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I'm still banging my head on this hormone business.  If I didn't think it
was important, I could let it go.  But for some of us, I think it's very
important, and the key to making a comeback from the edges of
functionality.  You feel good; you function good.  Okay, you function
well.

Let's say my concerns are coming from the fairly high rate of osteoporsis
and carbohydrate intolerance among us.  Why are some of us unable to
handle complex carbs?

And reading Dr. Barry Sears' book Enter The Zone, I recognized I had the
bodyshape of the hyperinsulemic.  My whole family has that shape.  As I
notice my 10 year old daughter suddenly bloomed into that apple shape as
her body prepares for puberty, the alarm went off.  There has to be a
hormonal component.

In my twenties I was diagnosed as hypoglycemic.  In my thirties, hypo-
allergenic.  When I excluded all carbs from my diet, I was fine...ate all
natural foods, the old "nothing from a can" routine.  First pregnancy, no
problem.  I ate a lot of ice cream & meats & greens...easy baby.  Prior to
the second, I was misdiagnosed with IBS...added wheat to my diet...I had
the pregnancy from hell.  Up to borderline gestational diabetes.  But when
that showed up, I cut back (but couldn't wean myself from) the crackers,
the cereal, etc.  Sugar level dropped & it wasn't an issue.  But it was.
The current thinking of insulin resistance just doesn't cut it for me.
First I am, with the hypoglycemia, then I cut out the complex carbs,
including rice and corn, then I'm fine.  I am resistant in pregnancy, then
after the preg, I'm fine again....till I hit perimenopause.

I felt very comfortable with the concept of a deficiency of some sort
causing the carb intolerance, I couldn't comprehend a resistance that
comes and go at certain times of my life...pregnancy and perimenopause.

So I began to think in terms of a model that possibly starts at puberty,
and is a factor in pregnancy and perimenopause...like sex hormones some
how affecting blood sugar levels.  Now, what I found is very preliminary.
I'm not a professional.  I'm sharing this as a springboard for your own
research.  In fact, I still have questions & see weaknesses here.  But
let's go on.

Speaking of the hormonal component, my life changed the day I downloaded
the CEL AUT 94 file and found a family portrait of the most likely to have
autism in the family.  Migraines and PMS were included in that profile.
Again, another possible hormonal link.  So I did a little research on the
autism side of this listserver, did a search for gestastional diabetes,
and yes, there had been some discussion among the listmembers on it.  My
second child did have developmental delay, and subsequently, autism has
been confirmed, but I was angry enough at the time to tell the neurologist
that I was probably autistic also...meaning, I am in the sprectrum, but
high functioning.  That there are a lot of us out there who are high
functioning, but no big deal.  I feel we have an obligation to maximize
our funtioning capability, but there should be no social stigma attached
to the way we are (& I struggle with bringing this up to the celiac list
till I think of one of the founders of this list had an autistic child.
And there are crossovers from the autism list.  So let's bring it out of
the closet and deal with it.  Some of us are.)

So excuse the long preamble, here's what I found out.

                The Hormonal Component

From Dr. John Lee's book, What Your Doctor May *Not* tell you about M*E*N*
O*P*A*U*S*E:

Cholesterol is the main building block of the steroid hormones. Among the
steroids, only estrogen molecules have a phenol ring.  I thought that
interesting, given that some of us are phenol sensitive.  That's in the
appendix of Lee's book, p. 357.

P. 359:  DHEA is produced in greater quantity than any other adrenal
hormone.  It circulates in the blood in a sulfated form, DHEA-S.  Lee
cites that 95% of the DHEA is stored in this sulfated form.

Lee doesn't address what happens when there is not enough sulfate to pair
with the DHEA...knowing of the use of magnesium sulfate (epsom salts) in
the bathwater, we are no doubt boosting the amount of available sulfates
to enable a natural process.  Back to the book:

p. 141...in premenopausal women, high DHEA-S levles are associated with
increased fat around the midsection...in healthy *post*menopausal women,
supplemenation with DHEA is associated with weight gain around the
midsection and insulin resistance, whereas in men, higher androgen levels
tend to correlate with less weight gain around the midsection.  Farther
down the page, "If progesterone is deficien in pre- and postmenopausal
women, the DHEA pathway tends to take up the slack".

I think what that means is that when progesterone levels are low, DHEA is
high.  I'm bringing this up only to mention about the epsom salts and to
speculate about the "switch" that would determine whether we make DHEA or
progesterone.  The DHEA is a precursor to androgens, testosterones and
estrogen (p. 13)...Does the body through the switch to favor DHEA &
estrogen production?  Hell, I don't know.  But the thought occured to me.
I'm way in over my head on this anyhow.

But I'll through this up to you, take a break, and get on to progesterone.