LEAKED Guest Expert Session: Cycle Syncing & Womb Wisdom w/ Jen Kavanagh

What's up, guys? Welcome back to the podcast. I'm excited to share with you another leaked session today from one of my programs, From Burnt Out to Badass. This is a guest expert session where I brought in a friend and past client of mine, Jen Cavanaugh, who is also known as the Womb Witch. And we talk all things cycle syncing and healing our sacred womb space. This episode is going to blow your mind if you've never dug into the different phases of your cycle and how to support your hormones, your lifestyle, your nutrition, and your focus in every single phase. So Jen's going to cover it all for us in a really beautiful, well-rounded way. You're going to learn so much, but this is definitely an episode that you'll want to have your notes app on your phone open or have your journal out and take some notes because there's just so much information. I know you're gonna love it. You're gonna learn so much. I'm excited to introduce you to Jen and the amazing work that she does in the world. She was inside of my business program Abundant and Ambitious, and then I decided to bring her into From Burnout to Badass as a guest expert to teach all of her beautiful womb wisdom. Because as you guys may know, I'm on my own journey of understanding my hormones and my gut health post-pill. So I came off of hormonal birth control about 2 years ago, but I'm still dealing with some PMS symptoms, breakouts, breast tenderness, painful cramps on the first day of my period. Lots of things that are common but not necessarily normal. Our periods aren't meant to be painful. We don't have to go through a lot of the stuff that we tend to just put up with as women because the system has told us, oh, that's just how it is, that's totally normal, you're totally fine. But really, if we start to live in sync with our cycle and we honor the phases of our cycle throughout the month. And maybe some of you do this already by living in accordance with the moon. There's tons of different ways that we can support ourselves as women so that our experience and our entire cycle from start to finish, not just your menstrual cycle, not just the bleed, but the entire 28 to 30 days is a beautiful sacred experience. So I'm so excited for Jen to dig in and give you all the juicy info. Have your Notes app open or your journal out and get ready to take notes. This is a really, really good one. Welcome to the Makeshift Happen podcast. I'm your host, Samantha Daly, entrepreneur, life coach, and your no BS bestie, here to bring you all things mindset, manifestation, and personal development. This podcast is designed to help you expand your mind, and uplevel your life. So turn the volume up and roll the windows down if you're coming along for the ride. Let's go make shift happen. I'm gonna let Jenn go ahead and introduce herself. And kind of give us an inside look at her journey and why this is something that she's like really passionate about teaching women. So go ahead, Jen.

Thank you. Thank you so much for having me here as well. Hello, everyone from Dublin in Ireland. I'm so excited to be on this call with you all today and just sharing this womb wisdom with you, because honestly, it has completely changed my life since I've started working with it. And I promise you that if you take anything from this session today and implement it, it will change yours as well. So with my own journey, I mean, I've been on a journey, let's just put it that way. But in terms of how cycle syncing has specifically helped, it means that I am now living a lot more in line with my body's natural abilities and wants and needs throughout my monthly cycle. I'm not going against it all the time. I'm much more in a feminine state instead of in a masculine state, trying to push through, always ignoring what my body actually wants and needs. And I've come from working in a corporate world to then working in retail for a couple of years to then now working for myself as an entrepreneur. So I know how to try and do this no matter what industry you're like working in, right? So there's a way to adapt it for wherever you currently are in your life. So for me, it's definitely allowed me to come home to my body, to really like reconnect with my mind, body, and soul, like your wisdom is such a powerful, potent wisdom holder, and none of us are connected in with it properly. We've been living in this masculine world where we've just been told to work, work, work in a masculine schedule, so disconnected from what we should actually be allowing ourselves to do. And my health was really bad a few years ago, and I was on, you know, the pill for like continuous cycles of like 3 months at a time. And so disconnected, just so disconnected. I didn't even know what my cycle was. I had really bad periods my whole life. It was so messed up. So back in like 2016, I came off the pill because it just stopped working for me. I was basically having little bleeds all of the time and I was like, what the hell is going on? And at this time I'd also started training as like a nutritional therapist, as a personal trainer. I was on this path of like discovering like the career that I wanted, like how I wanted to be working with people and this holistic health industry. And I was like, there has to be a better way to do this. And I started looking into using your lifestyle and using your diet to really support your cycle. And then later on after that, all of the spiritual stuff came in and I'm now on this crazy path of womb healing where honestly, I don't know what's going to come up day to day. Right. But that's where we are. It's like absolutely magic. And honestly, like, once you start and once you start to see the differences that you can make every single day just by choosing a particular type of food, by actually acknowledging what type of exercise your body wants to do on that day, by acknowledging your levels of energy, like, game changer. So I'm really, really excited for you guys to learn more about that today and just to take something home from it. Okay, so taking back your feminine power, right? This is what we're all about. We are in this beautiful, uh, space right now in the world as a collective where the divine feminine energy is rising. As part of that, getting back in touch with your womb space, allowing yourself to start to receive that inner wisdom, your intuition, right? Reconnecting with that, it's so, so powerful. Potent, and important for you. So we've got to take back your feminine power, and you can start really simply with cycle syncing. So this is what cycle syncing is to me. So it is a deeply personal practice whereby you reconnect with your menstrual cycle, become aware of your cyclical symptoms and patterns of behavior, and address it mind, body, and soul using nutritional, lifestyle, and spiritual practices. Okay, so you will see that written differently everywhere, but this is how it has worked for me and how, like, what it means to me and what it means to the clients that I work with around us. So why is it so important? So when we are not connected with our menstrual cycle, we are literally living in a state of denial. Okay, so we're not allowing ourselves to actually experience thoughts, emotions, feelings, and we're disconnected from our self-power and from our self-worth. So all of those times where you might feel unworthy of something, or where you might be struggling with like a little kind of inner argument that's going on all of the time, that's all like inner child stuff coming up as well. That all comes from the womb space too. So we're looking at the sacral region of the body all of the time, which is, which is the womb space on women. And men have like an energetic womb space as well. And but that's where we're looking at. So all of your self-worth issues, anytime you're not allowing yourself to really step into your power, it's coming back to your connection with your womb space because that is where you're holding the deepest, most wonderful part of yourself that needs to be let loose. Okay, so we are victims to the toxic menstrual cycle behavior. So like, how often have you been working somewhere, or have you been, um, you know, around friends or family members, or like even when you first got your period, like what was your experience with that? How How were you told to handle it? How were you told to hide it? I mean, were your family open with period products like tampons or pads, or were you told to like hide them away in a drawer, like never to be seen again? You can't let the men in the family know this, see this, right? So like we have to look at all of these different behaviors that we've been so accustomed to and attuned to throughout our whole lives from when we were first even told about our menstruation, and we have to start unraveling them and unlearning them, and we need to be able to speak about this openly. It's like we're reclaiming the word pussy, right? We're reclaiming this word now because it's had such a negative connotation to it, but it doesn't have to. It doesn't have to have the connotation that it's had. It's actually a really empowering word. So it's like we're unlearning everything that we once knew about menstruation and starting to actually work towards empowering ourselves with this. Okay. So obviously, as I have there, we are working from a place of disempowerment. And we're also generally operating from a wounded masculine and feminine state. So that's because we've had to take on board the masculine way of doing things throughout our whole lives, because that's what we've been told we have to do to be successful in any way, shape, or form. So how often have you been like, say, the week that's coming up to your period and you're so tired and you're so exhausted and you're like, no, no, no, I just have to get this done. I have to power through. I have to get it done. You don't give yourself any time for a rest. You don't give yourself any downtime. Any— you don't even give yourself compassion over it, cuz you're like, well, this is just the world I live in, so it's expected of me. But what if it could be different? What if you didn't have to operate that way? You're also completely disconnected with your physical body and what it wants and needs during this time. So we've gotta start bringing back the connection and actually honoring it. And that's what cycle syncing is all about in the first instance. Okay.

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So how can you get started? So one of the first things that I always recommend is like downloading a little app. So I love the My Flow app. And then a lot of people are really fond of the Flo app as well. They're really fantastic little tracking tools that you can use. The one thing that I will always say about apps is they are limited because they don't track all of the different types of symptoms that you could have. So one thing that I do love and that I try to get my clients to implement as much as they are willing to do that is to create your own little cycle track because you can basically create it to map out the length of your cycle. So that's another thing that we should briefly discuss. We're often told that like the 28-day cycle is like like the norm. It's where we should all be aiming for. Everybody is so different and so unique. And from working in this industry now for like a number of years, seeing different clients— I specialized in women's health when I came out of nutritional therapy— I have seen women who have had everything from like a 24-day cycle up to like a 50-day cycle. Okay. And that's not just people who are approaching menopause. That's like women from all ages of their life. And it's impacted by so many different things. So we have to be aware that there is no one-size-fits-all. So yes, a longer cycle or a shorter cycle could potentially be pointing to certain symptoms of different disorders or diseases in the body, but that's not necessarily always the case. It can just be for some people that they have a longer or shorter cycle. So let's take out the kind of one-size-fits-all approach here. 28 days is not what you're aiming for. It's just a natural 28-day progression, and it goes with the moon cycle. That's where the 28 days originally came from, okay? And that's the next thing, is get more knowledgeable about the moon phases. We're so in sync with the moon. That's where our cycle comes in with it. And depending on what you're doing, like whether you're bleeding on the new moon or bleeding on the full moon or on either side of it, it can tell you a lot about what's going on in your life as well. As well. But honestly, it's such a difference when you start to see how you're feeling as well in line with the moon. It can really help you understand your emotions, right? Your thoughts and your feelings and all of the different things that are going on in your body. So definitely something that you want to just get on board with a little bit if you can. So what I would say is when you're tracking, try and track all of the different symptoms that come up for you and especially your feelings and emotions. And I'm going to talk through it when we go through the phases of the cycle now in a minute, but different things can come up that the apps don't necessarily take into consideration, that people are really embarrassed to talk about. So certain types of discharge, or whether or not you get itchiness or dryness or discomfort in the vaginal area. This is all stuff that we need to talk about, and it's been so put under this umbrella of things you do never— like that you never discuss, right? It's embarrassing. You don't talk about it. Like, we've got to remove that shame around it, okay? Because everybody's actually experiencing it. And then if we all knew that each other was experiencing it, we'd feel a lot better about it, right? So understanding the 4 stages of your cycles and how the hormones fluctuate in those. So once you can understand more about how the hormones fluctuate, you can get to understand what actually helps support each of those individual hormones during that stage of your cycle. Cycle, and then looking at incorporating the nutritional and lifestyle changes that go alongside that. So ultimately, what you're aiming to do is learning how to work with your hormones, your body, and your womb space. And that is going to improve all areas of your life because everything, everything that you do is tied into your cycle, whether you realize it or not. How you're feeling on a particular day, that's all down to like how your hormones are fluctuating right now. Obviously, external factors can influence it. But if you're in your spring or your summer phase and something like not so nice happens and it might usually bring you down, you're not going to feel it as heavily as you're going to feel it when you're coming up to your menstruation phase, when you've also got all of the emotions because of your hormones fluctuating. So once you start to actually get really in tune with them and in tune with your body, you're going to understand so much more why you're acting in a certain way as well. So all of your behavioral patterns will become a lot clearer. Okay. Okay, so let's have a little look at the womb cycle. So I love calling this the seasons rather than the actual scientific names for them, because who needs science, right? Let's go with the spiritual stuff. So we're looking at spring, summer, autumn, and winter. So again, depending on the length of your cycle, this is going to be different for every single person. So the days that I have down there, so 7 to 10 or 3 to 5, whatever, that's like a rough estimate. Okay, so the spring is your follicular phase. So generally that can tend to be anywhere from 7 to 10 days. This is where your eggs are maturing and ready, one is getting ready for release basically. And at this point as well, towards the end of those 7 to 10 days, your womb space lining will start to thicken a little bit too. So we'll have a little look at the hormones that are coming in over that time now in a second. But that's generally what's going on in that phase. It's like your body's getting ready to produce an egg and send it out fertilization by sperm. Obviously, that's what it's hoping for, right? Your summer then is your ovulation phase. So the egg has been released and it's traveling down. And this is the part where you are randy because all you want to do is basically get with whoever is around you as much as humanly possible because you are horny, right? You want to procreate and your body is going to make you want to do these things whether you're on board with it or not. Not. That's what we got to put up with as a woman. So during this time, this is when you can expect to be, you know, eyeing up the men around you, even if it's somebody who's not usually your type. Sometimes we're like really attracted to the pheromones of people, right? So it's almost like we're literally just randy little dogs going around the place looking for a new butt to sniff. Like, that's literally what we're doing during this phase, right? So this is your summertime. So this is where you're going to get the most kind of fluctuations of hormones. And it's also where we really need to like look after the body the most as well, because everything happens during this phase is massively going to impact later in your cycle. And again, I'll explain that a little bit more in a minute when we're on to the next slides. So in the autumn phase, then everything starts to kind of come down. Now, the autumn phase is your longest phase, your luteal phase. So during kind of the first half of this, you'll still have a little bit of energy and you might still want to be like sociable and stuff. But definitely towards the second half, this is where you'll start to notice that your energy is like coming down. Time, right? And you might be a little bit more introspective, a little bit more introverted, and not as keen to be doing as much as you usually would. But it also has its other benefits. And then you're going into your winter, which is your menstruation phase. So again, this is so different person to person. I mean, I am envious of the people who get the 2 to 3 day period. Like, I am envious of you because mine has never been that short. But it really does depend on the person. And again, it can be longer than that too. So then the only other thing just to mention there is when you reach menopause stage, we call that the eternal winter. And that sounds like a really dark thing, but you never lose your womb space. You never lose the energy of it. So when we're talking on a spiritual level, it doesn't matter what point in your life you actually start to do this healing. You can still track your cycle because you do it by the moon. So you just take it that you would be having a bleed at the full moon and you continue that throughout your cycle, right? So you're still tracking how you're feeling because nobody loses it. I mean, even people who have had hysterectomies, they will still have the energy space of the womb cycle. They will still naturally have the kind of ebbs and flows of things going on. So it's definitely something just to keep in mind. Or, you know, as you start to do this work for yourself, what I find really interesting then is, say, looking at my mom or my aunts and things like that who are in menopause stage or have gone through menopause stage and seeing how that's affected them. So you can really start to notice the ebbs and flows and other people around you too. Okay, so let's look a little bit more at spring. So the hormones in this stage, so they're generally low at the start, right? Because you're coming out of menstruation. So in menstruation, all of your hormone levels are at their lowest concentration in the body. So your follicle stimulating hormone, or FSH is how you'll normally hear it said, is on the rise because it's preparing that egg for maturation and release.

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So in terms of nutrition Your hunger levels generally in your springtime are quite low. You're not overly hungry. I know for me, like, I'm usually on maybe 2 meals a day unless I'm working out. I might still try and get the 3 meals in, but I'm generally not that hungry. I'm okay with lighter food. So you might be looking at soups, salads, smoothies, juices. You're just getting a lot of nutrients in again because you've lost a lot during your menstrual phase. So you're just trying to build those back up. So keeping things nice and light here is a great time to include your fermented foods. So throughout your cycle, the other thing that you need to be really aware of is that the pH balance in your vagina can change massively. Okay, so different things, whether it's sexual intercourse, whether you're using tampons, or whether you are using a menstrual cup or different things like that, as you actually have your period, they can all upset the pH balance of your vagina. Even the foods that you eat can upset the pH balance of your vagina. So if you eat a lot of sugar, in your luteal phase than in your menstruation phase, you can have more of an imbalance going on there. So what that actually causes then is an imbalance in your bacteria and your vagina. So you've probably all heard of probiotics that you would take for your gut, right? Yeah. So what happens is it's kind of the same thing for your vagina. So there's certain strains that, yes, you would find in your gut, but you'll also find them in your vagina as well. So imbalances in that can obviously cause like bacterial vaginosis. It can also cause, uh, candida overgrowth as as well, so your yeast infections. So if you get any symptoms like that, and it can be quite common between your ovulation phase and your luteal phase for something like that to happen. And one of the best things that you can actually do, and this is like, it's really random, it sounds really random, but you can do two things. One, you can use some natural yogurt on like a tampon and you can pop it inside you. I'm not a huge tampon fan, so for me, I actually use a probiotic. So a really good probiotic, I'm pretty sure you guys would all have Udo's Choice over there. I should think they should be worldwide. They're Super 8s, it's a probiotic capsule, it has 8 different strains in it but it contains the ones that you need for the vagina as well. And you just pop it up there overnight and what it does is it dissolves and actually spreads out the bacteria to the vagina and then it usually offsets the pH and the bacterial imbalance. So it means that you don't have to go to the extent of getting, you know, the kind of suppositories and the creams and stuff like that, it generally sorts itself out. So, that's been one of the biggest things that I've noticed clinically over the past number of years, and it's really, really worked for a lot of people. So, anytime you feel that kind of itchiness or discomfort, maybe pain upon urination, if it's not linked to a urinary tract infection, obviously two very different things, sometimes it's just a little burning when you pee, then try a probiotic and see how you get on with that, okay. So, So when we're trying to offset that, then in the springtime, it's really nice to introduce your fermented foods. So you're thinking about like kimchi, kombucha, all those kind of fermented products that you can now buy in your health stores in different departments and things like that. Really great to include little bits of that on this week. It's just going to help the gut to rebalance and also the vagina as well. After your menstruation, fresh veg and fruit and then keeping your carbs lighter. So you're looking at quinoa and buckwheat and things like that rather than your heavier, denser carbohydrates. And you probably won't really want things like bread and that kind of thing too much during this phase. That's quite dense and heavy for your system. Okay, so lifestyle then. Your energy levels are higher, and so cardio and strength training in terms of exercise. You're starting to say yes again to more social gatherings. You've got a little bit more energy for people. You want to see them. You've been in hibernation, right? You've been in your winter, so you're like, yeah, I actually want to see people again. Again. And then in terms of sexual intercourse, one of the main things to focus on is sexual arousal. So a lot of sensuality, a lot of building up, because you're going to be a little bit drier, so you need more motivation, right? So you've got to get the juices flowing, otherwise it can hurt, and you don't want that. You're just causing more trauma to your vagina, so we definitely don't want that to happen. So that's even if you're just playing for yourself as well, so not necessarily just if you're with someone. Like, for self-play too, you might use lubrication, or you might just really work on like learning how to build yourself up to that point. And that can be a lot of fun too, and I know because I'm single, so sharing. Um, okay, so focus. So creativity is higher, and so this is what you want to be doing during this phase. So planning mode is on. So all of the different things that you want to get done, you want to be in planning mode during this phase. And this is a great time also to set intentions for all areas of your and also to work on releasing those limiting beliefs. So all those things that are holding you back, because think about springtime, what does it kind of bring up in you when you think about the actual season itself? You're excited, right? You're starting to like get going a little bit. You're like, there's warmer days to come, there's lovely sunshine around the corner. It's the same internally as well. So because your hormones are starting to rise again, you're not flatlined anymore. You've actually got a little bit more energy. So you're like, oh yeah, okay. And then you can start to reprogram those limiting beliefs. Release, it's the perfect time to do that. Okay, so you're like in your summer phase, you're just more about like external things. This is still a little bit internal, perfect time to get that done. Okay, so summertime. So this can be anywhere for 3 to 5 days. Mine is a little bit longer. I generally tend to go anywhere up to 7 days, um, with my summer. So again, as I said, this is only a guideline, really take it for like your own cycle. Okay, so during this phase, all of your hormones are rising. So you've got luteinizing hormone and follicle stimulating hormone. So both of those are involved obviously in the maturation of the egg and then the release of the egg. That's what they're there for. And then your estrogen is rising, so that helps to thicken the lining of the uterus. And then your testosterone is rising, and that's what makes you randy. Okay, that one, that's what gets you horny and gets you wanting to get out there and get impregnated and Be with all the boys, right? So this is what we are talking about here. And what we want to look at with nutrition here, as I said earlier, this is probably the most important when it comes to your diet, because what you do here is going to impact the rest of your cycle. So a lot of you may have heard of like an estrogen-progesterone imbalance, or maybe you haven't, but a lot of women have this. Okay. And what happens is that your body isn't able to actually get rid of excess estrogen, and then your progesterone is out of whack as well. And it can lead to all sorts of kind of, you know, PMS symptoms. Like, PMS isn't actually natural. It's not normal to get PMS. We've made it normal because it's part of that sort of toxic culture that we live in where it's like, oh, it's so normal to be laid up for days on your period. It's actually really not, and especially not in the lead up to it either. And as you start to do this work and you see symptoms lessen, you'll, you'll get to understand that. And so we really want to work on balancing the estrogen levels in the body. And that one of the hardest parts about that is that we live in an environment where there's so many things called xenoestrogens. So it's basically things, whether it's in food, plastics, or different materials that are around us that we absorb in through our skin as well. They act as estrogen mimickers in our body. So the reason why that can be so harmful is because your body's like, oh, I've actually already got enough estrogen, I don't need to produce anymore, or I've got too much, I need to send this away. But it's not actually estrogen. So then your progesterone levels can get too high, right? So there's all of these different factors that we've got to take into consideration. And it's honestly one of the leading reasons why there's so many more cases of infertility or fertility issues in men and women these days. So very like something just to really be aware of, okay, is all those different things in your environment. So how can we counteract that? Obviously, be careful about the materials that you're using first and foremost, and also like where your food comes from, what it's been sprayed with, all that kind of thing. Your hunger levels tend to be quite like levels, like they're not too high, they're not too low. You might just need a little bit of extra support because you're so much more active during this period. You've got so much more energy. Energy to support. But let your intuition guide you on that. So really bring in your kind of intuitive eating here. So go with what your body is requiring on each day. So how do we support the estrogen progesterone? We eat high fiber foods. So what we want here is lightning fast, well able to help us, well able to support us digestive system. We also need to make sure that the liver is working on top form as well. Right. So the liver The liver's job with regards to hormones is to detoxify them. So everybody thinks that's like a bad word. It's not. That is literally what the liver does for hormones. So when the hormones reach the liver, basically it needs to detoxify them because they are actually treated like little chemicals in the body, like toxins, right? So it needs to detoxify them and then it needs to excrete the part of the hormone that's not going to be reused again in the body, and that stops then estrogen from getting too high or progesterone from getting too high. If our digestive system is not working properly or it's slow or sluggish, our liver gets backed up as well, and we need to be operating in top form. So that means loads of water, right? And high fiber foods. So you want things like oats, you want your milled seeds. So I always say milled because otherwise if you eat the full seeds, they can actually make you quite bloated. So I'm talking about the likes of your chia and your flax here, or linseed, whatever way you get it. Lots of cruciferous vegetables. So cruciferous vegetables contain two different compounds, I3C, so indole-3-carbinol, and then the other one's just going to go out of my head now, but there's another compound that it contains as well. And basically both of those help with putting the liver into stage 2 detoxification, which is where you want it for when it's working with hormones. Okay, that is it working at its most crucial and viable state. So cruciferous veggies like your broccoli, cauliflower, all of those kind of chunkier greens like asparagus, all of that kind of stuff. So get as much of that into you as you can during this phase. Lots of fruit and keep your carbs lighter still, right? So still focus on that kind of— apart from oats, introducing oats, work on the quinoa and the buckwheat and that kind of thing. Sweet potato, for Great. So for your lifestyle, so energy levels are super high, right? This is your summer, you are out and proud, optimal for doing exercises like HIIT, keep up your strength training as well. You've got the capacity to really push yourself here. It's a hell yes to social gatherings. This is where you are at your most social. This is where you want to be the social butterfly. So as you're looking to your month ahead and different things are coming up, schedule as much as you can for this phase of your cycle because you're going to have the energy for it and you're actually going to want to to do it as well. And with regards to sexual intercourse, you are wet and ready. Okay, so your lubrication is at its highest point. If you're not on the pill and you have your cycle, what you'll notice throughout the month is that you'll start to understand the different types of discharge that you can have. So during your follicular phase, there isn't really much at all. During your ovulation phase, you can often get this kind kind of like gooey liquid, and it's cervical fluid that's been released. Okay, so that's actually all part of kind of the impregnation cycle of the womb, but it's completely normal, and it's usually kind of sticky and can like be stringy even. There's nothing wrong with this at all, right? It's very, very normal. So I used to get people coming into the shop to me. I worked in and managed a health store, and they'd be like freaking out, being like, what the hell is this, and it's completely normal. So don't panic if you do come off the pill, or you're still working on that right now, or you get it and you've always wondered what the hell it is. It's normal. And so this is a perfect time to, you know, have your kind of quickies and not needing that massive build-up. And so get a bit raunchy, and even if it's just with yourself, again, you know, explore it, play, bring in toys, do whatever it is that you want to do. And really, really great time to, to get that. Get that done. Okay, so focus then is collaboration. So especially for like work projects and things like that, um, or if it's friendships, different things like that, collaborate with people. Um, so present, communicate, and sell, right? This is the perfect time to do those things. So again, if you're looking at your, at your month ahead for work and you've got to do these different things, you start programming in where you can in advance the things that need to come up like this to get them done in this particular time, right? Obviously it's not always viable that you can do that, but you do it as much as you can, and that's going to support your energy levels so much more. And then this is all about your manifestation power, right? So what are you calling into the world? Because this is at the time where your energy is highest as well. So you're vibrationally, you're going to be up there with the universe. You're going to be like, hell fucking yeah, I can get anything that I want. So this is where you really work on that manifestation. So you've already figured out in your springtime what it is that you want want. Now you're calling it in, right? And the womb is a portal of manifestation. It's a portal of birth and creation. So this is where you really harness that power. Okay, your autumn, so 10 to 14 days. This is the longest phase of your cycle. As I said earlier, you've kind of got two phases to it. So the first half, you're still kind of in that higher energy. You can still get a lot of stuff done. You still want to be a bit sociable. And then the second half, you're really coming out of that. So your hormones all peak during this stage. So your estrogen, testosterone, and progesterone, progesterone. So they all peak and then they drop. Okay. So it's kind of like, and you'll really notice it when they drop because a lot of people tend to have a little like energy blip the day that it drops. So when you really get into tune with your cycle, I mean, I can tell you without ever looking at an app now exactly what stage of my cycle I am in. I can tell you the days that I'm switching over between my ovulation phase and my luteal phase. That is how, like, in tune you can actually become with your body because you get to know the symptoms and the patterns of behavior that happen during that time. So for nutrition, your hunger levels are going to skyrocket. And this is because during this phase, as your energy levels begin to drop, what's your body naturally going to, going to crave? Carbohydrates for sugar, right? And so massive sugar cravings and water retention. Now, I will say, as you do this work and you kind of regulate your, your eating throughout the month to support the cycle, you won't get as high sugar cravings. It might just come in kind of the week that those few days leading up to menstruation. So again, you keep up the high fiber foods, you're still detoxifying those hormones, you still got to work with that. So as before, right, leafy greens. So here we want to look at supporting all of the different nutrients that are going to need to be replenished pretty quickly during your menstruation phase, but also the different things that are going going to help you in this last phase as well. So lots of leafy greens for magnesium, root veggies as well, and, and like maybe roast some different things like that. You're going to be craving kind of denser meals, so more hearty meals and sweet fruit for those sugar cravings. Dark chocolate— there's magnesium in dark chocolate. So good quality dark chocolate, you're thinking like 75% or more. And then lots of extra water again for that water retention. A lot of people think you don't drink water when you're retaining water. But actually you do. So if you're retaining water, your liver isn't functioning well enough, right? Your kidneys then are affected as well. So you actually want to be drinking more water to keep flushing everything out. And then herbal teas are fantastic during this stage too. I love like the Dr. Stewart's liver tea, or also, and they have a lovely detox tea as well. All of the things in there really help to support that. Do you guys have puka in the States? Yeah. So they have some really nice some really nice teas as well. I'm trying, like, even their Peace tea is fab for this time. If you're struggling with digestion, their Relax tea is actually really good for digestion. Most people wouldn't go for that, but it's got marshmallow root in there, so it's really amazing for it. So anything that's kind of struggling at this time, you very much can help herbally, right? So they're lovely little things to bring in. And if you need a higher dose, dosage, all you do is literally double up on the tea bags. So just use a higher amount of tea bags and you'll get more of a dosage of the herbs. Lifestyle, your energy levels are high, then they get lower in the second half. HIIT strength at the start, and then you start to bring it down to kind of more relaxed things like your Pilates or your yoga, or you might just be going for walks. But this is a guide. Again, go with what your body's able for. I'm still able to continue strength training throughout my cycle. But I just might have to change the time of the day that I do it at so that I know that I'm well fed in the mornings, that my energy levels are high, and then I can maybe go around lunchtime and then I can eat after that to replenish again. That's how you kind of have to start working out your going, how you feel your body works, right? Giving yourself, most importantly, a break when you need it and reducing your social gatherings. So taking down that time with other people, you're going to need more rest, more recuperation time. And then again, going back to that sensual arousal being key, you're going to be drier during this phase. And also, a lot of women will find that they find it harder to climax, so you'll just need a little bit of extra stimulation. So maybe that's from an external source like a toy or something, or maybe you just learn how to play yourself with lubrication, different things like that. But it's something definitely that if you do have a partner, it's worthwhile kind of exploring and seeing what ways you can really build that and also just have a little bit of fun with it too. So then Focus, it's on completion. So this is a great time to get all of your different like projects and things done and get your to-do list done, right? So this is the perfect time. You're so like, it will annoy you. It annoys me when things are out of place during this time. I'm like, no, I have to have this in a certain way. And it's a really, really great time to get a lot a lot of work done. So if you are too like flighty, like I find myself quite flighty during summer and I'm like, I cannot focus on the task at hand, like say in a work situation, try and see if you can schedule more of that stuff for this week or these 2 weeks because you're going to have the energy for it and you're going to have the mental capacity for it a lot more. So organizing your life, figuring out what's working and what's not working. And here is a really great time as well to start setting your boundaries and speaking your truth because you're in a calmer phase. You're in, you're starting to go a little bit more introverted, a little bit more introspective, and you're kind of feeling more into what's right for you. So this is a really great time to start practicing that. And finally, our winter phase. So hormones here, lowest level of all hormones. But what this actually allows you to do, and again, if we take a step back and just look at it from a spiritual perspective, here, it gives you this beautiful space. So you think about what it's like for your body not to have to be dealing with all of these hormones raging all over the place all the time. There's suddenly this like clarity, this kind of level of peace. It's like calmness internally. And that also gives you calmness to be able to think and focus and feel, right? So coming down into that intuition, coming down into the feeling part of it, reconnecting with the home space. Like, periods back in the day by our ancestors were absolutely revered. Like, women were treated like royalty when they had their bleed because they were so in touch with nature, they were so in touch with the elements, they were so in touch with their wisdom. And this was just completely forgotten about as the more masculine structure came in over the years, and we were basically told to hide all of flat. So actually, during this phase is when you can get the most clarity on everything that you could want to get clarity on. It's the perfect time to do this. So nutrition-wise, your hunger levels will be higher at the start as you move into menstruation, and then they're going to drop pretty quickly. Again, can differ for everyone. What you're aiming to support here: iron levels, zinc, and magnesium. So magnesium in general, not bioavailable in food anymore, which basically just means that the food that we're eating doesn't contain adequate levels of magnesium. Honestly, as a woman, every single one of us should be supplementing with magnesium. Okay. And I'll talk to you a little bit about supplements in a second. And iron and zinc, you leach during your period. I mean, most of us know about iron. Most of us don't know about zinc. Zinc is also chronically low in people right now. Again, it's really struggling with being bioavailable in our food. So a lot of people having to supplement. I'm chronically low in zinc. One really easy way to tell is if you've got any of those little white marks on your nails. So I know in Ireland We were raised to think that that was calcium deficiency. It's not. It's actually zinc deficiency. And so that's one really easy way to tell. The other is if you get a lot of acid reflux and you're probably quite low on zinc because zinc is needed to produce your stomach acid. So you'll know if you're kind of getting that regurgitation. All right. So something that you can look at again, supplementing and then your iron. And if you don't eat meat, so you have two forms of iron. So you have your ferrous iron and you have your non-ferrous iron or your heme iron and your non-heme iron. And your heme iron you can only get from meat. So if you're a vegetarian or vegan, you're not going to get it from plant-based sources. So anybody that tells you you can is wrong. And this is the one that really actually supports the body the most, especially during menstruation. So I don't eat a lot of meat, but at like once a month, every single month on my period, I will have a high-quality organic grass-fed steak because honestly, the energy levels that I have from that are just insane. They are incredible and it completely restores the iron that I have lost. So it's one kind of exception to the rule that I really make every single month. And if somebody's willing to do it, I would advise them to do the same. Otherwise, you're looking at non-heme sources, which are fine, but you're not going to get the same energy levels or quality of iron from them. Your body can't use it in the same way. So it's something to be really aware of. So include your high fiber foods. High fiber is basically important throughout the whole cycle, right? Here, it's usually because— I don't know if any— like, it's different again for every single woman, but your bowel habits can massively change in the lead-up to menstruation and then through menstruation. So to make sure that you don't become constipated, you want to make sure that you still have high-fibre foods going through the diet. Okay. Extra protein. So again, we're looking to replenish those stores. So if you eat meat, fantastic. Stay away from chicken as much as humanly possible. Like, I mean, I think we all know the horror stories about chicken now at this stage, but they are ingest— they're actually injected with so much estrogen you're taking in extra. So that's another form that you really shouldn't be taking into the body. So where possible, um, if you can eat like turkey or, um, try and use vegan or vegetarian sources of protein instead, it's really, really good. And obviously if you can get organic chicken, fantastic. It's few and far between here in Ireland, and when you you do, it's extremely expensive. So definitely looking at turkey as a more viable option. And then you want your leafy greens. Again, you're still working on keeping that magnesium coming in where possible. You're not really absorbing it, but where you can. And healthy fats. So thinking of the likes of your avocados, your feta cheese, your halloumi, and all of those different kinds of sources of healthy fats that you can bring in. And then heartier meals. So this is where you're going to want your comfort foods. So it's your winter. So what do you want in winter? You want your soups, you want your stews, you want different things like that. So focusing in on giving your body what it's craving. And so your lifestyle. And so here, yeah, your energy levels are lower when you get your period and then they're going to shoot up. And so rest, lots and lots of rest. Give yourself the afternoon naps. Like, I love a good afternoon nap. Love it. Set your phone even for like 40 minutes. It doesn't have to be any longer than that and get your little nap and you'll feel so much better afterwards. And then you'll start moving back up into like your Pilates, your yoga, your walks, time in nature. Like, nature is so good for you throughout the whole cycle, but particularly like during menstruation because you're trying to like re-energize, right? So having your feet out on the ground in nature, like, really beautiful way to do that. If you want to have sex during this time, just make sure that you do use extra lubrication because you are actually quite dry. So definitely go with how you're feeling on that. And then with regards to your focus, it's a time of reflection. So that real introspection, reflection, right? So you're coming inwards, you're reflecting on everything in life, so internal and external. So how are you doing? How are you doing in life? What's going on for you? What do you want to work on? And contemplate, analyze, and make decisions that are led by your intuition. As I've already said, you have this right and left brain hemisphere, like, complete cohesion during this phase because there's nothing else going on. So it's a perfect time to actually make decisions, right, and stick with them, and then refocus. So what do you do after that? Okay, start now. So start small and just start. Don't think you have to have everything perfect. Don't think you have to go out and do a big shop beforehand. Literally start with tracking your cycle. That is what's going to give you the most in-depth analysis of where you're currently at, and we all know that we cannot know where we're going where we're going or what we're doing until we know where we're currently at. So that's the most important task for you right now if you want to do this. And take time each week. I do it every day, but that's a practice that I built up to. So what I would say is take time each week for now to really sit in a place of embodiment of the power of the womb space. So that is like sitting down, hands on the womb space, just closing the eyes. I'm going to show you how to do this. I'm going to guide you through a little thing now. In a minute. And just connect with her and listen and, and feel and speak and allow yourself to just be heard. And a lot of inner child work can come in here as well. So especially if you're triggered by something and you're feeling very vulnerable and raw, it's a lovely time to kind of sit down and go within to the womb space and see what's going on there. Okay, check in with the inner child to see what's coming up for you. Why have you been triggered? What has this brought up? How can you move past this? How can you reparent yourself? On this, right? So that's kind of another thing that you can do alongside the womb healing. But they're both very, very connected and very, very interlinked. So once you've started to explore these basic principles, this is like your gate— it's like the gateway drug to womb healing, right? So this is like the easiest way to kind of bring yourself into alignment more with your womb space and understanding it and moving through it and looking after it, looking like self-care. This is a huge, huge part of self-care, right? Probably the biggest thing that you can do for yourself. And then you can start to explore the kind of wider concept of womb healing. So as I mentioned already, the womb space in all women and the womb, the energetic womb space that's in men, so that sacral area, it is the center of all creation, right? So we birth life, whether it's a human or whether it's a project or we're— whatever it is that's coming through us, we're birthing these creations all of the time. And so when we're not connected to it, as we've said already, it's like it's a huge disconnection from our power, right? And the other thing that happens with the womb space as well is that it actually carries an awful lot of trauma. So whether it's ours from this lifetime or previous lifetimes, or whether it's generationally, so from our ancestors in this lifetime or ancestors that have come down to us through stages, we carry a lot of that trauma. So, I mean, science can back this up now. It shows how trauma is carried in the body anyway from different things that happens throughout your life. And it's, it's now kind of the root cause of a lot of different illnesses and diseases that go on in the body. And so we have to start to work through that. And as people start to heal from their traumas, then they notice huge improvements physically too. The womb space is no different. The other thing that can come in with that as well is like we store the energy of every single sexual partner, even people that we've just kissed. We store their energy in our bodies because we're actually allowing them into our space, right? So as women, we have our womb space and we have our heart space, which is just out here in front of our body. We're letting people into that space when we let them into our personal space. So, um, our sensual space. Our sexual spaces and restoring their energy, because they are giving us energy as they do that. So we've got to start clearing that out in order to begin to heal, and then also so that we can start actually allowing ourselves to feel, right? So we're so disconnected from feeling. So even though we might get an orgasm, even though we might feel pleasure, how deeply connected are you with that pleasure? Right? Is it a very surface level pleasure, or are you actually really feeling it in the body? Are you really feeling it in the mind? You're really feeling it in the soul? Does it bring emotion with it? Most of the time, if you're really, really deeply feeling, it will. So we've got to start reconnecting to this, and we have to start clearing out that old energy to be able to do it. So womb healing goes on and on and on. There's so many, so many layers to it, but this is the first place to start because we've got to work work with whatever we have in terms of like the, the easiest part that starts it, right? It's so hard to do all of this sometimes, and it can feel very overwhelming to do all of this whilst you're working full-time for other people in different kind of industries. You've got to work with what you can do. So as I said, as we were going through, you start to look at your month ahead. First, you track your cycle, you understand what your cycle looks what points of the month different things happen for you, how you're feeling throughout different parts of the month, what your energy levels are. Then you look at your job and you're like, okay, how can I somehow incorporate this in? Where can I make changes to allow myself the rest when I really need it? Right now, everybody can't just take a day off every time they get their period. That's not what I'm saying. But what you can do is maybe schedule especially like big meetings, or, you know, if you have to interact with a lot of people, try and do that on a different day. Try and allow this to be an easier day for you. It's such a good time for paperwork or admin tasks that, you know, it's a really nice time to schedule those things instead, and it allows you that space to be a little bit more introspective. So it's something to definitely think about and take Victoria Ward.

Okay, all right, that's going to be it for today's episode. Thank you guys so much for tuning in. Don't forget to go give Jen a follow on Instagram. We will have her account linked below. And also, if you're feeling super lovey-dovey, generous, beautiful, go over to Spotify or Apple and leave us a 5-star rating and a review. We so appreciate it. If you loved this episode and you learned a lot. I would also super appreciate your feedback. So if you want to send Jen a DM or shoot me a DM and let me know how you felt about this episode, if you learned anything, or just take a screenshot of the episode right now, share it to your stories and tag us so that we can see that you loved it and what your major takeaways were. All right, you guys, have a beautiful week. I will We'll see you next time.

Bye!