How are stress and hormone levels in a woman's body related?

Stress and hormonal imbalance can do very unpleasant things: increase weight, change behavior, and worsen well-being. Read more about hormonal imbalance and stress.

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How does the hormone cortisol work under severe stress?

Disruption of ovarian hormone production and stressful circumstances can trigger a condition that a woman may not even suspect. When the level of the hormone estradiol in her body decreases (this happens before or during menopause), a state of stress occurs.

When you are stressed, the level of the hormone cortisol in the blood increases, and other hormones – serotonin, dopamine, acetylcholine and norepinephrine – decrease their beneficial effects.

Hormonal imbalances

With increased doses of cortisol in the body, the ratios of other hormones are disrupted, and weight becomes very difficult to control. After all, these hormones are responsible for normalizing weight, the amount of fat deposits on the sides and waist, as well as in the chest and back area.

Muscle function is disrupted, muscle fibers are destroyed due to hormonal imbalances, sleep becomes restless and uneven, memory is poor, and libido decreases.

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Stress causes poor digestion of food

When we are stressed, food is digested very poorly, and this contributes to the deposition of fat in the body. Why does this happen?

The hormone cortisol, which is released in excess during stress, slows down the metabolism. In addition, when we are worried, the cells are poorly saturated with oxygen, nutrients do not reach them, which means we do not receive enough vital energy.

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A little stress breeds more stress

If we do not pay attention to the hormonal background of our body at this time, the production of the hormone estrogen is suppressed by cortisol, which means that the state of stress is aggravated even more.

And the thyroid gland also starts to function poorly. All this together forms a vicious circle, from which one can only escape by conducting hormonal tests and consulting an endocrinologist for treatment.

Otherwise, we may consider stress and excess weight as unrelated things, which means we will not be able to eliminate the real causes that lead to extra pounds and poor health.

How does stress cause disease?

When hormones are playing up in the body, it does not contribute to our excellent health. On the contrary: stress can give rise to diseases that would never bother us in a normal, calm environment.

Hormonal imbalances in themselves are additional stress for the body, which aggravates and complements psychological stress. In order to escape from this trap and return to normal health and weight, the body is as sophisticated as it can, adapting to all the changes that happen to us.

Of course, this requires additional vital energy from him. And if this energy is not enough, the poor health only worsens. Therefore, at the slightest signs of depression, mood swings, which are accompanied by the accumulation of kilograms, contact an endocrinologist for examination.

Why do cortisol levels rise?

We have already found out one reason – it is stress. What else provokes increased production of cortisol?

• Malfunctioning ovaries that produce less sex hormones
• Problems with the thyroid gland, which also reduces the production of autoimmune hormones
• Taking medications with steroids (mostly concerns athletes working to increase muscle mass)
• Alcohol without any control
• Reduced resistance to infections
• Poor environmental conditions
• Narcotic substances
• Stressful conditions (physical or psychological stress, including increased workload, anxiety about family, lack of sleep)

A decrease in cortisol levels leads to suppression of ovarian and thyroid hormone production (we remember this). As a result, the hormonal cycle is disrupted, and a woman may suffer from irregular periods, too scanty or too heavy.

Stress and fertility

How does stress affect fertility? Natural defense mechanisms are such that pregnancy is extremely rare during periods of severe stress. A mother who is worried cannot give birth to a healthy baby. Nature has provided for this. And this is true, because in this way a woman is less likely to give birth to a child with abnormalities.

Why does stress reduce the ability to conceive and bear a child so much? Because estrogen, a female hormone, is suppressed by male hormones. Then the hormone progesterone, the so-called pregnancy hormone, is almost not released in the female body. And without it, it is impossible to get pregnant.

And so a woman who has once experienced stress runs the risk that her condition will only worsen without proper treatment and may ultimately lead to infertility.

As for women who are in the precarious period between the onset of menopause and full menstrual cycles, they also risk an earlier start of menopause.

What are the signs that indicate loss of weight control?

No matter how weak and unnoticeable these signs are, they can be identified. This way you can avoid gaining extra pounds, which will then be extremely difficult to get rid of. Here are these bad symptoms.

1. You start to love one particular product and eat it in large doses.
2. Your favorite food - sweets or something fatter
3. You suddenly experience moments of anxiety and worry, which are then suddenly replaced by a state of joy.
4. Before your period, you feel like your heart is beating unevenly, often
5. Your mood changes so quickly that you don't have time to keep track of it. Those around you - even less so.
6. Do you have bouts of ravenous appetite?

Be careful and attentive: all these signs can be observed long (even a couple of months) before you start gaining weight. So do not listen to those people who attribute your condition to life circumstances or something else.

Check your hormone levels, particularly your thyroid and ovarian hormones. If there is an imbalance, start treatment immediately so as not to pay later with a flabby figure and poor health.

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Remember or write it down!

When you are under stress, and hormonal imbalance is added to this, medications can only aggravate the destructive processes in the body and the insidious deposition of fat.

The thing is that with stress and hormonal imbalance, sedatives will simply relieve anxiety for a short period. But if the attacks of brutal hunger and adoration of a particular product do not go away, sound the alarm: most likely, your level of the hormone estradiol is low, and your cortisol is higher than normal.

Most likely, this is also accompanied by glucose and insulin intolerance, and also an increase in blood sugar.

Advice to "calm down with tranquilizers" is bad advice, especially for women over 35. Your first priority should be checking your hormone levels, and then everything else.

Other symptoms of stress and hormonal imbalance

Sleep. What should heal and restore energy no longer brings any pleasure. Do you know the feeling when you wake up broken, as if you unloaded a wagon of coal? Or bricks - it doesn't matter.

What is important is that your sleep is disrupted and it no longer saves you from fatigue and bad mood.

This condition is explained simply. When the body has more cortisol than normal, the level of estradiol drops. This further activates the production of cortisol, the stress hormone. And then you begin to have a real nightmare: you are constantly hungry, you do not sleep well, you have a headache and you hate those around you.

Without even realizing it, you are embarking on a shaky path of fat accumulation and a nasty feeling of how disgusting you are to yourself. Not a good picture. So don't associate your bad mood with stress alone, take care of yourself and don't be lazy about going to the doctor.