For most of my life, I honestly felt like my menstrual cycle was a punishment for being a woman. Like clockwork, every month I felt cramping, bloating, and mood swings. I’d try to silence it with medication or ignore it altogether because I had too much on my plate.

But the signs of hormonal imbalance in females are hard to ignore. We’re talking about swollen, tender breasts, brain fog, hot and achy joints, uncontrollable mood swings, low sex drive, and the inability to get a good night’s sleep. 

Sound like you?

Most women believe that suffering from hormonal imbalance is just something they have to accept and live with for the rest of their lives. But let me tell you – that is dead wrong. You don’t have to suck up the pain. Instead, you can heal hormones naturally and bring them back to balance. 

Here are 10 of my tried and true techniques.

10 Steps to achieve hormonal health and wellness naturally

1. Perform resistance and high-intensity interval training (HIIT) weekly – this will stimulate the production of Human Growth Hormone (HGH) which helps you burn fat, sleep better, increase bone density, and improve your immune system’s function.

    

   When it comes to HIIT, just 20-30 minutes per session is enough. Make sure to warm up properly as your HGH releases much better if you’re warm versus working out stone-cold. Try to fit in resistance training three times per week. 

2. Take a hot shower – women sweat less as they age, especially once we hit 40. Take the hottest bath or shower that you can tolerate for as long as you can. Then, wrap yourself up in a towel or bathrobe, lie in bed (get comfy, grab a book), and continue sweating.Raising your body temperature will open up your detox pathways which is absolutely paramount for healing your hormones.

    

3. Eat more foods rich in copper – copper is the crucial element that helps support the production of testosterone in your body. Testosterone is your dominant hormone and is what keeps your vitality and sex drive at healthy levels.Add oysters, shiitake mushrooms, sweet potatoes, sesame seeds, cashews, chickpeas, salmon, dark chocolate (70-85%), and avocado to your meals.

4. Add more zinc to your diet – this is another great way to boost your testosterone levels. Zinc-rich foods include oysters, crab, lobster, organic beef, pork, and chicken, mushrooms, kale, lentils, black beans, hummus, and edamame.

    

5. Eat a pound of cruciferous vegetables a day – the fastest way to naturally stimulate your detox pathways and heal your hormones in the process is to consume cruciferous veggies and herbs (cilantro, arugula, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, collard greens, brussels sprouts).A healthy mix of those in your diet will ensure that you get your bowels moving every single day. If you’re struggling to build up to a pound a day, try integrating those veggies in your smoothies first.
6. SMASH your meals – add salmon, mackerel, anchovies, sardines, and herring to your weekly meals.

    

7. Eat 3 Brazil nuts a day – those will boost your levels of Selenium and detox you from heavy metals. Just 3-4 will get the job done.

    

8. Adopt a female-specific ketogenic diet – Wait, hear me out! This does not mean stuffing yourself with butter, bacon, and fat bombs. I developed my signature Estima Diet which is an adapted keto plan for women based on your menstrual cycle.What’s different about the Estima Diet vs mainstream keto is that you still get to enjoy fresh foods like asparagus and broccoli, while feeding your microbiome and providing resistant starches that regulate your digestion.

   Going into keto as a woman without an expert guide to coach you is like watching one YouTube video on running and setting out to complete a marathon – a recipe for disaster.

   So, if you’ve tried keto before and fell off the wagon or even worse, put on weight instead of losing fat, check out the Estima Diet. In it, I give you the exact guide on what to eat and when, a full grocery list, travel foods list, 71 pages of recipes to keep your meals exciting (both meat and vegetarian), my period cycling meal protocols, and a ton more.

9. Naturally regulate your hormones through fasting – go for 14-16 hours without ingesting food. You can decrease that timeframe to 12 hours as your bleed week approaches. You will still be allowed to drink water, tea, and coffee (without sugar, sweeteners, or milk).And here’s a hack from Dave Asprey extracted from an episode of the Better! Podcast – add coconut oil to your black coffee when fasting. It contains only fat and no carbohydrates or protein. This will signal to your body that yes – energy is available so you don’t go into starvation mode, but no – we’re not breaking the fast just yet. You can listen to the short version of the episode with Dave Asprey here.

10. Sync your workouts to your cycle – ever noticed that you can’t perform the same workout at the beginning of your cycle versus the end? That’s because your hormone levels are different. 

While you may absolutely smash jump squats in the second week after your bleed, you may not be able to jump an inch off the ground in your pre-menstrual week. The secret to keeping your hormones balanced is to sync your workouts to your cycle so you can prevent yourself from unknowingly wreaking havoc on your hormones and damaging your joints in the process. 

Get my detailed plan on how and when to exercise for your hormones in my best-selling book, The Betty Body – a geeky goddess’ guide to intuitive eating, balanced hormones, and transformative sex.

Remember, your body is not Amazon Prime, so be patient

All changes take time. Your new, perfectly balanced body will not show up the next day by 9 PM. But the sooner you start healing your hormones and reclaiming your hormonal health, the quicker you will free yourself from the dreaded period cramps, mood swings, bloating, inability to lose weight, and all of the symptoms you’ve suffered all these years.

For more proven techniques to identify and heal hormonal imbalance, get yourself a free copy of my Hormone Checklist where I’ll give you my proven tips to balance your hormones in four weeks or less.