How to balance hormones

What are hormones?

Our bodies are immensely complex systems, with cells, organs and limbs that perform different functions and need to communicate with one another to work properly.

When we want to move an arm or a leg, our brains send an electrical message through the nervous system telling our muscles to contract. It takes a mere fraction of a second, and is great for ‘short-term’ activity.

But what if different parts of our bodies need to communicate over the long term? Puberty is a great example of this, as at a certain point your brain needs to be able to instruct your pituitary gland to start sending out the chemicals you need to develop into an adult.

This long-term process, along with many others, is regulated by hormones. At the simplest level, hormones are chemical messengers which are released in one part of the body, travel to a different organ or system and cause changes there.(1)

A network of organs called the endocrine system controls the release of hormones throughout the body.

Examples of hormones and what they do in the body

If you were born female, the word “hormones” probably has a particular significance for you. Many of us have experienced the hormonal chaos that arises around ‘that time of the month’. Mood swings, skin issues, bloating - you name it, we’ve experienced it!

This is sometimes called ‘premenstrual syndrome’, or PMS.

The exact mechanism behind these symptoms isn’t fully understood. However it’s likely to be linked to the interplay of oestrogen and progesterone, two hormones involved in regulating our menstrual cycle.

Elsewhere in the body, another hormone called insulin is vital for regulating our blood sugar levels. When your blood sugar levels rise (for example, after a meal), the pancreas releases insulin into the bloodstream.

The insulin then travels around the body, instructing your cells to take up the glucose from your bloodstream and either use it as energy or store it as glycogen in areas like your liver. This keeps your blood sugar levels stable.(1)

What is ‘hormonal imbalance’?

Usually, your endocrine system is very good at releasing just the right amount of a particular hormone to manage your bodily processes.

However, if the system is disrupted, you may end up with more or less of that hormone circulating in your body than is needed.

To make things even more complicated, many functions in the body are regulated by more than one hormone.

For instance, hormone-secreting glands send out hormones to target areas of the body, but may also receive hormonal messages back. These can tell the original gland to stop producing the hormone when the target area has received enough.(1)

A complex relationship between different parts of the endocrine system and their target organs is often called an ‘axis’.

Based on this, it’s easy to imagine how the delicate balance might be disrupted if one element of that communication system is altered.

What happens when hormones become imbalanced?

Because hormones regulate so many different functions in the body, the results of a hormone imbalance can look very different.

Let’s take the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA axis) as an example.

The HPA axis controls bodily functions like your metabolism and immune response. So, it makes sense that an imbalance here could have serious negative consequences.

For instance, if the adrenal cortex fails to produce enough hormones, it can cause Addison’s disease. This leads to symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, fever, muscle weakness and a host of other unpleasant effects.(1)

On the other hand, if the pituitary gland produces too much of a hormone called adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), the result is Cushing’s syndrome. Symptoms include muscle wasting and the redistribution of body fat.

This often means that patients show a rounded ‘moon’ face, prominent abdomen and thin legs.(1)

So, as you can see, keeping your hormones in balance is vital to allow normal bodily function - and avoid unpleasant health issues.