The menopause industry, doctors, most leaflets you get in doctors waiting rooms, books (both conventional and alternative) all give one version of the way we menopause. That menopause happens when the ovaries pack up and are not creating enough hormones. It is therefore logical that you have to supplement them artificially — and aren’t we lucky that Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) exists even though it increases your chances of cancer, heart disease and thrombosis? Plus, don’t get hooked on it, because you can only be on it for 10 years because that’s when the real risks kick in.
But what happens in women who don’t get hot flashes, and there are millions of them all over the world, particularly in non-industrialized societies that are still living in traditional ways? Plus, there are women in the West who don’t either.
Why aren’t their ovaries packing up? Where are they getting their hormones from? There is an alternative model, but here’s the crucial point: It’s not put forward by the menopause industry, but by the fertility industry who are really serious about the way women’s bodies — and particularly our ovaries — work.
In this model, the healthy woman’s ovaries never pack up; they always give the brain what it asks for. When menopause happens, the body handles hormones differently.
Obviously, for some women this doesn’t happen — and this shouldn’t be the norm. If your ovaries do start to falter, we should look at what’s wrong with them and get them working again. Just replacing the hormones with artificial ones gives rise to so many other problems — not the least of which is breast cancer — that it should never be the first port of call.
So, what causes ovaries to fail? Some women might have genetic problems, but for the rest of us it’s the changes brought about since industrialization. Our bodies (and ovaries) are bombarded with chemical and industrial estrogens. Study after study has proven that they interfere with both our hormonal signals and the ability of our ovaries to function normally.
Secondly, we don’t eat as many plant hormones as we used to. There are a number of books on how you can change your entire diet in order to get more plant hormones. Many people can’t manage it, so instead take expensive plant hormone supplements or pay even more to get “bio identical” HRT. Luckily though, there are easier (and indeed cheaper) ways to get plant hormones into our bodies.
If you start eating sprouted foods, you will be ingesting one of the richest sources of plant hormones on the planet. Every successful culture has a tradition of them, including our own. You can add them to whatever else you are eating and give yourself a plant hormone boost. Plant hormones then get to work on our hormonal balance — they can either top the body with hormones if we don’t have enough or calm it down if we have too much. If we were in any doubt that we need plant hormones, scientists have recently discovered that we have special plant hormone receptors in our cells just looking for them.
Scientific evidence also indicates that sprouted foods can help rid our body of polluting chemicals and turn harsher estrogens into more gentle ones. The biggest bonus is that these foods have such a rich bounty of plant hormones and other nutrients that we only have to eat a small amount to get a big effect.
Much of the research I have done isn’t in the public domain, yet I found over 400 scientific studies. The reason there is so much research is that scientists are very interested in the potential of sprouted foods. They test them, dissect them, measure their contents and isolate them so they can be put into supplements and drugs and sold to us as an alterative to HRT. They never say that we can cut out the middle man and grow them ourselves on our windowsills. It just takes a couple of minutes a day to water them. Yet, this simple act challenges the menopause industry on many different levels.
I also looked into the way plant hormones react with cancer and cancer treatments. Many women who are at risk of hormone-dependent cancer think that plant hormones just add more estrogen to the body. Yet, there is tons of research that show how plant hormones eaten as part of a healthy diet, rather than pills, or supplements, are perfect for everyone, even those who have had cancer.
It’s time to challenge the menopause industry and the way we think about menopause that also offers practical solutions for menopausal women everywhere to return to the natural health that should be our birthright.
