell proliferation and really is connected a lot more to cancer outcomes.
Our goal here would obviously be to favor the 2OH pathway, which would be the kind of good pathway where the good estrogen can go and do the good stuff and then reduce that kind of conversion to the 4 or the 16OH. So then the second phase is the conjugation we already spoke about. And this is where we're making estrogen more water soluble so then it's easier to be passed through the gut basically. So there we've got first methylation happens in the gut where we're breaking down the estrogen and then we've got the glucoronidation that we mentioned.
And then we've got another step called sulfation, which is that extra step of binding the estrogen and making it ready for clearing through the gut. The primary nutrients that are involved here in this phase 2 are going to be our B vitamins. B vitamins, especially activated B vitamins, are very important here. Magnesium super important in this step.
SAME and choline are another two molecules that are very helpful here as well. Then we've got phase 3, which would be that elimination aspect. That's where the good and the kidneys also are involved. So the goal here is to get it out, basically get it out of the body.
And some of the issues that we would encounter here are like what I mentioned already, that beta glucoronidase enzyme where it'll remove the brick and reactivate the estrogen. If it's elevated and if we have a proliferation of bad bacteria and then we've got constipation is a huge, huge factor here. Let's pause on this for a minute. I think constipation is a driver of a lot of health issues.
One of the primary causes of constipation is low thyroid function and then the next is usually going to be dehydration and then of course we've got structural issues. We can have SIBO a few other things. But thyroid is a big consideration here and especially in context where we're talking about excess estrogen and removing the estrogen, excess estrogen will slow down thyroid function, which will cause constipation. So you can see where there's a vicious cycle here.
So you've got to be getting it out. You have to be pooping one to two times every single day or you're increasing the likelihood of this recirculation of the estrogen and then that's going to obviously influence thyroid even more. It'll increase systemic inflammation and it'll cause damage in many, many other areas, including the production of that four and 16 OH, those kind of more negative estrogen metabolites to be formed and obviously nobody wants that. But this is huge.
I see people with a lot of constipation and those who have the most constipation seem to have the most issues with estrogen and systemic inflammation and then, like I mentioned, that will affect you on many levels but I also noticed they have a lot of mental health issues as well. They struggle a lot which would make sense because of all these toxins being recirculated in their body. So constipation 100% leads to estrogen reabsorption and recirculation. So that's something that's really, really important.
And then at the level of the kidneys, we don't excrete a lot of estrogen in our urine, but we do excrete some and of course anything that's transported through the blood will go through the kidneys. So we do want our kidneys to be helpful. Lots of clean water there, lots of electrolytes, hibiscus tea, burdock tea, dandelion tea, very good. Again, lots of electrolytes and hydration.
This is something a lot of women are lacking in and need a lot of reminders. If you think you need more fiber to help a bowel movements, totally do that. You can try some other practices. You can try a squatty potty, one of my favorite tools ever.
If you absolutely needed to use some sort of laxative or high dose magnesium or vitamin C to get the bowels moving. I hesitated there for a second because I don't like the idea of promoting laxatives, but also I don't like the idea of waste sitting in the intestines for days and days and days. So you want to get it out and sometimes that will require that you use a laxative. Just remember, if you do do something like that, you have to rehydrate after and compensate for the lost fluids in the bowel movement.
Generally, laxatives are going to cause more of a looser stool or even diarrhea. So there's a lot more water being lost there and minerals. You have to compensate for that. So it's very simple example would be if you're used to drinking tree leaders of fluid a day and now you have diarrhea, well, then you should be on four leaders that day just to compensate for that loss in fluids and minerals there.
So a couple of things that can help with this detoxification process of Eastergens. We've gone through the steps and the phases and the pathways and really the key factors are helping the liver and the gut function optimally. So a few things that are going to help with that, the teas, the hydration I already mentioned. Then we also want to, well, some people are going to want a little bit of extra help there.
So how could we help our body in regards to maybe supplements or other therapies? So firstly, I did mention that lower thyroid function is a factor here and we know in a lot of people, if there's lower thyroid function, not only are they more prone to constipation, but there's usually some liver issues. For those of you that listened to my podcast conversations with Keith Littlewood, I believe on our first conversation, I put to him the question of which came first, the liver or the thyroid issues. And honestly, it could go either way.
There's generally though a liver issue if there's a thyroid issue. So you have to support the liver. So the B vitamins, those herbal teas that can be beneficial, but be careful because some herbal teas that we believe are beneficial actually are counter beneficial. It's a red clover being an example, even raspberry leaf being another example.
But if I was doing it, I would personally choose hibiscus, raw dandelion leaf, or bird ox. Those would be kind of my go-to's for the livers and the kidneys, and lots of hydration, lots of electrolytes. And I mentioned making sure that you have good B vitamins. I really like torn research.
There'd be vitamin complexes. You've got magnesium. I love thorns. Magnesium.
I really like bi-optimizers. Magnesium. Vitamin C, very, very important for liver function. Another one that I spoke about in my Facebook Health and Hormone Support Group the other day is calcium deglugarate.
There's a lot of information about calcium deglugarate being beneficial for detoxing estrogen. Because what calcium deglugarate does is you remember that enzyme that causes the beta-glugarate adation. Well, calcium deglugarate can help to reduce the production of that enzyme. So then that, if there's not a lot of that enzyme around, then it basically can't remove the block or the brick from the enzyme molecule.
So you're reducing the instances of that happening. And calcium deglugarate has been recommended for a long time by naturopaths, functional medicine practitioners. People in the know, it's one of the things that works for the majority of women and even men to an extent, and they can feel the difference. So that is one option that I think is viable for a lot of people who need it.
Then we have glutathione, formerly known as our master antioxidant. I don't know if it's silly. But it's one of our main antioxidants can be very helpful for the liver and even sulfation. It can be quite helpful there.
So that end pass of the estrogen before it goes into the gut. Then we've got sulforifane is another one. Dr. Ronda Patrick discusses sulforifane a lot, not just for estrogen detoxification, but also as a potential preventative measure for cancer.
So forifane, you can get it in a supplement. You can also get it in broccoli, but you have to get a lot of broccoli. She, apart from supplementation, Dr. Ronda Patrick recommends that you eat broccoli sprouts or microgreens.
So, and they're really easy addition to a diet. You can add them to scrambled eggs, you can put them in an omelet, you can add them to a salad, you can add them to a soup, you can sprinkle over roasted meats and vegetables. You can put them into smoothies and juices. So, and some people just eat them.
They just eat them as a side dish with a bit of lemon juice and salt. So, that can be super beneficial. And even Dr. Ronda Patrick doesn't speak about this as much but red radish microgreens can also have a beneficial effect in detoxifying estrogen, supporting that at the level of the liver.
So, before we wrap up, I wouldn't be doing this podcast. Just this, if I did not mention the next four things. First, I did mention thyroid. You have to have to have to support your thyroid all day, every day, especially as you get older and transition through the perimenopause years, because that is really what's going to influence how you feel, but also obviously that quote perimenopause weight gain.
So, thyroid really important how you do that. There's multiple ways. You can just do a true nutrition. You could do a true some lifestyle practices, or you could take some sort of thyroid hormone or gland.
The next, oh, and you could also support your thyroid through this next point, which is progesterone. We know that bioidentical progesterone is very, important for optimal thyroid function. Prothyroid, and we see this when we ovulate, that it influences temperature and thus thyroid function metabolism. We see this if you're taking your temperature, you will get an elevation and that will stay high until day one of your bleeds.
So, progesterone is really powerful there. Progesterone also protects us from the damaging effects of estrogen, and it can have anti-inflammatory effects. It can have liver supporting effects. There's many, many reasons, and I'm sure if you've been following me for the last few years, and you've listened to a lot of my podcasts and conversations with Dr.
Michael Platt and many others, that you know the benefits of progesterone. But in this aspect, progesterone does help with the detoxification of estrogen. So, something I use daily, I think I'll use it for as long as I can, and I think most women need to, especially in perimenopause, regardless if they think they do or not, I think most women do need to. It's kind of that idea.
And Dr. Geroland Pryor has spoken about this as well, and I've spoken about it. That just because you don't think you have a thyroid issue in perimenopause and postmenopause doesn't mean you don't, and you don't need some help there. So, then we've got movement walking especially.
Like if you can't do anything else, or you're not doing anything else, you're not doing resistance training, you're not doing weight training, or body weight training, you're not doing anything else, at least walk. We know that walking is very good for the liver, because walking also helps with contraction of the gallbladder, and then that movement of vial, which is very good for the liver too, and helps with any stagnation of toxins there. It just helps to keep everything flowing really, really, really well. So walking, walking, and then, and we're still on the level of the liver right now, but these, everything I've said so far, will have some sort of positive effect on the butt as well, and bowel transit time.
So do some sort of walking. I very, very much like, and I do it obviously for cosmetic reasons too, but I very much enjoy abdominal exercises for supporting my liver, because it helps to encourage blood flow around the organs, and it helps with muscle contraction there. So, and that can be very helpful for bowel movements. There's some women that find if they do, if they are constipated or struggling to pass, they're still that if they do some abdominal exercises, the contraction of the muscles around the intestines will encourage them to have a bowel movement, which is really helpful.
So at the very least, if you do nothing else, at least walk, movement is important for the liver, and then the last thing is sleep. Sleep really is where the magic happens. All this other stuff that you're doing and taking during the day, it really doesn't make its big, big impact until you're asleep, because that's when everything else stops, and your body can just focus on the essential processes then, and that's where a lot of liver detoxification and metabolism happens, not just the v-strogen of other molecules as well. And that's where we do a lot of reduction of our inflammation and cleaning out damaged cells, and even our brain goes through a process of gliadinasian.
And then we also do a lot of our production and upregulation of production of our hormones during sleep as well, like sleep is where the magic happens. And if you're not prioritizing your sleep, and you're not getting the results you need or want, you really should be. Like I think most women, and I'm specifically talking to women now in perimenopause and midlife, should have their head on the pillow by 9.30 pm every night, if not 9 pm, and pretty much going to sleep then, and then you wake up around 6, and that's ideally a good night's sleep. So prioritizing sleep is very important, especially when we're discussing hormone health and hormone balance.
So just circling back then to the gut a bit, the primary thing with the gut in this aspect is helping with bowel movements. Now some people would say, well it's not actually, it's keeping that healthy balance between the good and bad bacteria. Not that that's totally wrong, but if you're constipated, you're going to have higher amounts of bad bacteria. So making sure that you're having those daily bowel movements and you feel like you're emptying fully, that is going to help control the bad bacteria because you're getting a lot of them out.
And usually those daily regular bowel movements indicate that you have more of the good bacteria and everything's working properly. There's obviously context to be considered when we start looking at people who have chronic diarrhea and bad bacteria, that's a different conversation, but making sure you're having regular daily bowel movements, at least one to two a day, is really important. And then making sure or at least trying your best to tilt things in your favor, like tilt things in the favor of the good bacteria, so you have more of them than the bad bacteria. So we're looking at our teas again, very beneficial here, our polyphenol rich foods, protein, a lot of the gastrointestinal lining is made up of protein and amino acids.
Collagen, bone broth can be helpful here, then our green vegetables, so those really fibers, green vegetables, just be careful with spinach and kale if there's thyroid issues. And then our good start is trying to keep your exposure to inflammatory foods as low as possible, because those inflammatory foods will increase, not just the inflammation at the level of the gut, but they'll increase the bad bacteria, and then they'll increase the recirculation of the estrogen, but also the production of endotoxins, and then we've got a whole other problem there. So limiting your exposure to trans fats, greasy foods, the alcohol again, seed oils can be highly problematic. Then whole grains, if you're going to have whole grains, go for fermented or sprouted whole grains.
I'm not a huge fan of beans and legumes unless they're very, very, very well cooked, like they're soaked or pressure cooked or slow cooker, just because I've noticed many of my clients do have a lot of negative reactions. Then also, obviously the junk and the processed foods and the additives, the food colorings. So yeah, I think a lot of people know what they should avoid, but they don't consider that avoiding these specific foods is going to help me reduce my bad bacteria and then reduce the production of the beta glucuronidase and the instances of estrogen detoxification being impaired and so on and so on. So, once bit more in depth there, I think it's all important.
Hopefully it wasn't too sciency. Hopefully you kind of understand a lot more now. One thing that I forgot to mention that actually, there is a study on this that I shared in my Health and Hormone Support Group and that's citrus and specifically citrus rinds, added to the diet have been shown to help reduce levels of estrogen in the body. So, some of my clients have started fermenting their lemons, their limes, even their oranges and they're adding them to different dishes.
Some of them are adding rinds into their yogurts in the morning and then just having the citrus. Like now, this time of the year, I already mentioned polyphenols, so, so important. Making some sort of nice fruit salad that's got a lot of citrus and berries in it. Like that's perfect at this time of the year and will be very beneficial for you, not just because of the citrus aspects, but obviously the enzymes, the structured water, the vitamin C, all that good stuff.
I'll leave it at that. I could go on more and more, but I think this is the most important stuff for you to take away. Hopefully you found that helpful. Please share with anyone that you think might benefit from this information, which I think is nearly every woman that we know.
Let me know if you have any feedback or questions. You can reach out to me on Facebook or Instagram at Shameen's Model Health. You can email me if you go to my website. There's a contact me button at the top there that emails me directly and I do read them and I do respond to them.
Otherwise, thank you for spending some of your day with me. I hope you really, really enjoyed this. Take care and we will chat soon. Bye-bye.