Trying to balance hormones after a hysterectomy can be challenging and downright exhausting. The most common way to go about it is to undergo synthetic or bioidentical hormone replacement therapy overseen by your doctor. While these therapies can provide the best outcome, changing your diet, exercise routine and the chemicals you come in contact with on a regular basis can also help.
It is important to have a hormone panel done by a specialist before undergoing a hysterectomy. This provides both you and your doctor with a baseline of where your body's hormone levels naturally were before a hysterectomy, which is the key to balancing hormones after a hysterectomy. For hormone replacement therapy, your doctor will likely prescribe a mix of estrogen and progesterone. Make sure to discuss with your doctor the difference between synthetic and bioidentical hormone therapy, because each poses different risks and challenges.
With hormone replacement therapy, it is important to note that symptoms such as hot flashes, mood swings, dizziness and insomnia — all caused by a hormone imbalance — won’t go away overnight. Hormone replacement therapy is meant to bring your hormones back to your body’s baseline level and keep them there for the rest of your life. The amount and types of progesterone and estrogen needed to meet this goal may require adjusting both initially and later down the road as you age. Working closely with your doctor or hormone specialist is essential to ensuring hormone replacement therapy success.
Other than undergoing hormone replacement therapy, changing your diet can greatly help you to balance your hormones after a hysterectomy. Chemicals have a strong effect on hormones, so eating organic fruits and vegetables and avoiding heavily processed foods can play a major role in ensuring the hormone therapy you are undergoing is working to its full potential. It is also important to cut out any red meat or dairy products that contain added hormones, because these can alter the effects of hormone replacement on your body.
Exercising several times a week can also help you to balance hormones after a hysterectomy. Exercise helps to alleviate both depression and anxiety, which can help you to keep your hormones in check. Despite this, having an elevated heart rate for a long period of time can actually change your hormone levels for the worse, so it is important to wear a heart rate monitor and keep your heart rate low when you are exercising.
Other than hormone replacement therapy, diet and exercise, paying attention to what you clean with can help balance hormones after a hysterectomy. You should avoid any kind of cleaner with chemicals, especially petrochemicals, and stick with natural products such as vinegar, baking soda or prepackaged cleaning products labeled “green” or “all natural”. If you follow all of these suggestions and work closely with your doctor, you should be able to balance your hormones and feel like your old self — or better — in no time.