Hormones are chemical messengers that play crucial role in regulating various biological and physiological processes including our behaviour, mood and emotional well-being. They play significant roles in maintaining balance in our body. I.e. ensuring that different systems work together to keep our bodily functions efficient. That sounds nice right!?
However, due to their widespread influence, a small hormonal imbalance can lead to significant physical and mental issues. Here we would delve more into it’s influence on mental health. Hormonal imbalances are characterized as the over secretion or under secretion of hormones in the body as opposed to the normal function of the endocrine glands. This can be due to various factors like genetics, aging, poor diet, or basic medical conditions.
Hormonal imbalances leads to mental health issues like depression, anxiety, irritability, mood swings, fatigue, cognitive difficulties e.t.c. Having a good understanding of how this affects our emotions and mental function, what causes these effects and ways to manage these effects, is very important to everyone of us, it enables us to recognize and approach this phenomenon correctly.
Various hormones and their impacts on Mental Health.
Certain hormones such as serotonin, oxytocin, cortisol, dopamine and so on have notable influences on mood and emotions. Let’s take a close look at some of them;
Serotonin: It is also known as feel good hormone, because, it contributes a sense of well-being and happiness. By influencing areas of the brain responsible for mood regulation, serotonin helps to stabilize and reduce stress. It also helps in regulating the sleep-wake cycle by influencing the production of melatonin. Adequate level of serotonin is necessary for maintaining healthy sleep patterns.
Furthermore, It affects appetite by interacting with brain areas that controls hunger and satiety. It is now obvious that serotonin plays crucial role in mood regulation, sleep cycle and appetite control.
Low level of serotonin leads to mood disorders like depression, anxiety, irritability and so on. It also leads to sleep disturbance like insomnia.
Cortisols: This is also known as stress hormone because it is released in response to stress. It helps by increasing glucose levels in the bloodstream. This gives our body the energy needed to respond to stress. It also manages stress by stopping or suppressing non-essential body functions, this gives the body maximum chances to deal with the factor causing the stress.
Cortisols helps the body to respond to stress for a period of time, however, elevated cortisol level for a long-term due to persistent stress leads to mental health issues like disorders, emotional Imbalance, cognitive disability, sleep disorder and so on.
Dopamine: Dopamine is another hormone that influences mood and emotional; mental health generally. It is involved in pleasure and reward, influencing motivation and cognitive functions. It supports clear thinking, decision-making, and problem-solving processes. Dopamine helps to maintain a positive mood and motivation to engage in various activities. Imbalance in dopamine secretion can lead to hyper activeness, disordered thinking, it can also lead to depression, memory problems and so on.
To mention a few, imbalances in the secretion of these hormones, causes undesirable negative effects. As students; medical students to be precise, taking good note of these gives the urge to monitor our body functions like; sleep-wake, stress regulation, and cognitive ability, while taking necessary actions and assisting one another whenever we observe or notice any of these symptoms of disorder or imbalance.
However, knowledge about this effects, though important, is not enough. We need significant knowledge on how to manage these effects.
Managing Hormonal Imbalances and their impacts on Mental Health.
Below are various ways to manage hormonal imbalances effectively;
- Medical treatment: This is a very important way of managing hormonal imbalances. This involves the use of the various hormonal therapies, surgical treatments, and medications to regulate hormonal imbalances.
- Proper nutrition: Balanced diets influences hormone levels. Consuming foods rich in vitamins and minerals can support hormonal imbalance. Therefore, our intake of food should be but into consideration when trying to manage hormonal imbalances.
- Lifestyle improvement: Improving our way of life can help a lot in managing our hormone levels. Regular exercise, adequate sleep, reduced stress and consistent meditation are basic ways to manage hormone levels.
To conclude this, I would say we must have vivid knowledge of the effects of hormonal imbalances and ways to curb these effects. This enables us to prevent it’s significant effects on our mental health.
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