The Surprising Link Between Oestrogen and Gut Health

Do you ever feel like your gut is messing with your hormones? 

If you’ve noticed hormonal symptoms ramping up when your gut feels imbalanced, you’re not alone. Understanding your hormones can feel like learning a new language. But don't worry, we’re here to make it clear. This article explores how gut health can influence oestrogen levels and how to support oestrogen balance.

Understanding Oestrogen Balance 101

Oestrogen shows up in a few different forms in the body, and keeping it in balance is important for your health. Normally, your body clears out extra oestrogen through your liver, kidneys, and bowel. But if that process isn’t working well, it can lead to a build-up, and that’s when imbalances can cause problems.

There are a few different types of oestrogen found in the body: 3 natural types and 1 artificial type.

Natural types¹:

• Oestradiol (E2): Made mostly in the ovaries in women who menstruate.
• Oestrone (E1): Made in fat tissue, which converts into oestradiol when needed.
• Oestriol (E3): Made during pregnancy by the placenta.

The fourth type of oestrogen is environmental oestrogens, also called xeno-oestrogens. These are synthetic oestrogens found in everyday things like plastics, pesticides, and some personal care products. They can sneak into your body through food, packaging, and even the air we breathe. In today’s world, our bodies are dealing with way more of these than ever before.²

Clearing Oestrogen is the Key to Balance

The body has a network of processes designed to maintain the balance of oestrogens. It's like your body has an inbuilt processing facility that works in two stages. First, it packages hormones within your liver, and then transports them out through your body's 'exit routes', your kidneys and bowels.

You can visualise this as oestrogen being ‘packaged’ up by a team of postal workers (i.e. your liver enzymes) who then pass it off to another team that organises it into different ‘delivery routes’ (i.e. being eliminated as urine, or as poop). 

Using the same metaphor, if the ‘drivers’ of these delivery routes (i.e. your kidneys and bowels) are slow, your levels of oestrogens might start to pile up. Add poor gut health to the mix, and oestrogen elimination can become even less efficient.

How Does Gut Health Influence Oestrogen Balance

When your gut is healthy, everything runs smoothly. But if the levels of bacteria in your gut are out of balance, this can lead to high levels of an enzyme called beta-glucuronidase.

This enzyme can delay healthy oestrogen elimination by "unpacking” the packaged oestrogen. By doing this, beta-glucuronidase can reduce oestrogen clearance and increase the amount of oestrogen that the body must process again.³

One study found that people who took antibiotics (known to impact levels of gut bacteria) have higher levels of oestrogen in their poop vs. urine.⁴

This suggests that changes to gut bacteria can impact how we process oestrogen. It also points to how important it is to have a regular bowel movement, otherwise, it doesn't go anywhere.

But that’s not the end of the story for gut bacteria and oestrogen. Remember environmental oestrogen from earlier in this article? Having a healthy gut microbiome also supports the body in processing xenoestrogens.

Research suggests that our microbiome may even be evolving to manage our levels of these compounds by developing helpful genes.² This goes to show that supporting gut health is a smart way to help your body maintain oestrogen balance. To help you with this, we’ve outlined some helpful tips at the end of this article.

How Gut Health Impacts Women at Every Age

Beyond oestrogen balance, our gut health has a huge impact on various conditions that can impact women. These are some examples below where you might consider looking after your gut health.

Menstruating and Non-Menstruating Women:

Gut health can impact conditions like menstrual disorders, premenstrual symptoms, polycystic ovarian syndrome and endometriosis.⁵⁻⁸ In these issues, the gut microbiome plays a big part in managing inflammation that can contribute to these conditions.

Menopausal Women:

These hormonal changes are associated with changes in vaginal flora and physical strength.⁹ Certain probiotics in Ultra Flora Women’s Complete can help offset these changes to support vaginal health.¹⁰ While supporting a healthy microbiome may support the management of arthritis symptoms that can impact women in this age group.¹¹

What You Can Do to Support Oestrogen Balance and Gut Health

With all of that in mind, here are some simple tips to support a thriving gut microbiome regularly to support healthy oestrogen balance.

1. Eat Fibre-Rich Foods: Feed your good gut bacteria with veggies, fruits, legumes and whole grains. Aim for 30 different plant foods per week.
2. Stay Hydrated: Help your body flush out hormones by drinking plenty of water. Aim for 2-3 litres daily.
3. Get Daily Movement: Regular exercise helps your bowels and your hormones stay on track. Aim for 20-30 minutes daily.
4. Support Nutrient Levels: Ensure you’re getting B vitamins, selenium, and protein through diet or supplements for oestrogen balance. Consider taking Femme Essentials Multivitamin to support healthy nutrient levels.
5. Limit Plastics and Processed Foods: Avoid plastic containers. Eat fresh, whole food. Shop organic wherever you can to minimise xeno-oestrogen exposure.

Balance Your Hormones Naturally

Hormone balance and gut health go hand in hand. That’s why supporting a healthy microbiome is central to achieving balance. For more guidance, click here to work with an experienced healthcare practitioner to help you unlock whole body health, starting with your gut.

References:

1. Simpson ER. Sources of estrogen and their importance. J Steroid Biochem Mol Biol. 2003;86(3-5):225-230. doi:10.1016/s0960-0760(03)00360-1
2. Chiu K, Warner G, Nowak RA, Flaws JA, Mei W. The impact of environmental chemicals on the gut microbiome. Toxicol Sci. 2020;176(2):253-284. doi:10.1093/toxsci/kfaa065
3. He S, Li H, Yu Z, et al. The gut microbiome and sex hormone-related diseases. Front Microbiol. 2021;12:711137.  doi:10.3389/fmicb.2021.711137
4. Adlercreutz H, Pulkkinen MO, Hämäläinen EK, Korpela JT. Studies on the role of intestinal bacteria in metabolism of synthetic and natural steroid hormones. J Steroid Biochem. 1984;20(1):217-229. doi:10.1016/0022-4731(84)90208-5
5. Yao Y, Hu H, Chen L, Zheng H. Association between gut microbiota and menstrual disorders: a two-sample Mendelian randomization study. Front Microbiol. 2024;15:1321268. doi:10.3389/fmicb.2024.1321268
6. Takeda T, Yoshimi K, Kai S, Ozawa G, Yamada K, Hiramatsu K. Characteristics of the gut microbiota in women with premenstrual symptoms: A cross-sectional study. PLoS One. 2022;17(5):e0268466. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0268466
7. Qin R, Tian G, Liu J, Cao L. The gut microbiota and endometriosis: From pathogenesis to diagnosis and treatment. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2022;12:1069557. Published 2022 Nov 24. doi:10.3389/fcimb.2022.1069557
8. Sun Y, Gao S, Ye C, Zhao W. Gut microbiota dysbiosis in polycystic ovary syndrome: Mechanisms of progression and clinical applications. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2023;13:1142041.. doi:10.3389/fcimb.2023.1142041
9. World Health Organization. Menopause. Published October 16, 2024. Accessed May 9, 2025. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/menopause
10. Reid G, Charbonneau D, Erb J, et al. Oral use of Lactobacillus rhamnosus GR-1 and L. fermentum RC-14 significantly alters vaginal flora: randomized, placebo-controlled trial in 64 healthy women. FEMS Immunol Med Microbiol. 2003;35(2):131-134. doi:10.1016/S0928-8244(02)00465-0
11. Manzo C, Natale M, Castagna A. Beyond rheumatoid arthritis evaluation of hand osteoarthritis: a rheumatologist’s perspective. Arthritis Res Ther. 2021;23(1):256. doi:10.1186/s13075-021-02427-9