Women's Health:
Natural Regulating of Hormones, PMS, Acne

I received an email from a woman suffering from irregular cycles and increasing PMS pain and symptoms. It occurred to me from doing so much research on how to help myself through Cipro I had uncovered a lot of natural information for women to help with hormones and other women's issues. Hormonal imbalance is a common problem for women, myself included. I suffered through terrible headaches and mood swings for years thinking it was just something women had to put up with. When I started looking on the drug reactions boards for my symptoms with Cipro and my mother's problems with Lisinopril it was horrifying to see how many women have adverse reactions to birth control and how many young women are being affected by very severe and even life threatening reactions to Gardisil. I sat there in front of my computer with tears for all those who were suffering from drugs and counting my blessings that although what I've been through is hard, it could have been much, much worse. The worst part of all is that it happens every day, there is a new victim somewhere out there every day who finds out the hard way the dangers of drugs and the greed of pharmaceutical giants.

Don't buy in to the doctor's advice of drugs for this problem. They just screw up the natural hormonal levels and block other important processes your body needs. You can have a perfect diet including whole grains, fresh vegetables and fruits and still have hormonal imbalance. Diet can't solve all the problems (mainly because it depends on the soil things are grown in and what nutrients are available for plants to grow).

Mother nature has a lot to offer women in help with PMS, acne and controlling the hormone imbalances we find ourselves in. There are many women out there who start on the pill just to cure acne. I understand and unfortunately have been there. I tried every lotion and potion and found nothing worked. I even took the pill with the same goal many years ago. That didn't work either. Only a few years ago when the internet came to my house did I learn about Pantothenic Acid or Vitamin B5. Two 500mg pills a day did the trick. It's not that I don't get acne still, but it's a normal level of a couple of spots a month around my cycle rather than the extreme outbreaks all the time. As with most supplements, it does take a couple of months for B5 to get into your system to see really good results.

As for those horrific mood swings of turning from a sane normal woman into someone who snaps at every little thing, there is relief. For a small amount of sanity return you can take Black Cohosh for a week before your cycle, right around the time the craziness kicks in. For longer lasting results, you need something else to help regulate your cycles.

GLA is a good Omega-6 fatty acid. You'll often find books that tell you to take evening primrose for relief of PMS. That's half the story. GLA is available in three supplements: Evening Primrose is the weakest strength, Borage Oil is medium and Blackcurrant Oil is highest. I chose medium and I couldn't believe the difference. It takes a month of taking it every day for results and once your there you should keep taking it. The headaches I suffered in addition to the mood swings are gone.

Most women know the importance of Calcium and drink plenty of milk. What doctors won't tell you about is the importance of Magnesium. Almost all Americans (me included) are deficient in Magnesium. At $4 a bottle doctors are not motivated to tell you about it. Search for Chelated Magnesium, it's easier on your stomach, 250mg a day. If you have any problems with leg cramps you'll be amazed as this too will go away. Malic Acid is a supplement that aids Magnesium be asborbed in the body, so that's something else to know.

For fibroids or fibrocystic breast disease it's important to know surgery and drugs are not your only option, and certainly should not be your first. There are many women who swear by Progesterone cream rubbed on the breasts, but I didn't go that route. Iodine supplementation for me was the answer. I had a preconcieved notion that iodine was for cuts and bad to take internally. I was wrong. Click here for details on the history of iodine and it's many uses.

I'm taking iodine because I found a grape sized lump in my breast. After the initial panic, then taking an antibiotic without question from a doctor that damaged my tendons and muscles, then having an ultrasound and then having to go back and fix the damage from the drug before I could even begin to fix the original problem... I made a lot of discoveries. Incidentally, it also cost my credit card dearly for that knowledge. I don't want anyone to go through what I had to in order to learn things that doctor's should tell you. In the end the ultrasound revealed I had fibrocystic breast disease (or lumpy breasts). I researched and found many, many women have this and it's most common in the US. In Japan it's almost unheard of and what's their secret? They eat piles of seaweed and sea vegetables, the primary source of iodine. If you don't want to eat all that (and I didn't), you can get Iodine in supplement form, although it's tough to find. I found you can search Amazon for Prolamine Iodine or there's a site called Relentless Improvement where I bought an iodoral house brand. It's easy to test for iodine deficiency (again doctor's won't tell you). At Walgreens they sell a little bottle of tincture of iodine. Paint a 2" patch on your arm or leg and if it's gone in 10 hours or less you are severly deficient, if it's gone in 24 hours or less then you're just deficient. Mine was gone in 4 hours. I found out through researching that iodine can reverse fibrocystic breasts, although it can take 6 months to accomplish this.

Last but not least, make sure you get your Vitamin C each day. I buy the Emergen-C packs and mix it with fruit juice (don't mix it with water as it tastes terrible alone). You can breeze through the flu season without a flu shot if you add this to your daily supplements.

For all women out there, take the knowledge I've given you here and do the research on these individual supplements online. There's a lot of opinions out there and you'll be surprised to find everything a doctor will never tell you about. It's too lucrative a business to make you well.