In this article I’m going to talk about high estrogen foods you must avoid and also estrogen rich foods that can destroy your health and really cause major hormonal issues. There are a lot of things that people are eating today that are disrupting their hormones, causing estrogen to be high, causing progesterone to be low.
Some of the side effects of consuming too many estrogen rich foods are, for men, having more feminine characteristics, and for women, increased issues like hypothyroidism, autoimmune disease, chronic fatigue, and even ovarian cancer.
Top 5 Estrogen Rich Foods To Avoid
I’m going to talk about the five estrogen rich foods and products you absolutely want to avoid, and then talk about a food here at the very end that you’ll want to add into your diet to help your body detox the excess estrogen.
The reason why these estrogen rich foods are an issue is because they’re called xenoestrogens. They increase estrogen in your body, or they act like estrogen, which again increases your risk of breast cancer and cervical cancer in women. And for men, major testosterone issues, impotence and other health issues.
1. Soy
So the first food that you want to avoid that contains way too much estrogen, or what are called xenoestrogens, is soy. Most of the soy products today, whether it is soy milk, soy protein powder, or just regular soy beans, are genetically modified. So consuming soy, which is a very high estrogen based food is something you want to avoid.
Now, soy started being consumed in large amounts years ago because it was so popular in Okinawa, Japan, but they consumed a different type of soy. It wasn’t the genetically modified soy that we consume today. It was a type of soy called natto, which is fermented soy beans. So it was loaded with probiotics, vitamin K2 and it didn’t have the same estrogen effects.
So again, soy: number one estrogen-rich food you’ve got to stay away from.
2. Sugar
Too many sugars and carbohydrates can increase estrogen in your body and lower progesterone. So eliminate the processed sugar. Get rid of grains in large amounts. If you’re consuming large grains, switch over to eating more fruits and vegetables.
Or if you want to eat grains, sprouted grains are a better option. But really balancing out those ratios, lowering your carb intake. Increasing your intake of healthy fats will also help naturally balance out and decrease excess estrogen in your body.
3+4. Conventional Meat And Dairy
Now, maybe the biggest offender of excess estrogen in your diet is consuming conventional meat and dairy products. In fact our average milk today contains 20 different chemicals and medications, including growth hormones like RBGH, as well as estradiol and other hormone-based medications.
So you go to your regular grocery store, pick up a gallon of milk with over 20 different medications and chemicals in it. All of these extra hormones and steroids in the milk supply will sky rocket your estrogen, and the same goes for the meat you eat.
If you are shopping on a budget, and you don’t have a lot of extra money to spend, if you’re going to invest in your health anywhere, make sure it’s on your meat. So eat grass-fed organic meat and raw organic dairy products, because if you’re eating those and they’re not organic, that’s going to increase your risk of all the things we talked about, from cancer to autoimmune disease to other neurological issues.
5. Avoid Plastic Containers
Stop drinking out of or eating a lot of things out of plastic containers that contain BPA, which stands for bisphenol-A. It’s a compound in plastics that’s known as an estrogen-mimicker or a phyto or a xenoestrogen. So stay away from the plastic bottles, especially when they’re heated.
If you leave a plastic bottle of water out in the sun, actually by about 90 to 100 times of those plastics will leach into the water. When you’re drinking those, those will get into your system, causing these hormonal-based problems.
Another thing along with plastic are teflon pans. In fact, when you heat up teflon pans, that heat actually increases PFLAs, which are also estrogen mimickers, by 400 times. So again, heating teflon pans, consuming things out of plastic bottles, another big no-no in things you absolutely want to avoid if you want to decrease estrogen.
Consume Cruciferous Vegetables
Obviously, we want to get rid of those foods and products. If you want to start detoxing your body of estrogen, there is a substance found in cruciferous vegetables called indole-3-carbinol. It starts out as a form of sulfur in your body, which has powerful detoxification properties.
So those cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, brussel sprouts, kale, collard greens, these cruciferous vegetables will absolutely help your body detox.
There’s supplementing with milk thistle and dandelion, two other great things. So cruciferous vegetables, milk thistle are great to support your body and to detoxify it from excess estrogen. Get those estrogen-rich foods out of your diet and start eating more testosterone rich foods.