testosterone is the primary male sex hormone that's absolutely crucial for things like building muscle mass strengthening our bones improving our memory and mood and of course increasing our sex drive and libido and while certain foods like oysters pomegranates and ginger can all help boost testosterone there are also certain foods that will hurt your body's ability to effectively produce testosterone and consistently eating these foods over time can even lower your testosterone levels and low testosterone can lead to a chain of negative side effects including a loss of muscle mass insomnia increased body fat depression and of
course low sex drive so today I want to go over seven foods that can hurt your testosterone levels based on scientific evidence starting first with flax seeds now I know that flax seed products have gained a lot of popularity over the last few years and some have even called them a superfood however even though flax seeds are very high in fiber and ala omega-3 fatty acids flax seeds aren't that great for optimizing male hormonal health mostly because they're loaded with lignans in fact they're the world's richest source of lignans flax seeds contain about 75 to
eight hundred times more lignans than most grains legumes fruits and vegetables now this can be a problem for two reasons first is that lignans are highly estrogenic in other words they increase levels of the female sex hormone estrogen second is that lignans increased levels of sex hormone binding globulin or SHBG now this may sound like a good thing but this hormone binds to free testosterone molecules rendering them inactive so the testosterone won't be able to be used for other beneficial hormonal functions we can see the direct adverse effects of flax seeds in a number of
studies for example just two tablespoons of flax seeds were given to 40 male participants for only a month and their testosterone levels drop by around 10 percent and another very small but also very interesting study a woman who had high testosterone levels was also experiencing excessive facial hair growth so to combat that researchers told her to eat 30 grams of flax seeds per day for four months after doing that her serum testosterone levels dropped by 70% and her free testosterone dropped by 18 9% in another study two tablespoons of flax seeds per day dropped total
testosterone and men by around 15% and free testosterone by 20% however it's important for me to mention that the participants were also told not to get more than 20% of their daily energy intake from fat and a low-fat diet could have contributed to a reduction in testosterone levels as well in either case if you want to maximize your testosterone levels you're better off going with other sources of omega-3 fatty acids like salmon fresh sardines and walnuts let's move on to cooking oils that are high in polyunsaturated fatty acids these include things like soybean oil vegetable
oil corn oil sunflower oil and margarine just to name a few most cooking oils used today are processed so many times they go through either bleaching D gumming or deodorizing couple this with the fact that these oils aren't that great for high-temperature cooking and you'll see why they're not exactly the best choice for your health but even if you don't use them for cooking their high content of specifically omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids hurt the production of testosterone this is because most people nowadays already get way too much omega-6 S and way too little omega-3s not
only does this create inflammation throughout the body and increase your risk of various chronic diseases but a high omega-6 polyunsaturated fat intake may lower testosterone in a study where researchers looked at how different nutrients influenced hormonal health they found that the more dietary fat the participants ate the higher their testosterone was and looking more closely this was found to be true for their saturated fat intake as well as their monounsaturated fat intake however the results were the exact opposite for polyunsaturated fats the more polyunsaturated fat that the participants ate in relation to their saturated fat
intake the lower their testosterone levels dropped so if you're looking for a plant-based oil that's healthier for your testosterone levels check out olive oil avocado oil and coconut oil next up is mint that's right while herbs from the mint family like spearmint and peppermint smell great they're not that great for testosterone at least that's what the rat studies and a very small human study indicates in the rodent study the rats were divided into four groups the control group received regular drinking water group number two received 20 grams of peppermint tea and group number three received
20 grams of spearmint tea finally the last group received double so 40 grams of spearmint tea in the end the rats that received 20 grams of the peppermint tea had a 25% reduction in testosterone group number three that received 20 grams of spearmint tea had a sixty nine percent reduction in testosterone and finally the last group that had 40 grams so double the spearmint tea experienced one hundred twenty three percent lower testosterone levels according to this study spearmint lower testosterone significantly more than peppermint and another rat study also found that spearmint drastically reduced testosterone in
rats the researchers from this study said that it was likely because spearmint and possibly meant in general causes oxidative stress in the hypothalamus resulting in reduced testosterone synthesis in the testes unfortunately there are no large studies on how mint influences male humans however research does indicate that spearmint can lower testosterone in women that have elevated androgen levels which caused them to suffer from excessive facial hair growth in one study 42 women drank spearmint tea two times a day for 30 days and as a result both free and total testosterone levels dropped significantly now unless you're
a woman who suffers from elevated testosterone levels or unless you're a male rat we can't say for sure that similar effects apply to men until we have further research but this data is definitely something to keep in mind next we have alcohol which will not only lead to a terrible hangover but can also cause a reduction in testosterone levels there are many rodent studies that show that alcohol reduces testosterone in a dose-dependent manner which means the more you take in the more it affects your testosterone when it comes to human studies there's also a strong
link between a heavy alcohol intake and reduced testosterone levels but luckily there is some good news when it comes to drinking alcohol low alcohol intakes don't have all that much of an effect on testosterone in fact one of the studies on alcohol found that drinking about half a gram alcohol per kilogram of body weight or about a quarter of a gram of alcohol per pound of body weight this was able to slightly increase testosterone for most people this would be about two to three drinks however other studies show that even small amounts like two glasses
of red wine can lower testosterone by seven percent so the real key is to drink in moderation and when you do don't binge drink where you're having like 10 tequila shots in a night the dose is what makes the poison here so do your best to limit your alcohol intake let's move on to licorice sure licorice might taste amazing and can have benefits in certain situations like reducing heartburn speeding up the repair of damaged stomach lining as well as some anti-inflammatory and immune boosting properties but the problem is that it also has one huge downside
it may lower tea levels this is because licorice contains glycyrrhizic acid which is the compound that gives licorice its unique sweet taste now even though it tastes great researchers found that exposing isolated rat gonnit cells to a modest amount of glycyrrhizic acid significantly block testosterone production the reason for this was because it significantly inhibited the activity of 17 beta HSD which is an enzyme essential for testosterone production unfortunately these negative effects of glycyrrhizic acid don't seem only limited to rats in a separate study researchers tested how glycyrrhizic acid influences human beings in this study a
group of men were given seven grams of licorice in the form of candy tablets and they contained about half a gram of glycyrrhizic acid surprisingly after just four days the average testosterone levels dropped from 21 to fifteen point nine in animals per liter the good news for all of you twizzler fans is that even though Hershey's labels it as a licorice candy the original red variety contains very little licorice but there obviously are other reasons to limit your intake of Twizzlers like them being high in corn syrups sugar and artificial flavors next we come to
soy products while this is still a debated topic soy may have negative effects on male hormonal health in general one reason for this is because soy contains a high amount of phytoestrogen ik isoflavones which can activate estrogen receptors and down regulate androgen receptors for those of you that don't know androgen receptors are the ones that male hormones like testosterone and DHT bind to for them to be able to have an effect so without being able to bind to the androgen receptors testosterone can't do its job on top of that soy can disrupt the uptake of
iodine in the thyroid and it can impede the production of thyroid hormones this is a big problem because poor thyroid function is linked to impaired hormonal health and lower testosterone levels couple that with the type of fat that's found in soybeans which is mostly omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids and you can see how soy can potentially lower testosterone more than half of the fat and soybeans is made up of these polyunsaturated fatty acids and like I already mentioned before when this type of fat is consumed in excess it increases inflammation and hurts your testosterone levels however
with all that said not all research shows that these effects on paper are transfer over to human beings for example a meta-analysis published in the Journal of fertility and sterility suggested that soy does not lower testosterone but there are many individual studies that do find a negative effect so if you want to be on the safe side you may want to limit your intake of soy based products like soy protein powder tofu and soy milk finally last but not least is a type of fat that most people already know is bad for your health and
it also happens to be bad for your testosterone levels I'm talking about trans fats now trans fats originally came about in 1901 while a German chemist was looking for a way to make cheap oils liquid at room temperature through a process known as hydrogenation of course this really excited manufacturers but researchers ran into some issues that they didn't expect one of the main ones is that this processing led to the formation of trans fatty acids which could have severe adverse effects not only on testosterone production but on overall health as well one reason for this
is because trans fats trigger systemic inflammation and that's definitely not good because there's a direct link between increased inflammation and reduce testosterone levels as well as a number of chronic diseases aside from that transfer also score high in polyunsaturated fatty acids which is linked to lower testosterone and sperm counts in both rodents and humans so it's definitely best to avoid products that contain trans fats fortunately the FDA has put a ban on trans fats in June 2018 but even though they can no longer be produced going forward some food in circulation still contains trans fats
which in some cases can be sold until 2021 also interestingly enough some unprocessed foods also contain trans fats such as milk cheese beef lamb chicken and pork however the good news is that data indicates that these natural trans fats are less harmful than the artificial ones that about wraps it up guys I really hope that you enjoyed this video and that you learned something new about testosterone and the negative effects that certain foods can have on your testosterone levels if you have enjoyed it and you'd like to see more content like this make sure that
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