[dwwml]

Hi all, I am new here and please forgive me if this isn't the right section for this thread, cuz if it isn't...please feel free to move it wherever it belongs. I wasn't sure where to post this.

I am a 21 year old female that has some questions about hormones. Let me start off by saying that I have been struggling with many unpleasant things for several years now but recently I feel as if these things only got worse. I sweat alot, not just the armpits but also on my whole face, it's mostly when i am nervous but just overall i sweat badly...when me and my friends play a team sport then i am always soaking wet, all over my body, with my face being one of the wettest places. my skin is bad...my face has big pores with blackheads in it and it's really greasy....oily...my back and my chest also have some acne problems cuz there's a bunch of small dots all over, neither my chest or my back is smooth as it should be. i've got some dark hairs in my belly button area...i've also got dark hairs on and around my nipples...it's not just a few hairs either, i tried to count and it was about 25 hairs on each nipple. my hair is damaged, dry, thin BUT the hair thats actually close to my head and especially my bangs...they get greasy extremely fast..i swear i can wash my hair and just a few hrs later my bangs are already getting greasy. when i wake up the next day my bangs are so greasy (together with my forehead...very oily) that i gotta wash them, while the "dingglin" hair is still somewhat decent. additionally my sex drive is really high...im also depressed and i have a tendency to be aggresive. im mentioning this because ive read how high level of male hormones can be the cause of these things...anyway, i def have some kinda hormonal imbalance and i just think ive got too many of the male hormones in me. i went to a doc and did some blood tests and he prescribed me birth control. i had been taking it for half a year and nothing changed. my doc said it should help with the sweating, make my hair and skin better but nothing happened. even my sex drive didn't lower. it's just so hard to live like this, when you're a woman....

ive got my blood test results here and i'd like to share it with you guys so that you may take a look and tell me if my results and levels of certain hormones are really that high. supposedly my testosterone level is within the norm BUT i want to know if it's still an average result for women in their twenties? or is it still too high? and then i've got two other "things" that are way above the norm....so please check this out:

Testosterone (ICD-9:041)
my result: 61,68 ng/dl min: 6,00 max: 82,00



Androstendion (ICD-9:l31)
my result: 7,37 ng/ml

and then it shows this:

0-10 yrs 0,02 - 0,86 ng/ml
11-17 yrs 0,25 - 2, 78 ng/ml
18-53 yrs 0,75 - 3,89 ng/ml
54-82 yrs 0,35 - 2,49 ng/ml

as you can see, the level of this hormone in my body is WAY TOO HIGH. no woman in any age should have it this high...


then there is this last hormone :

DHEA-SO4
my result: 668,90 mg/dl min: 95,80 max: 511, 70

so this hormone is above the norm also.

i'm not sure what these two are, but please would you read this and look through and tell me ?

[Stillness]

How is your diet? I know that some foods (tofu comes to mind) are said to mess with female hormonal balance.

[dwwml]

i have been trying to eat healthy for the past month and im trying to work out more often.

ive actually read that tofu is supposed to decrease testerone...i dont even eat tofu.

anyway, idk what to do, i feel hopeless and helpless...i doubt a certain food will help me with anything here, doesnt the issue go much deeper?

[Stillness]

I'm not saying that one food can make or break you. It's possible, but your overall diet definitely can. "You are what you eat" is not just a catchy phrase somebody made up. Have you seen a change with the improvements in your diet and exercise?

[dwwml]

nop, i havent

[kira]

I would suggest a couple things. Beta blockers are often prescribed to stop sweating or high heart rate in people with anxiety and could be an option but it will not help the other problems. With the adrenal gland activity a neurologist might want to check for a tumor in the brain but getting a neurologist to do anything is kind of difficult. You usually have to rule everything else out and get a referral from one of your doctors. Because of that the best first step would be to go to a gyno with your test results and the concern you might have something like PCOS and they can ultrasound your ovaries for cysts that might be bumping hormones up and causing the male hair growth as well as doing more blood tests. You didn't list any test of female hormones and sometimes the difference between 2 female hormones is ever so slightly off causing those symptoms. It can be hard to get a doctor to diagnose it accurately because both hormones can be within normal range but not normal to each other so a specialist is often needed to take everything in to account. You don't need male hormones to create male hair growth and other symptoms.

[dwwml]

I would suggest a couple things. Beta blockers are often prescribed to stop sweating or high heart rate in people with anxiety and could be an option but it will not help the other problems. With the adrenal gland activity a neurologist might want to check for a tumor in the brain but getting a neurologist to do anything is kind of difficult. You usually have to rule everything else out and get a referral from one of your doctors. Because of that the best first step would be to go to a gyno with your test results and the concern you might have something like PCOS and they can ultrasound your ovaries for cysts that might be bumping hormones up and causing the male hair growth as well as doing more blood tests. You didn't list any test of female hormones and sometimes the difference between 2 female hormones is ever so slightly off causing those symptoms. It can be hard to get a doctor to diagnose it accurately because both hormones can be within normal range but not normal to each other so a specialist is often needed to take everything in to account. You don't need male hormones to create male hair growth and other symptoms.

Ok but do you think that this hormal imbalance is causing all this? from excesive sweating to hair growth and very oily, bad skin?

you think this can have something to do with a tumor in the brain? maybe this doesnt matter but since a few years ago ive been getting a very umcomfortable slight pain on the right side of my head/body. from my head to my eye to my ear and my neck and my back even...oh and my throat. and all on the right side of my body...

i think the last time i went to the gyn he checked all my private parts...and he said it was all right...

ive got some other results but theres things named like "FT3", "FSH", "LH" etc so i didnt think these could be female hormones...

all i know is something is wrong with me and i really want to know.

please tell me, the results i did share, are they really out of norm and could they too be the cause?

[kira]

FSH and LH are the common hormones produced by the reproductive tract. The difference between the 2 numbers can help diagnose a problem with the ovaries or uterus.

They've been finding lately that a lot of people with things like PCOS have a pituitary gland disorder that is often a small tumor so it's good to rule out if you can get someone to do it. The pituitary gland controls pretty much everything and every hormone. It signals your entire body what to do so a problem there can cause all sorts of symptoms especially hormone related. To ultrasound the ovaries for cysts though you will have to stay off birth control for awhile so they act normally. Birth control helps shut down the ovaries so the cysts don't form and LH and FSH plus others are not released. It makes it hard to diagnose a hormone problem if you are taking hormonal birth control. I have all your symptoms when I'm on the wrong pill or not taking any plus I gain a pound a week. I have to take the really high dose stuff to stop my acne, greasy skin, dandruff, male hair growth, weight gain.... I also have period problems like really excessive bleeding for a week. I had to keep missing school because the heaviest tampon and pad would not last an entire class period. I'm on seasonique right now which only has a period every 3 months and there are no inactive pills just lower dose pills.