WOMANCODE

Greta Livingood
May 2, 2017
6 min read

long post comin atcha’

it was perfect timing when my gyno office called to tell me that i needed a physical. its like they knew that i had been researching the benefits of hormone balance, fertility, and cycle synching. so after my 10 minute physical with Allie, I broke out my list & started asking all the questions. who knew that I was inviting myself into a conversation of grown up “sex-ed” and hormonal education?! after babbling on & on about how I wanted her help to proactively manage my health with holistic approaches, she just smiled. she was so on board with helping me become more in tune with my body, my hormones, and my cycle.

where it all began

it all starts with birth control (BC) and missed periods for me. not having a period made me feel like something was missing that was supposed to be present in my life. why did it come at 14 years old then leave at 16? why was it so irregular starting with light periods and then so heavy i couldn't leave the house? it didn't make sense?

so when i was in high school, i booked it to my family doctor and told him what was up. he decided to put me on the pill to regulate my period but all that did was cause weight gain, acne and moodiness; on top of being a high school girl. WOAH. let's just say BC did not fix the issues i was having.

around the age of 16, i was super involved in sports & my period diminished. POOF; gone. i was spending my days in school, going to track practice right after, then pro choir (where you dance and sing) and then to gymnastics until 9pm. being so active, i knew that that could be the reason why my period had dissipated. after years of running in circles, it just became normal that i wasn't getting my period. i was still on the pill at that point but decided to take a long {2 year} break from BC to see what, if anything, would change. nope. my years in college were spent running in circles too; literally doing laps at practice, going straight to the weight room, & then crashing after a long day of chaos. college flew by and even though i was getting my period, i knew i wasn't transitioning between the 4 phases of a menstrual cycle.

like the 4 seasons, 4 phases of the moon, there are 4 phases of a the female cycle; Luteal, Menstrual, Follicular, and Ovulation....more to come.

after college, i moved to Minneapolis to be with my boyfriend at the time {now husband}. i was still super active in the gym and even ran a boutique fitness studio. being in the fitness industry, i feel like i was drawn to trends, fads, diets and trying out new things. i was getting motivated to learn about health education & even tried different wellness journeys, introducing & leaving certain foods out my diet to see changes in my body. to date i have tried {vegan, peskatarian, no carb, no sugar, high fat, paleo, whole30, etc.}. guess what; still no regularity in my cycle. i thought that maybe the different journey's i had tried could have been a trigger as to why i wasn't having a regular cycle. it could also be stress related. juggling work, a new home, living with a man for the first time, social life in a new city as well as trying to be happy all the time, even if i felt miserable.

remember those phases {Luteal, Menstrual, Follicular, and Ovulation} . In each of these phases, there are different hormones that are being cycled through your body like estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, FSH, etc.. all at different amounts too! crazy, i know. so, in order to fully balance and restore my hormones, i needed to make a change in my lifestyle and diet.

it was at that point in my life where i just wanted some normalcy, so i found a gyno {Allie} and we decided that the reason i wasn't getting my period was because my hormones weren't working with me but against me producing the wrong hormones, or too little or too much of a hormone at the wrong times. Allie suggested that i try one last form of BC before cutting the ties. she introduced the IUD Mirena to me which is a small, flexible, plastic, T-shaped IUD (intrauterine device) that releases small amounts of a progesterone hormone called levonorgestrel into the uterus. Mirena is also one of the only estrogen-free forms of BC. this means that follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) is still producing, which is a hormone responsible for the growth of ovarian follicles. these follicles aid is the production of estrogen and progesterone in the ovaries & help maintain the menstrual cycles in women. that's a good thing! having a form of BC that doesn't deplete FSH was the direction i needed to go because i wanted to have a menstrual cycle & didn't want a BC that still gave me all the PMS symptoms.

after implanting the IUD, she told me that although my period might stop again, i would start the process of balancing my hormones. this IUD was going to help my regulate the amount of estrogen and progesterone in my body. it was going to tell those hormones when & how much to release. COOL. long story short, i still wasnt getting the satisfaction of a period or a holistic lifestyle that i desperately wanted. So, I started reading all the articles, journals, books, & blogs to try and educate myself on removing my IUD and making the transition to a fully involved holistic lifestyle.

i quickly came to learn that everything you do is part of this woman equation of balancing hormones and living life to the fullest. the workouts you do, the foods you eat, the drinks you consume all matter and definitely all affect your hormones. to break it down in the most simple way, i have included two graphs that help determine 1} how to exercise to the fullest capacity during your cycle phases and 2} the right foods to eat to fuel your body during each phase. these foods can help flush out toxins, give you mental power, promote estrogen flow and help curb wacky cravings! ever since reading WomanCode, i have followed these graphs pretty religiously and they have helped me tremendously. with practice comes intuitive knowledge. the knowledge that will help you life a happier, sexier, and pain free life!

photos from: 5thelementwellness & WomanCode

WOMANCODE is a book i recently purchased about educating woman on the importance of our bodies & using our hormones as a tool rather than a shielding blanket. pick up a copy of her book here.

"My desire is for women to have access to the language they need to learn how to interact with the information their bodies are communicating, because being able to leverage that means being more effective not simply at work management, but in ways women conduct themselves in all other areas of their lives. You can use your shifting hormonal patterns to improve your career, save your marriage, make more money, have better dates and have better sex. And those are just some of the benefits. Can you imagine a world where women wouldn’t feel their bodies were a mystery but instead would know how to use them as tools to master their environment in corporate life or at home? Once we learn to work in harmony with our bodies, all the work we do, whether at home or at work, becomes more efficient, and we can engage our cyclical biochemistry to empower us to be influential change agents in our sphere of influence." - Alisa Vitti

Spoiler alert: i've come to learn from this book that it is ALL about your hormones & creating a healthy environment for them to thrive in, not MASKING or covering up your hormones with birth control.

so when I met with Allie for my physical, we also made the conscious decision to remove my IUD {had it for 8 months} and start the holistic journey to balance my hormones and start thriving in life! i'm so excited to get one step closer in the right direction. a direction i've been going for a while, just needed this last little push.

THANKS AL :)

after getting home from my appointment, i felt cleansed. i headed to the gym for a HIIT style workout and what made it that much better was after i fueled my body with the right foods, i drew an epsom salt & lavender oil bath & made a turmeric tonic.