By Todd Lee M.D.

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Estrogen

We all know that estrogen is important for having good cardiovascular health. It's associated with lower blood pressure and better cholesterol profiles. It is also known for preserving bone in postmenopausal women. What may be news to you is this bone preservation is secondary to estrogen preserving the muscle!  Post-pmenupausal women lose muscle without hormone replacement therapy.  As the muscle decreases the bones get softer because there is no structural need to withstand the forces of the now smaller muscles.   So if it preserves muscle...

Estrogen Can Build Muscle

I'm totally serious, it can and here's how.  There are 2 estrogen receptors: ER-alpha and ER-beta.  After muscle damaging exercise, rats were injected with estradiol. I am shocked to report that satellite cells were recruited upon ER-alpha binding and IGF-1 levels increased after ER-beta binding.  This means estrogen acts on its own receptor in tandem with testosterone to synergistically facilitate cell growth and splitting. In other words, estrogen gets you more muscle cells and makes the ones you have bigger.

Additionally, in an unknown mechanism, estrogen helps reduce inflammation to damaged muscles. Another interesting finding was that the absence of ER - alpha resulted in less GLUT4 expression. GLUT4 is the glucose transporter found in muscle which is expressed after the activation of the insulin receptor.  This means estrogen helps shuttle in nutrients to the muscle for growth by helping insulin do it's job.  Along with its direct signaling for muscle growth and it driving nutrients into the cells, estrogen as we know is a 'wet' hormone. It causes your body weight to rise as you hold on to more water.

What this means for muscle growth is more intramuscular water stretches the fascia that surrounds the muscle, making your pumps greater and increasing the capacity of the muscle to hold that pump. More pump, bigger muscle.

This makes sense if you look at the bro science.  Wet steroids like testosterone and deca help you put on more muscle than the dryer variants that don’t aromatize, especially the super wet orals like D-bol and MENT. But the 17 methylated orals are bad for you right? 

Birth Control Pills Are Steroids

Now, for all you ladies reading this, before you try to get your hands on some estrogen to grow bigger muscles, don’t bother. You’re probably already on them. And not just any steroids, methylated ones. The absolutely most toxic steroid class.

I love telling this to women when they look down their noses at men who use steroids. I simply point out, “If you're taking birth control you are using steroids and very unhealthy/toxic ones at that.  What you take is much worse for you than men who inject testosterone or other anabolic steroids.”  It amazes me how ignorant and judgmental attitudes go hand in hand like Weight Watchers and 24 point ice cream sundaes. You know all those health risks with postmenopausal hormone replacement therapy? Blood clots? Stroke? Those are all due to the methylated estrogen birth control pills doctors put female patients on! 

Disclaimer

Nothing in this article or on this site should be considered medical advice or as an endorsement to violate any law of the country in which you reside.  The information given is for fun and entertainment purposes only.  All claims are 100% dependent upon proper diet and exercise.  Please consult a medical practitioner prior to any diet and exercise program.

References 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22278942 http://www.pnas.org/content/103/5/1605.short http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S8756328297002238