The majority of women who suffer from endometriosis also suffer from estrogen dominance. That is they have more estrogen in their hormonal system then normal, much of it caused by outside environmental factors. This is concerning to medical researchers because estrogen is the primary hormone that causes endometrial cells to reproduce and grow. The more estrogen a woman with endometriosis has the greater the tissue growth will be.

One of the outside influences that scientists have studied is caffeine. What they have found that caffeine causes a rise in estrogen in nearly all women.

It was found in clinical studies that women who drank just one cup of coffee had higher estrogen levels then women who had no coffee. These studies also found that as the women drank more coffee their estrogen levels continued to rise to the point that women who drink four to five cups of coffee a day saw an estrogen increase of almost 70%. Those four to five cups equals around 500 mg of caffeine.

There are three different types of estrogen women produce; estrone, estriol, and estradiol. In further studies caffeine has been shown to increase the third one, estradiol, the highest. This is worrisome because it not only causes endometrial cell growth but high amounts of estradiol are known to cause some forms of cancer.

Caffeine is also known to affect other bodily organs in a negative manner. The one organ of the body that removes the bulk of any excess estrogen is the liver. Caffeine interferes with the livers ability to do this, causing a build up of estrogen. As you can see caffeine causes estrogen dominance in two ways, by causing the body to produce more and also preventing the liver from doing its job of removing any excess as well.

The female body also has a hormone called progesterone that naturally counteracts the affects of estrogen. The adrenal glands produce pregnenolone which in turn produces progesterone. Large doses of caffeine, which the vast majority of women and men consume, continually bombard the adrenals until they no longer function correctly causing adrenal fatigue. This naturally leads to a decrease in the production of progesterone and over 50 other important hormones. With nothing to buffer it estrogen continues to build up.

This whole cycle caused by caffeine leads to estrogen dominance. This excess estrogen intensifies the growth rate of endometriosis and contributes to the many symptoms women with this condition suffer from such as fatigue, bloating, back and neck pain, and depression.

The first step to reducing estrogen dominance is to stop the consumption of caffeine in all its forms. Caffeine not only makes endometriosis and its symptoms much worse but it also negatively affects the body’s ability to deal with excess estrogen and the affects it has.