For women, estrogen alone is not enough. In order to be a mother, there must be another hormone, which is the progesterone that we are very familiar with.
The fetus spends the first 10 months of its life in the mother’s womb. These 10 months are a very critical initial stage of life, where primitive cells undergo extremely complex physiological changes. The uterus The environment must support and ensure that this process proceeds absolutely safely and smoothly without any mistakes! To ensure this, it depends on sufficient amounts of estrogen and progesterone!
Let’s first understand how the uterine environment is formed. As the follicles develop, estrogen gradually increases, and the endometrial basal layer cells proliferate to repair the wounds after the endometrial peeling, and then continue to proliferate and thicken. Generally, the endometrial thickness can reach about 8 mm 3 days before ovulation. It reached 8.5 mm in 2 days and about 9 mm in the previous day. In the second half of menstruation, progesterone appears, causing the endometrium to continue to thicken, the endometrial glands to become longer, and the flexion to become more obvious. Glycogen-containing vesicles begin to appear under the nuclei of epithelial cells, interstitial edema occurs, spiral arterioles continue to proliferate, and intracellular glycogen overflows into the glands. At this time, the intima thickness can reach more than 10 mm. The main function of progesterone during this period is to cause the basic substances in the interstitium to lose their viscosity, increase the permeability of blood vessels, and allow nutrients and metabolites to communicate freely between cells and blood vessels. In this way, the endometrium can receive adequate nutrition and prepare for the implantation and development of the fertilized egg.
Progesterone works on the basis of estrogen. For example, estrogen provides a high-quality rough house, and then progesterone exquisitely decorates the rough house.
Many sisters have experience in purchasing off-plan houses. After signing the contract and paying the deposit, both parties will agree on a delivery date. Before the house is handed over, the builder\’s construction team is working there. Once the house is completed, the real estate developer hands you the keys to the house. Handing over the keys is a critical day. From then on, you have sovereignty over the rough house. Next, everyone usually renovates the rough house, so the decoration construction team entered the rough house. Correspondingly, before ovulation, only increasing estrogen works hard to create a basic endometrial thickness and promote follicle development in the uterus. Ovulation is a critical day. After ovulation, progesterone appears, which further thickens and improves the endometrium.
For the house we bought, decoration is a once and for all thing. If you don\’t move in immediately, leave it empty, thinkYou can move in anytime. But the environment of the uterus is different. If no fertilized eggs are implanted that month, the hard-built endometrium will be destroyed and rebuilt in the next cycle, and the cycle will repeat.
Why is this? It turns out that in order to prevent bacteria from traveling up through the cervix and damaging the embryo, progesterone tightly blocks the cervix. However, since it can prevent bacteria, it can also block the entry of sperm, preventing a large number of sperm from passing through the channel to combine with the egg again. If no fertilized egg is implanted, progesterone can only remove this line of defense. As mentioned above, the withdrawal of progesterone drives the estrogen to decline together. As a result, the endometrium loses hormonal support, shrinks and falls off, forming a very regular physiological phenomenon for women – menstruation once a month.
The withdrawal of progesterone drives the estrogen to decrease together, forming regular menstruation for women. Therefore, regular menstruation usually means ovulation.
If only estrogen were present, women’s menstruation would become unpredictable! Without the antagonism of progesterone, the long-term stimulation of the uterus by estrogen will firstly lead to the risk of excessive endometrial hyperplasia; secondly, because estrogen only fluctuates and does not retreat regularly, the endometrium will continue to shed as it fluctuates. and repair crossover phenomenon, causing irregular uterine bleeding. So when your menstrual cycle is disordered, sometimes heavy bleeding, sometimes amenorrhea, you should think that this is probably a type of anovulatory menstruation that is only affected by estrogen!
Some sisters believe that as long as there is menstruation, there must be ovulation. This is a misunderstanding. Now everyone should know that there are differences between them for the same bleeding phenomenon.
When you arrive at the day when your period is supposed to come, but it still doesn’t come, doctors’ normal practice is to inject you with progesterone (progesterone) to cause the uterus to change its secretory phase. Days, when progesterone withdraws, menstruation begins.
Progesterone is indispensable. Before pregnancy, due to the antagonism of progesterone, excessive hyperplasia caused by long-term stimulation of the endometrium by estrogen is avoided; due to the withdrawal of progesterone, the formation of female Regular menstruation; due to the action of progesterone, the endometrium undergoes secretory phase changes, establishing a suitable environment for the fertilized egg to implant; progesterone also seals the channel so that bacteria cannot harm the embryo. After pregnancy, progesterone plays a more important role. Without it, there is a risk of miscarriage or fetal arrest.
Progesterone is secreted by the corpus luteum, which appears once a month in the ovaries. The corpus luteum is actually just a piece of tissue in the ovaries that usually appears once a month; however, it may not appear at all.
Even if the corpus luteum appears, it will only exist for 14 days, or 16 days at most, and will eventually turn into a corpus alba and die. By the next month, another corpus luteum will appear in the body, and after a certain number of days it will die again, and the cycle begins again.
So, strictly speaking, progesterone is not secreted by a permanent functional department such as the ovary.It is just a temporary organization formed temporarily to complete a specific task.
Since the corpus luteum is only a temporary institution, we have to face many problems it brings. Any organization that is temporarily established will face such a problem – instability, including instability in ability, instability in work attitude, etc. In our daily work, we know that if the temporarily transferred personnel have strong working ability and are dedicated, they will be able to achieve results; but if the temporarily transferred personnel have poor working ability and are not serious about their work, they will only be able to become a monk for a day. If you have the mentality of beating the clock, the situation will be bad.
The same goes for the corpus luteum when it comes to conceiving a baby.
The corpus luteum is a temporary tissue formed in the ovary. The corpus luteum tissue formed every month is different, so even if the corpus luteum function is very strong this month, it does not mean that the corpus luteum function will be equally strong the next month.
So, if you test the body temperature curves for several months in a row, you will find that almost no two months of curves are exactly the same, and sometimes they are even very different. Many people do not understand this result, but now that we know the characteristics of the corpus luteum formation every month, I think everyone will not find it strange.
Now, I provide some progesterone data, which can be used to interpret the endocrine status and avoid falling into blindness:
◎ The serum progesterone level in the luteal phase is less than 3ng/ ml, indicating that there is no ovulation, there is no possibility of pregnancy, and endocrine abnormalities;
◎ Serum progesterone level is lower than 10ng/ml, which strongly supports luteal phase defect (luteal insufficiency) and poor endocrine;
◎ When HCG is measured and the progesterone level is less than 5ng/ml, the embryo must be an abnormal embryo. At this time, intrauterine pregnancy or ectopic pregnancy should be identified;
◎ When HCG is measured, the progesterone level is less than 5ng/ml. At the same time as HCG, if the progesterone level is less than 10mg/ml, you should immediately take measures to protect the fetus;
◎ At the same time as HCG is measured, in the state of natural pregnancy, the progesterone level is higher than 20ng/ml. ml, it will naturally rule out ectopic pregnancy;
◎ Before 7 weeks of pregnancy, it is normal for progesterone to fluctuate between 18 and 32ng/ml (average 24ng/ml). Of course, higher is better than lower!
This article is provided by Baidu Reading and is excerpted from \”Pregnancy Can Be Simple\” Author: Feifei Mom