The Gut-Hormone Connection: What Every Woman in Menopause Needs to Know

Are you doing everything right - eating well, exercising, taking supplements - and still dealing with bloating, brain fog, stubborn weight, and exhaustion? The missing piece might be your gut.

In this episode of the Joyful Menopause Podcast, Registered Dietitian and Functional Nutritionist Lynda Enright reveals why gut health is the most overlooked factor in midlife hormone balance - and what you can do about it starting today.

You’ll discover:

•       Why perimenopause and menopause dramatically change your gut microbiome

•       The estrobolome - the gut bacteria that directly regulate your estrogen levels

•       How gut dysfunction drives bloating, brain fog, fatigue, weight gain, and mood shifts

•       The #1 food to eat daily for hormone balance (hint: it’s in your pantry)

•       Why constipation may actually a hormonal issue - not just a digestive one

•       Simple, daily habits that compound into real results

Whether you’re in perimenopause or post-menopause, this episode will completely change how you think about the way you feel.

When you're ready, here are 3 ways I can help you to feel your best during perimenopause and menopause:

1. Want more science-backed health tips? Click here to sign up for my free weekly newsletter for practical advice on navigating menopause with confidence:
 
2. Click here to get the free guide: 5 Natural Ways To Reduce Menopause Symptoms.

2. For more information about Lynda and how she supports women on their health journey, click here to learn more.

3. Interested in seeing if nutrition coaching with Lynda is right for you? Click here to book a free discovery call with Lynda.

Transcript

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In my 25 years of working with women in midlife, what I find is that many, if not most of the women that I work with, are working really hard to feel good, and they're not getting the results they expect. They're eating well, they're exercising, they're taking supplements, but things aren't working. They're getting symptoms like bloating, weight that won't budge, brain fog, fatigue. And I just don't hear doctors talking about this enough. We don't talk about women's health enough, and we also don't talk about a very important piece of this midlife puzzle, the gut. We think about your gut just for digestion, but actually it's at the center of hormone health, your immune system, your metabolism, your mood, and literally how you think and feel every single day. And during perimenopause and menopause, the gut becomes especially vulnerable to disruption in ways that no one probably ever warned you about. And there's chronic problems in our world today around the health of the gut. So today we're going to talk about what is happening in your gut during midlife, why it matters so much more than you might think, and the simple, practical things you can start doing right away to support it. So let's get started. Menopause doesn't have to feel like you are living in someone else's body. Your host, Lynda Enright, has spent the last 25 years helping women to thrive in midlife. Here you'll find science-based practical advice that you can start using today to get real results for your health. Welcome to Joyful Menopause. A question I get asked all the time: why is everything suddenly so much harder? I was fine in my 30s. What changed? The answer is a lot has changed, and your gut can be one big reason why. Most people think of the gut as just a tube, a long tube that processes food. I mean, that's what it is. But it is also home to trillions of microorganisms, bacteria, fungi, viruses, that collectively are called your gut microbiome. It is a community of organisms that is responsible for a ton of different functions in your body. It helps regulate your immune system. About 70% lives in or around your gut. It produces neurotransmitters, including about 90% of your body's serotonin, which impacts mood, digestion, sleep, healing, even libido. Also, it influences how you absorb nutrients, how you process hormones, and how you manage inflammation. So when your gut is off, a lot of things are off. And what happens during midlife? Why has this become a little bit more important and a little bit more tricky? One of the big things is estrogen and progesterone are protective hormones for the lining of your gut. So when those hormones decline, a normal process through midlife, our gut lining can become more permeable. Something called leaky gut can start happening, and that can lead... then lead to more chronic inflammation throughout the body. This changes the diversity, the composition of the microbiome, and this balance, the healthy balance that we're supposed to have, gets upset. Stress, now on the other hand, further disrupts the gut through the gut-brain axis, this two-way communication highway between your nervous system and your gut. The good news is you have so much influence over your gut microbiome, more than a lot of systems in your body. Diet, exercise, sleep, stress- they all directly shape the health of your gut. So let's talk about what your gut controls. There are some key roles that your gut plays in your overall health. It is central to a lot of different things that are going on. Number one, estrogen detoxification. So when we talk about hormones, we talk about estrogen. We're thinking about estrogen declining as we're getting into the years of perimenopause and menopause, but something that surprises a lot of women is that the gut, health of your gut is directly connected to hormone balance because of this estrogen situation that's going on, something called the estrobolome, which is a specific collection of bacteria in your gut whose entire job is to metabolize, to break down estrogen. So how does this happen? The liver processes estrogen. It prepares it for elimination to get it out of your body. It packages it up. It sends it to your intestines. The gut bacteria, though, can get out of balance, and when that happens, the enzyme, this one enzyme, beta-glucuronidase, reactivates that estrogen and sends it back into circulation, so now you have more estrogen again. So that seems like it might be a good ti- good thing, but what that can mean sometimes is estrogen dominance. Some of the symptoms of that: bloating, heavy periods if you're still getting a period, breast tenderness, mood swings, weight gain. Even as your overall estrogen is declining, an imbalanced gut can keep recycling it in ways that can create problems. On the other side of it, an overly depleted microbiome, so you don't have enough good bacteria, can contribute to estrogen dr- dropping too low and too fast, making other symptoms like hot flashes, sleep disruption, vaginal dryness. All those things can get worse. So your gut is a hormone-regulating organ that we do not talk enough about. Number two, nutrient absorption, another big thing that's happening here. This is where nutrients get into your body. So now, you know, at this time in your life, if you're a mid-life, we need nutrients more than ever. We need magnesium for sleep and stress. We need B vitamins for energy and mood. We need iron for fatigue, calcium, vitamin D for bone health. If our gut is inflamed, then our microbiome can get compromised. So we might have, like, a really good diet. We might be taking all these supplements, but we're not absorbing them adequately because we don't have this good nutrient absorption because the gut is out of balance. Third thing that's going on is regulation of your immune system. 70% of your immune system is in your gut. The gut microbiome is in constant conversation with your immune system. It's teaching it to tell the difference between friend and foe, things that belong, things that don't belong, and it helps to regulate your inflammatory response. It helps to regulate inflammation, again, a, a job of your immune system. So when our gut gets disrupted, immune signaling can get... go crazy, so we have this systemic low-grade inflammation going on. Chronic inflammation, I talk all the time about inflammation, it can be at the root of so many things: weight gain, joint pain, heart disease, brain fog, fatigue, mood disorders. A lot of different things that are going on can be a result of this inflammation because of immune system reg- dysregulation. Metabolism and weight are also impacted. Bacteria influence how many calories you get out of food. It impacts how your body responds to insulin and how your hormones that regulate hunger and satiety, leptin and ghrelin, two important hormones, these are all impacted by the bacterial balance. So research shows that people that have greater bacterial diversity, have a more diverse microbiome, have a healthier weight, they have better metabolic function, and they have less inflammation. So this explains why two women might eat the same thing, have a very similar diet, and they have very different results. Everybody is unique, so we got to figure out what is best for you. I want to share for you some signs that your gut is needing some support. So you have a little better under- understanding now of what your gut controls, but what are some signs that your gut may be out of balance? So I want you to just think about how many of these resonate with you. Bloating after meals, but maybe no matter what, maybe waking up even bloated. Very common complaint I hear all the time. It's rarely just food choices. It can be this imbalance. Constipation, irregularity, transit time, how quickly things move through your digestive tract can be a window into the health of your gut. So when it's slow move- moving, estrogen is getting reabsorbed. That's not balancing your hormones very well. Brain fog, feeling mentally fuzzy, sort of slow, unable to concentrate. Inflammation impacts the gut, making serotonin and dopamine, so these are two important hormones for focus, memory, and mood. Fatigue. Fatigue that doesn't resolve even when you get enough sleep. When we have poor nutrient absorption, we have elevated inflammation, and we have disrupted sleep. Now neurotransmitters are all connected back to the gut because we have this imbalance that's happening, and now leading to more fatigue. Weight resistance, especially belly fat, especially that doesn't respond to diet and exercise the way it used to. Bacteria in your gut influence insulin sensitivity and influence how your body stores fat, particularly abdominal fat. Getting sick all the time or your immune system being just run down in general. Skin issues, things like acne, eczema, or rashes, and mood changes, anxiety, low mood, irritability, and, and mood changes that feel disproportionate to your life. You know, those things are, are normal. Like, we all experience times where we don't feel super happy, but is it impacting you bigger than it was historically? If you recognize yourself in several of these, know that this is not about willpower. This isn't, you know, not necessarily about just choices that you're making that you have so much control, but it isn't necessarily the way you think it is. So it might be that your gut health is a problem, and it's absolutely addressable So let's talk a little bit now about the estrogen and the gut connection. So I want to spend some more time on this because I think it is one of the most important and not super well understood pieces of health for women during midlife. So I mentioned the estrobolome before. This is the gut bacteria that metabolize at and break down, metabolizes breaking down estrogen. So we want to look a little bit more deeply at this. When your liver finishes processing estrogen, it ships it to your intestines to be eliminated. If you have a really good, healthy, diverse microbiome, bacteria leave that estrogen alone and it gets excreted. If you have an overgrowth of certain bacteria, if you've had a lot of antibiotic use, if you have a high sugar or heavily processed diet, if you have a lot of stress, if you drink alcohol regularly, the bacteria in your gut might be producing too much of this enzyme beta-glucuronidase. I talked about this before. And this enzyme interferes with that breakdown of estrogen, and estrogen then gets reabsorbed, or interferes with that getting excreted out of the body, and so estrogen can get reabsorbed. So now we have estrogen recirculating and estrogen dominant symptoms even when your estrogen levels are declining. So we have this imbalance. That's the key, is everything we want to create balance, and now we have too much estrogen in relation to your other hormones like progesterone. So a lot of women then might be feeling some symptoms of estrogen dominance in addition to sort of being estrogen deficient. So they can both be happening in different ways. It's kind of crazy to think about it like that. But we actually, we're recirculating it, so we get dominance, but our levels just overall are low in a deficient state. Fiber is a huge tool here. Fiber is one of the most effective ways to support healthy estrogen metabolism and a balance in this estrobolome. So let me explain that. Fiber feeds bacteria that make short chain fatty acids. Short chain fatty acids are the fuel for the cells of your gut. It helps to reduce inflammation, it helps protect the gut lining, it helps to regulate your immune system. Fiber binds to excess estrogen in your intestines and then carries it out of the body before it can get reabsorbed. So common, women are eating far less fiber than they need. Current recommendations, 25 plus grams a day. Research suggests even 30 to 35 is probably ideal. Depends how much food you eat total and how many calories your body needs, but somewhere in that range. The average American is eating about 15. So it's just a lot less than, you know, maybe half of what we should be. This isn't about just eating salads all the time. There's all kinds of different ways to increase fiber in your diet, and we're going to talk about those practical things you can do in a few minutes. Elimination, having regular bowel movements, something that sounds simple and can be so frustrating and very common for women, and is a foundational piece of this hormone balance, is having regular bowel movements. You should be eliminating at least once a day, ideally with ease. Estrogen sitting in the colon longer can then get reabsorbed. Constipation i- you know, is a c- inconvenience at a minimum, but it, it is also a hormonal issue, so it's something we need to pay attention to. So how do we support healthy elimination? Getting enough fiber, getting plenty of water, moving your body every day, managing stress, getting enough sleep. All of these things that we're talking about, they all connect to help create the best environment for your gut. So we want to... We have the, all these bacteria in our gut. We want... We have this good balance. We want to m- support this good balance, and we also need to feed those bacteria. So what we eat can actually help to support a healthy microbiome because it helps to feed that, helps to feed those good bacteria. Plants, number one, lots of them. M- the most important thing you can do for your gut microbiome is to eat more plants. Not-we don't have to have some specific diet. We don't need to do keto or vegan or anything else specific. Just eat more plants. Just add plant foods wherever you can. You've maybe heard, um, there's something called a 30 plant challenge, which is eating 30 different plant foods in a week. That can help to create a really diverse gut microbiome, and the research shows that 30 a week compared to a diet of maybe 10 a week really changes the balance of that gut bacteria. So really a strong marker of gut health is just getting plenty of plants. And I know that 30 plants sounds like a lot, and it, it, it did for me too when I started thinking about what am I actually eating? How am I getting that many different things? But it adds up a lot faster than you think. Herbs and spices, nuts and seeds. You know, think about a salad with mixed greens. Might be multiple different greens. Put some tomatoes and cucumbers and radish. Add some walnuts and pumpkin seeds. You know, you've got a handful of things in just one meal, so it really can add up faster than you think. Fiber is the foundation, the prebiotic foundation. That is the fuel. It's the food for the gut bacteria. So without enough fi- fiber, the, those bacteria, those good bugs, th- they literally starve. The harmful bacteria then, the w- ones that we don't want too many of, they can start taking over. So thinking about fiber as sort of that fertilizer for your microbiome. So those are foods we want to include. There's a couple different kinds, soluble and insolu- soluble. Legumes, oats, ground flax seeds and chia seeds are awesome. Fruits and vegetables, whole grains, all just great choices. A little bit of a side note on flax seed to mention that here, ground flax seeds specifically, we don't want whole flax. Whole flax is fine, you know, it'll, it moves through, it's not a bad fiber, but your body can't break down those seeds, so you need it ground. It can actually be a super powerful tool for the balance of estrogen. It's recommended one to two tablespoons of ground flax seed a day. Thinking about where you might add that, maybe in smoothies or oatmeal, yogurt, even salad dressings. Flax seed contains lignans. Lignans are plant compounds that sup- specifically support healthy estrogen metabolism, so really sort of easy thing to just incorporate that into your day. Then thinking about fermented foods. Fermented foods are good bacteria. They're actually live good bacteria for your gut. So yogurt, uh, is an option. Yogurt varies tremendously in the quality. Um, looking for things that are simple, they don't have additives, and gums, and sweeteners, and all of that junk. Just plain old yogurt is great. Looking at the date on it, the bacteria are alive, so they die over time. So if you're eating a carton of yogurt that's dated today or tomorrow, m- most of those bacteria, or many of those bacteria, have already died. So you want to be eating yogurt that's dated a few weeks out. But you got to be careful about yogurt because it can have so much added sugar and other stuff. Keep it as simple as possible. Other fermented foods, kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, miso, tempeh, kombucha. There's just so many choices. You don't need a lot of them, but just thinking if every day you could have just one thing, one or two, you know, even just on most days of the, the week if you can have a small serving, that's going to give some good bacteria for the good bugs. Supplements can be helpful. Su- as food sources generally can be better absorbed, but that's an option. I look for bacteria, or supplement probiotics that have multiple strains, you know, maybe 10 or so different strains of bacteria. At least 10 billion CFUs, up to maybe 50 billion CFUs. Reach out to me if you want to understand more. Um, it's certainly something that, that I can talk about with my clients. Hydration, also important. Even mild dehydration is really common, but it impacts gut motility, it impacts that movement of food through your whole GI tract. Also, water is so important for the lining, for just the, that mucosa, the cells that line the gut. So when we have enough hydration, we're protecting the gut cells, we're feeding the good bugs. The goal is eight to 10 cups a day, something like that. I mean, it depends on, again, how much food you eat, what your calories are, what your exercise is, you know, if it's a dry climate, how much coffee you drink, that, you know, anything that's caffeinated kind of depletes hydration a little bit. Um, but n- any non-caffeinated drink, um, can be i- included in that. You know, focusing on water first, of course. And then just if you're, if you're eating a lot of water-rich foods. If you have a diet that's very rich in fruits and vegetables, you're getting some good hydration from that also. Shift gears a little bit, and let's think about lifestyle, too. So we're talking all about food, and food is the foundation for sure, but it's not the whole story. Our gut health is impacted by so many things in your lifestyle, and this is where a lot of women are unknowingly sabotaging their progress. S- let's talk about stress a little bit. The gut and the brain are in constant communication through this gut-brain axis I mentioned before. The gut-brain axis is a network of nerves, hormones, immune signals that run in both directions. They go back and forth. So what happens in your gut affects your brain, and what happens in your brain, stress, anxiety, overwhelm, they directly affect your gut. So chronic stress, when your body's in chronic stress, your body is releasing cortisol. Cortisol suppresses the immune response in your gut. It reduces the diversity of that gut bacteria. It increases permeability of that gut lining, so larger molecules that don't belong outside of your gut get into your bloodstream. They slow or disrupt motility. Um, stress is just can be one of the most damaging things for the gut microbiome. Women that are under high chronic stress consistently show a different gut microbiome than women with lower stress. And in midlife, when estrogen, which helps to buffer the stress response, is starting to decline, we are absolutely just more vul- vulnerable to the gut-damaging effects of stress than ever before. So things that we could get away with when we were 30 is just not the same when you're 50. So nervous- supporting your nervous system is, is also supporting your gut, absolutely. Things like breathing, gentle movement, getting enough rest, and just finding moments of calm in your life. You know, these are just not nice ideas. They're actually medicine for your gut microbiome Sleep, so important. Gut, your gut has a circadian rhythm. It has an internal clock, and when our dis- our sleep is disrupted, it disrupts the rhythm of your gut bacteria. It reduces their diversity, and it increases their gut permeability. And the reverse is true, too. Like, if your gut produces most of your serotonin, I talked about that before, which is also interestingly, serotonin is a precursor to melatonin. You've probably heard of melatonin. Melatonin helps you to sleep well. So when you have a disrupted gut, it can make it harder to fall asleep and stay asleep. Again, this bi-directional relationship, it can either work in your favor or it can work against you. So prioritizing seven, at least seven hours of sleep a night is, again, medicine for your gut. Key to just have some consistency. Going to bed at a consistent time, limiting screens in the evening, keeping your room cool and dark. They all support your sleep and your microbiome. And then movement. Exercise increases the diversity of your gut microbiome. Research shows that women who are physically active have a more diverse and beneficial gut bacteria than women who are sedentary. So independent of diet. That's just based on physical activity. Movement supports the motility of your gut, which keeps things moving, preten- prevents constipation, and then preventing again, that estrogen from getting reabsorbed. Even just a 20 to 30-minute walk, after eating is even better, can make a really noticeable difference in your digestion. Okay, let's wrap up with simple things you can do to support the health of your gut. Number one: eat real, whole food as much as possible. We're not aiming for perfection at all, but the majority of your food should come from whole foods that came from the earth. Fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, good quality proteins, and healthy fats. Ultra-processed foods are damaging to your gut microbiome. They contain emulsifiers and preservatives and additives and all kinds of stuff that can disrupt the gut bacteria. Now we have an increase in intestinal permeability. Now we have these molecules that don't belong in your bloodstream getting there, and now we have systemic inflammation. So again, we're not aiming for perfection, but we're trying to reduce processed foods to make a big difference in how your gut works. Chewing your food and slowing down. This is a funny thing that I, I don't remember to talk about all the time because it's, it's common sense, of course, chew. But we don't do it that well, and I admit I eat too fast, but this is a simple thing that can really help your gut. Digestion starts in your mouth, and when you chew your food well, it's mixes- starts to mix that with the enzymes in your saliva, and that starts digestion. So now when the food gets into your stomach and moves into your small intestine, it's started the process. We're just making your gut, it just easier, all the work that your gut is supposed to be doing. So when you eat really fast, when you swallow larger pieces of food, or also when you eat distracted or stressed, you're putting extra burden on your stomach, your intestines, and then leading to potential symptoms, bloating, gas, and digestion just not working the way it's supposed to. So what can you do? Just put your fork down. Take a bite, put your fork down, chew thoroughly. Food should be a paste before it moves down into your stomach. That's hard to do if you, you know, you haven't been doing that very well, so s- just start working on it. Start doing the best that you can. You know, chewing it 20 to 30 times is ideal. Eating without screens. You know, just eating, breathing, staying calm around your eating is going to help too. And also that, that breathing and just that calm, that activates your parasympathetic, your rest and digest nervous system. So even if you can just take a few deep breaths before you start eating, your body is going to be better at digestion. Fiber- talked a lot about fiber. We need to add fiber slowly. Too much can make you feel bloated and gassy and not awesome right away. So even, like, two or three grams more of fiber in a week, and then the next week two or three more grams, just slowly building up to get maybe again that 25, 35 grams a week or a day. If you increase too fast, again, you might feel worse, so that's not great. Um, so you want to add f- add slowly, and also then you want to add water to it, too. So we want to have plenty of water so that fiber can move through. If we do it slowly, it gives our gut time to adapt. Within even a few weeks, I have found that women, they just- the bloating improves, regularity improves, their ener- energy improves, so it can really help. A few- here are a few non-negotiables for a healthy gut, or really important, that I, I think really add up, and they don't have to be that complicated. The ground flaxseed I talked about. Even a tablespoon or two a day, again, smoothies, oatmeal, yogurt, really can be helpful for those good lignans as well as good fiber. Getting plenty of fruits and vegetables a day. Five to seven, you know, even more than that would be all right. Aiming for color and variety. So color is where the nutrients are. It tells you that things have lots of nutrients, so things like berries and leafy greens and broccoli and Brussels sprouts, and all those sorts of things. And variety, talked about that 30 plant challenge, because they all vary. They vary in the nutrients that they contain, so if we can have variety in our foods, we get variety in, in our nutrition, and that feeds our good bacteria. Fermented food, just one serving, a little bit every day. Kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, miso, yogurt. Plenty of water, eight or more cups a day, spread throughout the day also, really helpful. Movement, 30 minutes of movement, and going to bed at the same time. Ideally 10:00 to 11:00 PM supports your circadian rhythm, your gut circadian rhythm. Flaxseed, fruits and vegetables, fermented foods, water, movement, sleep. Those are the things to focus on. Non-negotiables every day. I hope that none of these things feel too particularly hard, but- and they're probably things that you already know about and may be doing some of them, but can you keep working on them consistently? Again, that's the difference, it's really about consistency. Hopefully you're understanding a little bit more about why they matter and why they're all important and they add up, because the effects of all these compound to give you great benefits. I want to close with something that I come back to again and, and again with working with the women that I work with. When we improve gut health, so many things get easier. Weight management gets easier because your metabolism and your insulin sensitivity improve. Your inflammation decreases. Your hunger hormones are better. Your hor- hormone balance gets so much easier because you're metabolizing estrogen properly. You're absorbing nutrients better. Inflammation isn't constantly driving the hormonal chaos. Energy gets better because the mitochondria, the, the powerhouses, the energy of your cells, have the nutrients they need. Your sleep improves because you're in a healing state rather than constantly on the defensive. Mood and mental clarity gets easier because, again, this gut-brain axis is functioning well. You're getting enough serotonin. There is so much impact that the health of your gut has. If anything I shared today resonated with you, I can't imagine that there aren't some things that resonated with you, because everyone I work with is struggling with some of these things. If you recognize yourself in that, if you've been working hard trying to figure it out and you want to understand what's going on with your body personally, I would be happy to talk with you. If you click on the link in the comments, you can schedule a free discovery call. This is for women who want to explore what it looks like to get functional, personalized support. No pressure, no commitment, just a conversation. So you can start to see what might be the best next steps for you. So thank you so much for being here today. I hope you have some good things to take away, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.