Holistic health for women offers the most efficient, the fastest and the easiest way to achieve balance. By your very nature, women face more potential health problems than do men. That means, the potential for harm from over medication also exists.
From puberty to menopause, with the menstrual periods and pregnancies in between, women can have a hard time.
Puberty can be tough for both sexes as the transformation from childhood to adult takes on new, unexpected feelings and life consequences. However, that’s more or less it for men, until later in life when they may have to consider prostate issues.
Common Hormonal and Menstrual Symptoms In Women
These vary from woman to woman, but there are common themes, which include:
- heavy menstrual bleeding
- irregular menstrual periods
- pain before, during or after menstruating or at ovulation
- pain can be in the abdomen, the back, the breasts, down the thighs
- irritability before or during menstruation
- headaches or migraines during menstruation
Other symptoms can include:
- discomfort during sexual intercourse
- low libido
Then there are the typical menopausal symptoms which include:
- low energy
- hot flushes/flashes of heat or intolerance of heat
- weight gain
- increased hair growth on the face
Some Causes of Hormonal Symptoms
Although the synthetic contraceptives have given women more freedom to plan their families, they do come at a price. And sometimes that price is paid many years later. You can’t mess with the highly delicate hormones of your body and not suffer consequences.
Which means that it’s a good idea to consider other safer options such as tubal ligation or vasectomy for one of the partners after you have had your family.
When teenage girls are put on synthetic hormones for facial acne, it’s dangerous and completely misunderstands the reason for acne. Acne is not caused by natural hormonal changes in the body.
Food is an important contributer to poor health. It isn’t just the junk or fast food that’s the culprit. Everyone knows these are. It’s the processed foods, the oils, and most importantly the animal proteins.
Humans haven’t evolved on animal proteins. You only have to compare your teeth with those of a cat to recognise that. Human teeth are for grinding up plant cellulose, not tearing meat off a bone or crunching up on bones.
Possibly, the most damaging of all animal proteins, especially for women, is the dairy they consume. Dairy is laden with three different hormones:
- the lactating hormone which helps the baby calf grow
- pregnancy hormone, as the mother is pregnant while lactating
- synthetic hormones to increase the supply of milk
When women with hormonal issues stop dairy just for a month, they’ll see an improvement in their health. Today, there are so many alternative choices to dairy, it’s easy to make that switch when you see those improvements and choose to make them permanent. Neal Barnard MD has create a great video on this topic that goes deep into the subject.
Reclaiming Your Responsibilities To Yourself
Holistic health for women, as for everyone, focuses on what you can do to help yourself. It’s insane to reach for a drug to mask the symptoms you don’t like on the one hand, while also engaging in harmful habits on the other hand.
Apart from eating according to how humans evolved, what else can you do?
- Exercise is essential to good health.It doesn’t have to be a work out at the gym every day. It does need to be regular and enough to increase your breathing rate and heart rate, maybe breaking a sweat.
- Weight bearing is also beneficial, especially as you age. Carrying an old lady’s shopping may not be doing her any good! Weight bearing exercises keep the bones strong.
- Getting out in Nature tends to be soothing to the senses and slows you down.
- Some form of spiritual practice, whatever works for you, is always beneficial. There are many forms, such as meditation, yoga, tai chi, qigong, etc. All help to keep you positive and in charge of you.
- Sleep is important and a solid eight hours provides you with the optimal amount for most people.
- Do what you enjoy doing, what makes your heart sing. Laugh.
Of course, holistic health for women would not be complete without having an effective health care system. Perhaps the most effective, as it can remove deep seated and traumatic effects, is good homeopathic treatment. Find a practitioner you like and can work with as you may be working with them a while as you unravel past insults to the body.