It's all about hormones! In this episode I'll give you three steps towards a more natural lifestyle and two amazing remedies for disrupted hormones in women.
Hello and welcome to Homeopathy at Home with Melissa. If you're ready to be independent in helping your family with acute and chronic conditions in a more natural way, if you're interested in learning how to use homeopathy at home, and if you enjoy positive, encouraging messages, then this is the podcast for you. Click subscribe, grab some coffee or tea and get ready to learn how to use Homeopathy at home in your family. The information in this podcast and its transcription is to be used for education only. The suggestions here should not replace the advice of your medical doctor and you should never stop any prescription medications without the advice and direction of your doctor. I am not a physician. I am not prescribing and I am not making healthcare decisions for you. It is your choice to use the information provided here and in any future communications with me regarding homeopathy and natural health care.
In every episode, I'm going to begin with at least a few steps that you can take to move yourself and your family towards a more natural, healthy lifestyle. So let's begin with these three baby steps. As you'll see, I like to define our terms. I don't like to assume that everyone understands what I'm saying when I use certain terms that I've been using for many years. Some of these words may be brand new to you, and I don't want anybody to have a misunderstanding or not be able to follow this teaching easily. Some of these words are common to some of you, so hang in there with me while I define our terms. Let's begin with a whole foods definition. No, I'm not talking about the store. I am talking about fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, legumes, and things like that, that have not been altered from their original state. A whole food is one that has not changed from the time that it came out of the ground or off the tree. Meat is different in that you do have to process it but a healthy meat is processed minimally. It comes from an animal who was free to eat and roam about the land as if it had been wild. So wild-caught fish in the sea is better than farm-raised fish. You also have to be careful when reading labels at the grocery store on the meat and eggs that say free-range or grass-fed. That's not always 100% true, but I'm not digging into that in this podcast.
Our next term is processed foods. So processed foods can be made from whole foods but they don't exist in their original state. Anything that comes in a box or a bag, even if the ingredients are all good, is processed. Boxes and bags don't grow from the ground or on trees. For instance, you might have a cookie or a cracker that's made from all whole food ingredients, which is better than a cookie or cracker that's made from a list of ingredients that you can't even pronounce but it is still processed and is not going to bless your digestive system as highly as a whole food will. Nobody has a perfect diet and there should be no fear or shame or condemnation around what you eat. This podcast is meant to encourage you and bring you to a higher level of understanding without the fear that can sometimes come with knowledge. So why is it important to eat a whole foods diet? The foods that God created are perfect. They support a healthy immune system and body functions. He created our organs and body systems to run on the fuel that He provided for us in the beginning. He provided all the medicines that we need, and He continues to provide everything that we need for life and health. Anything that man tries to recreate will be imperfect. God gave us everything we need in the beginning. Genesis 1:11 and 12 says, "Then God said, 'Let the land sprout with vegetation, every sort of seed-bearing plant and trees that grow seed-bearing fruit. These seeds will then produce the kinds of plants and trees from which they came,' and that is what happened. The land produced vegetation, all sorts of seed-bearing plants and trees with seed-bearing fruit, their seeds produced plants and trees of the same kind and God saw that it was good." And then, in Genesis 1:20 through 31, it says, "Then God said, 'Let the waters swarm with fish and other life. Let the skies be filled with birds of every kind. So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that scurries and swarms in the water and every sort of bird, each producing offspring of the same kind, and God saw that it was good. Then God blessed them saying be fruitful and multiply. Let the fish fill the seas and let the birds multiply on the earth. And evening passed and morning came marking the fifth day. Then God said, 'Let the earth produce every sort of animal, each producing offspring of the same kind, livestock, small animals that scurry along the ground and wild animals, and that is what happened. God made all sorts of wild animals, livestock and small animals, each able to produce offspring of the same kind and God saw that it was good. Then God said, 'Let us make human beings in our image to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth and the small animals that scurry along the ground.' So He created human beings in His own image and in the image of God He created them male and female, He created them, then God blessed them and said, 'be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and govern it, reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky and all the animals that scurry along the ground.' Then God said, 'Look, I have given you every seed-bearing plant throughout the earth, and all the fruit trees for your food, and I have given you every green plant as food for all the wild animals, the birds in the sky, and the small animals that scurry along the ground, everything that has life,' and that is what happened. Then God looked over all He had made and He saw that it was very good and evening passed and morning came marking the sixth day." Did you notice in verse 30, He says He has given every green plant as food for all the wild animals, the birds in the sky, and the small animals that scurry along the ground? Everything that has life, God meant for the animals to eat the vegetation that He placed here, not man-made junk food, because He knew that what the animals ate, we would be eating. He knew in the beginning that what went into the animals would make them healthy or sick and therefore the animals that we ate would make us healthy or sick depending on what the animals ate. He had a perfect design from the very beginning. Genesis 9:2-3 says, "All the animals of the earth, all the birds of the sky, all the animals that scurry along the ground and all the fish in the sea will look on you with fear and terror. I have placed them in your power. I have given them to you for food just as I have given you grain and vegetables."
We need to guide our families into a more natural, healthy lifestyle. To embark upon a lifestyle change, there needs to be peace and no fear. If you're interested in making changes to your food choices or medicine choices, fear cannot be a driving factor. I'll dive deeper into fear and its effects in another episode but if you're feeling fear right now, here are some scriptures to meditate on and let me just speak peace over your mind right now in the name of Jesus. Here's your scriptures: John 14:27 and 2 Timothy 1:7. Just go look those up and meditate on those scriptures, and see what the Lord says to you about fear through those passages. Take your time, pick one thing to replace or stop buying at a time. Let everybody get used to that, then choose another thing. As you stop eating processed sugar, your taste buds will come alive again, and you'll begin to enjoy the taste of real food without it being super salty or super sweet. Start with your bread or your milk. You might have to experiment with different brands or kinds of bread but make it fun, and once you replace it, don't go back. It'll take time and maybe some grumbling to get used to a different taste and texture, but you're likely to see that your family actually likes it better. Look at the labels and avoid any ingredients that you can't pronounce or that you don't know what they are. This may mean that you find bread in a different location in the store, or a totally different store. Of course, if you have time, making your own bread is ideal. Finally, be sure that your heart is in it, especially before you ask your family to do so. If you're wishy washy or unsure about making this change, your family won't take you seriously and they won't be receptive. You have to know what you're doing and why you're doing it. Be grounded. You could spend some time thoughtfully writing down the long term benefits and health goals that you have for yourself and your family. I always encourage people to think long term health rather than short term happiness. This is true with food and medicine. Once you're committed, and your heart is in it, move forward with a small change, don't despise small beginnings. So there's a few steps that you can take towards a more natural, healthy eating habits.
11:39
Now let's move on to hormone balance. A lot of women have hormones that are just not balanced and I see a lot of women posting about progesterone cream and bioidentical hormones for perimenopausal and menopausal symptoms. I just want to say that even bioidentical hormones are synthetic and can wake up estrogen receptors that were dormant. When you do that you end up having too much estrogen. Homeopathy can uproot the problem and correct the hormones, whereas hormone replacements, even organic or natural ones, do not uproot the problem so you would have to use it for the rest of your life. This is what I've heard from women who are in their 60s and 70s that have tried to stop using the cream or stop using the hormones and they can't because their symptoms return. Whether it's weeks or months later, they have to go back to using it. I used a "natural" progesterone cream for a long time, and my symptoms got better but it didn't correct the problem so when I stopped using the cream, my symptoms returned. But homeopathy goes deeper, and it actually corrects the problem. So with homeopathy, you don't have to keep taking the remedies for the rest of your life. Within a year or so you should be finished with the correct homeopathic remedy and be able to stop those remedies because the condition will be uprooted.
13:34
So let's talk about two remedies that are wonderful for hormone balance. Pulsatilla and Sepia are great hormone remedies. Of course, there are many others but in this podcast I'm going to tell you all about what these two remedies can do for young girls going into puberty all the way up through and beyond menopause. Again, let's define our terms. Puberty is the stage of adolescence in which an individual becomes physiologically capable of sexual reproduction. So at around 9 or 10 years old girls begin to produce reproductive hormones that prepare her for the reproductive years and adulthood. These hormone levels gradually increase from ages 9 to 12 and then they take a bigger jump in the early teenage years. One of the first signs of puberty in girls is growing faster. During this growth spurt, she may need homeopathic remedies for growing pains. Another sign of early puberty is breast development so she'll develop buds or swelling under the nipples and this development takes two to three years. She'll also get pubic hair and underarm hair and sweat glands become larger and more active. Her skin and hair will change. She may get a discharge that occurs and then finally menstruation begins. Menarche marks the end of puberty, and the average age is about 12 years old. Now let's look at the other end of the "hormone train" I like to call it - menopause. So the definition of menopause is the permanent cessation of menstruation, usually occurring between the ages of 45 and 55. The symptoms of menopause can be wide and various. Some of them are irregular periods until they stop completely, vaginal dryness, hot flashes, chills, night sweats, sleep problems, mood changes, weight gain, and slow metabolism, thinning hair and dry skin, and loss of breast fullness. While puberty, menarche, and menopause are all normal cycles that women go through, some women just have a really hard time dealing with these different stages of life. Some young girls have a really hard time with emotions, or they have a really hard time with with their menses and then some women as they're going through menopause just have a lot of symptoms. Then in between, women can have flooding or just very painful cycles. So some women need more help in going through these cycles due to various reasons and homeopathy can help uproot these conditions that cause trouble during these different stages in a woman's life.
16:50
So let's first talk about Pulsatilla. Pulsatilla is the Wind Flower, which is in the Buttercup family. It's a beautiful purple flower with a yellow center that naturally grows in Central and Northern Europe and parts of South of England. This flower is in bloom at Easter, and has often been used for coloring Easter eggs. The mother tincture is made from the entire fresh plant when it's in flower. It flowers in spring and again in autumn. Both of those seasons seem to be a time of rebirth and change, right? So spring is rebirth, Autumn is change, and that kind of goes along with what happens in puberty and menopause. Pulsatilla is a great remedy for abnormal menstruation, amennorhea, dysmenorrhea, PMS, menopause, hot flashes, vaginitis, and leucorrhea. It's mostly used in young girls or young women who have not had children yet but it can be used in any age or gender. The disposition and mental state are the chief guiding symptoms. The person needing Pulsatilla may be sad, crying a lot, crying easily weeping when talking about her symptoms. She might be moody, contradictory. She probably loves consolation and really feels better from consolation. She might be sentimental, and she may have changing or shifting symptoms. Pulsatilla 30c twice per day can be used in a luteal phase defect, where the timing is off in between ovulation and the start of the next cycle, especially if it's too short, and usually due to progesterone deficiency. Pulsatilla can also be used in a 200th potency twice a week or every other day for severe menstrual cramps. It would be used throughout the month, not just during the menstrual cramps. So we aren't just treating menstrual cramps. You are uprooting the cause of severe menstrual cramps. So menstrual cramps are normal, right? And they're part of shedding that uterine lining but when the cramps are severe, then you could take Pulsatilla 200, twice a week or every other day throughout the entire month to uproot that condition. The 30th potency used every other day or a 200th potency every six hours can be used in severe vomiting or nausea during menses. Also a 200th or a 30th potency can be used twice a day for vaginitis where there's a creamy discharge, vaginal itching, and irritated red, inflamed vulva. Pulsatilla corrects the menses that are irregular or absent, especially in young women and girls who have not been pregnant before. You should seek the advice and direction of a professional homeopath for use during pregnancy.
20:17
Next up is Sepia. Sepia succus is the ink from the cuttlefish, also known as Indian ink, and is highly indicated in hormonal disorders, especially in women who are of childbearing age or who have had children. Sepia is usually not for children. It can be used in children, but it's usually used in older women so it's primarily a female remedy, but of course can be used in men. I like to suggest it in a 200th potency once or twice a week and sometimes twice a day depending on the chronic conditions that are presenting. This woman who needs Sepia may be irritable and fatigued. She may feel like she just wants to run away from it all. She's overwhelmed, and she just doesn't want to do it anymore. She may be disgusted with her husband and her children and have no interest in her family. I want you to know this is a common occurrence and if this is speaking to you right now, you need to know that you're not alone. If you're feeling guilt, or shame, or condemnation right now you need to know that's not from the Lord and He does not want you to carry that so I just speak Truth into your mind in the name of Jesus. We don't carry guilt, shame or condemnation. Hormone imbalance is really common after we've had children and can cause these feelings and Homeopathy can correct them. Have you ever seen a goat or some other animal reject the baby she just gave birth to? That would call for Sepia. I've heard of that quite often. Working in the hospital as a Lactation Consultant, I see this sometimes also. It's this unusual disinterest in the baby and that absolutely calls for Sepia. The woman needing Sepia probably has a loss of libido, could have some depression, headaches, anxiety, and/or ill effects of past or present birth control use. I see very often women being prescribed birth control pills, even young girls being prescribed birth control pills to control flooding and pain or irregular cycles. This is worse than unnecessary. The use of hormonal birth control methods could cause chronic conditions to surface both immediately and later in life. So it can really hurt the menopausal era. Sepia is a great remedy for women who have had a hysterectomy. If you're using this remedy, you should stop it during menstruation and during pregnancy. If it's indicated in pregnancy, you should seek the advice and direction of a qualified homeopath. Also Sepia used in a 200th potency every three days is great for postpartum depression. Just stop it when you're feeling better. Women who are prone to recurring yeast infections can benefit from Sepia 30 especially when the discharge is yellowish green and has an offensive odor before menses. Sepia 200 weekly - I like to call it Sepia Sunday - is great for monthly hormonal headaches or migraines. I myself used to have monthly migraines for years until I started this protocol, which completely stopped those headaches. I never would take anything for the headaches I would suffer for a day or two, and it was every single month before I started my period. Now I don't have those anymore. Sepia 200 is great for the symptoms of PMS. Remember that PMS is not a diagnosis but more of an umbrella term that indicates lots of different symptoms in different women, including but not limited to, swollen or tender breasts, constipation or diarrhea, bloating, cramping, headache, backache, clumsiness, lower tolerance for noise or light, irritability, fatigue, it can disrupt sleep, it can cause food cravings, trouble concentrating, anxiety, depression, feelings of sadness, crying spells, mood swings, and a lower libido. PMS is no joke. In a young girl who is not of childbearing age or who has not had children, I would use Pulsatilla for PMS, but in an older woman who has had children, I would use Sepia, or even if she's older and has not had children, I would use sepia. So sepia 200 weekly is wonderful for hot flashes during menopause. It's not the only remedy for hot flashes, but it is a good one.
25:33
So there you have it - two great hormonal remedies for the different hormonal cycles that women experience from puberty all the way up through menopause. I hope you've enjoyed this episode. And I would love to hear your comments. I would love for you to just rate this podcast and this episode and let me know what you would like to learn in the future. With that, I say God bless you and have a wonderful rest of your day.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai