Your Stomach, Estrogen and Detox....

Did you know your stomach produces estrogen that your liver uses for detox? In both genders?

Nov 27, 2022

Estrogen is the oldest hormone on the planet.

She was the first.

She was the “Eve” of hormones.

As I wrote in Sexy Brain, the first to exist was the receptor. Not yet the hormone. Estradiol is so complex, it would take an evolutionary while for estradiol to be made on this planet.

But something had to signal this first estrogen receptor.

But keep in mind, first was this estrogen receptor.

But a hormone has to dock into the receptor for signaling to unfold. For genes to be told how to signal life.

Hormone signaling is at its most basic, a two-part act. A hormone, called the ligand, has to nestle on in, or dock, into a receptor. So you need both a hormone and a receptor.

However, first, was 'only' the lonely estrogen receptor. Looking around for a hormone.

Or… something... to signal it.

Dr. Michael Baker is the world’s expert on estrogen. Dr. Baker was my consultant for Sexy Brain.

Dr. Baker says his decades of research show that what first docked into the estrogen receptor, was a piece of a male hormone, a male hormone segment, a 3-beta-diol.

So, from the very beginning, femaleness needed maleness.

This "gender dance" is real and biologically hard-wired into our physiology, as well as our psyche. No matter what "gender bending" comes down the pike.

Estrogen, being historically so intertwined with our biological evolution, has so much more to do inside our bodies than merely reproduction and sexy things. In both genders.

Did you know that parietal cells, that make stomach acid and initiate the whole “flow” of digestion, also produce estradiol? As much as the ovaries! In both genders.

From the stomach, this “gastric produced estrogen” is shunted to the liver.

In the liver, this gastric estrogen's job is to help the P450 detox system work efficiently.

Thus, we, both genders, require estrogen to detox many molecules from hormones to toxicants to medications.

This production in the parietal cells is done with aromatase enzymes. So being on aromatase blockers for extended periods blocks this detox support. Women or males on these meds really need Receptor Detox and Hormone Balance and Protect, (my opinion).

I also wonder and worry if this gastric production of estrogen needs proton pumps to do its work. In sleuthing the science, it seems so. This suggests that proton pump inhibitors, PPIs, would block this stomach production of estrogen.

Most doctors have no idea about this parietal cell-estrogen-liver-detox-axis.

Aromatase is the enzyme responsible for conversion of C19 androgenic steroids to the corresponding estrogens: a reaction known as aromatization.

In systemic circulation, the main source of 17β-estradiol, an estrogen, is the ovary in women, and fat cells and circulating pieces of contributing lipids, in gentlemen.

Japanese investigational reports have shown that gastric parietal cells synthesize stunningly “large” amounts of estrogens into the portal vein in both male and female rats.

In fact, there are many estrogen-producing cells in the stomach of both younger and older participants of men and women.

In new research from Japanese medical anatomy departments, they have reproducibly shown that in postnatal development, gastric aromatase increases gradually from 20 days after birth.

This production of estrogen from the parietal cells starts right out at birth, it is so critical.

They suggest that gastric 17β-estradiol might contribute to liver growth.

Throughout life, estrogen and the liver have an intimate relationship.

Perhaps the troubling high incidence of fatty liver, 1 out of every 3 adult Americans, may be partially due to endocrine disruptors blocking healthy estrogen action.

An old article I found from the 1930’s but so well done, tracked stomach acid in pregnant mom’s and found that they became more and more deficient as the pregnancy unfolded. They also suggested that the stomach acid was being used to help with organogenesis (the producing of organs).

The regulation of gastric 17β-estradiol differs from that of other gastric endocrine systems and gastric acid secretion.

Although ovarian estrogen fluctuates, “gastric 17β-estradiol synthesis remains stable” during the estrus cycle.

And in males!

Hormones are politically correct in that both genders need all hormones. Just in different amounts.

The synthesis of gastric 17β-estradiol is independent of the regulatory system of the ovary.

The circadian rhythm of the arterial estradiol level depends on the hepatic estrogen receptor alpha expression, and also on the concentration of gastric 17β-estradiol in the portal vein.

The gut-portal vein-estradiol level is synchronized with arterial concentration throughout the day.

Fatty liver epidemic is even on the rise even in our youth.

It is caused by experimental and pathological issues, such as portal vein ligation, partial hepatectomy, and bile duct ligation, let alone abusing alcohol and eating processed foods, high fructose corn syrup, etc..

This causes gastric estrogen to flood into the systemic circulation. Instead of going to the liver. This may be contributing to lower T levels in males as well as estrogen dominant diseases in females.

This is fascinating. This unappreciated (yet again) role of estrogen.

Estrogen, it turns out, is a critical link between the cells that make stomach acid, the amazing parietal cells, and their intimate role in liver and stomach health. As well as detox. In both genders.

All this is being referred to scientifically as the “estrogen gastro-hepatic axis”.

Hormones are a rabbit hole in medicine. So much of what they do is kept way down deep. In the dark.

I try to shed some light.

Dr. B.

Agile Thinking

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