Welcome to OBGYN Champs, the show where no question is off limits. Join host Morgan Allen and board-certified OB/GYN Dr. Suny Caminero, MD, as they tackle the topics women are often too embarrassed, afraid, or unsure to ask about. From hormones, menopause, and sexual wellness to pregnancy, pelvic health, cosmetic gynecology, and everything in between, each episode delivers honest conversations, expert advice, and practical insights to help women take control of their health with confidence.
Whether you’re in your 20s, navigating motherhood, approaching menopause, or simply looking for trustworthy answers, OBGYN Champs is your place for real talk, myth-busting, and empowering education. Tune in, ask your questions, and join the conversation because your health deserves to be talked about.
Dr. Suny Caminero, MD, OB/GYN
Founder of Cosmetic Gynecology Florida
Website Address: https://cosmeticgynecologyfl.com/
Can a woman’s hormones change so dramatically that she can barely recognize herself physically or emotionally?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Yes. And that is one of the things I hear about the most. I am not myself. This is not me. That is just it’s almost 99% of women when they come in. I expect that if they’re coming in for a hormone consultation, that they’re going to tell you that it is that common. This is not me. I’m not myself. I don’t know where she went, essentially.
And so hormones can change drastically, not just in perimenopause, but it can change when you’re a teenager. Hormones are the really they’re incredible, right? They’re just like chemical messengers that the body has that signal the body to do different things. And if you don’t have them, then that doesn’t work anymore.
And the ovary is such an incredible organ. Like, thank God we have ovaries. But it’s such an incredible organ and it does so many things. It has so many hormones. And the three, one of the three biggest hormones that the ovaries produce is the estrogen, testosterone and progesterone. And so those three hormones, just those three home runs in conjunction with a whole lot of hormones in the body, just kind of dance well together. Right. And when one of them or two of them or three of them in a case of menopause are no longer present, you have side effects from it.
When you’re having periods for for women who have, like, premenstrual disorder and their hormones are just so out of you’re just so erratic the way that it goes up and down, you have symptoms. If you if you have if you on birth control oral pills, for example in your testosterone zero well you have symptoms. So there’s so many things that can affect hormone not just perimenopause and menopause. Pregnancy is a big one right. So pregnancy your hormones go so high and you actually feel amazing like in pregnancy.
So many women who normally have headaches now they don’t have headaches in pregnancy because their estrogen is high. You get this. Although you’re nervous in pregnancy, you get this calmness because your progesterone is super high at the time. And then once a woman delivers, those hormones just crash. I mean, literally crash. And you have all the symptoms, and then you have to take care of a baby at the same time that you have all these symptoms.
Morgan Allen: So it causes like, not PTSD.
Is that what causes like that mild depression? After pregnancy?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Depression, it’s related to cortisol. Is related to estrogens related to progesterone. Yes. Yes. Exactly. So hormones are just so important. And it’s hard to talk about hormones in a, you know, ten minute, 15 minute kind of that’s a whole like field of hormones.
But hormones are good. And I want people to know that hormones are not bad for you. Like they’re not your body. It doesn’t make evolutionary sense that your body will make a hormone that is bad for you, right? And so all of these, these talks that hormones be careful because hormones cause breast cancer. It really that is that is not the case. If you if your own estrogen progesterone distortion is going to cost breast cancer, it would have happened when you were a teenager when you were really high. When you’re pregnant is even higher.
So I don’t want women to be scared of hormones. Now, whenever you’re dealing with hormones, you have to be careful, right? Because if you’re it’s like where you’re analogy with cooking, you’re putting all these ingredients together. Do I put a little bit here, a little bit of that. Well there’s art to that definitely. So you don’t want to put too much. You don’t want to put to little. They have to kind of dance together. Well. But not not to be scared that if you, if you’re taking hormones, if you’re taking bioidentical hormones, that you’re going to get breast cancer because you are on grounds that makes sense.
Morgan Allen:
What about women with PMOs or endometriosis that could affect the ovaries.
Does that create hormone changes?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
100%. Yes. Endometriosis in particular because endometriosis is such an inflammatory condition that it’s like the ovary is exposed to war, essentially. And so the ovary is in this inflammatory state and ages the ovary much faster as it ages the ovary much faster. That’s where part of infertility comes from. That and part of, going into premature menopause come from that because the ovary age is faster because of that inflammatory response from from endometriosis.
Morgan Allen:
Oh, wow.
And then I wanted to circle back a little bit to the pregnancy hormones. You said there’s a time when they’re flying high. When is that?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
The minute you get pregnant, those hormones are going up and up and up and up and up. Yes, yes. They’re there. The progesterone and the estrogen are going up. Progesterone is very, very, very important, particularly in the first trimester.
Some women, as your ovary ages, you’ve heard of, you know, if you’re 35 and older, then your advanced maternal age, your risk of miscarriage goes higher. Part of that is because your ovary has aged more and now it doesn’t produce enough progesterone. That’s part of that. Okay. And so progesterone is really needed for that first trimester to maintain a pregnancy.
If the progesterone drops and then then you lose a pregnancy essentially. And so some women actually have to be on progesterone in the first trimester, particularly if they’re over 35, to make sure that they it maintains the pregnancy, that is, that they don’t lose it. So by the way, something interesting is when you’re having a period, let’s say that you have, you know, a period every single month, right? Right before your period, your progesterone drops like your ovary goes, oh, we’re not pregnant. I don’t need to give you progesterone anymore. And so it drops that progesterone that is the signal to the body to have a period. That is what tells you about how a period the progesterone dropped.
Morgan Allen:
Oh, okay. Okay. That’s what it is.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
It starts it starts all over. Then you start the it starts to flow, and then you start to make a little follicle that will become the that’s the egg essentially. And those hormones starts to go up in pregnancy. Now you want to keep that high progesterone level. You want to keep that high estrogen level. And it just stays through that brain and see okay
Morgan Allen:
And then you mentioned like the progesterone it creates this like calm sensation. Now is that in alignment with like pregnancy brain. Because you’re almost like two calm that you only think about like one thing at a time and then you’re in la la land. Just curious.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Not necessarily. Progesterone doesn’t do any doesn’t do the pregnancy brain progesterone is a really calming and help you sleep type of hormone. Okay. Progesterone is the one that starts to really decrease at 35. And then once you hit like 40 is when women are like, I can’t sleep. I’m anxious about everything. Things are causing me to be anxious. That I typically am not anxious about that. Is that progesterone that has dropped when it comes to the pregnancy brain? Your body is doing so much in pregnancy to include increasing the amount of blood flow that you have in your body, right? So increases by 50%. Like it’s a huge amount of blood that has to circulate through your entire body. And all that function takes a lot of energy. Your brain is working really hard. So is the rest of your body okay.
Can hear modal changes actually affect your hair, skin and body smell?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
100%. Yes. 100%. Yes. Yes, yes. Estrogen completely needed for your hair. Yeah. Okay. So again, as we start to hit perimenopause, you start to thin hair and then you start to lose hair that it’s really estrogen. High levels of testosterone will also make you lose hair.
Morgan Allen:
Okay. For just thought it would make you gain hair.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
In the wrong places. You get hair. Here, here. What we call male pattern. Hair in areas that are more male pattern for women. But you lose it from your head. High levels of testosterone
Morgan Allen:
And and I know, I don’t know, I don’t want to go. I want to go down rabbit holes left and right with, like, deodorants and things. Because. Deodorant. I feel like I have to change a deodorant every six months because my body gets used to it. I don’t know if that’s a hormone thing or what.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Part of it can be hormonal. And part of it is, is that your body? The hormones are not something that just, like, are staying stable. Like they’re going up and down and up and down, depending on whether you’re going to ovulate or you’re going to have a period, they’re going up and down. And so your body odor changes based on this up and down. For some women it doesn’t. Some women. Some women don’t use deodorant believe it or not I would love for that to be my case but it’s not.
Everybody is different at the levels of hormone that their body lives with genetically. And then everybody’s different at how high it goes and how bad it drops. Interesting. Every woman is different.
Morgan Allen:
Wow. How cool would it be to know your body so well? But like I know, month or week one of my period I use this deodorant, then week three I use this deodorant.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Some women are very, very in tune.
Morgan Allen: Yeah, very in tune. Yeah, I love it. Okay.
Is it possible for a woman to have normal hormone blood work but still experience these hormonal symptoms?
Dr. Suny Caminero: Yes, yes.
Morgan Allen: Tell me a little bit about that.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
So normal is the range is for normal are so wide okay that you can like for normal estrogen from 50 to 450. Well if you fit in any of that category is considered normal. Well, but if you’re at 50 and you feel terrible in your symptoms, are telling you that it’s a low estrogen, then yes, you’re having symptoms because even though you’re not normal range, that is not where you feel the best you have.
50 is not what you feel the best, and maybe 100 where you feel the best, or 150 where you feel the best. So yes, your labs can be normal and that happens to them in a lot where it’s like I’m having all these symptoms. Am I going crazy? My labs are all normal. Well, the labs are in the normal range. It does not mean that they are optimal for you.
Morgan Allen:
Really? And is that like a genetic thing that it could.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Yes yes yes yes definitely. Every woman is different.
Morgan Allen:
Yeah okay. Interesting.
So can your hormones make you feel hungry all the time or cause intense cravings even when you’re eating enough.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
The body is amazing. It is amazing. You know how you get really hungry right before your period and, and during a period, you just want to eat carbs, right? Well, you’re shedding the lining of the uterus, so there’s a process that’s happening. You’re shedding and you’re losing. You’re losing sugar essentially with your blood cells. And now you also have to heal the lining of the uterus again. And so the body wants energy. Wow. And with that energy comes like okay, start eating because I need energy. I need more sugar is what it’s asking. You don’t necessarily need all that sugar because we overeat sugar for sure, but it is about me saying it needs it needs the energy.
Morgan Allen:
Interesting. Yeah, because I love me some dark chocolate.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Yes, dark chocolate is great it actually is good. It’s it’s the other stuff like the, the the 70, 80, 90% cacao is those are that’s actually not bad for you. But the other stuff with the sugar added and highly processed just not good for you.
Morgan Allen:
Yeah. Okay.
If you’re eating those things can it can not affect your hormones. Like if you’re eating a certain diet. Does that affect hormones.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Yes. Oh yes. Yes. Because if you eat a lot of sugar now you increase your insulin. And insulin is really not a bad hormone, but it’s a hormone that you don’t want it to be too high, because that hormone affects all the rest of your hormones in the body, including your ovulation hormones.
Morgan Allen:
So yes. And then how does that lead to diabetes?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Insulin resistance. Exactly. Insulin resistance. So the insulin comes out because it wants the body wants to get rid of all that sugar that you just gave it. It wants to take it out of your blood system. So insulin goes in, get it out of the blood system and it goes into the cell.
So. There’s a receptor in the cells that then sugar comes into the cells to get it out of your blood system out of your highway okay. And so that comes in. And now you eat another sugary thing. Insulin comes out again. And now this is like I have no more receptors for you. Like I have nowhere else to put the sugar.
And that’s that insulin resistance when it goes up. And then it becomes diabetes because you now you have damages to, to to sometimes for your system just from having all that sugar exposure and sugar is very inflammatory.
Morgan Allen:
If you could see my mind just being blown right now, like I am a common person, I don’t know all of these things and I feel like I’m learning so much. This is so cool.
It’s it’s really crazy how the body weight, it’s what else?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
What am I going to have? There’s all this stuff I know not
Morgan Allen:
Today’s more more than hormones. It’s rabbit hole. Because there’s so much that goes into this.
So there’s a lot of buzz around bio identical hormones. Are they actually safer or better than traditional hormone therapy?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
So, traditional when you, when you say traditional meaning like the old ways that we used to do hormone therapy. So the old ways we used to the do hormone therapy was mostly from, believe it or not, horse pee. Yes. So we got horse pee estrogen, which had tons of different estrogens, not just the type of it from either horse.
Morgan Allen:
Was it just the woman horse?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
I believe it was from a lady horse. Great question though it would have to be right. And and then get the estrogens from there. And then we would use that for women. Now, they’re able to make bioidentical hormones, meaning the hormone is exactly same chemical composition as what you’re ovary produces. And they often get it from yams.
And so that that estrogen or estradiol in particular is very different than the horse pea estrogen. And the studies that had been done before was on that horse pee estrogen essentially, versus what we now have, which is the bioidentical, which it is natural to the body. Right. It’s in the sense that because the body recognizes it as if it hadn’t made it on it on its own, not as a foreign type of estrogen.
Morgan Allen:
Wow. So yams the ones that grow in the ground?
Dr. Suny Caminero
Yes like the ones you eat
Morgan Allen:
Yeah, that’s really cool.
Now, can hormone therapy help prevent long term health problems like bone loss? Or is it primarily about relieving symptoms?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
It can definitely help prevent now right. Right now the recommendations are not to give hormones to prevent which I just think it’s not necessarily good. Okay. But hormones do prevent it prevents, recurrent urinary tract infections for women. It prevents the the dryness of the vagina. It prevents the the issues with the pelvic floor, your muscles and women who has gone through menopause and is still exercising knows that they’re not getting the response that they used to get from exercise. And that’s because of hormones.
Hormones are the the brain, also the brain fog that you get based on having less estrogen and less testosterone. So hormones are really if you start hormones early on when you first start having symptoms okay. And you maintain it, you will prevent disease versus having to treat it once the disease is already there. Hormones are not so good at treating. You’re much better at prevention.
Morgan Allen:
Interesting. Okay. Yeah.
Is there a age that you would say all women should get their hormones checked, like 45?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Right now. Well, if you’re having symptoms, you should get your hormones checked because there are women that have premature failure, meaning the ovaries actually fail in this typically genetic, they fail at 25, 28. And so they’re having symptoms and they, they they go and get checked and well you’re fine. Well nobody checks hormones at 28. But they’re having symptoms. And anybody who has had prematurity and family knows exactly what I’m talking about, because they’re so frustrated that nobody checked their hormones to see what was happening.
So if you’re having symptoms, it can’t just be like the typical regular lab work that gives you 2 or 3 numbers. You have to have a more a more comprehensive panel in that comprehensive panel should be hormone test.
Morgan Allen:
Yes. Okay. And so say, you know, a 25 year old realizes, you know, life’s a little different. She tries to fix it on her own.
What are some of the common issues with like, DIY hormones and trying to fix it yourself?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
There’s no such thing.
Morgan Allen:
Oh, okay.
Dr. Suny Caminero:
No. Yeah. There’s no DIY, only because yeah hormones are great but but they’re they can be very dangerous. Like if you do it wrong you can be salt as dangerous if you do it wrong. Yeah. You know, so it’s so you wouldn’t you wouldn’t necessarily kind of fix that yourself now. Lifestyle changes all day long. Like you, you should always have the the healthy lifestyle changes.
Eat less sugar, exercise. Run. Do you know weight bearing exercises, lift weights, all that. Avoid toxins. Like, as much as you can’t possibly avoid everything, but avoid as much toxins as you can. So always start with that. And then you’re still having issues. Just definitely go get it checked by a professional.
Morgan Allen:
Like, I thought it was like a black market for hormones. Is there is a black market?
Dr. Suny Caminero:
Yes there is which is terrible. Yeah, it’s really terrible. But, you know, part of it is that, we haven’t we haven’t provided women that answers that they, that they need. And so they’re going outside of medicine to try to get to the black market to get hormones, which it’s really sad that that should not be the case, really.
And then I think that we have come a long way. Meaning that we’re not back in the 2000, 2005 was like, everybody come off hormone, they’re there cause cancer, all that kind of stuff. Like, we’ve come a long way and not long enough, actually. Really not long enough. But we’ve come a long way.
My fear is that there’s so many women that can be doing hormones the wrong way, that it’s going to give hormones a bad name again because of being doing it wrong. And it’s the same thing. It’s if you if you if you have too much salt, you’re going to die of too much salt. Right. But salt is not necessarily bad for you, right? If you do it right.
