World Health Day: How Stress Impacts Hormonal Balance In Women?

It is a known fact that no amount of stress has done any good to anyone. Stress causes serious impact on both men and women, physically and mentally. But for women, stress can cause multiple complications and can affect their lives. Chronic stress triggers the release of cortisol, the body’s primary stress hormone. This hormonal imbalance can lead to irregular menstrual cycles, fertility issues, and mood fluctuations. Let's understand how stress can lead to hormonal imbalance and affect your life.

How stress affects women's hormonal balance?

Stress, and especially chronic stress, has the potential to severely derange a woman's hormonal equilibrium and reproductive well-being. From a biological perspective, stress refers to the body's reaction to an actual or threatened disruption of its equilibrium, initiating a sequence of interactions among the endocrine, nervous, and immune systems. This highly coordinated stress response is meant to be transiently adaptive, but when repeatedly activated, it starts to degrade vital processes, most notably hormonal control.

According to Dr. Sheetal Jindal, Senior Consultant and Medical Director at Jindal IVF Chandigarh, "In females, chronic stress activates the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, causing excessive production of cortisol and other stress hormones. Hypercortisolemia disrupts the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal (HPG) axis, essential for reproductive hormone regulation. Stress can thereby inhibit the secretion of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH), which is vital in initiating the secretion of luteinizing hormone (LH) and follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH). These disturbances can delay or prevent ovulation and can result in anovulatory cycles and infertility.

Stress is linked to shortened luteal phases due to inadequate progesterone production, which is essential for successful implantation and the support of early pregnancy. Ongoing psychological stress can lead to menstrual irregularities, such as amenorrhea or oligomenorrhea, and can intensify premenstrual syndrome symptoms. Additionally, stress-related hormonal imbalances may negatively affect egg quality, hinder gamete transport, alter endometrial receptivity, and disrupt embryo implantation.

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