Could stress be messing with your adrenal glands and progesterone levels? Here are some simple but powerful strategies from Marcelle Pick to balance your hormones and get your health back on track
When I first saw Lisa, I could see immediately that she was totally exhausted and completely overwhelmed. Her despair was clear in her tired, flat eyes and her frustrated words: “I can’t do this anymore.”
The 38-year-old graphic designer, like so many women her age, was working herself into the ground. Her day often began at 5 a.m., and she didn’t leave the office until after 8 o’clock many nights—especially when deadlines were looming.
On top of all that, she traveled for her job frequently and felt like she was never available for her preteen daughter. Forget quality mother-daughter time . . . Lisa wasn’t even home for the typical parental nagging! She felt guilty and sad most of the time but had no idea how to change things.
Not only was Lisa tired and stressed beyond belief but she also had an extensive list of health complaints. Her PMS symptoms were intense, and she had vaginal dryness, thinning hair and weight gain.
She was irritable and forgetful, and she had trouble concentrating. She regularly woke up at 2 a.m. and felt like she needed a nap as soon as her alarm went off in the morning.
Does this sound familiar? Are you juggling so many responsibilities that you don’t feel like you’re doing any of them justice? I’ve heard from so many women who tell me they don’t feel like themselves anymore; their lives have spun out of control with no relief in sight. And their health is suffering greatly because of it.
What Lisa and these other women don’t know is that they’re experiencing adrenal dysfunction and low progesterone. Hormonal imbalances are behind their issues, and their crazy pace of life isn’t helping a bit.
There’s a lot of talk about estrogen, but many women don’t have a clue about how important progesterone is. This essential hormone is a key player in the menstrual cycle, fertility and pregnancy. Progesterone is one of those things we learn about in high school biology, then promptly forget until something goes wrong. But for women, that’s a big mistake.
Women often don’t know how important hormonal balance is and how much control they have over it. Some lifestyle changes can make a huge difference in the symptoms they’re experiencing if they just realize the root of their problem: progesterone deficiency and adrenal dysfunction.
Lisa knew something had to give. She listened carefully to my recommendations, addressed her low progesterone and adrenal dysfunction, and came out the other side feeling better than she had in years. Somewhere along the way, she also learned to slow down a bit so the problem wouldn’t return. And you can, too.
Progesterone is one of your major female sex hormones. The corpus luteum in your ovaries releases progesterone during your cycle to prepare your endometrium for a potential pregnancy after ovulation. It helps to thicken the lining of the womb to accept fertilized eggs, reduces muscle contractions that can lead to rejection of fertilized eggs and stimulates glands that nourish the embryo.
Progesterone helps keep your body calm and healthy. Unfortunately, like Lisa, many women don’t realize that progesterone deficiency is the culprit behind their anxiety, moodiness, PMS, heavy periods and other symptoms. Because of major hormonal shifts as you move beyond childbearing years, low progesterone may also cause symptoms in menopausal and postmenopausal women.
Nothing in your body happens in isolation. For your body to function at its best, all its hormones need to be properly balanced. If one is out of whack, chances are, others will be too. Since progesterone is produced in your adrenal glands as well as your ovaries, it’s not surprising that progesterone deficiency and adrenal dysfunction are often connected.
Adrenal dysfunction may feel like walking through a perpetual fog. You may feel groggy, irritable or anxious. You may have trouble concentrating, sleeping or losing weight. You may have digestive issues, PMS or severe menopausal symptoms. Life just feels like a chore.
Your adrenal glands are located just above your kidneys. They’re responsible for producing and releasing a long list of hormones that your body can’t function without. If your adrenals are dysfunctional, these hormones get out of balance, leading to those uncomfortable symptoms.
The primary responsibility of your adrenals is to help your body respond to stress. They release adrenaline and cortisol to allow your body to survive.
Cortisol is also known as the stress hormone. It converts nutrients from food into energy, reduces inflammation, supports the immune response, and regulates your blood pressure and cardiovascular function. It also activates the “fight, flight, or freeze” response under stress.
This comes in quite handy if you’re facing a real threat. Our ancestors used cortisol to fight for survival when running from wild animals, fire or other danger. It’s also the mechanism that can help you react appropriately and survive if you get mugged or get into a car accident.
But it’s not exactly practical when you’re experiencing constant everyday stress, such as being stuck in traffic, dealing with job frustration or reading the news. When you’re under chronic stress from family, relationships, your job and other life issues, your body’s stress response gets stuck in the “on” position.
Your body never gets the memo that everything is alright and it can relax and chill a little bit. Instead, your adrenal glands produce cortisol constantly, causing imbalances in your other hormone levels.
Eventually your adrenals may also get tired of the continuous cortisol demand and start producing too little cortisol instead. Too little cortisol can also lead to problems, including exhaustion and hormonal imbalance.
There are lists of symptoms for both progesterone deficiency and adrenal dysfunction below. There’s a lot of overlap, which can make it tricky to tease out exactly what you’re dealing with. But at the root of them all is stress.
An ongoing stress response is not healthy. Your body shouldn’t have a fight, flight or freeze response because of small daily stressors, like a traffic jam.
Chronic stress taxes your adrenals and leads to overproduction of cortisol. However, when your adrenals are working overtime to make excessive cortisol, they have to cut back on progesterone production, causing estrogen-progesterone imbalance (estrogen dominance).
At first, your symptoms may be slight: a little fatigue, trouble sleeping or a jittery feeling. But if your adrenal dysfunction goes unaddressed, you’ll start experiencing more extreme fatigue and symptoms. Due to prolonged stress, your body then reaches that stage called “pregnenolone steal.”
Pregnenolone is a hormone precursor—a compound the body uses to make cortisol, progesterone and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA). DHEA helps produce two other critical sex hormones, estrogen and testosterone.
When you’re experiencing chronic stress and pumping out cortisol around the clock, pregnenolone reduces progesterone and DHEA production to make space for the creation of more and more cortisol instead. Cortisol ultimately steals the space from progesterone.
Another problem during stress is that the production of 17,20-lyase (or 17 alpha-hydroxylase) gets blocked. This enzyme acts on pregnenolone and progesterone and is essential for hormone production, sexual development and reproduction.
Since 17,20-lyase is critical for hormone production, this can become a serious problem. It blocks the conversion of cholesterol to hormone production, and progesterone levels get low.
This leads to an imbalance in hormones including progesterone. It’s why so many women have progesterone issues.
The insufficient production of progesterone leads to progesterone deficiency, estrogen-progesterone imbalance, other hormonal imbalances, worsened PMS, perimenopausal or menopausal symptoms, infertility, low sex drive, irritability, moodiness, fatigue, brain fog, blood sugar imbalances and other issues.
If your body continues to overproduce cortisol for a long time, eventually it will reach burnout. It will stop producing cortisol while still only producing low levels of progesterone and DHEA. At this stage, your symptoms became even worse, making daily life very challenging. Your risk of digestive disorders, other hormonal imbalances, autoimmune conditions, infertility and other health issues also increases.
Now that you know why balanced progesterone is important, what can you do about it? Most conventional doctors don’t offer much advice. Lisa, like most of my patients, went from doctor to doctor without results. When she came to me, she finally found improvement with the help of some natural solutions.
It seems so simple, but your body is incredibly wise. If you support it with natural strategies and allow it to rest, it will repair itself. Like Lisa, you may also find success with the following natural strategies.
Reduce your stress levels
If you don’t give your body a break, your adrenals won’t be able to slow down, either. Eliminating stress entirely is impossible, of course. But you can reduce stress and learn how to better respond when stressors do arise.
A good place to start is finding just one thing you can stop doing in your overloaded schedule. Every small step can eventually lead to big results.
Start your day with deep breathing
Breathwork is one of the most powerful ways to relax your body. Start your day with a few conscious deep breaths and stop throughout the day to practice deep breathing for a moment.
Practice meditation to release your feelings and identify negative patterns. Try meditation or yoga to calm your mind and body. Spend time in nature to slow down and connect with yourself.
Sleep plenty
Sleep deprivation is one of the main underlying causes of stress and adrenal dysfunction. Your body needs seven to nine hours of quality sleep each night. Try to go to bed and wake up around the same time every day to support your natural sleep-wake cycle.
As bedtime approaches, avoid stress, heavy foods and electronics. Engage in relaxing activities that help your body and mind calm down. Reading fiction, journaling, coloring, crossword puzzles and meditation are great evening ideas.
Follow a hormone-friendly diet
Food is medicine. It’s simple but true. Be conscious about what you put into your body. Avoid refined sugar, refined oil and processed foods.
Consume nutrient-dense whole foods, including lots of greens, vegetables, fruits, legumes, whole grains, wild-caught fish and seafood, and lean red meat. Choose organic whenever available and affordable.
Pay attention to how you eat as well. Don’t rush your meals. Sit down comfortably and focus on your meal instead of scrolling on your phone or watching TV.
Slow down, chew your food well and stop between bites. Stop eating when you feel satisfied, before you become uncomfortably full.
Support your body with supplements
Vitamin B6 is great for optimal progesterone levels and helps to break down estrogen, reducing estrogen dominance.
Suggested dosage: 10 mg daily
Vitamin C helps to boost your progesterone levels and offers antioxidant benefits, lowering oxidative stress and reducing free radical damage.
Suggested dosage: 250–500 mg daily
Magnesium helps to regulate your hormones and maintain optimal progesterone levels.
Suggested dosage: 400–800 mg daily of a bioavailable form such as magnesium glycinate
Zinc promotes progesterone production in your ovaries and helps you to maintain healthy progesterone levels.
Suggested dosage: 15–25 mg daily
To meet your vitamin and mineral needs, I recommend taking a high-quality multivitamin. Always check with your healthcare provider to make sure a particular supplement is appropriate for your unique needs. Testing for vitamin and mineral deficiencies may help you choose the right supplement.
Try herbal support
Adaptogenic herbs help to reduce stress and improve your adrenal health. Here are a few to try, but remember to check with your healthcare provider to make sure these herbal supplements are right for you.
Astragalus root helps to regulate your body’s stress response, immune function and blood sugar levels.
Suggested dosage: 250–500 mg extract twice daily
Ashwagandha helps to lower stress and anxiety, reduce cortisol, and improve brain function.
Suggested dosage: 200–400 mg daily
Rhodiola rosea helps to reduce stress-related fatigue, improve immune function, boost mental clarity, reduce anxiety and depression, improve immune function and regulate blood sugar levels.
Suggested dosage: 200–400 mg daily
Licorice root supports adrenal balance, energy and endurance.
Suggested dosage: 400–500 mg in powdered form daily
When Lisa returned to me a few weeks after making the shifts I suggested, she was no longer in despair. In fact, she was radiant! I couldn’t believe the visible difference in just a short time.
She said she was learning to reduce stress (yes, she even said no to her boss sometimes), find joy by spending time with her daughter and support her health with natural strategies. You can improve your health the same way.
Supporting your diet with stress-reducing techniques, better sleep, a hormone-supporting diet, vitamins, minerals and adaptogenic herbs is a road worth taking.
These are some typical symptoms of progesterone deficiency:
If these symptoms seem familiar to you, you may be experiencing adrenal dysfunction:
What do you think? Start a conversation over on the... WDDTY Community
Great news! Discounts are available based on your cart total. Check the details below:
