Women’s Health: The importance of nutrient density & eating a balanced diet.
In addition to eating a whole-food, nutrient-dense diet, women need to put an extra focus on hormone balance. Good hormone balance will promote optimal weight, energy, mood, skin health, and libido. And that’s just the beginning.
Hormones Need Calories and Nutrients
Nutrient density is important for everyone, but it's especially important for hormonal balance. You want every bite to count so the goal is not only to avoid the junk but also to make sure what you are getting is worth it.
Start by limiting sugar, white flour, soy, and industrial-seed oils. These foods are fillers and don’t contain the nutrients we need. Industrial-seed oils include canola oil, sunflower oil, vegetable oil, peanut oil - pretty much all of the oils you typically see on packaged food labels! They are highly processed and inflammatory so you’ll want to stick with traditional fats, such as olive, avocado, and coconut oils, butter, and ghee. Replace your flour with starchy root vegetables like potato, beets, and yuca.
It’s become common to follow a keto or low carb diet, and these diets can be very effective in the short term and particularly for aiding in weight loss. But for many women, the long-term effects will lead to hormone imbalances that then make weight loss extremely difficult to maintain. Eating a balanced diet that includes protein, fat, and carbohydrates is necessary for hormone balance. And you need to eat enough. Too few calories will negatively affect our hormone balance.
Important Nutrients for Hormonal Health
Fat-soluble vitamins A, D, and K2 can be found in liver and cod liver oil, egg yolks, fatty fish (sardines, mackerel, salmon), shellfish (oysters, clams, shrimp), and grass-fed dairy.
Zinc and copper can be found in pumpkin and sesame seeds, grass-fed beef, eggs, and shellfish. Vitamins
B6, folate, and B12 are abundant in liver, dark leafy greens, eggs, broccoli, and chickpeas.
Magnesium is important, but due to soil depletion, even our best food sources of magnesium may not be enough and supplements are often necessary. Still, to get it from food, eat dark, leafy greens, pumpkin seeds, avocados, bananas, dark chocolate, and molasses.
Choline is in liver, egg yolks, and red meat.
Inositol isn’t something everyone is aware of, so it may be unfamiliar to you, but it’s a sugar that supports the body’s insulin response, as well as a balance in other hormones. Like magnesium, it is often taken as a supplement, but can also be found in cantaloupe, citrus fruits, beans, and sesame seeds.
Omega-3 fatty acids are found in fatty fish (salmon, mackerel), flaxseed, and walnuts. Note that the omega-3s found in fatty fish will be much easier for your body to use than the ones found in plant foods.
Exercise, Stress, and Other Factors to Balance Hormones
Exercise Regularly
Exercise promotes good insulin sensitivity, weight loss, and normal hormone function, and sweating typically expels toxins. Aim for three to five days a week of 30 to 60 minutes of exercise. Make sure to mix it up with strength training, yoga, sprints, and longer endurance cardio. But make sure you aren’t overtraining! Too much exercise can have the opposite effect. It can be stressful to your body, resulting in hormonal imbalances. Symptoms to watch out for include decreased performance, increased recovery time, fatigue or lethargy, insomnia, and more.
Manage Stress
Too much stress can directly affect ovarian and thyroid hormones. Make sure to include regular stress management activities such as yoga, meditation, deep breathing, artistic expression, music, laughing, and quality time with loved ones (and yes, of course, pets count!).
Sleep
Your circadian rhythm affects hormone production. Unfortunately, quality sleep is often a struggle in our modern lives. To maximize yours, aim for seven to nine hours per night. Minimize exposure to screens at night. Maximize exposure to natural light at midday (ditch the sunglasses for half an hour to benefit!). Keep your bedroom cool. And make sure you’re eating enough. Incorporate stress management techniques into your bedtime routine. Even a few minutes of deep breathing exercises can help prepare the body for sleep. My favorite tool helping me fall asleep right now is the Nothing Much Happens app.
Support your Gut and Liver
Our gut and liver help us to clear excess hormones and make sure our estrogen is balanced. Supporting these organs starts with your diet. Insoluble fiber binds to excess hormones. Soluble fiber and resistant starch feed healthy gut bacteria. To include both in your diet, focus on leafy greens, fruits, fresh herbs, fermented foods, and root vegetables. A probiotic adds more healthy bacteria to our gut. It’s especially important if you aren’t consuming fermented foods regularly. Include healthy fats and cholesterol-rich foods such as egg yolks and liver. Finally, limit alcohol to one drink per day and caffeine to one to two cups of coffee per day.
Avoid Environmental Estrogens
Environmental estrogens don’t act like our body’s natural hormones. They are longer-lived, more difficult to break down, and can accumulate in our fat tissue. Common sources include plastic containers (particularly if you heat your food in them!), cosmetics, hair and body products, conventional produce and meat, and household cleaners.