Lara Briden - The Period Revolutionary
Leading the change to better periods and hormones
Progesterone is the hormone women make after ovulation and is important not just for fertility but also to help to prevent osteoporosis, stroke, dementia, heart disease, and breast cancer. Regular ovulatory cycles are beneficial for general health. Progesterone can also be taken in the form of micronized progesterone to relieve heavy periods and the symptoms of perimenopause.
PMS is my favorite thing to treat because it responds so well to natural treatment. I love to hear patients say: “I was surprised when my period just arrived. I didn’t even feel it coming.”
No irritability. No headache. No food cravings. It is possible.
The first step to easy periods is to value female hormones. Both estrogen and progesterone are powerful assets, and not something to be switched off with hormonal birth control.
A change is coming for endometriosis treatment. Until now, the clinical approach has been surgery followed by hormonal suppression with hormonal birth control or other drugs. Going forward, the approach will shift to anti-inflammatory and immune-modulating treatments. That’s because there is growing evidence that endometriosis is not primarily a hormonal condition. It is autoimmune.
The pill was an important step in our struggle to legalize contraception. I celebrate that, of course. Hormonal birth control can also be medicine for debilitating conditions such as severe endometriosis and very heavy periods. I celebrate that.
What I don’t celebrate is the distorted message that hormonal birth control is the only birth control. And I don’t celebrate its widespread prescription as “hormone balance” for any hormonal symptom that might arise in women and teenage girls.
Ovulation is beneficial because it’s how women make hormones.
Every month, as the ovaries get ready to release an egg, they pump out estrogen. Estrogen, in turn, stimulates serotonin, which is why women can be more outgoing and energetic in the few days leading up to ovulation.
Every month, after ovulation, one of the ovaries releases a huge amount of progesterone—the calming, soothing, anti-inflammatory hormone.