What Is Hormone Literacy
What is hormone literacy?
Hormone literacy is the ability to read and interpret the signals your body sends through hormonal fluctuations, symptoms, and lab results. It is the foundational skill every woman over 35 needs to advocate for her own health — and no one is teaching it.
We teach financial literacy. Career literacy. Why not hormone literacy?
Women spend decades learning to read financial statements, market signals, and business metrics. But when it comes to the most important system in their body — the hormonal cascade that governs energy, weight, mood, cognition, and longevity — they’re left completely illiterate.
The result? Women over 35 are told their exhaustion is “just stress,” their weight gain is “just aging,” and their brain fog is “just perimenopause.” These aren’t diagnoses. They’re dismissals.
Hormone literacy teaches you to read your own body.
When you understand how cortisol, insulin, estrogen, progesterone, and thyroid hormones interact — and what happens when one disrupts the cascade — you stop being a passive patient and become an active participant in your health.
Hormone literacy means you can look at your symptoms and see signals. You can look at your labs and see patterns. You can walk into any doctor’s office and ask the right questions — because you understand what your body is trying to tell you.
— Sheila Jackson
Five shifts that change everything.
- From symptom management to root cause understanding. Instead of treating each symptom separately, you see how they connect through the hormonal cascade.
- From “normal labs” to optimal ranges. You learn the difference between standard reference ranges and the functional ranges where you actually feel well.
- From passive patient to informed advocate. You can read your own DUTCH test, question a TSH-only thyroid panel, and know when “everything looks fine” isn’t fine.
- From quick fixes to foundations first. You understand why supplements and hormones can’t outrun a broken foundation — and why order matters.
- From fear to agency. Your body isn’t betraying you. It’s communicating. Hormone literacy gives you the language to listen.
The F.E.M.A.L.E.S. H.A.C.K. Method is hormone literacy in action.
Every step of the method teaches you to read and respond to your body’s signals. It’s not just a protocol — it’s an education that lasts the rest of your life.