By Laura Markison, NMD
When I had my hysterectomy at 45 years old I went into instant menopause. I had hot flashes, anxiety, insomnia, and felt very weepy. I called my gynecologist who did my surgery and asked if I could start hormone replacement. He didn’t believe in hormone replacement and told me “I would adjust”…. Well, I did not adjust. I thought I was losing my mind. At the time we lived on Maui, Hawaii, and there was one doctor who prescribed bioidentical hormone cream. He was a very strange man who only was interested in me having a lot of interest in sex (he was a lot cruder to me than that) …He prescribed Biest estrogen cream, progesterone capsules, and testosterone cream. The creams helped so much, and I regained my sanity. But I felt too revved up and felt overdosed.
I flew into Santa Monica a few times to meet with an MD that ran me through a bunch $7500 of tests concluding my hormones were still too low and prescribed higher doses. I felt worse, more revved up and still had some insomnia and anxiety. I started gaining weight and not understanding what was happening to my body. I was going to see this doctor to lose weight!
Then we moved to Arizona and I began the arduous journey of going to naturopathic medical school. I had to observe a naturopathic doctor for two weeks when I started as a requirement for school. I learned she balanced hormones. After some tests it was determined my liver had some methylation issues meaning it was harder for my liver to detoxify the byproducts of the hormone replacement creams. She put me on some specific supplements to help my liver’s detoxification process and she lowered my hormone replacement doses. I finally felt “normal”.
Naturopathic medicine’s first and foremost goal is to get to the “root of the cause” of health decline and disease. The body knows how to heal once we removed the barriers to healing. A visit will consist of one hour to discuss all concerns, blood tests will be ordered if necessary, and then a plan will be made. One will not find this kind of approach with a traditionally trained allopathic doctor. We offer food allergy testing that is unique that tests the white blood cells reactions to 170 items including food coloring and chemicals. We also offer comprehensive stool testing and cellular vitamin levels to see if there are any deficiencies.
If you or a loved one are tired of not getting answers about your health issues, come by for an appointment. I am sure we can come up with a solution. Call us today at Mesa Naturopathic at (480) 306-8111.