Some of you may already know some of this.

Anyways, in the first chapter of Open Your Heart (hitherto referred to as OYH), Drew mentions that he's been taking herbal supplements to keep his hormonal imbalance somewhat controlled. I haven't yet mentioned what, though this will come up in Chapter 4 whenever I manage to write it. So right now, I'm going to describe the science behind what I'm writing, for two reasons. First, I don't want anyone going off and telling me it's not possible, when I know full well it is, when I use it in OYH. Second, maybe some of you might find it useful knowledge so you don't inadvertently mess up your own hormonal balance with your diet. Which I think I've done myself, now that I've done all this research for my story... and I think may be the cause of my gynaecomastia and other feminizing features, such as my feet narrowing, and my fingers slimming, my waist narrowing, and my hips widening... none of it is all that severe, but then I probably don't consume nearly high enough concentrations...

Anyways, it's important to know how your body creates its hormones for any of this to make sense, so, a chart:

The chart doesn't list what "A" stands for in the T->E switch, it's aromatase.

There're two main ways to manipulate your hormonal balance herbally. The first, is by preventing the reduction/conversion stages from occurring.

Now, say you do something to prevent 5-alpha-reductase from working. This is called a 5-alpha-reductase inhibitor. A popular herbal treatment for men with male-pattern baldness or prostate problems is Saw Palmetto. Saw Palmetto is also a common ingredient in hair removal creams that advertise inhibiting of hair regrowth. Why? Saw Palmetto acts as a powerful 5-alpha-reductase inhibitor. By inhibiting 5-alpha-reductase, free testosterone cannot be converted to dihydrotestosterone, which causes hair loss on the scalp, hair growth on the body, and all other secondary masculine traits to occur. The only thing free testosterone is good for is muscle growth. Saw Palmetto is also a common ingredient in steroid cocktails for that reason, steroid users want to get muscles, but they don't want the problems associated with excess "sex hormone" testosterone. So, to summarize, if you inhibit 5-alpha-reductase activity in your body, you become less masculine. The most powerful herb to do this with is Saw Palmetto. Saw Palmetto can also act as a mild phytoestrogen, covered later.

Next, say you do something to inhibit aromatase activity. This one should be obvious. The only way to make estrogens is to convert it from androgens. The only thing your body can use to convert androgens to estrogens is aromatase. If you block aromatase activity, you block estrogen development in your body. Luckily, for those who WANT to become more feminine, very very very few naturally occurring substances that you might eat can do this. Of course, in Drew Pattengales case, he was becoming more feminine, and wanted to stop it, so, he had to find something that could. The most powerful aromatase inhibitor, even more powerful than prescription drugs, is the bark of a phellodendron. The phellodendron genus of deciduous trees is common in the Far East, and is a known invasive species anywhere that deciduous trees can grow. The bark is used to treat all kinds of things in traditional Chinese medicine, so if you are female, or an MtF transsexual, you are strongly advised to be cautious of any herbal remedies claiming to be a traditional Chinese one! For the purposes of OYH, I'm going to claim that Drew was able to discover a large quantity of the trees on the apt complex property and has been harvesting the bark himself. Drew just recently harvested a large amount of it and... well, you'll just have to read and find out when I get there.

There's another way to manipulate your hormonal balance with what you eat as well. This is by eating things that directly act as though they are the desired hormone. These are known as phyto-hormones. Phyto means plant-based.

To boost your estrogen count, you can eat something with high phytoestrogens. Interestingly, for you drunks out there, alcoholic beverages, and beer especially, are known to be high in phytoestrogens... Now, I'm not telling you to go out and get drunk, obviously there are better ways. Soy. Soy is extremely high in phytoestrogens, and is also known to be the opposite of an aromatase inhibitor, it actually boosts your metabolism of aromatase... Which is good on two counts for women or MtF's, by keeping your unused aromatase low, you keep fat off better, and, by boosting your metabolism of aromatase more free testosterone becomes natural estrogen. For men who don't want to grow boobs... now you have a reason to tell your wife not to feed you those veggie-burgers anymore. ;)

For those curious about why beer is NOT a good way to feminize: #1: it'd take too much to be effective at changing your overall hormonal balance, #2: instead of being an aromatase booster, it's high in aromatase, and it acts as an aromatase inhibitor. Unused aromatase == fat, well, not exactly, but aromatase that isn't metabolized gets stored in your fat cells and actually makes them worse.

You can also eat things that boost your progesterone. Progesterone is a mood-altering hormone for both genders, and you ought to be careful with it, any excess gets converted to androgens, or cortisols, while you can notice significant improvement to your mood and slight improvement to your ability to concentrate. Or it can go opposite. There's really very few foods that can boost this, but one of the better ones is chasteberry. The fruit, obviously, not other parts of the plant. Chasteberry fruit, however, really really should be used with caution by any male who wants to remain male, it acts as a moderately strong 17,20-lyase inhibitor. While you can get estrogens from plants, you can't get testosterone from plants. Inhibiting your testosterone at that level can also cause full, irreversible, chemical castration if your organs go and stay dormant for too long. You can hope that the one remaining route to testosterone that remains open is enough to keep the organs from completely shutting down, but I don't think you'd want to risk it. (I'm told 6 months, but I'm not sure on the accuracy of that).

Anyways... about why I think this is all related to why I'm feminizing... I'm taking Saw Palmetto for male-pattern baldness, Chasteberry fruit for anti-depressant, and my diet is high in soy. Yeah... I'm hitting it big time.

To be honest, even though I do not believe myself to be transgender, I don't feel any NEED to be female rather than male, I'm not all that bothered by it, and now that I know my diet's likely to blame, and nothing in it is likely to cause me significant grief later in life, I don't honestly give a care.

It'll be interesting as my breasts continue to develop and my figure continues to feminize, finding clothes that fit decently without resorting to cross-dressing though... And I imagine my parents might take it poorly when it gets to the point that I -have- to start wearing a bra. Ah well, maybe I'll have my own place by then and if they want to get all pissy about it, they can just deal with me not wanting to be around them.

I suppose I could see about getting hold of some of that phellodendron bark and see if that helps to at least stem it, but I'm not sure I'd want to risk unused aromatase causing me problems.

Well, this has turned into a very very long explanation, I'm not sure I can even touch half of this in prose without making my readers go cross-eyed. So, when I do push out Chapter 4 of OYH, I will be putting asterisks next to all references to anything covered in this blog entry, and at the end of the chapter, where I've been shamelessly plugging my music, explaining a few extra tidbits, and shamelessly requesting feedback, I will put a link to this blog entry.

PLEASE REMEMBER THAT EXCEPT FOR SOY, ALL OF THESE THINGS CAN BE VERY VERY DANGEROUS IF USED IMPROPERLY. I SEVERELY RECOMMEND THAT YOU USE THIS INFORMATION AS A WARNING, AND NOT TRY TO INTENTIONALLY CHANGE YOUR BODY CHEMISTRY WITHOUT THE AID OF A SPECIALIST.

Kudos to anyone who actually managed to read this whole thing to this point. Thanks for giving me so much of your very valuable attention.

EDIT: Corrected the info on progestins, some additional information came to me that suggested my previous information was incomplete, in a bad way. Also, added a further warning, in all caps, near the end. In case someone forgot along the way.