by Laila Salaam

Created on: November 22, 2008

Say no to estrogen (HRT).

From the dawn of time, women have had to go through the experience of their bodies aging and dealing with the affects of less estrogen. This is a process that was created for our own good. When you reintroduce estrogen into the body, once it has decided it was time for a natural reduction, your create some real problems-not the least of which is stress on the liver.

For some who are thrown into menopause at an early age, like I was at age 38, I listened to my doctor who said that if I didn't take the hormones terrible things were going to happen to me. My sex drive would decrease. I would have hot flashes. I would experience severe depression. I would be grumpy and I would gain weight.

So...being young and naive, I decided to take my doctor's advice. They did the surgery and three days later, amid uncontrollable sobs, I called my doc and said, "Is it time for the medicine, yet?" Little did I know that was just the beginning of my problems. Of course, the estrogen did help with the depression for a while, but it turned me into a total witch. For anyone who has experience a woman on pure estrogen (you can't take progesterone with it if you've had your ovaries removed), you know exactly what I'm talking about. I still gained weight because "unsupported" estrogen (no progesterone) causes weight gain. Sheesh! It did help with the hot flashes a bit, but I still woke up with night sweats and broke out in droplets of perspiration at the most inappropriate times.

About four years into my HRT (hormone replacement therapy) I began experiencing terrible pain in my right side. I thought maybe I had a stone or something in a bile duct. Since I didn't have a gallbladder I knew it wasn't gall stones. So I called the doc and he said to come in. Oh, and did I mention that my eyes were yellow, my skin was yellow, and I'd lost about 15 pounds in a few weeks? Hmm....

When my doc saw me he gave me that raised eyebrow look. You know, the one that say, "this isn't good." One look at me and he knew I had hepatitis. My blood work came back all out of whack and my bili-rubin was 16.8. He told me what the problem was but, at first, he thought it was Hep B or Hep C...wanted to know did I every use IV drugs. Hmmmph. I looked at him like he was crazy.

Well, there was no doubt that I was sick as a dog. I could hardly get up out of bed, was in constant pain. Just walking made my muscles hurt. But there seemed to be no reason for what they finally called non-viral hepatitis. I didn't take a lot of pills. I hardly even used Tylenol (which can be a culprit).

So...researcher that I am...I got on the Internet and did some medical research of my own. Guess what I found! There is such a thing as "Estrogen-induced Hepatitis." Can you believe that? After four years of being the wicked witch of the Southeast, I was told I couldn't take any more estrogen, not even the vegetable-based phyto-estrogens (usually made from soy). Wow! What a shock to my system! I went through horrible bouts of crying (doc finally gave in and gave me a little bit of antidepressants for a few months), the worst hot flashes in the world (I wanted to come out of my clothes when they hit), and I ate everything in site.

It took a few years to get through all of the side affects of being thrown into full-blown menopause overnight, but it was so worth it. I'm feeling so much better now. Even though its hard, sometimes, I keep my weight down and my husband can stand to live with me. :D

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