A woman came into our clinic one time and referred to her hot flashes as “power surges.” At least she was able to have a sense of humor about them. Most women don’t.

If you've had one, there's no mistaking it: the sudden, intense, hot feeling on your face and upper body, perhaps preceded or accompanied by a rapid heartbeat and sweating, nausea, dizziness, anxiety, headache, weakness, or a feeling of suffocation. Some women experience an "aura," an uneasy feeling just before the hot flash,that lets them know what's coming. The flash is followed by a flush, leaving you reddened and perspiring. You can have a soaker or merely a moist upper lip. A chill can lead off the episode or be the finale.
What causes them

Hot flashes are mostly caused by the hormonal changes of menopause, but can also be affected by lifestyle and medications. A diminished level of estrogen has a direct effect on the hypothalamus, the part of the brain responsible for controlling your appetite, sleep cycles, sex hormones, and body temperature. Somehow (we don't know how), the drop in estrogen confuses the hypothalamus—which is sometimes referred to as the body's "thermostat"—and makes it read "too hot."

The brain responds to this report by broadcasting an all-out alert to the heart, blood vessels, and nervous system: "Get rid of the heat!" The message is transmitted by the nervous system's chemical messenger, epinephrine, and related compounds: norepinephrine, prostaglandin, serotonin. The message is delivered instantly. Your heart pumps faster, the blood vessels in your skin dilate to circulate more blood to radiate off the heat, and your sweat glands release sweat to cool you off even more.

This heat-releasing mechanism is how your body keeps you from overheating in the summer, but when the process is triggered instead by a drop in estrogen, your brain's confused response can make you very uncomfortable. Some women's skin temperature can rise six degrees Centigrade during a hot flash. Your body cools down when it shouldn't, and you are miserable: soaking wet in the middle of a board meeting or in the middle of a good night's sleep.

At Wellness Innovations, we will check the level of all your hormones and use only natural, identical-to-human hormones to get rid of your hot flashes and night sweats, without having to resort to anti-depressant medications or any of the harmful hormones of the past .

 

"Write a testimonial? You bet I'll write one! I'm 48 years old and I never wanted to take any hormones because of everything I had heard the last few years. then I started having hot flashes every night and sometimes during the day --gradually at first--then they became regular.

My older sister told me I was going into "the change," and that I needed some hormones.

I started asking around and was referred to Wellness Innovations. They found out that I was low in estrogen. In less than one week on the new kind of healthy hormones--no more hot flashes! It was so simple! "

-Terri N., Salt Lake City, Utah