Hormone Balance and Why it’s Important
Your hormones play a major role in your overall health including controlling your appetite, weight, sleep and mood. Hormones naturally change throughout different life stages (i.e. menstruation, pregnancy, perimenopause, and menopause) but they can also be cused by other health issues as well as environmental factors.
Why is Hormone Balance Important?
When your hormones are off balance, it can cause a range of symptoms and even long-term health issues.
Our body’s endocrine system is responsible for regulating a range of bodily functions through the release of hormones which are spread throughout your body. Those hormones control nearly all the processes in your body, so having balanced hormones is really important.
Hormone imbalances cause a lot of problems for us women (see below) and can can spiral into serious issues such as adrenal and thyroid disease.
Hormone Imbalance Symptoms and Issues
Symptoms that may suggest hormonal imbalance include weight gain, bloating, fatigue, irritability, depression, anxiety, insomnia, thinning hair or hair loss, brain fog, mood swings, trouble concentrating, and low libido. When gone unchecked, our hormone imbalance can lead to thyroid issues and adrenal fatigue, just to name a few.
Balancing Hormones
Fortunately, by making some simple changes to your diet and lifestyle you can balance your hormones and prevent or reverse many of these health issues. Studies have shown that minerals and vitamins play an important role in hormone regulation. There are a number of ways you can incorporate the needed vitamins and minerals through the healthy foods you choose and supplements you take. Magnesium and Pyridoxine Vitamin B are very helpful in balancing your hormones.
Magnesium
Magnesium is magic for your hormones and is one of the most essential minerals to help balance hormones. Chances are you are deficient in magnesium and don’t even know it. Our bodies literally get rid of magnesium when we are stressed and let’s face it, today’s women are stressed.
Magnesium calms your nervous system and prevents the creation of excess cortisol, the stress hormone. It also helps the production of the thyroid hormone and helps prevents thyroid issues. It’s also improves your sleep, helps control insulin production and reduces sugar cravings. (Learn More)
Food sources: Pumpkin and sunflower seeds, raw almonds, black beans, avocado, tofu, salmon, bananas and even dark chocolate.
Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxine)
Vitamin B6, otherwise known as Pyridoxine, is a water-soluble vitamin that has many important roles and is required for over 100 enzyme reactions in the body. It is involved in more bodily functions than any other single nutrient and has one of the most impressive mood-elevating effects of all the B vitamins.
Vitamin B6 helps reduce estrogen dominance and plays a role in progesterone production restoring the balance between estrogen and progesterone. It also reduces histamine (high histamine contributes to PMS).
Vitamin B6 is needed for tryptophan to be metabolized into serotonin giving a positive effect on both mood and sleep. (Learn More) Vitamin B6 also helps with the production of the neurotransmitter GABA, an amino acid which has a natural calming effect on the brain and helps to reduce stress and regulate mood.
This vitamin allows the body to efficiently metabolize carbohydrates so that the carbs act as a potent energy source rather than getting stored as fat. Great news, right?! (Learn More)
Food sources: spinach, walnuts, eggs, fish, poultry, beans, seaweed.
Supplementation
As you can see, magnesium and Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxine) play an important role of balancing hormones. This is why we included them in the Craving Defender. Taking a supplement such as Craving Defender can help reduce cravings and encourage a balanced hormonal system.
So who is ready to balance hormones, lose weight and defend those crazy cravings? Check out our Craving Defender today!