Having low progesterone can cause many problems for women when it comes to fertility. Its not just fertility thats effected when your progesterone levels aren’t balanced its can also cause loads of other unpleasant symptoms for your overall health as a woman.
The two most dominant female hormones are progesterone and estrogen. When it comes to “balancing hormones” there can be a lot of confusion. That is because these two hormones aren’t supposed to be equal to each other every single day of the month. As a woman our hormones are constantly fluctuating.
These are just a few of the most common symptoms associated with low progesterone.
if you’ve suspect or been told you have low progesterone what this means is that when your body should be producing progesterone its not producing it at adequate levels. It could also mean its low in relation to your estrogen levels. This is called Estrogen Dominance. I have a whole blog post link below.
How I’m Healing Estrogen Dominance Holistically | Protocol For Low Progesterone + Hormonal Imbalance
Many things can cause low progesterone like lifestyle, environment, PCOS etc. Below are some of the most common causes.
Stress: This is a common reason for low progesterone. This is because the body will produce cortisol at the expense of sex hormones.
Over-exercising/ under-eating: Doing this can create stress on the body. When the body is under chronic stress it can send signals alerting that now isn’t a good time to have a baby.
Estrogen dominance: This is very common nowadays and creating major strife in our hormonal systems. Things like fragrance and BPA’s have xenoestrogens. Xenoestrogens act exactly like the estrogen we create in our body causing elevated levels of unnatural estrogen in the body. Almost all commercial products contain one or both of these things and constantly expose and bombard the delicate hormonal balance. If you want to know more about this an how to fix it I’ll my my blog post again here.
As opposed to men who operate on about a 24 hour cycle us women as you may know about on about a 28 day cycle with four different stages.
Menstrual Phase: The first day of your bleed marks the first day in your cycle. At this point all your hormones are at their lowest point and your uterine lining is breaking down.
Follicular Phase: During the follicular phase a hormone called FSH (Follicle Stimulating Hormone) starts to rise. This is to get the ovaries to start maturing follicles to turn into eggs. At this time estrogen also starts to rise and the uterine lining starts to thicken. As far as progesterone goes it’s still very low at this point.
Ovulatory Phase: With a perfect 28 day cycle ovulation usually occurs around day 14. At this time estrogen is at its highest and the most mature follicle has matured into an egg and will travel into the fallopian tube to be fertilized. Progesterone stays low and uterine lining continues to thicken.
Luteal Phase: The luteal phase is the phase following ovulation. This is a very important time in your cycle when trying to conceive. This is also when the corpus luteum starts producing loads of progesterone and ideally is at its highest to support a pregnancy.
As you can see, hormones fluctuate so much throughout the month. However, its important your hormones are rising and falling at the correct times throughout the month. Unfortunately, many women are struggling with a lack of progesterone increasing in the second half of their cycle. Progesterone is crucial for maintaining a pregnancy. A healthy egg can travel, become fertilized and implant into the uterus but if your body isn’t producing adequate levels of progesterone it can result in an early miscarriage.
Progesterone is the pregnancy hormone. In normal circumstances we see this rise in progesterone following ovulation in the event an egg was fertilized to support pregnancy. If an egg was fertilized the corpus luteum will continue to release progesterone until about week 12 of pregnancy. This is when the placenta takes over and starts to produce progesterone on its own. if an egg was not fertilized you’ll see a sudden drop in progesterone triggering the body to shed the uterine lining.
Now, if you’re struggling with low progesterone or high estrogen dominance in relation to your progesterone. This is where we can see issues. Not all miscarriages are a result of low progesterone. Miscarriages can happen as a result of genetic components and other unknown factors. However, as I mentioned earlier a perfectly healthy egg and sperm can fertilize a baby, it can travel perfectly, implant perfectly and everything. Unfortunately though, if the corpus luteum is not producing adequate amounts of progesterone this can trigger the body to shed the lining of the of the uterus early before the placenta has the chance to take over resulting in a miscarriage.
This is why many women struggling with recurrent miscarriages and find a lot of success in taking synthetic progesterone in the first 12 weeks to prevent a miscarriage. I am absolutely not a doctor and anything I say should be taking with your own personal discretion and with guidance from your doctor. If you’re anything like me and don’t feel comfortable taking synthetic progesterone due to very scary side effects and are looking for a more natural approach to boosting your progesterone keep reading.
Your menstrual cycle is considered a vital sign. It is super important to be in tuned with your cycle and hormones for optimal health and vitality. So many women today are struggling with their hormones and don’t even know its their hormones causing the issues. Women in the modern world are so detached from their cycle and I promise you getting in touch with your cycle and healing it will absolutely change your life for the better.
