Gut Health Probiotics: What Every Woman Needs to Know to Balance Hormones Naturally

Dr. Brighten: Did you know that your gut bacteria can decide how much estrogen circulates in your body or influence whether or not you develop an autoimmune condition with autoimmune thyroiditis or thyroid disease being one of the top autoimmune conditions that women get? Hi there, and welcome back to the Dr.

Brighton Show. I'm your host. You know what? I'm gonna start this whole thing over. I have like no energy right now. I'm like, did you know that I'm boring? Okay. What are you doing? Just gonna double your close. Okay. Because I can hear your like squish, squish over there. That's good. Did you know your gut bacteria can decide how much estrogen circulates in your body or even have an influence?[00:00:00] 

Did you know your gut bacteria can decide how much estrogen circulates in your body or even influence whether or not you develop an autoimmune condition? Hi there and welcome back to the Dr. Brighton Show. I'm your host, Dr. Jolene Brighton, and today we're diving into one of the most overlooked. But incredibly powerful relationships in your body, the connection between your gut and your hormones.

If you've ever struggled with fatigue, PMS, period pain, thyroid issues, anxiety, infertility, or you've been diagnosed with PCOS, you're definitely gonna wanna tune into this episode. I. Because your gut is not just about digestion, it's your hormones headquarters, if you will. And today I'm gonna show you how restoring gut health and supporting it daily can shift your hormones in a major way.

And at the end of this, I'm gonna talk to you about some exciting gut strategies that are coming through in the research that you probably haven't heard about before. Now, if [00:01:00] you're watching this on YouTube, know that you can always use the chapters that are found in the description to jump to the part that you wanna hear most totally fine by me.

And before we jump in, I just wanna say thank you to everyone who has left a review for the podcast. This helps center women's voices in women's medicine and women's health, and ensures the women who need this information can actually find it. And if you haven't yet left a review. Please consider taking a moment to do that wherever you're listening to this podcast.

So first things first, let's get into estrogen and the estrobolome. Now, you might already know this, especially if you've read any of my books, but your liver processes up estrogen what you don't need anymore, and it packages up to get excreted. But did you know it's your gut microbiome that is. Basically let the last word on that.

It's one of the final say in whether that gets [00:02:00] eliminated. So the estrogen you don't need or it gets recirculated. So there's a specific group of bacteria in your gut that make up the estrobolome. These bacteria produce an enzyme called beta glucuronidase, which can reactivate estrogen that your liver has already packaged up and it's supposed to be moving out.

And if you have too much beta glucuronidase, estrogen then gets recirculated, which can contribute to symptoms of estrogen, excess, what some people call estrogen dominance that can look like. Heavy periods, breast tenderness, uh, fibroids that are continuing to grow, experiencing mood swings, having cyclical headaches or even migraines.

And then certainly it can contribute as well to those of us who have histamine issues, feeling like we have the period flu, um, or just feeling overall icky before our period. Now I wanna talk a little bit more about what the estrobolome does. 'cause all of that makes it sound really [00:03:00] bad. But these gut little critters, if you will, that are producing these, um, these enzymes, so specifically beta glucuronidase that's causing deconjugation of estrogen.

So unpackaging it, allowing it to go back into secretion. Once the estrogen is de conjugated, it can get reabsorbed. Your body can then use it instead of it getting eliminated in the stool. And this is called entero hepatic. Recirculation for minor nerdy people out there. Now this whole estrobolome beta glucuronidase, like why would your body allow this?

Like why would it wanna do this, right? So I want you to understand this mechanism isn't inherently bad. In fact, mild reabsorption of estrogen is really biologically useful under normal conditions. So. Estrogen, if you don't know, is critical for our survival and reproduction. So it's, it's helping us solidify our bones.

It's taking care of our heart. It's, uh, modulating immune health. It [00:04:00] supports fertility. It's supporting brain health as well. And so. We have to have estrogen in the right amount during our formative years and through our reproductive years, so that all of these systems are at their best and that's contributing to our survival, and we love that.

So this is one mechanism in which the body makes sure that you have. Enough estrogen. So the, it's not that your body is like betraying you. There are certainly problems with dysbiosis that we're gonna talk about, but this whole mechanism is about balance and making sure that you have the estrogen that you need.

And this becomes really beneficial when we have times of our life where we don't have enough estrogen, like postpartum, post menopause, late stage perimenopause, uh, primary ovarian insufficiency. 

So this entire estrobolome beta glucuronidase was not designed to make your PMS Hell and make your breasts hurt all the time, or make you bleed like [00:05:00] crazy. Um, it really was a way to ensure that your. Body has a reserve system, if you will, to maintain balance of estrogen. And again, especially in those times when we can be low or maybe, um, you know, during fasting or nutrient deficiency, that your body can say, well, this is all of the estrogen we have.

So like, don't just throw it away like it's nothing. Make sure that we have enough of this. And all of this is part of a very finely tuned feedback loop happening in the body. The body doesn't wanna waste estrogen necessarily. So when levels are appropriate or low, reabsorption through the estrobolome can help extend the life of the estrogen that you've made.

Again, the goal is homeostasis, not excess. So we've gotta talk about when the estrobolome backfires because like everything in our bodies, like it's designed for your survival. But things can get off balance, and then we're like, why is this the [00:06:00] worst experience ever? So specifically, it's when the gut microbiome is imbalanced.

So that's what we call dysbiosis. This can occur due to antibiotic stress, poor diet. Not eating enough fiber, that's when we can see a disproportionate amount of the enzyme beta glucuronidase. And then that means too much estrogen gets reabsorbed. And then that's when we're like, great, like cyclically. I am just losing my mind.

I'm crying all the time before my period. I have super heavy periods. I'm having breast tenderness, mood swings, migraines, um, and my fibroids are growing. My endometriosis. Seems to flare, oh, so bad. I have those period flu-like symptoms. So there's a lot of ways that this imbalance or this excess amount of estrogen can affect us.

Now, to be clear, estrogen should always be present through your entire cycle. It is after ovulation that then you make progesterone, and that's when estrogen takes a [00:07:00] little bit of a backseat. Lets, and, and lets progesterone shine. But just understand that estrogen is still there. But it's gotta be in the right amounts and it's gotta be balanced with your progesterone.

So the big bottom line to know about the stroum is that has the ability to recycle estrogen as a survival mechanism, if you will, of it's, it's a good thing until we have de dysbiosis and then not so much a good thing. I'm gonna give you tips today on like what you can do about that. And we don't wanna wipe out the Strobel.

We don't wanna suppress the estrobolome. We want to optimize it. So we wanna optimize our gut health as a way of optimizing our hormones. And when it comes to gut health, I need you to understand like this whole estrogen connection, estrogen also modulates gut health, so they work together. It's also important for conditions like endometriosis.

So studies show that women with endo [00:08:00] tend to have less beneficial bacteria like lactobacillus and more pro-inflammatory microbes, and this may be part of the drive behind the systemic inflammation, and it can also contribute to excess estrogen. Which creates a perfect storm for more endo symptoms. Not to mention endometriosis lesions sometimes make their own hormones, which further contributes to the problem.

And I'm gonna link to some additional episodes on endometriosis in the show notes @drbrighten.com. That way you can get in all of that. But I wanna give you some action steps right now. And if you do have endometriosis, you can grab my guide to help you manage endo flares. It's dr brighten.com/endoflare flare that will help you manage the pain.

But if you have dysbiosis or you suspect you have dysbiosis, I think working with a clinician is one of the most important steps to make sure you're addressing your individual needs. Um, [00:09:00] but while you're, while you're waiting to schedule an appointment, here's what you can do. Right. Now, so actually let me back up and just say that your provider may actually wanna order a stool test.

So if you're like wondering, how would I know if beta glucuronidase is elevated, you can get a stool culture and these functional stool labs, they can look at your beta glucagon based activity, and that can be indicative of estrogen problems that estrogen might get.

Reactivated. Reabsorbed can also show dysbiosis, so imbalances of beneficial versus opportunistic, and sometimes even pathogenic bacteria. But most of the time with dysbiosis, it's like. Good guys and okay guys, but then not enough good guys and too many of those. Okay, guys. Um. I'd like to think about like the commensal flora in there.

Some of it's like, like they're bouncers at the club, right? And so [00:10:00] they serve a purpose. They're not bad. We don't want too many of 'em, so they're supposed to be like, you're pathogenic. Get outta here. Like you can't get into the club. Like this is my house. Um. But just, you know, just like you wouldn't want too many bouncers at a party, right?

Because that's not a good time if you're over patrolling everybody. You also don't want too many of these commensal flora. So. Understand when I say opportunistic, for example, yeast vaginitis getting a yeast infection, that's the overgrowth of opportunistic organisms. They're supposed to be there. So the idea is never to completely wipe out everything in the gut.

It's about to. It's about eating and structuring your life in a way that helps support balance at the microbiome. And if you do find your way self in dysbiosis, it helps you quickly, correct.

Now, the other cool thing that the stool test can pick up is something called short chain fatty acids. That's a marker of how well those [00:11:00] little critters in your gut are working for you. We're gonna talk a little bit more about short chain fatty acids today as well, and then we can also track for the presence of inflammatory markers like calprotectin.

Elevated secretory, IGA, that tells us that there's distress in the gut, there's inflammation going on. And then of course, checking into things like, do we have candida overgrowth? Um, h pylori is another one. Sometimes parasites are present, but you know, most of the time we're seeing things like small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, h pylori, candida, and elevations in those commensal flora.

That are really opportunistic

and anytime we're doing this testing, we also want to partner it with what your symptoms are. It's not enough just to do testing on its own. Now back to the supportive strategies that I thought I was gonna give you, uh, before I took that little detour. So first thing is polyphenols. Polyphenols [00:12:00] promote microbial diversity.

They support beneficial bacteria, and they may help those bacteria do its job and your whole body do its job in secreting the estrogen you no longer need. We give polyphenols in things like. Blueberries, raspberries. So berries, overall, green tea, excellent source. Pomegranates. Soon as you know, the season hits, get your pomegranates dark.

Chocolate can be a source. Coffee is another source. So including polyphenols in your diet. And if you can stack that as polyphenols, that also come with fiber, even better. So we want to increase our fiber if we're not already eating 25 to 30 grams a day. We wanna start moving towards that, which you know, might be something that you're only eating like five grams a day right now of fiber.

You're not gonna jump to 25 tomorrow, so you're gonna need to move slow and you're need to gauge it on how it [00:13:00] best works with your gut. Other things that are helpful to bring in are cruciferous vegetables. These are gonna provide things like dim sulforaphane that helps with the liver. The cruciferous vegetables are also going to help the gut.

So overall estrogen support there. Taking a look at your inventory of like your, your day, your week, and ask yourself how many probiotic foods like sauerkraut, keefer. Ginger bug, uh, you know, um, you know, uh, probiotic.

Now I always invite my patients to take an inventory of their day and of their week and ask themselves how many probiotic rich foods are they taking in things like sauerkraut, keefer, kimchi, uh, ginger bug, you know, these kinds of foods that are fermented, fermented pickles. We wanna be making sure that we are eating those.

Several times a week, if not daily, so that we're really supplying our gut with what it needs to function at its best. Something else that can be really helpful, especially if you have elevated beta glucuronidase or symptoms that suggest you might, is calcium, deg glucarate. So this supports the body's natural glucoronidation pathway, [00:14:00] which is phase two liver detox, and it may help reduce beta glucuronidase activity.

That enzyme that we've been talking about, that's gonna reactivate your estrogen. Now, most of the time when we are working with beta glucuronidase, we are going to do that in a. Supplement form. I actually have that in my balance. Women's hormone support formula to support phase one, phase two, liver detox, and then phase three, which is like gut health as well and getting that estrogen out.

But you can also get it in food like oranges, apples, grapefruit. Back to those cruciferous vegetables again. So including in those in your diet can be helpful. I want you to understand that you also need to be drinking water for estrogen elimination because you are not just excreting it through the bowels, but you're also excreting it through the kidneys as well.

So. We need to make sure that we're hydrated so that we can excrete, uh, that estrogen through our kidneys, but [00:15:00] also so that we can have bowel movements daily. So I, uh, I do really like calcium deg liquidate because it helps the liver and it helps the gut component. I like to couple that with Sulforaphane.

Um. DIM supplements, uh, having Selenium involved can be really helpful. Um, you can find all of this in my balance, women's Hormone Support Supplement, which is at drbrightenessentials.com, if you wanna check that out. Otherwise, you can couple several supplements together if that's what works best for you. The other thing I would recommend is limiting alcohol that can lead to dysbiosis and it can.

Really be problematic in terms of estrogen metabolism and making sure that you get your estrogen out. Now, I wanna shift gears from that, and I wanna talk about a tool that can be really helpful for supporting gut health and your gut microbiome, which is probiotics. Actually, let me do it this way. Let's talk about [00:16:00] prebiotics, probiotics, and postbiotics.

So prebiotics.

If you haven't heard of prebiotics before, this is the food for your gut microbes. So prebiotics are types of non-digestible fibers and plant compounds that feed the beneficial bacteria in your gut is how we start to shift and keep things healthy and optimized in our gut. So the prebiotics, they kind of act like fertilizer.

They help you grow bacterial, uh, bacteria that are good for your gut and they help them thrive so that they can do their job in supporting your digestion, your immune balance, your hormone metabolism. So. When we think about prebiotics, there's a lot of them out there like garlic and onions, but things like chi, uh, chicory root can also be a nice one to bring in and have in the mix.

Leeks are another source, so when leaks are in season, start making your lee soup. When asparagus come into season, let's. Pull those in Jerusalem. Artichokes. If you can get your hands [00:17:00] on those, that's another great source of prebiotics. Um, if you're somebody who can hang with Green Bananas, I know not everybody can, but Green Bananas can be a really great source.

They also have resistant starch, which can help your bacteria and making butyrate. We're gonna talk about that short chain fatty acid a little bit later on, but I want you to understand that we have to be. Eating prebiotics. We have to be eating fibers if we wanna have a healthy gut. 'cause I was like, let's talk about probiotics.

I'm like, wait a minute, let's back it up. We should definitely talk about prebiotics. One prebiotic that we have, um, in our women's probiotic, the Dr. Brighton Essentials one is, uh, Guar Gum. And that one, I really love that because prebiotics can actually aggravate people who have sibo and Guar Gum doesn't tend to do that.

Now what are probiotics? You may already know this, but in case you don't or you haven't heard it from me [00:18:00] before, probiotics, those are the live microorganisms, uh, that are mostly beneficial bacteria. There's also yeast as well, like croise. These Bollier is one that we sometimes supplement with, and. They can be taken, um, to support your gut health, but we also just wanna be nurturing your gut health as well.

So I really wanna emphasize you have to eat in a way and live in a way that supports your gut health because these microbes, they're helping, they produce c certain nutrients, they help, um, improve your digestion. So when they're in the right balance, we're not having gas, bloating, constipation, diarrhea.

We know that. Gut health is paramount to immune function. That's where the majority of your immune system lives. We're gonna talk about this more as we talk about thyroid today, and as I said before, they assist in hormone clearance. Um, so super, super important. Now common sources. So you can take a probiotic or you can also [00:19:00] eat foods that have probiotics in them as well.

Little seeding of the gut, but we gotta make sure we're feeding the gut. Don't forget that. So yogurt, but specifically yogurt with live cultures, because they don't all do that. They don't all have that. Yogurt, but specifically yogurt with live cultures because not all of them have that. Uh, Kiefer, we talked about sauerkraut.

Kimchi, we talked about miso. We didn't talk about, um, you can pick up miso paste. Typically what you wanna do is put that in. If you're making a soup, you are not gonna boil it. Like if you're making a chicken soup and you wanna do this after the chicken has gone in at the very end, mixing it up so that we, we are not just.

Boiling the heck out of them. And listen, sometimes these microbes are dead and they come in and they still participate in signaling that's really important for gut health. So don't, I don't want you to be like, it's all or nothing with the miso. Um, and then if you're thinking about. Probiotics. You wanna be looking at high quality probiotic supplements, making sure that you, they have enough in them, they [00:20:00] have the right kind of strains in them to actually support what you're trying to do, and that those, those beneficial bacteria are doing.

What we, what we're gonna talk about next is producing postbiotics. So postbiotics are what your gut bacteria create. They are bioactive compounds that the bacteria produce after they digest the prebiotic fibers. So these can include the short chain fatty acids like butyrate that I mentioned before, um, acetate propionic, so those short chain fatty acids.

They also can produce enzymes, peptides, neurotransmitter precursors, and neurotransmitters like serotonin. GABA metabolites. So these postbiotics are, um, really a, a new area of where the research is starting to explore how beneficial these postbiotics were, uh, how beneficial these postbiotics are. What we're starting to understand, postbiotics can help, they can help with brain function.

In some situations reduce [00:21:00] inflammation there, they can actually help with repairing our gut lining. So let's say you take ibuprofen, we know that can cause some damage to the gut lining. It can lead to leaky gut. These postbiotics, what your bacteria are making these can help you with repairing that.

There is research starting to explore the role in regulating estrogen and cortisol and insulin sensitivity. So it's, it's a really cool area that I think we're gonna see a lot more research coming out in the future that tells us that, man, these gut bacteria do so much more than we even thought. I remember.

Over 20 years ago when I was in, uh, nutrition school and they told us like, oh, these gut bacteria, there's just a bunch of freeloaders. Like, yeah, they make a little vitamin K, maybe a little B12, but like, they're not really doing much for you. Um, and I just laugh at where we are now. Um. That we've got so many bacteria and they're, uh, doing so much [00:22:00] for us.

And it's not just bacteria. It's all kinds of microbes in there. So just, I wanna reiterate, like, um, how, how prebiotics, postbiotics, how it all works together. So you eat the prebiotics, they feed the probiotics in your gut, and then the probiotics make postbiotics postbiotics heal, regulate, and balance your gut and support your hormones as well. 

I just had a whole lot of information and right now you might be like, okay, just like what is one thing that I could do right now to positively influence my gut microbiome and my estrogen levels? So the number one thing I would say is start with cooked cruciferous vegetables like a half a cup. Maybe even up to a cup if you're already eating those, like broccoli, cauliflower, kale, Brussels sprouts.

So those cooked cruciferous vegetables will be easier on your digestive track. They'll feed those good guys in your gut. They'll support estrogen detox through the liver and supporting the gut bacteria that are helping aid [00:23:00] you and getting the estrogen you no longer need out. And if you're like, I cannot do crucifer vegetables at all.

Then you try two tablespoons of broccoli sprouts, which is a lot of bang for a little tiny bit of cruciferous.

Now wanna switch gears and start talking about thyroid hormones and gut health because your gut is gonna activate. Like 20% of your thyroid hormone. So T four is converted to T three, the active form in the gut. So when your microbiome is outta balance, you might not convert this as well. And if you don't, you're gonna have hypothyroid symptoms, which is like fatigue, cold intolerance.

Constipation, dry skin, brain fog, irregular periods, heavy periods. Um, you, you may have like lots of gas and bloating happening in the digestive track. You may have [00:24:00] heartburn, you may be experiencing joint pain, hair loss, loss of the lateral third of your eyebrows. And I don't know if I said this already, but infertility can be associated with low thyroid hormone, so.

When you produce thyroid hormone from the thyroid gland at the front of your neck, here you are producing mostly T four. It is out in the peripheral tissue where you have to convert it to T three. That's your active thyroid hormone, your mood, your metabolism, your menses, your gut motility. And so the gut is one of these places where this conversion.

Takes place, but there's like an even deeper layer to what is happening in the gut as well. And that's because the number one cause of thyroid disease is autoimmunity. Hashimoto's and Graves disease are both autoimmune and origin. And what's one thing that can trigger autoimmunity in many people? Gut infections.

So certain pathogens like Yersinia h [00:25:00] pylori, even SIBO imbalance has been linked to thyroid antibodies. Plus leaky gut or intestinal hyperpermeability allows immune cells to be exposed to things they were never meant to see, which can kickstart an autoimmune reaction. Now before I get into strategies, I just wanna remind you, I do have a full episode exploring the root cause of thyroid disease with Dr.

Isabella Wentz, and I'll link that in the show notes for you. 'cause if you're like, I just wanna go super deep on thyroid, I want you to know that I've got you covered on that. Now Graves' disease is hyperthyroidism. That is when you have antibodies that attach to the thyroid receptor and stimulate the thyroid to produce hormones. Hashimoto's is what causes hypothyroidism. Those antibodies flag the thyroid for destruction. Then the immune system comes in and destroys the gland.

Then you don't make enough hormones 'cause you don't have enough of a gland left and then you have hypothyroid symptoms. In [00:26:00] both cases, we have to work on gut health. So if you have gut infections, we have to treat those SIBO parasites. In some cases h pylori super common. We have to treat it. Especially those who are hypothyroid.

We need to look at stomach acid and consider using things like bitters orbit, retain HCL, because you need thyroid hormone to stimulate the cells that produce acid in your stomach. So if you're having heartburn, you probably don't have enough stomach acid. We also wanna be eating selenium rich food, soap, Brazil nuts, sardines, eggs, fish altogether, and also eating fermented veggies, prebiotic fibers like we talked about.

I'll link in the show notes to dr brighton.com article that lists out some of the best prebiotic fibers. So if you're really visual, I'll give that to you as well. Now. Selenium that I just mentioned. I just wanna say that is helpful because that's been shown to help with reducing thyroid antibodies, as can [00:27:00] my acetol as well.

And then we may also wanna bring in glutamine, um, bone broth. Bone broth can be really healing for some people. For others it can cause a histamine issue. So it's just about what's true for you. And lastly, move your body even if it hurts, even if you're so tired, even if it's just a little light walk. We activate our thyroid hormone also through movement, so while you're working on your gut, make sure you're still moving your body, and that's also gonna support your gut health as well. now you may have heard me say before that there's three ingredients to creating the autoimmune cake, if you will. Uh, Dr. Fasano's research is where this comes from. . 

Number one is you have to have the genes to develop that autoimmune disease. Number two is leaky gut, intestinal hyperpermeability. And number three is a triggering event. So we can effectively, we can't change your genes, we can change your gut health. So I wanna talk a [00:28:00] little bit more about gut infections and as it relates to stress and cortisol, because Hashimoto's graves, they're not the only autoimmune conditions and.

Gut infections, those can be a triggering event. Plus you have intestinal hyperpermeability or leaky gut stress. That can be a triggering event. But we also know that with autoimmune disease, we can have dysregulation of cortisol because it is another type of stress. So it, let's get into that a little bit more. Now I need you to understand that your gut is both a victim and an amplifier when it comes to stress. So when you're under stress, your brain shifts how it signals the endocrine system, your hormones. It doesn't steal hormones. To be clear, it prioritizes survival like cortisol over reproductive, ones like progesterone and chronic stress can also damage our gut lining leading to leaky gut.

And that can create more inflammation. And if you have a gut infection, your body sees [00:29:00] that as a 24 7 stressor. And it creates a, a cortisol loop where it's like infection, bump, the cortisol, oh, we have gut damage, more inflammation, we need more cortisol. And this is where you're having gut issues, but you're having other symptoms.

Uh, in a lot of cases we'll see things like anxiety, irritability, trouble sleeping, or insomnia. You might feel that you're having cravings that you never had before. And when we have cortisol dysregulation, one of the hallmark signs is that wired and tired feeling. I try to go to bed at night, my body is exhausted, my brain will not shut up.

So again, you know, bringing in things like glutamine to help heal the gut lining can be helpful. But we wanna work with a provider because whatever's there, we need to treat it. If there's something there and there's an infection, we need to treat it. We need to treat it the right way. We don't need to just go on TikTok and do a parasite cleanse, [00:30:00] one that might be really harsh and be worse for your gut and cause more problems.

But two, we don't wanna guess at what we're, what we're treating. We want to get in, get the job done, and get out. Other things that can be beneficial. If you can't do bone broth, maybe looking at collagen rich foods. Some people tolerate that well, but as we're talking in the, in the stress, uh, conversation is daily stress reducing rituals.

So I have episodes where I talk about vagus nerve stimulation. We go through a whole, uh, breathing. That's with Dr. Naoz. I will link to that doing box breathing. Inhale four, hold four, exhale four. Hold for, do it again. Nature walking. Very good for your hormones, very good for your gut getting out, getting that movement.

Journaling we, we wanna make sure that we're doing things that are gonna help us dissipate and deal with the stress 'cause we can't control and eliminate all stress. So I would [00:31:00] challenge you to add a daily nervous system ritual. Deep breathing, grounding, something calming that helps your body feel safe and sends a safe signal because that can help with your gut healing journey and help your hormones now.

I wanna talk to you about something really exciting, um, microbiome, circadian rhythm synchronization. So this, I think, is super, super cool. Newer research coming out, and it, it gives us some insights on how we can start to structure our eating and our life in a way to support our gut at another level. 

So you are probably familiar with circadian rhythm, right? Our cortisol rises in the morning and we, and we wake up, we wanna get sunlight. But what we're learning is, is that gut bacteria have their own circadian rhythms that sink. With our body clock and disruptions like poor sleep, erratic eating, jet lag, that can be a really bad [00:32:00] one.

Um, even just disruption of like our hormones, like cortisol, melatonin, insulin, estrogen can disrupt these bacteria as well. So we now are understanding. That the gut microbiome exhibits diurnal oscillations, which means certain species grow, shift, produce metabolites in sync with our 24 hour circadian rhythm and these microbial rhythms influence and are influenced by. Your own central and peripheral clock. So including hormone secretion.

So remember, cortisol peaks in the morning with the sunlight, right? And melatonin degrades insulin, uh, is, tends to be more effective earlier in the day rather than eating at like midnight. Right?

Estrogen and progesterone are regulated via pulses from the pituitary gland, FS, H, and lh. And then we know melatonin is produced [00:33:00] in darkness, and melatonin is also involved with our immune system, our gut health. So all of these hormones are connected to our gut. Our gut is connected to our hormones. And when the rhythm gets.

Disrupted. So do hormones. And when hormones get disrupted, we see the gut can get disrupted as well. So when we have chronic circadian rhythm misalignment, um, which can happen from poor sleep, uh, as I said before, erratic eating patterns. So. Uh, A-D-H-D-B will know, um, erratic eating patterns, but not eating in a regular schedule or regular windows.

Um, if you're someone who has shift work, thank you for your work that you do. And also, it's not really great for a circadian rhythm and for our gut health. Jet lag. Like I said, that's another one that can de synchronize the gut's microbiome's natural rhythm and what that can lead to. In some instances, like [00:34:00] if it's extreme, it could be bad.

In a lot of these, like jet lag, we're gonna see temporary hits and then your body's gonna come back because you are doing all of these great things that we're talking about in this episode. But we can see, um, reduced microbial diversity. So diversity lowers, we can see leaky gut comes on, we can see inflammation, um, glucose metabolism can be affected.

Did. We can certainly see dysregulation of the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal access or HPA access, so we start seeing cortisol issues. We can see sex hormone imbalances. We know when there is sleep disruption. We might not ovulate and we might not produce enough estrogen. And you know, again, all of these hormones are super important to our survival and also are connected to our gut and our overall health.

So. There's something called chrono nutrition. Uh, it's really cool. It may become like the new frontier for like hormone and gut [00:35:00] therapy. Um, and what it means, maybe I should define that, right? It refers to like the timing of your food intake in alignment with your body, circadian rhythms to help optimize your metabolism, your gut health, your hormone signaling, and the key principles of this that like you abide by if you're following it.

Is to eat during daylight hours to support the microbiome and insulin sensitivity. And I want to just acknowledge that the higher you are in latitude, the less sunlight you're getting. And so if you're like, no, but before I leave the house, it's dark and when I get home it's dark. It's like. Well, that's, that's the way that you are living right now.

And I wouldn't say like, oh, reduce your feeding time to just the little bit of light that you're getting in a day. But we overall want to follow a pattern where it is, where we're eating in line with our circadian rhythm. So when we wake up, we are eating. Hopefully getting some sunlight exposure when we're [00:36:00] going to bed and it's dark, we're not eating.

So as we're gearing up two to three hours before bed, we are not eating food. Um, and what's interesting is that all of your organs are also on clocks. And it's interesting because, um, we see that like digestive enzymes and insulin, they're, they're not optimized to be produced like after 8:00 PM for example.

It's. How it is for a lot of people and what some of the research has said. So later at night, we're not really optimized to digest food, to handle a glucose response. So this way of eating is looking at like, how are you naturally in rhythm with nature? And let's make sure that we're eating in this way. What's interesting about this is that it follows something that I've used in my clinical practices for many years. Unless somebody has blood sugar issues and they need a snack at night, we're closing the kitchen for about 12 hours after dinner until breakfast. And so, um, that 12 hour spot tends to do really [00:37:00] well, whether it's men or women.

So the 12 hours of not eating while you're sleeping. Okay, you're gearing up for bed. You are, you're going to sleep. Then you're getting up in the morning and you are, uh, starting to prepare breakfast, and then you're eating. Now the other thing, um, the, the, another principle that we wanna think about is front loading fiber and probiotic rich foods earlier in the day to work with those gut microbio biota rhythms instead of like, you know, realizing I didn't get enough fiber and then eating 20 gram of fiber for dinner.

We, we wanna front load the fiber and again, avoid late night eating because that. It can be disruptive to your hormones as well. And sometimes we just don't sleep well the later we eat. Um, it's something that if you have a wearable, you can actually test that and see if that's true for you.

No, I said I was gonna talk a little bit more about, uh, postbiotics, um, the short chain fatty acids. I think this is also really interesting research that we're [00:38:00] starting to see. So the postbiotics, as I was saying, they can help with tight junction proteins, reducing gut permeability. They can protect. Does potentially from autoimmune triggers.

So Hashimoto's increased inflammation, thinking about endometriosis. So when it comes to these postbiotics, remember we have to eat the prebiotics. We have to have the probiotics of, uh, present to eat that so that they then produce the postbiotics.

So butyrate is one really cool one. You can actually get that from ghee and dairy sources, but your bacteria also make it. Um, and so it helps with your gut lining. We've talked about that. We talked about inflammation. It may also help with better estrogen metabolism, healthier immune response. Um, their study starting to look at brain function, how it helps those with A DHD Pro.

Um. That's another short chain fatty acid supports blood sugar balance with insulin sensitivity, um, which is really important for like polycystic [00:39:00] ovarian syndrome, perimenopause. I have a whole episode about insulin, uh, issues that I will definitely link to for you. Um, and acetate, which helps regulate your appetite.

It fuels. Your brain, your liver, like it's, it's another really important one. So we rely on these postbiotics and I want to talk about some specific things that you can eat to help. You make those postbiotics help your gut bacteria make those postbiotics. So the, the thing I wanna talk about the most that I haven't really covered is resistant starches.

So cook cool your potatoes, eat them, cook cool your rice and eat them green Bananas. I did mention before, um, lentils can also be helpful. We don't wanna leave our, um. Potatoes and our rice on the counter. Okay. Like we wanna cool them in the fridge. And this resistant starch can help you make more butyrate.

We talked about high fiber foods. So, um, foods that are loaded [00:40:00] with inulin, uh, saccharides, these pro uh, prebiotic fibers, they promote microbial diversity. And that's what we want in the gut, in the vagina and, um, the uterus. We do not want microbial diversity, but in the gut. Yes, we do polyphenols, cacao, green tea, pomegranate berries, olives.

We talked about these before. They feed beneficial bacteria. They increase prebiotic production and they can help with lowering inflammation. They can also support longevity. I want you to understand that, um, polyphenols are like rocket fuel to like our cells. Like they just make our cells just like high octane performance little cells.

They're amazing to be including in your diet every single day. Omega-3 rich seeds. What I like about, um, chia seeds, flax seeds, is that yeah, they're giving you anti-inflammatory omega threes, but they also can help you increase the [00:41:00] abundance of short chain producing bacteria. So chia seed pudding. I will throw a couple tablespoons of chia seeds on top of yogurt.

Um, I will share an article, a link to the article about seed cycling in this episode as well. That's another great way, um, to be getting those seed fibers in as well.

I like to say microdose your microbiome when it comes to eating. So oftentimes people will be like, okay, I get enough fiber, but where are you getting that fiber? I'm getting that fiber because I eat lentils, oats, chia seeds, and you know, carrots in my week. Are you eating anything else? N no. That's primarily my staples that I'm eating every week.

We want to show our microbiome as much diversity of foods as possible. So what do I mean when I say microdose Your microbiome? I use this a lot, especially with my [00:42:00] neurodivergent patients. Those with a DHD and autism especially have, um, food aversions. It is not. That you always have to go and like eat a whole plate of this root vegetable and then switch and eat something different.

The microdosing or microbiome is, can we just add a little bit of something that's different? So, for example, I went to the Asian market. They had a lot of Chinese stuff, but they had ramen. So I'm like. I'm calling it the Asian market because they had a lot of different cultures, um, available of food, different cultures, foods, um, available, and they had, uh, dehydrated mushrooms and they had quarters and they had mushrooms.

Like they had just species of mushrooms I hadn't seen before. Totally edible. But we got that and, um, I, I bought that and I made a soup with it. My toddler was like, I'm not eating that slimy mushroom. You are crazy. I'm like, I hear you. 4-year-old. And can I just [00:43:00] give you the littlest piece? Can I just give you, can I just like treat your gut bugs?

Can I just microdose your microbiome and give it a little bit of something? So I say that because if you're someone who's like, I'm listening to all these foods and I don't want to eat them, and I have food aversions, like, can we just give a little bit? Can we wanna be getting that 25 grams, 30 grams of fiber, but can I just give you a little bit of something, something new?

Maybe you're eating different kinds of sprouts. Maybe you are picking up a root vegetable and you're like, listen, I. I don't want to eat this weird fruit vegetable that I've never seen before. Right? That's a normal human reaction. So maybe what you do is you're like, I'm making a stir fry. I'm going to grate a little bit of this root vegetable and I'm only gonna put a tablespoon in and.

In that way, like is this gonna completely transform your microbiome? No, nothing on its own. Not one thing I say today is gonna be the one thing that transforms your microbiome. You're gonna need to be doing, [00:44:00] um, a combination of things. But when we microdose the microbiome with like little bits coming in, we are signaling.

That the environment has this variety, and we know that food variety leads to microbial diversity, and that's what we want in the gut. So if you are somebody, I bring this up because if you are somebody who's like, Ew, I don't wanna eat these foods, can you just give your microbiome a little bit? Can it be one bite?

Can it just be a tiny bit so that we're giving your microbiome something different? Something interesting, something to flourish on. Now, I wanna remind you as we wrap this up, that your gut is part of your hormone headquarters. Okay? The truth is, your gut isn't just about digestion, it's also what's going on with your hormones, and your hormones are potentially messing with your gut as well.

If you're having things like heavy periods. Thyroid issues, autoimmunity, PCOS, burnout, you have any of these kinds of conditions. [00:45:00] Endometriosis, it's really important to investigate how is this connected to your gut? Now listen, if you found this information is helpful, please share it with someone that you know it could help.

 

Um, leave a review. I love hearing how you're feeling supported and how I can also support you in future episodes. So thank you so much for being here with me, and please, please, please honor your gut and make sure that you are always taking care of it because it is so crucial to your hormonal health.