If you spend any time in the wellness or detox communities, you’ve probably heard the term “endocrine disruptor” thrown around a lot. It usually pops up when people start talking about chemical toxins, microplastics, and clean living.
But what does that actually mean for you and your daily life?
Today, we will be diving deep into the biggest sub-category of these hormone-hijackers: estrogenics. What are these microscopic particles? What exactly do they do to our bodies? And, most importantly, how do we avoid them?
Don’t worry, we’re going to answer every single one of these questions. I am going to give you a quick, easy-to-understand breakdown of how these particles interact with your body, the scary effects they have on our health, and a look at where these toxins hide.
Want to dive even deeper?
A lot of the science I’m sharing with you today comes from the book “Estrogeneration: How Estrogenics Are Making You Fat, Sick, and Infertile” by Anthony G. Jay, Ph.D. (President of the International Medical Research Collaborative). I personally own this book and it is a great read when wanting to learn more about these pesky hormone disruptors.
Short on time? If you want to skip the science and go straight to the checklist of things to avoid and swaps, Click Here.
What Exactly is Estrogenics?
Let’s start with some basic definitions.
In short, an estrogenic is anything that binds or ‘sticks’ to estrogen receptors in your body.
Now what is an estrogen receptor? To understand this let’s look at the big picture first. Estrogen and estrogen receptors function within the steroid hormone system.
Anthony G. Jay, Ph.D. does a good job of explaining this by comparing it to a radio broadcast system. In a radio broadcasting system, a radio tower sends out a signal and if you tune into a specific radio channel you will pick up on that specific broadcast.
Simply a broadcast is sent out from one location and picked up at another location (this is how we get songs on the radio). Just like this, your body creates hormones in one place and sends them out into your blood. These hormones are then picked up by receptors in other locations.
When these hormones are moving through your blood, specific hormone receptors that are attached to the outside of our organs will snatch any correlated hormones out of your blood stream. So, Leptin receptors will snatch up Leptin. Estrogen receptors will snatch up Estrogen. (We aren’t talking about Leptin today, just to help explain this process)
The Cellular Hijack: Why Estrogenics Are So Dangerous
Here is where the radio signal gets completely jammed.
When our body naturally creates estrogen, it pushes it into the blood, and the organs with estrogen receptors will catch it to keep your body running smoothly. It just so happens that estrogen receptors are found in almost every cell in the body (yes for men and women).
When we use everyday products packed with artificial estrogenics, these fake chemical hormones flood our system. Because they look just like the real thing, they bind to your cell’s receptors, hijacking the “radio signal” and sending chaotic, glitchy messages to your cells.
By tampering with our natural estrogen levels, we aren’t just affecting one or two functions. We are causing systemic problems all over our bodies.
Where Exactly Are These Receptors Found? (Spoiler: Everywhere)
When I say these fake chemical hormones cause problems all over, I mean all over.
To give you an idea of just how serious this is, here is a list of the exact locations where estrogen receptors are waiting to snatch up signals. Estrogen receptors are actively found in your:
- Prostate
- Breast
- Uterus
- Ovary
- Esophagus
- Skin
- Trachea
- Lung
- Liver
- Bladder
- Kidney
- Skeletal Muscle
- Thyroid
- Pituitary
- Spleen
- Lymph Node
- Tonsils
- Hematopoietic Stem Cell
- Adipocyte (Fat cell)
- Macrophage (Immune Cell)
- Monocyte (Immune Cell)
- Dendritic (Immune Cell)
- T-cells (Immune Cell)
- B-cells (Immune Cell)
How Fast Do They Act? (And How Long Do They Stay?)
Before we look at where these sneaky chemicals are hiding, let’s talk timing. How quickly do estrogenics act, and how long do their effects last?
Because hormones travel directly through our bloodstream, they essentially “travel at the speed of blood”. That means once you are exposed, the initial hormonal impacts can last anywhere from hours to days. Some hormonal impacts can even become genetic over time (making them very long term if they can be passed on)
Now that we understand what estrogenics is and how estrogen receptors work, what effects does this have on our health? Click Here to read about the 7 major effects of estrogenics.
If you want to jump straight to where these estrogenics are hiding and practical swaps to avoid them, Click Here.
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