Estrogen is an integral part of a woman's reproductive cycle. Along with progesterone, it runs your body's menstrual clock, ensuring a healthy environment for any future children to be born. This hormone has further reach than this, however, in the full function of your brain and body. Moods are strongly influenced by estrogen levels, and this can be seen most strongly during the times that levels change, like puberty onset, before and during menstruation and during menopause.
Menopause and Mood
Changes in estrogen levels can have both positive and negative effects on the mood. When estrogen levels are low, hormone therapy to replace some of it can take sour moods and calm them. Pregnancy, which results in a very high surge in estrogen, can also change moods. One of the most common results of this is that women with high estrogen levels have a strong sensitivity to emotion, and can be easily moved by things. Women who have these high levels will often say that they cry at commercials or are very anxious over someone's emotional state. Women with low estrogen, on the other hand, may suffer from bad moods, anger, resentment, aggression or reclusiveness.
Estrogen and Positive Mood Changes
Moods increase when low estrogen levels are raised in many cases. This can be due to supplementation, the end of a menstrual cycle point, or healthy foods that will even out your hormonal balance. If you suffer from low estrogen, you are more likely to get these positive feelings when estrogen returns to your system. It may feel like de-stressing, or a relief from anxiety or it may be a drop in irrational anger. If your moods were strong enough, you may not be able to realize how irrational you have been until your hormones level out.
Estrogen and Negative Mood Changes
In most cases, when your estrogen levels drop, moods do as well. There are a number of psychological conditions that have been identified in regard to low estrogen and mood. This includes depression, dysphoria, anger and delusions. There have been a number of psychological cases that have shown that women under the thrall of low estrogen are not in control of their own facilities without psychological pharmaceuticals. Though many of these cases revolve around the menstrual cycle, they must take the mood stabilizers, antidepressants or antipsychotics all month as if they had any other mental health disorder. Another common occurrence of negative mood changes in regard to estrogen drops is with post-partum depression. After months of elevated estrogen levels have supported the growth of your child, the sudden depletion of the hormone can leave women feeling disoriented, alone, easily upset, and incapable of emotionally bonding with their child.
