What is the connection between stress and hormone imbalance?
When we’re under stress, our adrenal glands produce cortisol. Cortisol is the stress hormone. When cortisol is high, it blocks your estrogen. So you end up with less estrogen getting into your cells. Less estrogen causes low serotonin. So now you end up with low serotonin and you have a short fuse and “thin skin.” Low serotonin also causes you to not be able to sleep, and that makes you agitated, irritable and cranky. Another thing that happens when serotonin drops, is that another chemical in the brain is released called norepinephrine. When norepinephrine gets released, all of a sudden you get a pounding heart, you wake up in the middle of the night, you get an upset stomach or hot flashes, and those symptoms cause you even more stress. Now you have physical internal stress going on in addition to all the external stress that started all of this in the first place. So, cortisol gets even higher, blocking estrogen even more, dropping serotonin even more. And before you know it, you’re
