Is It Me or My Hormones?: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly about PMS, Perimenopause, and All the Crazy Things that Occur with Hormone Imbalance

by Marcelle Pick MSN OBGYN

The four-week plan for hormonal health that will stabilize your hormones and make you feel like yourself again.One of the most common and agonizing problems women face today is hormonal imbalance. Sometimes it’s a nightmarish premenstrual syndrome – depression, cravings, bloating, weight gain, irritability, and even out-of-control rage for up to three weeks each month. Sometimes it’s periods so painful that you have to arrange your entire life around your cycle. Sometimes it’s a rocky passage into perimenopause that changes everything you know about yourself and your body. Luckily, you can resolve these hormonal issues – you just need accurate, actionable information to do so.In Is It Me or My Hormones?, Marcelle Pick, author of The Core Balance Diet and Is It Me or My Adrenals?, delves into the often misunderstood world of female hormonal imbalance. Sharing her personal struggles and her experiences with patients, Marcelle helps you understand how the right diet, exercise, supplements, herbs, and psychological support, occasionally complemented with bioidentical hormones, can free you from hormone disruption.After walking you through the basic science of how your hormones affect your body, mind, and emotions, Marcelle lays out an accessible, easy-to-follow, four-week plan for hormonal health – complete with schedules, exercises, supplements, meal plans, and recipes – that will stabilize your hormones in just one month and make you feel like yourself again.It’s hard to imagine what a huge impact your diet, your lifestyle, your thoughts, and your hormones can have on your health and well-being. Unlike many medical professionals, Marcelle knows that your symptoms aren’t "just a normal part of being a woman" or "not that big a deal." And in this book, she validates your experience of hormonal imbalance and opens your eyes to the power you have over your health. So join Marcelle on this journey to implement simple, natural changes that will help eliminate your cravings, depression, mood swings, and weight gain, and make you feel energized, sexual, and in command of your life!"By paying attention to hormonal balance, you can sail through your 40s and 50s as an energetic, sensuous, and sexually alive woman, reaping the benefits of age and experience while enjoying the vitality of youth." -- Marcelle Pick

Genres: Health, Nonfiction, Self Help, Adult

313 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 26, 2013

Reviews

[Dana · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am not impressed with this book. The author's regime relies heavily on supplements - lots of them - and includes things like visualizing an empty basket next to your bed that you add blessings to - which just sounds really hokey to me. It also includes daily and weekly meal plans and schedules - which include things like "11:30: Make yourself a cup of green tea. Take two minutes to take ten deep, slow breaths, inhaling and savoring the scent of the tea." Really? Then that evening "8:00: Read, journal, or meditate - begin to wind down." This woman obviously has no children or even a husband. Her recipes include ingredients that I prefer to avoid like soy milk and other highly processed ingredients like canned refried beans. All in all, I did not find the book to be useful.

[Ariadna73 · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a book about female health. Basically is an "eat this-buy that" book; whose target reader is a bored homemaker married to a man that can afford her elliptic exercise machines and salmon for breakfast. There is absolutely nothing wrong with assuming that your reader is a very wealthy person, but that leaves out a very big slice of the population cake. Believe me.

[Nancy Crocker · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am use to writing reviews about Romance novels. But when I was browsing through NetGalley and came across this book and another one by Marcelle Pick titled "Is It Me Or My Adrenals" I must say my attention was captured.

I have been a long time sufferer of Fibromyalgia and possible M.S. But I have been stating to my PCP lately that I can't help but think some of my issues are hormone related. After reading through this book, I am convinced more than ever I am correct. So I am now sure, I must adjust my diet. I am not sure if I can do the entire one she outlines, but I will do my best. And I promise down the road to update my progress on my review of this book on Amazon and Goodreads.

Anyone searching for answers and feeling lost. Don't give up. Follow what your heart tells you. This book is well written, and gives full details of supplements to take and foods to cut out. If you are dragging through life and the doctors are not helping you with answers, or better yet telling you it is all in your head. Then I think this book might be worth looking into. Who knows you just might feel better after making changes in your lifestyle.

This book gives you easy steps to follow, yes there are a number of things to do, but it is not like you need to read an encyclopedia to get through it. It is very easy to understand and even lays out a 28 day program. Ask yourself this: what do you have to lose? I recommend this to all women everywhere.

Thank you Marcelle Pick, Hay House Publishing and NetGalley for making these two titles available to me.

5/5 stars

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Lisa Hayes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my God! Where was this book 20+ years ago!!! It makes so much sense. Any woman (or man married to a woman) should read this book! With my background in health and nutrition, this is the first book I've read that had made any sense regarding women's issues!

[Stephanie · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF about halfway through. This may be helpful for a lot of women with slight hormonal imbalances but for anyone with endometriosis, adenomyosis, PCOS, POI, or other medical conditions there are much better and more informative books out there. Many of the recommendations in this book are going to be covered in other texts as ways to help your symptoms, but other books will remain realistic in reminding you that there is no cure and that these interventions (diet, exercise, etc.) are only for symptom management. This book felt preachy and overpromising - “be symptom-free by following my 28-day plan!” as well as overly focused on losing weight and not at all body-positive. Only giving it two stars for the fact that I believe many of her recommendations are decent as a complement to other treatments and information, or that this book may be a helpful introductory book for a woman struggling with PMS or perimenopause at a natural age who has ruled out other medical conditions. Honestly I don’t think endo, PCOS, POI, or fertility should even be mentioned in the description.

[Traxy · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading, and appreciating, Is It Me or My Adrenals? by the same author, I plowed on with this one, about hormones, and what effect they have on our bodies. Female bodies, I should point out, because it’s a book for women. While it touches on testosterone, it’s more about estrogen and progesterone.

The thing is, if our hormones are out of whack, we’re not going to feel well. This book goes into a lot of different causes of hormone imbalances, and what you can do about it. For instance, it’s shocking to read how much we’re exposed to hormones without even trying. Plastics, for instance, there’s one. The book inspired me to throw out a lot of plastic containers and put things in glass jars instead!

Toward the end, there’s what a “typical day” could look like. While some people would certainly think you need to follow it point to point, that’s not the point – which the author is quick to point out herself. It’s a suggestion of how someone’s day is structured, not necessarily how your day works. It’s more about giving examples of how easily you can incorporate a ten-minute walk in an otherwise busy schedule.

There are a list of hormone-friendly recipes as well, but I mainly skipped those. A lot of them contain very American ingredients, but if you know what you’re doing in a kitchen (and look up things on Wikipedia that you don’t know what they are), you can find substitutes fairly easily. If something’s described as a “white fish”, there are several white fish that I’m sure would work just as well, for instance.

If you don’t want a book to suggest taking nature-identical hormones and supplements, exercise a bit more, or be careful with what you put in your mouth, then Is It Me or My Hormones? is not for you, and you’re not going to like it, even though it says you don’t actually need to take supplements, but you will feel better quicker if you do. If you don’t mind any of those things, it’s an interesting read. If I have any real criticism, it would be that the book is more for perimenopausal, menopausal or post-menopausal women rather than slightly younger women in their 20s or early 30s who haven’t quite got as far as perimenopause yet, but who are still affected by hormone imbalances.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Marcelle Pick's experience and observation about how hormones affect women's lives, overall, was helpful. As life progresses, propelling me forward into perimenopause and its eventual successor, it was good to read about ways in which this practitioner has assisted other women as they navigate the ups and downs of their hormonal lives. Diet, exercise and sleep make a tremendous difference (not a revelation, surely), but when a person is desperate to find solutions for problems that plague, all healthful advice is appreciated. It's nice to know you're not just going crazy sometimes, if you get my drift.

[Bookish Enchantment (Katherine Quirke) · Rating 3 out of 5]

At first I thought this was a good book for all women but truly much of the information is stuff that you can easily get online. Sure it makes you feel that you are not alone with your crazy hormones but forums, blogs and Facebook would do the same thing. Most of the book contains recipes and many of them with food products that are likely to be only easily obtained in certain parts of the USA. I was disappointed in the end.

[Jean Brazil · Rating 2 out of 5]

Looks at cause of assorted female problems. Pretty standard advice: diet high in protein, veggies, healthy fats; eliminate gluten and caffeine; exercise and sleep.

[Nhi Aronheim · Rating 3 out of 5]

I LOVE the information that the author shares about PMS, perimenopause, menopause, and Bioidentical hormones. The 2nd part of her book is the 28 days plans for food, exercise, and supplements. Although the plans are fabulous, I think her food recommendation is not realistic. Unless we have a personal chef, it’s a half time job to prepare all the suggested meals (we tried and the plans are not practical). And the additional supplements in the plans, It’s a lot to take up to 12 pills a day on top of our regular medication.
I would still recommend this book to those who want to have a deeper understanding about our hormones.

[Samantha · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very scientific-based look at how hormone imbalance affects your body with good, easy-to-understand explanations. The book included many recipes, but I didn't try any because I had to return it to the library.

[Traceys · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you're lacking info about your body and hormones, this may help.

Being 52 I know a bit about my body and dodgy hormones, it's interesting learning a little more.

What I took from this book is live a balanced life, eat healthy, exercise, do things you enjoy etc

My advice, If you get to mid 40s and feel off, go to doctors and get a blood test to see if perimenopausal and grab some hrt, magic stuff if you can take it!

[Tina Gagnon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Found this to be an interesting read on a topic that can be riddled with alot of misunderstanding. Practical tips and life style changes that can help a woman with some of her hormonal problems.

[alicebme · Rating 3 out of 5]

Got me thinking about an anti inflammatory diet and how about how all hormones affect the others. Not into herbs tho.

[Kristen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is okay. I wish it was more fact based. Also wish there were more sources cited.

[Missyohara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of good information. I liked the personal examples from her patients.

[M.Marie.S. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nothing super surprising here...some good, simple recipes at the back.

[Joy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fair bit of good advice, although she makes assumptions about the experience and expression of sexual desire that essentially ignore the possibility of someone being asexual. Also, as someone who's tried it and suffered severe consequences, I'm sad to see her recommending avoiding antidepressants in favor of diet and exercise. Diet and exercise are helpful, but if you need meds please keep taking them. She makes a good case for looking at things holistically and being aware that menopause involves a suite of interrelated systems going thru adjustments that can be made easier by trying to keep a balance between them all.

[Mitch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good. Provides a ton of helpful, practical info that I had not easily come across elsewhere, as well as resources, support and clear explanations. Best of all, the author's demeanor and words are reassuring, inspiring and uplifting. Her professionalism, intelligence, and loving reassurance for humankind made me want to cry in that really good way (versus that kind of cry that we know sometimes comes from whacked out hormones). Thank you for all the time & work put into this book.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hm. She's a little on the nutty side, claiming that GMO's are proven unsafe and recommending lots of high dose supplements, which have not tested to be safe or effective. Plus she pretty much says being a vegan is bad. But doesn't mention any research showing animal protein to be a bit less than the best thing. So, am leaving most of this advice alone.

[Donna Gambino · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great information every woman should read !

[Sara Miller]

So far, it is common sense that needs to be organized in common words for us women. Just because I am a nurse, doesn't mean I understand my own hormones. Haha...

[Meira Berger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just started book and skimming through it. Interesting advice! I think it's worth looking into using recommendations.

[Dawn Striegel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting and educational. The "treatment" plan is a little overwhelming and you may feel a little defeated before you even get a chance to start. I'll look for a different plan for sure!

[Linda Carmel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyed the book. Good overview of things I've learned before.

[Kathy · Rating 2 out of 5]

There was some interesting information in here, but overall I was underwhelmed.

[Maria Gottuso · Rating 5 out of 5]

Changed my life.