Our personalities and the way we look at and perceive our lives are all tied to our hormones. When we are young and full of hormones, we are interested in sex — it’s Mother Nature’s way of making sure we perpetuate our species.

We live our lives with the ebb and flow of our menstrual cycles. Our moods are ruled by the “time of the month.” We’re usually in a great mood after our periods end. That’s when we are heading toward the middle of our menstrual cycle, when ovulation occurs and our bodies become ready to get pregnant. If we get pregnant, that good mood continues. If we don’t, our mood starts to slip as we head into the last two weeks of our cycle, when the loss of hormones leaves us depleted, bloated, sad, irritable, craving salt and sugar, and putting on five pounds of water around our waist.

Then, just when we are almost ready to bite someone’s head off, we get our period. We become docile and gentle and the cycle starts again. It is the ebb and flow of estrogen and progesterone that keeps these cyclical changes in place and leaves us fluctuating when it comes to mood, bloating, weight gain, and our overall sense of well-being.

As we age, we enter perimenopause and menopause, the time when our hormone production starts to diminish and eventually ceases. This process leaves us bereft of hormones and makes us feel like we are staring at a stranger in the mirror.

At this stage, low levels of estrogen and progesterone remain throughout the month, and we no longer define ourselves by the time of the month, pregnancy, or childrearing. The loss of hormones is the beginning of the downhill slide that is aging.

Fortunately, we can supplement the loss of hormones with pharmaceutical versions made to look identical to the hormones we make during our youth. These formulations of estradiol, progesterone, and testosterone are available in creams, tablets, troches, pellets, and patches, and they are found at the drugstore by prescription and in specialty compounding pharmacies.

The key to success in getting your hormones back in balance to where they were in your late 30s and early 40s is to find a truly knowledgeable physician who has experience with the use of these hormones (also known as bioidentical hormones). Find a doctor who cares about you, listens to you, and focuses on working with you to find the ideal balance in your life.