Spend more than 5 minutes on Instagram or TikTok – especially as a woman of a certain age – and you’re likely to encounter a fit, attractive person showing you what they ate today. It’s usually a bowl of oats, flax seeds, and berries, or a plate of leafy greens with lean meat or other “good protein,” or a raw carrot salad and little else, all of which are enviable and claim to be balanced. Excess estrogen, lowers the stress hormone cortisol, supports adrenal gland function, and even helps you get rid of “hormone belly.”
So-called hormone-balancing diets are not new: Self-help books that treat hormone balancing as a recipe for health have been around since the early 2000s, combining scientific-sounding claims with weight-loss plans. But what does “hormone imbalance” actually mean?
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As it turns out, not much. Hormones are chemical messengers produced by endocrine glands found throughout the body, such as the thyroid, pituitary gland, ovaries, and testicles, and are responsible for coordinating many basic functions. “Hormones basically play a dominant role in our bodies, so to speak,” says amelia sherrya registered dietitian in New York. “Different hormones regulate everything including sleep, hunger and satiety, growth, sexual development and libido, pregnancy, energy metabolism, blood sugar, and more.”
Therefore, the concept of “balance” has little meaning in the context of an ever-changing endocrine system. “‘Hormonal imbalance’ is not a term often used by endocrinologists… because it suggests that if the measured hormones are not always within the ‘normal range,’ that something is wrong,” …
