194. Ebb the Flow: What's Behind Fibroid Growth and the Herbs Traditionally Used to Support Balance
Updated: 48 minutes ago
Written by Donna Troy Cleary, Clinical Herbalist and Registered Nurse
A diagnosis without a cause
If you have been told you have fibroids, you were probably also told that the cause is unknown.
That is technically true. It is also incomplete.
Studies estimate that 70% to 80% of women have fibroids if you look for them (Baird, Johnson, Cousins, 2003). Most are small, asymptomatic, and discovered incidentally on an ultrasound ordered for something else. They become a problem when they grow. And what drives that growth, in large part, is the hormonal environment the body is living in. So the question is not just what fibroids are. It is what is creating the conditions for them to thrive.
That is a question the medical literature is now answering in ways the standard gynecology appointment rarely has time to address.
The body this system was not built for
I believe the Neolithic builders in Ireland were people who understood something our current culture has largely forgotten: that the generative body is sacred. The feminine and masculine were equally divine, balanced, honored. The land was tended, not stripped.
We live in a different system now. One that treats some bodies as expendable. Uses them up, passes the costs on, and moves the profits elsewhere. My last post on Samhain named this. The research shows who pays.
A systematic review published in Fertility and Sterility (Katon, Plowden, Marsh, 2023) examined racial disparities in uterine fibroids and applied what the authors call "social, structural, and political context" as the explanatory framework. Black women develop fibroids at consistently higher rates, at younger ages, with larger growths and more severe symptoms than white women. The authors point to social, structural, and political context, not a single biological cause. That context includes differential exposures across a lifetime: chronic stress, environmental toxins, and a food system that has made processed, hormone-disrupting food the most affordable and accessible option in the communities with the least political power to choose otherwise.
I see this as a public health crisis shaped by income disparity and food access. The women who carry the greatest fibroid burden are the same women whose labor helped build the wealth that funds the food system making them ill. Their bodies are not coincidentally more affected. The system has been permitted to operate this way, without consequence, for generations.
What the research shows: how processed food drives fibroid growth
A review published in Nutrients in 2023 (Krzyżanowski, Paszkowski, Woźniak) analyzed the research connecting diet and uterine fibroids. Several mechanisms are now documented.
Endocrine-disrupting chemicals. Ultra-processed foods contain chemical additives, preservatives, and packaging contaminants, including phthalates and bisphenols, that act as endocrine disruptors. These compounds mimic estrogen in the body, binding to hormone receptors and triggering growth signals. Fibroids are estrogen-dependent growths. They contain more estrogen and progesterone receptors than normal uterine muscle cells, which means they respond more strongly to any estrogenic signal in the environment.
Researchers have mapped other ways this happens.
Insulin spikes and fibroid cell proliferation. Diets high in refined carbohydrates and added sugars cause rapid blood sugar and insulin spikes. High circulating insulin is associated with increased fibroid cell growth and volume. This is the same metabolic mechanism at the center of my Metabolic Syndrome post, showing up in uterine tissue.
The estrobolome: where gut health becomes hormonal health. Ultra-processed diets lack adequate fiber, which leads to gut dysbiosis. A disrupted gut microbiome impairs the estrobolome, the group of gut bacteria that helps metabolize and clear estrogen. Estrogen that isn't cleared can be reabsorbed into the bloodstream. This is why the Microbiome post is essential reading alongside this one.
Weight, fatty tissue, and circulating estrogen. Large studies of American adults link higher meat intake, including processed meat and poultry, to higher body weight (Wang, 2009). Body fat makes estrogen, and fibroids respond to estrogen.
Vitamin D deficiency. Multiple studies in a Nutrients review found significantly lower Vitamin D levels in women with fibroids. Serum levels above 20 ng/mL were associated with reduced fibroid growth, and levels above 30 ng/mL with decreased incidence. Lab research suggests Vitamin D may inhibit fibroid cell proliferation. Deficiency is widespread, and communities with less outdoor activity and sun exposure, often the same communities carrying the highest fibroid burden, are disproportionately affected.
What protects. The same body of research found consistent evidence that high-fiber diets, fresh vegetables and fruits, and specific plant compounds are associated with lower fibroid risk. The Black Women's Health Study, which followed 22,583 women, 6,627 of them diagnosed with fibroids, found an inverse association between fruit and vegetable intake and fibroid occurrence. More whole food, fewer fibroids. Fiber supports the gut's work of carrying estrogen out of the body, and plants deliver anti-inflammatory compounds. Lab research suggests some of them influence how cells grow and how fibrous tissue builds up.
What you can do: add in, rather than eliminate
The research on diet and fibroids is consistent. A diet higher in red meat and lower in vegetables, fruit, and Vitamin D is associated with higher risk. A diet rich in whole, plant-based foods, with fiber and anti-inflammatory compounds, is associated with lower risk.
The approach I recommend is not elimination. That often creates anxiety around food and makes everything harder. What works is slowly adding more whole foods in. Each whole food you add crowds out something processed. Over time, the ratio shifts, and so does the hormonal environment your body is living in.
In practice:
More plants. Every vegetable, legume, and whole grain delivers fiber and anti-inflammatory compounds. Fiber supports healthy digestion and gut balance, which makes it one of the simplest places to start
Intermittent fasting. You've all heard about it. I go into it in depth in my Metabolic Syndrome post, and I used it myself. I lost 8 pounds, slowly, over 4 months. I stop eating after 6pm and give my body at least 14 hours overnight before I eat again. I do this most days. The hardest part is the late-evening craving, which a giant cup of steaming, delicious cacao solves completely.
Ceremonial Grade Cacao Paste. Cacao has been used in Mesoamerica for thousands of years. I mix half an ounce of cacao paste with hot water, a splash of milk, and a little maple syrup. Twice a day: 2pm and 8pm. It handles my sweet craving midday and at the end of the evening. It is mineral-rich, with magnesium, calcium, and iron, and full of anti-inflammatories and antioxidants. It feels decadent, and to me it feels like medicine.
Vitamin D. Given the research, getting your levels checked and supplementing if deficient is one of the most direct things you can do. Sunlight, eggs, fatty fish, and fortified foods are dietary sources. Levels above 30 ng/mL are associated with decreased fibroid incidence in the research.
Sleep. Research links stress and elevated cortisol to fibroid risk, and poor sleep makes stress harder to manage. This is not optional. Check out our organic, plant-based options for an evening wind-down in this post.
The Herbs in Ebb the Flow
Fibroids involve hormones, the liver, the nervous system, and inflammation, often all at once. The herbs in Ebb the Flow are traditionally used to support each of these.
Vitex (Chaste Tree Berry). Vitex has been used in herbal practice for centuries to support menstrual regularity and comfort. Herbalists understand it to work upstream, on the pituitary gland that signals the ovaries.
Ebb the Flow is formulated around Vitex alongside the supporting herbs below.
Red Raspberry Leaf. Known as "the women's herb" for centuries. Traditionally used as a uterine tonic and to support healthy menstrual cycles and comfort.
Burdock Root. The liver herb in the formula. The liver plays a central role in processing and clearing hormones, including estrogen. In advanced chronic liver disease, that clearance is impaired and circulating estrogen rises (Vargas-Beltran et al., 2025). Whether milder liver strain does the same has not been established.
Estrogen is processed by the liver and passes through the gut, where gut bacteria can send some of it back into circulation (Yang et al., 2022). Burdock is traditionally used to support the liver. Lab research in liver cells suggests its chlorogenic acid supports fatty acid metabolism (Ma et al., Molecules, 2023)
Nettles. Traditionally used as a gentle diuretic and cleansing herb, and as a natural antihistamine. Researchers suggest that chronic inflammation may play a role in how fibroids form and grow (Yang et al., 2022). Lab research suggests nettle leaf extracts calm inflammatory signaling in cells. (Bhusal et al., 2022)
Oatstraw. The nervous system herb in the formula. Research links stress and elevated cortisol to fibroid risk (Yang et al., 2022). Oatstraw has long been used as a trophorestorative, traditionally used to nourish and rebuild the nervous system over time.
The pairings
Vite-Achoo Tea. The nettles and oatstraw in Ebb the Flow are also in Vite-Achoo Tea. Steeping them overnight in water is how you get their minerals and vitamins, which an alcohol extraction doesn't capture. Steep a cup before bed and drink it in the morning, or make it in the morning and drink it in the evening.
Ceremonial Grade Cacao Paste. Cacao is my evening ritual, and a mineral-rich way to get through the cravings that come with eating less late at night. Read more about it here.
Shop Ceremonial Grade Cacao Paste
Directions
Take Ebb the Flow once daily.
For best results, take for three consecutive months, then take a two-week break before resuming.
Do not use during pregnancy or nursing. If you are taking prescription medications, speak with your provider before adding an herbal supplement.
Choose your size: 1 oz (one-month supply): $35; 2 oz (two-month supply): $60, save $10. Subscribe and save 15%
What my ancestors knew
From 1400 to 1700, my father's family, the Troys (Ó Troighthigh), ran an herbal medical school in Munster. My mother's family name, Lee, comes from the Irish word leighis: physician, medicine. On both sides, knowledge was the inheritance.
As I understand it, the women who came to those healers were not living in a system that extracted from them. They were living in a system that tended them. The land was cared for too.
Some men are used up by this system as well, their labor taken and the cost passed on. They live in the same neighborhoods, with the same food and the same underfunded care. The research on Black men and prostate cancer has a parallel. In a study of more than 28,000 men in the southeastern United States, most of them Black, men in the poorest neighborhoods were more likely to die of prostate cancer than men in the wealthiest, even after accounting for age, smoking, weight, income, and PSA testing. The authors point to structural racism and neighborhood resources (Kumsa et al., 2024). The system extracts from the planet and from the bodies it treats as disposable.
The body was honored.
That knowledge did not disappear. It lives in the plants. And it lives in the people who remember it.
For prostate health, there's our Easy Pee-sy Tincture. Learn more in this blog post.
Continue Reading
Metabolic Syndrome: Visceral Fat, Intermittent Fasting and the Path Back
The Microbiome and Your Health
The research behind this post
Baird, Dunson and Cousins (2003): High cumulative incidence of uterine leiomyoma in black and white women: ultrasound evidence.2003 American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Scott, Willet, Dunn (2026) Consumption of ultra-processed foods and increased risks of prostate cancer PMID: 42567433
Krzyżanowski J, Paszkowski T, Woźniak S. (2023). The Role of Nutrition in Pathogenesis of Uterine Fibroids. Nutrients, 15(23):4984. PMC10708302.
Katon JG, Plowden TC, Marsh EE. (2023). Racial Disparities in Uterine Fibroids and Endometriosis: A Systematic Review and Application of Social, Structural, and Political Context. Fertility and Sterility, 119:355–363. PMC9992263.
Roshdy E et al. (2013). Treatment of Symptomatic Uterine Fibroids with Green Tea Extract: A Pilot Randomized Controlled Clinical Study. Int J Womens Health, 5:477–486. PMC3787340.
Fibroids in Late Reproductive Life. Gynecol Endocrinol, 38:63–67.
Yang Q et al. (2022). Endocrine Reviews. PMC9277653.
Vargas-Beltran et al. (2025). World J Gastroenterol. PMC12400232.
Ma K et al. (2023). Molecules. PMC10647434.
Bhusal KK et al. (2022). Heliyon. PMC9253158.
Wang Y, Beydoun MA. (2009). Int J Obes.
Kumsa FA, Fowke JH, Hashtarkhani S, White BM, Shrubsole MJ, Shaban-Nejad A. Front Oncol. 2024;14:1343070.
The statements made regarding these products have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. All information presented here is not meant as a substitute for or alternative to information from healthcare practitioners. Please consult your healthcare professional about potential interactions or other possible complications before using any product.
For the SEO title, I'd suggest "Ebb the Flow | Fibroid and Hormone Support Herbs | Brooklyn" (59 characters). Keep the long title as the headline, and make the excerpt and meta description identical.
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