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I'm Hormonal | Hormone balance, gut health & nutrition insights
Welcome to I’m Hormonal — the podcast where we make sense of your bloating, brutal PMS, and missing periods… without blaming it all on “just stress” or “being a woman.”
Hosted by Bridget Walton, Women’s Hormone Coach, this show is your no-BS guide to decoding your cycle, calming your gut, and actually balancing your hormones (not just crossing your fingers and hoping for the best).
Each week, we break down what no one taught you about hormones, nutrition, and gut health in your 30s — especially if you're tired of guessing what your body is trying to tell you.
Expect solo episodes packed with real talk and root-cause tools, plus the occasional expert guest to help you feel less confused and more in control.
Because you deserve better periods, better digestion, and a better shot at getting pregnant — without burning out trying to figure it all out alone.
I'm Hormonal | Hormone balance, gut health & nutrition insights
The Biggest Blindspot Impacting Your Hormone Balance | Ep. 124
Hi, I'm Bridget! Women's Hormone Coach, Functional Hormone Specialist, and the host and founder of I'm Hormonal.
You're doing everything right - tracking macros, meal prepping, hitting the gym religiously. So why do you feel exhausted, bloated, and like your period has gone MIA? Here's the plot twist: the problem isn't what you're eating, it's how much you're NOT eating.
Most high-achieving women are unknowingly starving their hormone production. When you undereat, your body goes into survival mode - cortisol spikes, digestion shuts down, and period production gets put on the back burner. Your body literally can't afford to make a baby when it thinks you're in a famine.
In this episode, we're breaking down:
- Why your "clean" 1,200-calorie diet is actually sabotaging your hormones
- How undereating creates the perfect storm for PCOS symptoms and blood sugar chaos
- Why you need way more fat and protein than you think (and no, it won't make you gain weight)
- The simple 3-day tracking method I use with clients to uncover their eating patterns
- Real client stories of women who saw changes in their periods after just weeks of adjusting their nutrient intake
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Earlier this week, I was on a strategy call with a new client and she says to me Bridget, I'm really careful about what I eat. I eat super clean, I've been exercising every day. My health is so important to me, why do I still have crazy periods? And here's the thing A lot of my clients, this gal included, make the same mistake inadvertently, and it's that they're under eating without even realizing it and that is hurting their hormone balance. So if you have missing periods, bloating, if you're feeling exhausted all the time, this episode is for you. We're going to talk about how under eating can influence your hormones and your period health.
Speaker 1:Welcome to I'm Hormonal, your source of information about women's hormone health and how to support your body naturally. I'm your host, bridget Walton, and I'm a certified functional hormone specialist and menstrual cycle coach. I am on a mission to hold these hormone conversations with as many menstruators as possible, because you deserve easier access to accurate information about what's up with your unruly menstrual cycle and with your fertility mysteries. Don't you think it's time that we figure this out once and for all? Hello, my friend, welcome to today's episode of I'm Hormonal. I'm your host, bridget Walton, and I'm really grateful that you are here listening. Our topic for today is one that we can all be a little bit surprised by. That has certainly happened to me before. That I think, oh, I'm doing a great job. I am feeling satiated after my meals, I feel good after my workouts. But I'll do a spot check from time to time to see where I'm at with my protein goals, where I'm at generally with calories and fat and carbs. You know what's the mix looking like and I say, oh, okay, well, I guess I need to really focus on adding a bit more to my diet to make sure that I'm getting everything that I need. And maybe this sounds a little bit familiar to you as well, because, if you are like a lot of my clients, if you're like a lot of the other gals who are listening to the podcast alongside you right now, a lot of my clients are busy women who are working hard. I know that a lot of you are traveling for work, like I used to be as well.
Speaker 1:Just an added complicating factor and we're in a rush, we're stressed out. We have these news sources that are constantly telling us what's going on, what's going haywire out there. We have social media telling us what we should do or what we shouldn't do. All of these things and plenty more to accommodate on our mental load. And where on earth do well-rounded meals fall within that schedule? Because usually meals fall within that schedule? Because usually usually nowhere. That's why girl dinner is a term, right. Girl dinner is a thing for a reason, because that's what so many of us are defaulting to.
Speaker 1:For some folks out there, that might not be a problem, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that if you are listening to this podcast right now, you are looking to better understand your hormones, understand how you can support your hormones and perhaps most likely, understand how you can restore hormone balance, fix your period, how you can support your gut health too. So if you fall into that category, my friend, then this is going to be a really good conversation for you to listen to today. Just a super quick intro. I kind of like to add this for those of you gals who are listening for the first time. But I just love to share with you that I'm Hormonal is a podcast, is a company designed to help support you on your wellness journey to having your best period, to having your easiest period, and I'm really all about sharing what I know, sharing what other professionals know, so that you can understand what to do, because isn't it crazy that the year is 2025 and we get so little information about how our bodies work? Like, why are we not learning this in school? But anyway, okay, school is, you know, in session here today. Thanks again for joining me. And why don't we just go ahead and jump right in?
Speaker 1:Let's talk a little bit about what happens in your body when you are under eating, and we probably need to define what under eating is before we go into that. I'm going to give you a super loose description, because it will be different for everybody. It will be different even for you, depending on, perhaps, what time, what phase of your cycle you're in, depending on how much stress you have, depending on how much you're moving your body all of those things and more. But generally, suffice it to say that if you're under eating, you're not getting all of the nutrients that you need. I'm thinking of protein, carbs, fat. I don't really love to think of calories overall, because I think there's just like too much diet culture. A lot of us have this history of hyper fixating on calories, so my main focus is okay, how much protein am I getting? How much fat am I getting? I'll talk about why for those two more. And generally, if I'm meeting what I need to feel good and satiated and same for you, then I'm probably meeting where I need to be at for calories, so that'll just naturally come with it.
Speaker 1:Now there's also a consideration right for certain vitamins or minerals. We won't focus on those specifics today, but it is worth noting that your body needs a variety of foods. If you've been here, you've heard me blab about that detail before. I shouldn't even say blab because it's actually so important and yet so easy to forget. I'm going down a rabbit hole. I'm reeling myself back in now because let's talk about what happens if you are kind of undernourishing and you have a lower fat intake than maybe your body would otherwise love to have. So what happens if you are under resourcing for fat? And this actually happened?
Speaker 1:I have a client who she had always been focusing on a low-fat diet, also kind of low calories, right, because she was wanting to lose weight. So this gal, she was getting in about 1,500 calories a day. That's what we found when we did her food and mood journal. This wasn't enough for her and what happened, or what was influenced as a result of this, was that some of her sex hormones were measuring relatively low. Now, why is that? Well, fat contains cholesterol, and cholesterol is this most basic building block for a bunch of your hormones. So let's get more specific.
Speaker 1:When I'm thinking about cortisol, estrogen, testosterone, when I'm thinking of let me just say cortisol again, because it's so important in our bodies, that's when you can see, okay, things are a little bit off. And when you aren't able to get those basic building blocks in your diet that you need, you're, for example, going to be influencing the amount of progesterone that you make after you ovulate. So let's zoom in on this for a second, and this is going to be particularly important for those of you gals who are trying to conceive, because if you want to conceive, if you're trying to prepare for pregnancy, you're going to want to produce, you know, kind of as much progesterone as your body can during that time after you ovulate. So making sure that you have adequate fat intake that basic building block for your hormone, progesterone is going to be really important. If you, for a period of time, don't have adequate fat intake, then that could eventually just say your body says, okay, well, fat is the basic building block for both cortisol and progesterone, so we're going to lower progesterone, so we can prioritize cortisol. If you want to learn more about how fat can influence your hormones and overall health, then check out an episode I did two weeks ago where I really just talked about fat the whole episode. You're gonna like it.
Speaker 1:Let's move on to talk a little bit about protein. Now, if you are not getting in all the food that you need throughout the day, that your body would love to have, you're perhaps not getting in as much protein as you would like, and this is really important for well, two reasons that I want to examine specifically. The first one relates to blood sugar. The second one relates to muscle. Now, when we're thinking of blood sugar stability, which this is really important for your overall hormone health protein that you're eating through your diet is going to be blunting blood sugar spikes that could result from the carbs in your diet that you're eating through your diet is going to be blunting blood sugar spikes that could result from the carbs in your diet that you also need. But eating these foods together can have a net positive influence on you know how does your body respond? How is it able to absorb the nutrition from those foods?
Speaker 1:On the other hand, our bodies are mostly protein right, and so when we think of building muscle I mean I know I'm not about to say something super new. We learned this in what? Elementary school maybe? But you know that protein is going to be really important for building muscle and maintaining muscle Now building and maintaining muscles. Maintaining muscle, now building and maintaining muscles. That's also really important for your sex hormones because it keeps your blood sugar levels in a good range, it prevents insulin from going cray-cray, and those are all good things. It all not all that's hyperbole, but it all comes back to blood sugar regulation, no-transcript.
Speaker 1:So both of these things that I mentioned kind of tie into stress on the body. So, separate from any particular macronutrient, if you're not eating an adequate amount of food, that inherently can become a form of stress. Sometimes we think of stress as being a you know whatever acute situation. I got into an argument with a colleague and that is a source of stress, yes, but also a lack of food, the scarcity, your brain, your prehistoric brain, being like oh shoot, are we good out here? Is this a famine? Right? That is going to raise your cortisol level, your stress hormone level, and that is not going to do any favors for your sex hormones, for the health of your period, nor will it do a solid for your gut health at all. I have two more categories that we're going to cruise through just again, thinking of what is actually happening in my body and to my hormones during times when I overeat.
Speaker 1:Now, this one is a bit more of a habit-based one, but tell me, like, raise your hand or nod your head, whatever you're doing, if this applies to you, but let me tell you that, for me, during times when life is really busy and I don't have the time busy and I don't have the time, if it comes down to a time thing, when I don't have the time to put together a nice, well-rounded meal, when I don't have the time to go to the grocery store, the time to meal prep, however that looks for you, that's probably when I'm going to be opting for more processed foods or opting for takeout, opting for something quick, and you know that when you're opting for those types of solutions, there's probably going to be, they're going to be more processed, which can lend itself also to some trouble with your gut balance and really just making sure that the microbes, everything that lives in your digestive system, has what it needs to operate to like all these good bacteria, these good components of your gut. So this isn't a direct one, but it's like, hey, if we're not. You know I'm not eating just whole foods during times when I have a lot of my plate, so maybe that applies to you. Maybe you also opt for processed foods, and really taking a beat to put a plan together for your food for a week can be a huge game changer in, a, how you feel throughout the week, but B also, how are you supporting your digestive microbiome? How are you supporting your hormones?
Speaker 1:The last thing I want to mention here and I actually, now that I'm looking at my notes, I guess I teased it a little bit, but just really coming back to what's going on with your insulin, what's going on with your blood sugar? Because when you are, for many of us, when we are not eating full you know three meals a day there can be more opportunity for blood sugar to get quite low, which then results sometimes in us really feeling like, okay, I am ravenous. It is time to really figure out like I'm going to eat as much as I can because I'm so hungry A totally normal response. You're just putting yourself on that roller coaster. If you are a gal out there who has PCOS polycystic ovary syndrome then perhaps you're aware that blood sugar or your sensitivity to insulin can be really strategic in helping you to manage your symptoms and feel your best, have periods that are as regular as you can manage.
Speaker 1:I want to share with you a little bit about how this conversation looks with my one-on-one coaching clients and what we do to get a pulse on nutrition and overall intake. And when I onboard a new coaching client, we will almost always start off now doing a three-day food and mood journal. So we will take a look at what are you eating, when are you eating it? Where are you eating it? What is your mood like? What does your digestive system have to say about what you're eating? All of these things to get the full picture of not just carrots, hummus, hard-boiled eggs. But, man, I was starving when I started to eat this meal, or when I was finally able to eat this meal or maybe you know, I ate this meal when I was running from one meeting to the other or maybe not literally. But when I was driving from client meeting A to client meeting B, I wasn't really able to sit down and focus, because what's more than just the food that you are eating, that you're chewing up and swallowing, is how you are eating it.
Speaker 1:How is your body able to absorb those nutrients or break down those components of your food and actually use them to create hormones and everything else that they do? I'll give you one more example here. I have a client who, similarly, we noticed that she was under eating. We noticed that she wasn't incorporating a whole lot of healthy fats into her diet. So we kind of honed in on that, incorporating them regularly. Now, shortly thereafter, we got back her gut testing panel. So the GI map is the panel that I use with my one-on-one clients. We get it back and there's a marker on the GI map for elastase.
Speaker 1:Now, elastase is the enzyme that helps to break down fats in your diet. It's released by your pancreas. It's released by your pancreas and ultimately, you know we need our pancreas to release this enzyme in adequate amounts so that, yeah, so our colon, our intestines, rather, can pull it apart, pull that fat apart and then let our body actually use it to create hormones, etc. Okay, so that's the background. On elastase, anyway, we got her GI map results back and we saw that her elastase levels were a little bit on the lower side, and so that is really important to note, because homegirl can be eating as much avocado to note, because homegirl can be eating as much avocado, as much extra virgin olive oil, as many flax seeds and salmon and all the other good sources of healthy fats that she wants. But if your body is not breaking it down, then you're naturally not going to absorb all of that. So I feel like I've really said this 18 times in 18 slightly different ways. I think you get where I'm going with this, but this is all to say. In addition to what you're eating, how is your body absorbing it, how is your body absorbing it and how well are you digesting the food? That's all really important and can help to paint the picture of what is up with your period and where is she?
Speaker 1:I have a couple of questions that I want to leave with you here to kind of noodle on, because you might be thinking okay, well, how do I know if I'm under eating? Let's come back to this. And so the starting point that I would give you is just take three days. It does not need to be every day, but three days. You can get kind of an average for how much protein, how much fat am I eating overall? How many calories am I eating? Is it at least as much as I estimate to be burning that my body needs just to exist and support my brain function? Because, remember, it's okay to eat as much as your body is burning. Despite being programmed, you know what? I'm not even going to go down that rabbit hole. Let me again reel myself back in. Do a pulse check. Just record your food for three days, or at the end of each day you can say, hey, chat, gpt, or hey, claude, or hey, whatever tool you like the best. Let me tell you what I ate today and just give me a quick estimate. I think that's the easiest way because you don't have to search for a million different inputs. All right, so let's assume that you've done that.
Speaker 1:The next step, or the next suggestion I would have for you, is to set some way for you to have these reminders throughout your day, to really check in with yourself on. Am I hungry right now? Do I feel full? How do I feel after I eat? Was it enough? Do I have the energy levels that I want or that I need? And that can be just kind of your starting point.
Speaker 1:Now, asterisks here. Big note here that for some folks, like if your stress is high, if those cortisol levels are high, that could suppress your appetite. So you might be thinking well, I mean, bridget, maybe I'm kind of under eating, I'm on the cusp there because I just don't have an appetite. So I am listening to my body and I hear you. I hear that with a lot of my one-on-one clients and so of course I don't know you and what's going on in your body. But just be thinking about okay, does this say something about my stress levels? And you know, is it right for me to say, okay, thanks so much for the signal, cortisol or lack thereof. But hey, I know that I need more nutrients than what I'm getting because I did those three days of estimating. So I'm going to teach myself to eat breakfast in the morning.
Speaker 1:And again I have gals who say, bridget, I don't feel like eating in the morning, it doesn't make me feel good. But then for those who are open to incorporating it, they start with something small, they start with something savory. I mean, I'm just doing like some mental math here, but usually after about two weeks let's call it. Yeah, let's call it two weeks they're starting to feel like okay, now I'm in this good rhythm of eating breakfast. It doesn't feel icky now and I noticed that I have better, more consistent energy levels throughout the day. So just a little inspo for you, if that was on your mind. Now I want to emphasize that this is especially important for you if your periods are missing altogether, because you know that's one of the first things I think of when periods are missing altogether is hey, okay, how much are we eating? Because that's a huge signal of safety to your body. Also very relevant coming back to this idea of irregular periods or maybe PCOS, because when something suspicious is happening I say that as a joke, don't take me too literally on that gang when something weird is happening with your blood sugar, well, of course that's going to be influenced by what you're eating and how often you're eating it. So I think that's also a good time to investigate.
Speaker 1:I have a client. She just finished up her four-month program in the last I guess it was the end of July here, regardless, when we started working together, her cycles were coming about every 35 days, so a little bit on the long side. We like to see it closer to 28. For her before, like in the last couple of years, her normal was more like 29 days. I digress. We started off working together. She had 35-ish day cycles. We were really focusing on food with her. That was one of the main things that we noticed, also increasing protein. We also worked together. She did a great job actually of really spearheading like how can she eliminate stressors in her life? By the end of our four months working together, her cycle length was down to about 30 days each cycle.
Speaker 1:As we get ready to wrap up on this episode, I just want to reiterate for you like this is actually pretty common. I've been surprised, client after client after client, that many of us are kind of unknowingly under eating. And again, this is something where I don't like to track my food all the time Definitely not. But maybe once a month I'll track for a couple of days, kind of in the same way that I suggested to you, and I'm like, oh gosh, I really thought that I was like kind of hitting the mark, but that's to say this is common.
Speaker 1:If you are trying to fix your hormones, if there's something with your period that needs adjusting, I would really love for you to examine this a bit. I also want to acknowledge that at this time in society, and for a long time. But you know, a lot of us are praised for shrinking our bodies, for becoming smaller, especially with this ozempic wave, this GLP-1 wave that's going on. But remember and I say this with all of the love and all of the nourishment remember that you need to give your body the tools and these building blocks to support your health and you also can absolutely eat tasty, nourishing food, all while bringing your hormones and your gut health back into balance. You are what you eat. It just takes a couple of slow tweaks, a little bit at a time, to get you where you need to be and so that you can feel your best, because you deserve to feel your best.
Speaker 1:I hope that this episode was helpful for you. I hope that you learned something. If this was helpful for you, I'd love for you to rate and review the episode. Share it with a friend. Also, if any of this resonates with you, I would love to invite you to set up a strategy. Call with me if there's something, you have irregular periods or missing periods altogether, and you want a little bit of guidance, one-on-one support. Maybe you're interested in learning more about the gut panel or the hormone testing that I use with my one-on-one coaching clients, then I would love for you to either click the link in the show notes or go to imhormonalcom slash goals and we can set up a time to talk.
Speaker 1:So that is it for today, gang. Thank you again for listening Again. My name is Bridget Walton and I will see you all on the next one. If you loved today's episode and got something good out of it, make sure you subscribe so that these episodes show up automatically in your feed, no work needed on your side. Let's put it on autopilot. As always, I need to give you my reminder that the information I share with you here is for educational purposes only, and it should not be used as a replacement for medical advice or diagnosis. Now, if you are, on the other hand, in the market for some one-on-one support, then I would love for you to take me up on my offer for a free strategy call. You can find these links and more in the show notes. All right, we'll see you on the next one.