Soy, Thyroid, and Women’s Hormonal Health

Dr. Marianne Teitelbaum explains: “This patient presented to our office for large growths on her breasts.  Her Ob-Gyn had been monitoring their growth for a few years using mammograms in case they turned into cancer.  Modern medicine thinks of prevention of breast cancer only in terms of frequent mammograms — they keep checking the breasts and if they find cancer, they remove it via lumpectomy, mastectomy and may give radiation and/or chemotherapy.

However, no attention is made on trying to reverse the situation — or to prevent the cancer from coming.  This case history is an excellent example of exactly why it is so important to first find the underlying cause of the problem.  In this case, a thorough examination of her diet revealed the patient was eating lots of soy products — tofu, soy milk, and edamame.  Soy has several problems associated with it:  first, the isoflavones in the soy depress the thyroid gland.  This patient had hormonal swings, yet her thyroid studies (bloodwork) came back normal — this is typical of all the thyroid patients I see.  The thyroid might not be functioning optimally, but it usually won’t be reflected in bloodwork.  However, even a small malfunction of the thyroid creates full-blown thyroid symptoms — constipation, cold hands and feet, hair falling, weight gain, lethargy.

Second, the soy has “unintelligent” estrogen in it.  The intelligent estrogen your body produces creates intelligent growth in the breasts and hips after puberty.  However, an unintelligent estrogen would cause growths such as cysts and tumors, even malignant ones.

And finally, the fat in the soybean is too dense to cross the cell wall, thus clogging the channels.

So first, we stopped the soy and cleaned up the rest of her diet (she was also eating the nightshade vegetables, which shrink the channels).  We then initiated some gentle detox once the channels opened and gave her the herbs to shrink the glandular growths.  And unlike pharmaceuticals, which have side effects, the herbs have side benefits, which we see all the time.  Thus, her large growth on her finger also went away as a result of treating the whole body.

Her hormonal symptoms normalized.  We gave her herbs to support her thyroid and some to help her hair to stop falling out — and now everything has stabilized.”

Dr. Marianne Teitelbaum

Cinnaminson, New Jersey

856-786-3330