Transcription
Have you been hearing all the hype about hormones and hormone replacement therapy, and you're thinking to yourself, "When do I start? Do I start with progesterone? I keep hearing about progesterone. When do you know when progesterone is the right hormone for you and when should you start?"
Hi, my name is Dr. Carrie Jones. I am a women's health and hormone expert, and I fully understand that hormones can feel like hurting cats. So, you're gonna want to hit that subscribe button and follow along because I answer all your questions and go through hormones so it's easier for you to understand.
Now, progesterone. Progesterone is your calming, soothing, "everything's going to be okay" hormone. It's the hormone that helps you not have heavy periods. It's the hormone that, like, eases your PMS. It's the hormone that helps with sleep. It is also the hormone of "pro-gestation." That's why it has its name of progesterone. It makes the inside of the uterus nice and big and fluffy so that should you be looking to become pregnant and should implantation occur, that there's a lot of fluff in there to bind into and grow a baby.
Now, you may not be looking to become pregnant, but that's what progesterone is for. Progesterone is only released after you ovulate. Once the egg goes out, then it magically, the cells left over magically, like an irreversible Cinderella, turn into a unit called the corpus luteum. I didn't name it, I'm just telling you. The corpus luteum, and that's what pumps out progesterone.
The problem is, once once we get older and into the perimenopausal transition, either we start to release that egg less, so we don't make progesterone at all, or we release the egg and the cells that are supposed to pump out progesterone, like this, you know, robust factory kind of fizzles out. And we, instead of getting this beautiful big stream of progesterone, we get a slow trickle. And we notice it. We start to notice, like, "I'm not as calm as I used to be. I'm more irritated. I don't sleep as well. My periods are getting heavier. My PMS is worse. What is going on?"
So, if that sounds like you, it's possibly time to consider progesterone. And you don't have to test for it. You do not have to test to determine if you need progesterone, although you may find that your practitioner suggests it, especially if you're still having regular cycles, just to see how much of a trickle do you make? Is it a medium trickle? A low trickle? Are you still pretty robust? What is going on? But if you feel like you can resonate with those symptoms, you're like, "Carrie, I am not sleeping like I used to. My periods are not that great. In fact, they kind of suck. My PMS is not that good. I don't feel calm. In fact, I feel pretty irritable and irritated a lot," then progesterone maybe the hormone for you.
Are there other options to increase and support progesterone production or ovulation? Yes. A common supplement in the natural world is called chaste tree berry, or Vitex. If you were early in your perimenopausal transition, if you're in more the early stage, and I have a whole video that you can watch on the stages of perimenopause, then that supplement chaste tree has been shown for a lot of women to help further support their own natural progesterone production. You will also hear about other supplements such as evening primrose oil. Evening primrose oil, and some women have been shown to support progesterone production in that early stage of perimenopause.
But sometimes that's not strong enough. Sometimes you just need the actual hormone. Your body is not going to produce it anymore like it used to. You know, you're you're further along in the stages of perimenopause and need to consider progesterone.
There are different kinds of progesterone. I have a whole video on the different types of progesterone that you can watch. But in summary, the basics: most women consider the capsule, the oral progesterone. The trademark pharmaceutical is called Prometrium. It is a 100 or 200 milligram of progesterone in that capsule. You do have to be careful. It does have peanut oil in it. If you are allergic or sensitive to peanuts, you can't do it. It does also have some, uh, food dye in it, binders, and fillers that if you are sensitive to those food dyes, you're going to want to do something different, such as a compounded progesterone.
Compounded progesterone is still progesterone, still bioidentical progesterone, but it is done without the peanut oil. It is done without the red dye or the blue dyes or in any of those other, like, crazy binders or fillers. And they can actually compound it, um, at a pharmacy to a specific dose for you. So, if you maybe were prescribed the 100 or the 200 milligrams, that's not quite your dose. Compounding can adjust. Maybe you need 150 milligrams. Maybe you need to start out with 50 milligrams. And that's why we like compounding.
There are also progesterone creams. Progesterone creams. There are some that are over the counter that you can get at health food stores, grocery stores, etc. And then you can compound progesterone creams. A lot of women do find the progesterone cream, it's been really helpful. They notice a difference in their symptoms, um, and it has been supportive for especially mood, uh, their periods. It's not as helpful for sleep. It's not as helpful for calm. The pills do a lot better. But the progesterone cream is an option out there.
Now, if you're already on estrogen, if estrogen replacement therapy is something you're already discussing with your practitioner, you cannot do the progesterone cream, especially if you have a uterus. If you still have your uterus, then it's the oral progesterone, 99 times out of 100, that they're going to recommend for you. And the reason for that is that we know in research that if you're on estrogen and you take the progesterone, your risk of a of the thickening in the uterus called hyperplasia is like next to nothing. It's it's super ridiculously low. But the cream doesn't have that research behind it. So, if you have a uterus, you're on estrogen, the oral progesterone is what they're going to recommend.
So, I hope this video was helpful. If you're having these debates, I'm like, "How do I know when I'm ready for progesterone?" If you're not feeling calm, if you're irritated, if you're not sleeping as well as you used to, if your periods are kind of wonky, or your periods are getting bad and heavy, crampy, the PMS is bad, and you're at quote "that age," you are midlife, you are starting to feel it, definitely time to talk to your healthcare practitioner about progesterone because it absolutely can help and make you feel like this perimenopausal transition is so much easier. Everyone feels easier. Everything feels easier when you sleep better, when you're calm, when your PMS isn't out of control, when your periods aren't super heavy. So, it's okay. It's okay to talk to your healthcare practitioner about progesterone.
Thank you so much for following along. I'm Dr. Carrie Jones. Hit that subscribe button because again, hormones can feel like hurting cats, and I'm here to help.