How Do I Keep Estrogen Slightly High?

[welshwing]

Let me explain the reason: Ray Peat seems anti-estrogen but you need estrogen to maintain bone mass. I'm getting the impression that eating like Ray Peat over time will make your estrogen levels lower than average. This is good but the only side effect I'm worried about is lowered bone mass - for example, women whos estrogen lowers with age get osteoporosis more so than average women under 20 who have higher estrogen.

Bottom line: If you lower estrogen below normal/ideal levels you risk bone loss over time. Eating K2/D3/Calcium (that increase bone mass) will not 'stop' it entirely - estrogen is very powerful and I'd rather not lower it.

Are there any real health side effects to keeping estrogen normal or slightly high? And are there any foods that can achieve normal-high estrogen levels?

 

[Such_Saturation]

If just eating food will make estrogen too low then I really must question whoever is saying that it's too low.

 

[michael94]

disclaimer: anyone posting on this forum is going to be biased as to whether estrogen is actually vital to the process you mention or if it's a red herring...

Do you know of the mechanisms behind estrogen being necessary for this and/or can you point me in the direction of how you came across that idea. Epidemiological studies are not particularly helpful for this matter

 

[Tarmander]

Eat some flax muffins with soybean frosting

 

[welshwing]

Women stay small boned even after puberty and estrogen protects their small bones from osteoporosis which is why they need it all their life. Men get denser bones but estrogen prevents them from growing too much, that's why high testosterone = denser bones. When men raise testosterone levels unnaturally high (like bodybuilders) estrogen is forced to rise to stunt their testosterone and they sometimes get gynecostemia (a thing normally only gotten from excess estrogen). These hormones must be balanced carefully - Ray Peat hates estrogen and loves testoserone, pregnenolone thyroid and all these anti-estrogenic hormones.

I'm not worried about going to extreme lows, but It's clear anyone eating like Ray Peat will have lower estrogen than the average person. This means their bones wither away quicker if they lack testosterone, this is how it is for women with osteoporosis (estrogen lowers with age in women, they have smaller bones so osteoporosis is more harmful) and also men with low testosterone / ectomorphic body types (long thin bones, low fat), they also need estrogen to not become brittle.

If eating some soybeans every day isn't too poisonous I'll do it. Any other way to raise it?

 

[Lightbringer]

Let me explain the reason: Ray Peat seems anti-estrogen but you need estrogen to maintain bone mass.

Every thing has a role to play in the body , even misunderstood things like estrogen and nitric oxide. Rather than saying he's anti-estrogen, you could also say he's pro progesterone. It's a bit more nuanced as he points out:

"An excessive estrogen/progesterone ratio is more generally involved in producing or aggravating symptoms than either a simple excess of estrogen or a deficiency of progesterone, but even this ratio is conditioned by other factors, including age, diet, other steroids, thyroid, and other hormones."

This is good but the only side effect I'm worried about is lowered bone mass -

Remember that you are eating a high calcium diet which even the mainstream acknowledges as useful for bone mass. You could read Peat's article on Progesterone. For a quickie on estrogen:
http://www.functionalps.com/blog/2012/06/19/hormonal-profiles-in-women-with-breast-cancer/

 

[welshwing]

Isn't there a healthy way to raise estrogen without PUFA?

 

[Jennifer]

Here are quotes on estrogen's role in bone health from Ray's bone density, estrogen and osteoporosis articles:

"Most often, estrogen is prescribed for osteoporosis, and if the doctors didn’t have their bone density tests, they would probably prescribe estrogen anyway, “to protect the heart,” or “to prevent Alzheimer’s disease.” Since I have already written about estrogen and those problems, there’s no need to say more about it here, except that estrogen is the cause of a variety of tissue atrophies, including the suppression of bone formation.[1]"

http://raypeat.com/articles/aging/bonedensity.shtml

"Animal studies show that estrogen stunts growth, including bone growth. The high estrogen levels in girls' teen years and early twenties accounts for the fact that women's bones are lighter than men's. In rat studies, treatment with estrogen was found to enlarge the space between the jawbone and the teeth, which is a factor in periodontal disease (Elzay, 1964). Teeth are very similar to bones, so it's interesting that treating male or female rats with estrogen increases their incidence of tooth decay, and removing their gonads was found to decrease the incidence (Muhler and Shafer, 1952). Supplementing them with thyroid hormone decreased the incidence of cavities in both males and females (Bixler, et al., 1957)."

http://raypeat.com/articles/articles/osteoporosis-aging.shtml

"The thyroid hormone is responsible for the carbon dioxide produced in respiration. Chronic hypothyroidism causes osteopenia, and in this connection, it is significant that women (as a result of estrogen's effects on the thyroid) are much more likely than men to be hypothyroid, and that, relative to men, women in general are "osteopenic," that is, they have more delicate skeletons than men do."

http://raypeat.com/articles/articles/osteoporosis.shtml

"A former editor of Yearbook of Endocrinology had reviewed a series of studies showing that excess prolactin can cause osteoporosis. Then, he presented a group of studies showing how estrogen promotes the secretion of prolactin, and can cause hyperprolactinemia. In that review, he wryly wondered how something that increases something that causes osteoporosis could prevent osteoporosis.

Women have a higher incidence of osteoporosis than men do. Young women have thinner more delicate bones than young men. The women who break bones in old age are generally the women who had the thinnest bones in youth. Menstrual irregularities, and luteal defects, that involve relatively high estrogen and low progesterone, increase bone loss.

Fatter women are less likely to break bones than thinner women. Insulin, which causes the formation of fat, also stimulates bone growth. Estrogen however, increases the level of free fatty acids in the blood, indicating that it antagonizes insulin (insulin decreases the level of free fatty acids), and the fatty acids themselves strongly oppose the effects of insulin. Estrogen dominance is widely thought to predispose women to diabetes.

Between the ages of 20 and 40, there is a very considerable increase in the blood level of estrogen in women. However, bone loss begins around the age of 23, and progesses through the years when estrogen levels are rising. Osteoarthritis, which involves degeneration of the bones around joints, is strongly associated with high levels of estrogen, and can be produced in animals with estrogen treatment.

Thirty years ago, when people were already claiming that estrogen would prevent or cure osteoporosis, endocrinologists pointed out that there was no x-ray evidence to support the claim. Estrogen can cause a positive calcium balance, the retention of more calcium than is excreted, and the estrogen promoters argued that this showed it was being stored in the bones, but the endocrine physiologists showed that estrogen causes the retention of calcium by soft tissues. There are many reasons for not wanting calcium to accumulate in the soft tissues; this occurs normally in aging and stress.

Then, it was discovered that, although estrogen doesn't improve the activity of the cells that build bone, it can reduce the activity of the cells that remove bone, the osteoclasts. The osteoclast is a type of phagocytic cell, and is considered to be a macrophage, the type of cell that can be found in any organ, which can eat any sort of particle, and which secretes substances (cytokines, hormone-like proteins) that modify the functions of other cells. When estrogen was found to impair the activity of this kind of cell, there wasn't much known about macrophage cytokines.

With the clear evidence that estrogen inhibits the osteoclasts without activating the bone-building osteoblasts, estrogen was said to "prevent bone loss," and from that point on we never heard again about estrogen promoting a positive calcium balance. Calcium retention by soft tissues has come to be an accepted marker of tissue aging, tissue damage, excitotoxicity, and degeneration. Positive calcium balance had been the essence of the argument for using estrogen to prevent osteoporosis: "Women are like chickens, estrogen makes them store calcium in their bones." But if everyone now recognizes that calcium isn't being stored in bones, it's better for the estrogen industry if we forget about the clearly established positive calcium balance produced by estrogen."

http://raypeat.com/articles/articles/estrogen-osteoporosis.shtml

 

[schultz]

Jennifer pretty much covered things I would mention.

Estrogen doesn't fall with age in women, progesterone does. Estrogen rises with age. I've attached a clip of Ray talking about this.

A high metabolic rate with adequate amounts of sugar and micro nutrients leading to greater CO2 in the body will build denser bones.

I wouldn't worry about trying to keep estrogen slightly elevated. Most people probably have elevated estrogen. It seems to be ubiquitous. I'm sure city water has estrogen in it from girls taking birth control and peeing out the estrogen into the water supply. Just staying a little bit on the pudgy side will probably keep your estrogen slightly high through increased aromatase activity.

 

[thegiantess]

Jennifer pretty much covered things I would mention.

Estrogen doesn't fall with age in women, progesterone does. Estrogen rises with age. I've attached a clip of Ray talking about this.

A high metabolic rate with adequate amounts of sugar and micro nutrients leading to greater CO2 in the body will build denser bones.

I wouldn't worry about trying to keep estrogen slightly elevated. Most people probably have elevated estrogen. It seems to be ubiquitous. I'm sure city water has estrogen in it from girls taking birth control and peeing out the estrogen into the water supply. Just staying a little bit on the pudgy side will probably keep your estrogen slightly high through increased aromatase activity.

"City water has estrogen in it from girls taking birth control and peeing out the estrogen.." Oh dear God, things that never cross my mind that I wish I could un-see.

 

[schultz]

"City water has estrogen in it from girls taking birth control and peeing out the estrogen.." Oh dear God, things that never cross my mind that I wish I could un-see.

Sorry!

 

[kaybb]

"City water has estrogen in it from girls taking birth control and peeing out the estrogen.." Oh dear God, things that never cross my mind that I wish I could un-see.

+1. And I wish everyone would stop using the "P" word.. Please...just for me . I am way too visual and old school ...haha

 

[docall18]

Dhea works like a charm if you want high estrogen.

 

[Ras]

"City water has estrogen in it from girls taking birth control and peeing out the estrogen.." Oh dear God, things that never cross my mind that I wish I could un-see.

It is reasonable to assume that, by now, all water has been, at least once, bodily fluid.

 

[ddjd]

So is ray saying carbon dioxide is more important than estrogen for bone health?