How health imbalance affect our emotional balance

[Stanislava Prochazkova]

But the more I think about it, the more I believe that it was the emotional instability and insecurity that caused my hormonal imbalance. And maybe now that I’m helping my body to restore my hormonal balance, the hormonal balance helps me to better manage my emotions… 🤔🙂

[Sarah Angela]

Hi Stana,

While Dr. Filipe is definitely the best person to provide a detailed answer, I can share from my own experience and understanding. During perimenopause, progesterone levels drop, which can affect mood, cause fatigue, and lead to changes in our period. For me, this last aspect, heavy periods, has had a big impact, especially in lowering my iron levels. So, I feel it’s extra important to take care of ourselves during this time of transition. 😊

There’s also the body-mind connection, where emotional dysregulation and being in a constant state of fight-or-flight can prevent our body from sending resources to digestion, healing, and affect the hormonal balance—especially cortisol levels. Our emotions are deeply rooted in the body, triggering both physical and mental responses that can affect each other.

For me, the tools I learned in the EBB not only supported my mental well-being but also helped create inner safety, allowing my body to shift into a state of rest and digest, fostering more calmness, better sleep, improved mood, digestion, and serenity. 😊

[Vohn M]

Hi Stana,

I completely agree with Sarah.

I think all these things are inter-related. A recovery programme I am currently in for my ME talks of the six types of fatigue – social, emotional, physical, hormonal, cognitive, and spiritual (as in spirit or self & self-identity). We need to provide self-care for all of these aspects of ourselves or any of them can become out of balance and overwhelmed. So our work in bootcamp to balance our emotions will also help with our hormones; and your supplements to help balance your hormones will also help with your emotions.

We often don’t think about what is actually happening inside us during menstruation. Our body is shedding the lining of our uterus. That is a physical trauma. It is instigated by big hormonal changes. We have become good at understanding that teenagers are exhausted and moody and need a lot of sleep due to hormonal changes, but we still minimise the impact of women’s monthly cycles. Our body is going through physical changes, emotional changes and hormonal changes throughout our monthly cycle. There is an energy drain & fatigue & stress associated with each of these things. When we have reduced energy, and increased fatigue & stress, we have reduced resilience and dysregulation.

Then during peri-menopause and menopause, things get even more complicated as our hormones that we have had these monthly struggles with are suddenly all out of whack, and it is harder to plan when self care is required. That’s where I’m at just now. I have had a regular cycle my whole life (5 days bleed every 28 days like clockwork, I’ve been incredibly lucky as it’s been easy to manage) until the past couple of years, when it’s all gone a bit haywire. I started menstruating last night, even though I only finished menstruating eight days beforehand. I’ve had three instances of that this year. It is a lot. It is bound to take a toll on my emotions, and all those other fatigues. But I’ve also had gaps of 42 days – easier we might think, but what on earth is happening with my hormones in those longer cycles? And how can we practice good self care when we don’t know what is going on inside us?

I don’t know if any of this helps you. It has certainly helped me to collect my thoughts and reflect on where I’m at in this process, so I am grateful for you asking the question.

V
xx

[Vohn M]

P.S. What supplements are you using please? I am always interested in hearing about natural remedies. 🙏

[Sumru Inal]

Hi Stana!
Most of my health imbalances were related to my emotional avoidance and emotional dysregulation because I didn’t learn co-regulation from my mother and self-regulation by myself to balance my emotions for a long while. And still learning it…

The hormonal imbalance was one of my experiences too and went through two years of hormonal treatment to have my periods as I experienced early menopause at the age of 30. I went through twenty years of treatment for allergies as my immune system was irregular and hypersensitive. Both of my doctors said that I had to learn emotional management rather than suppress them. One year ago, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto thyroiditis, which is a chronic autoimmune disease.

My hormonal imbalance and autoimmune diseases were the results of my dual traumas (the birth trauma and emotionally enmeshed relationship with my mother) and emotional avoidance. They affected all domains of my life, not only my physical health.

I am sure Dr. Filipe will answer your question soon. I’ve just wanted to share my experience with emotional avoidance and suppression as an health issue.

• This reply was modified 1 year ago by  Sumru Inal.
• This reply was modified 1 year ago by  Sumru Inal.

[Stanislava Prochazkova]

Thank you Sumru for sharing.

Lots of love ❤️

[Vohn M]

Thank you so much for sharing this @sumru-inal. I am so sorry to hear of your health issues – sending you huge hugs.

I completely resonate with you saying that you didn’t learn co-regulation from your mother – same here. Self-regulation by myself to balance my emotions is new to me as of last week. It’s inspiring to hear you are already using it to help yourself. I’m hopeful that bootcamp is going to help balance my health problems a bit too. Wishing you so much good health in the future.

[Martina P]

Just started to learn more about hormones and female cycle now that I entered perimenopause. Before I didn’t pay much attention and my body didn’t demand too much. Had rather regular cycles without severe cramps. The last year I observed heavier bleeding and this year my cycles started shortening.
So I’m not an expert either but can contribute my observations and conclusions:

The month my mother died in 2022, I had two full menstruations in february and attributed this to my emotional stress in that time.
I also observe stronger emotional ups and downs before my period as I grow older and homones change.
I was recommended monks pepper by my doctor as I was not interested in hormone therapy and this seemed to have stabilized my cycle and emotional PMs symptoms a bit (causing homonal acne, so I felt like 17 again ..).
I also feel overwhelmed easier by my emotions when I am physically in a worse condition (too much work, too little sleep).
I also believe that my tiredness, low resilence and that I literally seem to catch any cold I meet are closely related to my inner stress levels due to dysregulated (suppressed) emotions. (It is said that ‘stress’ brings down the imune system)

On the other hand I am quite healthy and in a good condition which probably has enabled me to keep my emotions ‘under control’ (down) for such a long time without developping worse symptoms than a light to medium depression and exhaustion … What further might has helped, was my yoga experience, exercise, breathing techniques and a mindset shift that reduces perceived outer and inner pressure to perform. So if emotions get overwhelming, I let out tears and rather quickly come back to control – usually rationalizing, staying far away from ‘wise response’ but at least I don’t cause harm to others …

So for me physical and mental states are definitely interconnected and influence each other. The healthier you are physically the more emotional stability you can develop and vice versa. There are of course exceptions but usually they are correlated.
And e-motions are also correlated with hormones – the often cited stress reaction with the adrenaline emitted to enable the fight and flight.

[Martina P]

@vohn – your question “And how can we practice good self care when we don’t know what is going on inside us” started something within me that I just want to share:
We’re a generation having access to more information / knowledge than we can digest and it seems the more we know the less wisdom we have when it comes to our bodies, health and ‘natural way of living’.
So maybe the EBB also helps here, as we don’t need to know what happens in our body, our body knows already and sends signals we just have to feel, listen to …
I listened to a workshop ‘The body revolution 3.0’ trying to sell a revolutionary method to stay healthy and happy and repeated mainly what I learned through yoga courses years ago. This seems still valid and therefore I call it wisdom was derived from the vedas, written ~ 5000 years earlier.
So for me it has become even more important to connect to my emotions, not just to control/regulate them better (which was my initial objective) but also be able to accept their help.
Listen to my anger, when a situation isn’t good for me and if possible leave or change and not suppressing the anger to be able to endure (and suffer) longer.
Thanks for the question and please be sure that what I wrote was never intendend to rate your words or opinion.

[Vohn M]

Thank you @martina-p
I have had similar thoughts too. I’m a big fan of qi gong, a practice that has also been done for millennia.

Also thank you for mentioning monks pepper. I had never heard of it before and have looked it up – it’s so pretty and flowers in autumn, which is always hard to find. I can grow it in the UK, even in Scotland as long as I choose a sunny site. I am adding it to my plant list. 😀

[Martina P]

Oh great when it was of help, it is recommended often for PMS and perimenopause symptomps. I also heard about black cohosh or sage against milder hot flushes and outbreaks of sweating.

[Dr. Filipe Rocha]

This is a great question and many of the contributions already shared here are super valuable.

This is an “egg or chicken” matter where both influence each other and are in fact part of the same integrated system. From a holistic perspective, the body influences emotions and emotions influence the body because they are strictly interconnected.

I think you’re asking “But what is the original cause?”. That depends on the perspective of who’s looking at it. I like to take a perspective that includes multiple ones – as many as I can.

Hormones are managed by the Nervous System, which in turn is the conduit for emotions. If our hormones are imbalanced, then it’s natural that we infer it must be caused by our NS and emotions. However, our NS is also dependent on “external” factors such as the environment, nutrition, habits, etc. If we are in an unsafe or insufficient environment/external factors, then that can also affect our bodies, Nervous System, and consequently our emotions.

So, when looking at the cause of your imbalance, you must take a holistic, integrated, and transdimensional approach. You can be very sure that balancing your emotions will have a profound impact on your hormonal balance, but you shouldn’t ignore important external factors such as environment and nutrition.

Module 1 and 2 will also give you more insights on this.

[Martina P]

I found a very interesting free 4 parts webseries from Polyvagal Institue which I was given permission to share (by Dr. Filipe) in the context of this post.

“From childrearing to navigating menopause with autonomic resilience, understanding Polyvagal Theory and the nervous system can inform how we thrive and grow through all of our life stages.”

Especially Part 3 on menopause which seems to be affecting some of us .. ; and listening to Stephen Porges can also be a beautiful experience.

https://www.polyvagalinstitute.org/womenshealthwebinarseries

(recordings available, so it can be used in addition to EBB)

• This reply was modified 1 year ago by  Martina P.

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[Vohn M]

Brill, thanks Martina. I’ve signed up so I can watch the third one. Much appreciated. 🤩

[Stanislava Prochazkova]

Thank you. I have also signed up