Are Phytoestrogens affective at all?

[Rosa]

I'm wondering if phytoestrogens have any effect in relation to HRT.  I have next to no T in my body so androgen suppressants are not needed.  In addition to osteoporosis, I have mood swings and cry so easily, which I attribute to lack of hormones.  I'm not in the position to get prescription estrogen, I just would like to see if female hormones help my mood and to see how my brain reacts to them.  I'm not trying to get boobs or anything.

So, would phytoestrogens give me a small taste of what HRT might be like and be able to tell me if I might be on the right track or are they a waste of money?  What I see in the drug stores seem to be mainly composed of Black Coash, Red Clover, Fennel, Soy, and vitamins.  Would taking these herbs give me an idea of how my body might react to estrogen, or not?  I would really like to get a sense of well being, which my doctor says T will give me, but he does not know I have GID and don't want to take it.

[Silver]

Probably much more of a risk than it's worth.

[Janet_Girl]

There are some that have had some success, but for the most part they do not work.  Don't waist your time or money.  Do what you can to get the real HRT.

[Karla]

I think their effect is minimal in most cases and in high doses they compete with the natural estrogen produced by your body.
If you're going to take herbal supplements consider the anti-androgen ones instead, but you have no T so..

I wouldn't take T to save my own life.

[tonia]

I tried them for a year and nothing happened. I did not felt any difference until I started real HRT.

[lilacwoman]

I started my transition with herbals and had soem effect that prompted me to go fulltiem and get the doctor to prescribe E.

With herbals its as well to remember that while eating them may be novel to you there may be other parts of the world where everyone eats the fresh stuff regularly as part of the diet.  Fenugreek works with some people but not others.
The highly flavoured food of the Mediterranean countries uses lots of what we call herbals but the men and women there are noticably more prone to looking like transpeople and in fact Greek men think they are God's gift to women and Greek women look like beauty queens - until they start making babies anyway.
Maybe what we need to consider is that we all grew up in our area/time on a particluar diet and our bodies adapted to any shortages so starting transition with a low does of anything may give different results to someone who had a better or worse diet from another area.

Lots of you may be eating fenugreek anyway:
http://www.theatlantic.com/food/archive/2010/06/from-yemen-to-greece-fenugreek-obsession/58451/.