The Progest-E & Raw Honey High

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“Over the decades, many studies have confirmed that prolonged, continuous exposure to estrogen is carcinogenic, and that progesterone offsets those effects.” -Ray Peat

Preventing and treating cancer with progesterone.

Ray Peat

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“Progesterone is the basic pregnancy protecting substance; when it’s used before fertilizaiton, the body thinks it’s already pregnant, and doesn’t allow fertilization.” -Ray Peat

 

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“As a portrait painter, I had been very conscious of the blue aspect that can often be seen in the skin of young women. In pale areas, the color may actually be blue, and in areas with a rich supply of blood, such as the lips, the color is lavender during times of high estrogen influence--around ovulation and puberty, for example. During these times of estrogen dominance, the blood is not only poorly oxygenated, but it has other special properties, such as an increased tendency to clot. The Shutes' work in the 1930s began with the use of vitamin E to antagonize estrogen's clot-promoting tendency, and led them to the discovery that vitamin E can be very therapeutic in heart disease. More recently, it has been found that men with heart disease have abnormally high estrogen (9), that women using oral contraceptives have higher mortality from heart attacks (10), and that estrogen tends to promote spasm of blood vessels (11). (These reactions are probably related to the physiology of menstruation, in which progesterone withdrawal causes spasms in the spiral arteries of the uterus, producing endometrial anoxia and cell death.)“ -Ray Peat

 

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“Around 1976 I met a woman in her mid-thirties who heard about my work with progesterone in animals. She had been disabled by a brain disease that resembled MS or Devic's disease, inflammation of the optic nerves. It would sometimes cause blindness and paralysis that persisted for weeks at a time. During remissions, sometimes using a wheelchair, she would go to the medical school library to try to understand her condition. She came across Katherina Dalton's work with progesterone, and convinced a physician to give her a trial injection. Although she had trouble finding people who were willing to give her progesterone, her recovery was so complete that she was able to climb stairs and drive her car, and she came to my endocrinology class and gave a very good (and long) lecture on progesterone therapy. Although her sensory and motor functions became normal, she remained very fat, and chronically suffered from sore areas on her arms and legs that seemed to be abnormal blood vessels, possibly with phlebitis. She appeared to need thyroid hormone as well as larger amounts of progesterone, but never found a physician who would cooperate, as far as I know.“ -Ray Peat

 

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“Since people who experience premature menopause are known to be more likely than average to die prematurely, it is reasonable to view menopause as a model of the aging process. It is now well established that progesterone fails to be produced at the onset of menopause (the first missed period, increased loss of calcium, symptoms such as hot flashes, etc.), and that estrogen continues to be produced at monthly intervals for about four years. The essential question for aging, in the present context, is why the anesthetic steroids are no longer produced at a rate that allows them to protect tissues, including brain cells, from the excitotoxins. Using menopause as a model for aging, we can make the question more answerable by asking why progesterone stops being produced.“ -Ray Peat

MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS AND OTHER HORMONE-RELATED BRAIN SYNDROMES.

The hormones pregnenolone, thyroid, and estrogen are involved in several ways with the changes that occur in multiple sclerosis, but no one talks about them.

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“In 1979, a woman whose husband was suffering from advanced Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) asked me if I had any ideas for slowing his decline. I described my suspicion that ALS involved defective metabolism or regulation of testosterone. In some tissues, testosterone is selectively concentrated to prevent atrophy, and ALS is a disease of middle-age, when hormone regulation often becomes a special problem. In the late 1970s, there was discussion of a higher incidence of ALS in males, and especially in athletes. I told her about progesterone's general protective effects, its antagonism to testosterone, and its prevention of atrophy in various tissues. She decided to ask her doctor to try progesterone for her husband. Later, I learned that her husband had gone into a very rapid decline immediately after the injection, and died within a week; the physician had given him testosterone, since, he said, "testosterone and progesterone are both male hormones." Besides making me more aware of the problems patients have in communicating with physicians, this tended to reinforce my feeling that a hormone imbalance is involved in ALS. Although I haven't written much about testosterone's toxicity, Marian Diamond's work showed that prenatal testosterone is similar to prenatal estrogen, in causing decreased thickness of the cortex of the brain; both of those hormones oppose progesterone's brain-protecting and brain-promoting actions.“ -Ray Peat

 

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“Retroperitoneal fibrosis is now known to be produced by estrogen, and is treated by antiestrogenic and antiserotonergic drugs, but as early as 1940 Alejandro Lipschutz demonstrated that chronic exposure to very low doses of estrogen produced fibromas in essentially every part of the body. Earlier, Loeb had studied the action of large doses of estrogen, which produced fibrosis of the uterus, as if it had accelerated aging. Following Lipschutz' work, in which he demonstrated the “antifibromatogenic” actions of pregnenolone and progesterone, several Argentine researchers showed that progesterone prevented and cured abdominal adhesions and other fibrotic conditions, including retroperitoneal fibrosis.” -Ray Peat

 

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“Animals that have been made diabetic with relatively low doses of the poison streptozotocin can recover functional beta-cells spontaneously, and the rate of recovery is higher in pregnant animals (Hartman, et al., 1989). Pregnancy stabilizes blood sugar at a higher level, and progesterone favors the oxidation of glucose rather than fats.” -Ray Peat

 

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“The supplements that most often help to correct diabetes-like conditions are niacinamide, thiamine, thyroid, and progesterone or pregnenolone. Vitamins D and K are clearly protective against developing diabetes, and their effects on many regulatory processes suggest that they would also help to correct existing hyperglycemia.” -Ray Peat

 

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“To produce pregnenolone, thyroid, vitamin A, and cholesterol have to be delivered to the mitochondria in the right proportion and sufficient quantity. Normally, stress is balanced by increased synthesis of pregnenolone, which improves the ability to cope with stress. Lipid peroxidation, resulting from the accumulation of unsaturated fatty acids, iron, and energy deficiency, damages the mitochondrias' ability to produce pregnenolone. When pregnenolone is inadequate, cortisol is over-produced. When progesterone is deficient, estrogen's effect is largely unopposed. When both thyroid and progesterone are deficient, even fat cells synthesize estrogen.” -Ray Peat

 

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“I think these facts imply that excessive tryptophan, estrogen, and polyunsaturated fats contribute significantly, maybe decisively, to the degenerative changes that occur in aging. Experiments have separately shown that reducing dietary tryptophan or unsaturated fats can extend the healthy lifespan, and several antiestrogenic interventions (removal of the pituitary, or supplementing with progesterone) can slow age-related changes and delay degenerative diseases. Since these factors interact, each tending to promote the others, and also interact with exogenous toxins, excess iron accumulation, and other stressors, it would be reasonable to expect greater results when several of the problems are corrected at the same time.“ -Ray Peat

 

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“Another hormonal condition that probably contributes to lactase deficiency is progesterone deficiency, since a synthetic progestin has been found to increase the enzyme (Nagpaul, et al., 1990). The particular progestin they used lacks many of progesterone's effects, but it does protect against some kinds of stress, including high estrogen and cortisol. This suggests that stress, with its increased ratio of estrogen and cortisol to progesterone, might commonly cause the enzyme to decrease.“ -Ray Peat

 

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“It is important to emphasize that progesterone is not just the hormone of pregnancy. To use it only “to protect the uterus” would be like telling a man he doesn't need testosterone if he doesn't plan to father children, except that progesterone is of far greater and more basic physiological significance than testosterone. While men do naturally produce progesterone, and can sometimes benefit from using it, it is not a male hormone. Some people get that impression, because some physicians recommend combining estrogen with either testosterone or progesterone, to protect against some of estrogen's side effects, but progesterone is the body's natural complement to estrogen. Used alone, progesterone often makes it unnecessary to use estrogen for hot flashes or insomnia, or other symptoms of menopause.” -Ray Peat

 

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“Knowing the long-standing problem of administering large doses of progesterone without a toxic solvent, I applied for and was granted a patent for the composition of progesterone in tocopherol. One of my reasons for publishing in the form of patents is that I have had many years of experience in having my discoveries taken up by others without acknowledgment, if they are compatible with conventional prejudices.” -Ray Peat

 

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“A lack of progesterone can lead to a variety of health issues and can also contribute to hair loss. Progesterone is a natural inhibitor of 5-alpha-reducrase. This is an enzyme that converts testosterone into DHT. DHT is one of the main causes of pattern hair loss for both men and women.

If you have little to no progesterone, 5AR is able to easily convert, meaning more DHT is produced triggering further hair thinning and loss.“

Does low progesterone cause hair loss?

Hair loss can happen to both men and women at any point in their life and it can happen for a number of different reasons. There are many different causes and factors in hair loss, it could be related to ageing, stress, or a change in hormones. For women, your hormones can change significantly...

www.hshairclinic.co.uk

 

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“In females, the ovaries and adrenal glands are the main producers of sex hormones. Female sex hormones include estrogen, progesterone, and small quantities of testosterone.”

Female sex hormones: Types, roles, and effect on arousal

Summary description Female sex hormones, or sex steroids, play crucial roles in sexual development, sexual desire, and reproduction. They also influence body weight and hair, bone, and muscle growth. Learn more about the types and roles of these hormones here.

www.medicalnewstoday.com

 

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“Carbon dioxide, high altitude, thyroid, progesterone, caffeine, aspirin, and decreased tryptophan consumption protect against excessive serotonin release. When sodium intake is restricted, there is a sharp increase in serotonin secretion. This accounts for some of the antiinflammatory and diuretic effects of increased sodium consumption--increasing sodium lowers both serotonin and adrenalin.” -Ray Peat

 

[Rinse & rePeat]

“I think these facts imply that excessive tryptophan, estrogen, and polyunsaturated fats contribute significantly, maybe decisively, to the degenerative changes that occur in aging. Experiments have separately shown that reducing dietary tryptophan or unsaturated fats can extend the healthy lifespan, and several antiestrogenic interventions (removal of the pituitary, or supplementing with progesterone) can slow age-related changes and delay degenerative diseases.” -Ray Peat

 

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“Progesterone is being used to treat brain injuries, very successfully. It protects against inflammation, and in an early study, compared to placebo, lowered mortality by more than half.” -Ray Peat

 

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“According to the World Health Organization, cancer is now the leading cause of death in the world. Although many "causes" are known, and despite the "War on Cancer," nothing practical has been done to reduce the incidence of cancer. Since Nixon started that war, the number of people dying annually in the US has increased faster than the population. In ancient Rome and Egypt, cancer was rare; cancer has been identified in only one Egyptian mummy. In the US and several other countries, between 2002 and 2005 there was an unprecedented decline (7% in the US) in the incidence of breast cancer, when the medical use of estrogen decreased following the Women's Health Initiative report showing that estrogen caused cancer, dementia, strokes and heart attacks. However, when the public was reassured about estrogen's safety, breast cancer incidence began increasing again each year.“ -Ray Peat