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Saying it outloud!
Saying it outloud!
EP 97: Understanding Hormones, Phases, and Contraceptives: A Menstrual Cycle Exploration
Ever wondered how tracking your menstrual cycle can give you a better understanding of your body? Join us, your hosts of Saying It Out Loud, and our co-host Stephanie as we demystify the menstrual cycle, discuss the importance of keeping tabs on it, and explore the world of birth control options.
We start by breaking down the different phases of the cycle and the hormonal changes that occur, as well as how they can impact your mood and cravings. Then, we dive into the various birth control methods available, such as oral contraceptives, injectables, progestin, and copper IUDs, and discuss the potential risks and benefits of each. Throughout the episode, we emphasize the importance of consulting with a medical professional to find the right method for you. So whether you're a woman wanting to learn more about your body or a coach looking to better understand your female clients, this episode is packed with valuable insights for everyone. Don't miss out on this empowering conversation!
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What's going on, everyone and welcome to Saying It Out Loud. A podcast created to help people who want to learn more about fitness and life. Our podcast will help you build a foundation and turn fitness into a lifestyle and help you conquer your life. I will be your host, leo, and my co-host.
Speaker 2:Stephanie, and we're the owners of a HALA Athletics coaching business built on our belief that a client aren't just a dollar sign and they're human. Now on to the episode.
Speaker 1:What's going on everyone and welcome back to Saying It Out Loud. Welcome to You Loud from San Antonio. Another episode to bless those ears of yours. It's been a busy week, it's been a busy month, it's been an interesting month And we are just traveling along. We had one of our clients say we're going to throw a little wall and she's going now off the greener pastures. And last week was very long, very busy, a lot of work done. I finished all the cheesecake so I'm going to be shipping those out, maybe this coming week, if not next week. I'm still waiting on my custom pack of dine and come in, so stay tuned for that. What else did we do? We watched the Black Clover movie and then we saw Extraction 2. Extraction 2 was fire bro. I don't know how. That movie didn't have a cinematic reveal or was in the theaters, but it was good, like he out there with John Wick, the prison scene, fire, but yeah, good movie. So these are two good movies and I made an animal cookie cheesecake.
Speaker 2:Animal cracker cookie. Animal crackers, that's not animal cookie.
Speaker 1:Animal cracker cookie cookies. How was that cheesecake? It was really good. And then we had Mexican night and some quesadillas. Those were fire. The steak was fire. I want more, but more.
Speaker 1:But yeah, other than that, this has been working. Training The use Oh, we got blood work back, very important, we got blood work back. So now we have What was I trying to say? Now we can look back at our old blood work and see the work that we put in actually worked out for us and it paid off. So the protocols work and done correctly and stay adherent to it, stay consistent with it pays off.
Speaker 1:I bring this up because a lot of people make an excuse. Mel lies, i'm 33 years old, 1156 testosterone Yeah, so there's no excuse. If I can do it, you can do it. The older you get an excuse because they say, once you hit 30, your testosterone is supposed to go down. Well, mine's pretty freaking high for a natural. But yeah, we're in theon that note.
Speaker 1:Let's get into this episode. Oh my god. Question of the day. Hopefully this only pertains to the mouse. I mean the mouse. Have you ever taken birth control? Probably, maybe you've at least heard of it. Okay, good, today's topic is birth control And, as you guessed it, i am not a female, but we do have a professional here with us today. Her name is Stephanie And we're going to be doing a little dive into birth control some of the side effects, maybe how to come off of it, maybe if you can come off of it, and just overall what birth control is and what it does to your body. So she's going to be doing majority of the talking and I'm just going to be piggybacking.
Speaker 1:No no, this is where we have notes.
Speaker 2:So you can follow.
Speaker 1:Okay, anyway, so.
Speaker 2:I'm starting with explaining the mental cycle because a lot of people, a lot of women in general, don't even know the different cycles, like the different phases through a cycle and specifics about menstruation. And if you're a male listener you might want to know because you have significant other or you coach women, so it's very important. So menstrual cycle, of course, only happens in women. It is typically 28 days. However, it can vary between 21 or 35. It really depends on the person and it also depends on their hormonal status. But ideally, when my clients get healthy, 28 is usually the average, so if it's any longer or shorter than that, it's a huge reflex. It's just kind of something I tell literally all my clients and pretty much everyone in the get a cycle track it like using up. There's flow apps, different apps. Oral ring now tracks it too. It's important because one it'll give you awareness of what's going on, to how long the cycle is happening, and you're going to learn a lot. But there's four different phases. The first phase is menstruation, so that's the first day that you're bleeding. Pretty much It's the beginning of your 28 days, or however long it lasts. So that is shutting up the uterine lining, of course, and it's triggered by hormonal levels, especially estrogen and progesterone. So this is when estrogen is at its highest point. This is something that further along we're going to talk about blood work and it's something that we need to kind of understand. So it's supposed to last around five to seven days. For some people it'll last three days, for some people last longer If you're in either spectrum not necessarily a very good thing. This is also something you want to keep track of. Second phase after that is follicular phase, so that approximately lasts 10 to 14 days after your menstruation period. This is where FSA's follicular stimulating hormone is released from the pituitary gland and assimilating growth and maturation of ovarian folliculose. So that's pretty much where your body is trying to get ready to ovulate, to get pregnant.
Speaker 2:So, which brings me to the part that's the most important part of the period in itself, is ovulation phase. So ovulation of course, occurs around the 14-day period of the menstrual cycle. It is technically one day. However, it can be very hard to track if you haven't tracked it before, and also keep in mind that, although there's only one day that you can actually get pregnant, sperm in itself lasts up to five to seven days after that. So it's still like a window of like one to five to seven days. So it's not something that you kind of want to risk it Which we're going to talk about, like natural birth controls too, and that's something to keep track of.
Speaker 2:So during ovulation phase, lh is triggered to release an egg from the dominant follicule And that's when in blood orb you'll see LH being highest. So if you're trying to get pregnant, blood works at different stages can be very important. But and then last phase is the luteal phase. This is when we take blood work. So this is when progesterone is at its highest And it's very important for us to get blood work at this point, because if we take it at any other point, we don't know if progesterone is just Like shifting around or if you actually do have quote-unquote PCOS or whatever it is. So he always wanted to be a deludial face. You all right.
Speaker 1:Period. You know, i got an ad pretty good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're just gonna move on because That was about to take in. We've actually been. I've actually been taking a course and learning more about the menstrual cycle for prepping females through body-butting shows because, un-nunks, i Didn't know a lot about period when I was Growing up. Actually, i knew nothing, other than I used to think that the menstrual cycle, that was it. I didn't know there was phases, i Just thought women bled and it lasted for a certain period of time, and all I did was bleed. I had no idea of the tremendous amount of Changes that took place during the menstrual cycle and that it like literally changes your, your mind. Yeah, chemical reactions in your mind to your transmitters, with the cravings and all that other stuff.
Speaker 2:So let's talk about first controllers different types of birth control, and Each type is very important because it's gonna dictate a lot of your symptoms or like what's going on with their body and how to prepare When you come off a bit wish. Ideally, you want to come off a bit pretty much. So oral is The most popular one because it's given by anyone pretty much and even like colleges will give it off for free and stuff in. Colleges.
Speaker 1:Well, that's for gynecologists.
Speaker 2:Like college university college Colleges.
Speaker 1:That was like some sling for gynecologists.
Speaker 2:Okay anyways. So there's Hundreds of different types out there and it's honestly pretty ridiculous How many types of work until there are, and most of them are barely studied pretty much. But there is some sort of combination between since the synthetic estrogen and progesterone or both, and Which type is very important as well, because one it'll reflect on blood work, to your symptoms and how to come off of it, but also There's different amounts for birth control. So it's a lot and it's a lot to keep up with. But just understand and that's why a lot of people don't understand that birth control is actually very damaging for your body, because there's just barely any information out there.
Speaker 2:The information out there is within maybe max a year, maybe three years, of a woman and that is not enough for us to kind of see what potential side effects could be causing. Also, they don't. If they do blood work, it's followed by Western medicine, so it's completely different. But overall, birth control potential side effects, the way that it works is by suppressing ovulation, so it's thickened cervical mucus and pretty much it's meant to thin the uterine lining. So based on this, it's supposed to prevent pregnancy. However, again, it's not inserted in you. So although they say, like some crazy stat like 98% accuracy you know you never know, honestly, and a lot of women out there are taking so many different supplements is actually affecting the birth control pill in itself and it's just kind of making you even more fertile, which is not what you want.
Speaker 2:But potential side effects. There's a long list. If you've ever opened one of these things, this is like a very short list. This pamphlet goes on for pages pretty much of all those side effects, so short list. Most common is like nausea, breast tenderness, mood changes, some bleeding in between cycle and increased risk of blood clots. So it's like not even scratching the surface of all those actual side effects.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's a way more than that.
Speaker 2:So there's also mini pills progesterone mini pills which is pretty much synthetic. Progesterone is meant to thicken the cervical mucus and it's only side effects, which is not really as irregular period, acne and changes. The problem with this and what we'll start seeing is anything that's progesterone heavy, is very, very bad. Honestly, it's one of the worst things that you can do for your body. Like if you are going to do some type of birth control, you want it to be non-homonal or just overall a balance, depending on what your body is. But if it's progesterone alone, you're going to gain weight like it's like overnight pretty much, and the reason for that is because progesterone in itself will start causing, like, more weight gain, water retention etc. Like that. But they don't really, they don't attribute it to that. So just letting you know, there's a patch which is pretty much you can put it on the arm. Mainly it's meant to release hormones through the skin to prevent ovulation. I believe it's changed every three months. There's a combination of hormones. Effectiveness is not really there. There's a vaginal ring, which is a ring that's inserted and it's pretty much releasing hormones into the vagina to inhibit ovulation.
Speaker 2:Injectable contraceptives, progestin, all name This is where depo comes in. Depo has been faced out by a lot of people because of how many lawsuits they have, by how bad it was because it was progesterone alone. The problem with this is that it's not just the injectable, it's also the IV, like marina, it's also the progesterone only pills. You have to be careful with anything progesterone alone Doctors won't tell you that to just give you what they were given. And there's copper iodine. This is non-hormonal iodine. So this in itself works by creating an environment that's toxic to sperm to prevent fertilization. Especially because it's inserted, it has higher effectiveness. You are going to have your normal cycle during this.
Speaker 2:This, in our opinion, is like the best one you can have, whether if you do have an autoimmune condition or if you have, like a pituitary Tumor or some other inflammatory disease in your body. You don't want to do this because it accumulates copper in your body a lot more and it can cause toxicity. When you talk to people About this, they're gonna say like, oh, that's like a very small chance that's gonna happen. But reality is that a lot of people nowadays have a lot of in our immune conditions, so they don't even know it's gonna happen and they think that they had a cup ready will help them And it makes things worse.
Speaker 2:Very important her monolid. It depends. There's like four different types Lilita, mariana, which is the worst, carlina and something else. These are a combination. Marina is heavy progesterone as well, so Mariana has a lot of lawsuits against it because of that reason. It causes a lot of issues, not only like a regular bleeding and spotting, but also the weight gain that everyone Is afraid of and happens during breath control. Do you want to? I feel like I'm in a lot.
Speaker 1:Going on a roll here.
Speaker 2:So On this, i already talked about breath control, but I also wanted to talk about like the other methods that there are out there that could be Help prevent pregnancy as well. Common ones are just like condoms there's female condoms as well and of course, there's like permanent methods. So like Historectomy, vasectomy for men and it, there's natural methods, so Nowadays it's more popular, right. So natural methods, fam, fertility awareness based methods are the most common ones. Some people Do this and then this is the most common. The one and the most of my clients do is 10 Sorry, my cat Climbing me is Messuring your basal body temperature. So during your ovulation phase your temperature is gonna rise, is not gonna arise huge amount, but it's gonna rise like two or three Fahrenheit degrees and that is enough for your body to be like and it's an ovulation. So the way that you do this, as you can do like natural cycles There's temp drop, there's different companies out there that does it natural cycles is the one that most of my clients have, especially if they have the oral ring, because it's super compatible And you track your ovulation based on that. Super easy, super simple. It's easy for them to prevent pregnancy, it has no other side effects on that and it's supposed to be 99% Effective. So it just really depends on You know how you guys are, but it's very important if you want to not be unbirth control. There's also cervical cervical mucus method, meaning you can track and see How your cervical mucus is changing, which technically happens and is supposed to change during ovulation. But again, if your body's not healed, like healthy hormonally, this might not happen and you're gonna risk, in front of some other apps, just like to tell you like, yeah, you're not your ovulation phase again, if you're not actually met measuring your body temperature. There is a seven day gap between those apps and that To be not also to get re-pronounced. That's just something to keep in mind of While you're kind of making your decisions and like if you want to be on birth control or not. So These things are effective depending, but it's 99% now, apart from that.
Speaker 2:So now I want to talk about functional side of birth control. So It's You get like the functional and great girls, which is like Just just don't do birth control and stuff like that, and that's very important. But I understand that there's people who just don't want to get pregnant. So that's also something to consider. Those methods and natural methods are very important, but I mean if, like I was saying, if you're cleared and you don't have an autoimmune condition or anything like that, copper IUD can be beneficial.
Speaker 2:Now, if you were to talk to a doctor over you when endocrinologist whatever it is one they might pull laps not full laps and Two they're probably gonna tell you, like it, that really doesn't matter. If you switch from birth controls, it really doesn't matter. Like your Symptoms, unless they do. Like an ultrasound and I find like a system, they'll quote-unquote give you a diagnosis of PCOS Or if you have severe period pains, they'll probably tell you that you have endometrocytes. The problem with that is they don't really give you any other further information and I've been seeing a lot of people just just take things to the Absolute extreme because of Instagram and because of doctors. Like a lot of people will say like you're never gonna get cured from PCOS, you're not gonna cure it from endometrocytes, that's it.
Speaker 2:Surgeries are the only method And I've had a lot of clients that come to me post hysterectomy When it's something that we could have prevented. So it's very important to understand that there are ways that you can go about this to actually heal your hormones and it's honestly not going to be through a doctor likely not a natural path or holistic doctors, because they've just been prescribing 50 supplements, not really changing anything else, and that doesn't help either. So one thing is important is where are your symptoms? Like, what is going on, are you and like currently during birth control, and also what was going on before birth control, because it gives us an understanding of like what has changed and also what type of birth control you're on. Based on that type of birth control, that means that we either do full blood work or we do what's called a Dutch test, which is a urinalysis test. It pretty much will measure your hormones on the well.
Speaker 2:I forgot the term of it. Okay, it measures your hormone completely different from your blood work.
Speaker 1:It's pretty much on a scale.
Speaker 2:Yeah, i just can't think of the word right now, anyways. So when you have an IUD, it's not always going to be reflected on the blood work, on what's going on, because there are different pathways that hormones can be going through that blood work does not reflect. So that's what Dutch test does and it helps us understand where your hormones are at and what your body is going to do as soon as you come up with those birth controls. This is why there are many posts out there that will say like, hey, this is how you come off of birth control, this is what to take. But it's a case by case, person scenario thing because it depends on your situation, the type of birth control, your symptoms and your hormones and all those supplements are not going to help. So I need to reiterate that because I feel like a lot of people will just jump on all these supplements, come up with it and their symptoms got 10 times worse or they gained more weight and they think that they need to get back on breast control to fix that, where in reality they just did things wrong. Also important again get your blood work done and read by someone. That's functional medicine, aka us, pretty much The way we measure things are completely different from doctors, and it's important for us to understand where you're at realistically and where you need to be, so we can actually take you through the phases correctly to get you to where you want to be.
Speaker 2:Birth control in itself So a lot of people will say, like this, really not that many side effects, apart from, like, a lot of mineral deficiencies. That's not true, because it affects your gut. It does affect your mineral deficiencies and it also does affect everything else. It does affect your neurotransmitters. It affects, like, how you see your partner and who you attract and who you're attracted to Like. There's way too many things that are affected by birth control and those things are important to understand because a lot of people just get on birth control when they're like 13 years old, they didn't want to get pregnant and they've been on it for like 10, 20 years And don't understand why, when they're 30, they can't lose weight. Yes, so those things are very important to keep in mind and understand because it's going to make a huge difference in, like, what's going on with your body, how to heal, how to get to your goals health-wise and gut health-wise. That's beyond dieting and working out, because that's not enough.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Yeah, i mean basically what it comes out to for anything generally is lifestyle factors.
Speaker 1:That's going to be the end all be all for your cures for most of the diseases out there that can be curable or put into remission or even the symptoms are lessened.
Speaker 1:So if you're on birth control and your lifestyle is that of a good one whole foods, training, managing your stress and doing what you need to do then you're not going to have these, not to mention you're not going to have these severe problems that most American women face nowadays, because they're all go, go, go, go go alpha personalities. And that brings the periods up to another level, because your body is just not in a state that it needs to be in to properly go through a proper cycle. So, regardless if you want to be on birth control or not, you need to have a lifestyle that goes with that. So that's where functional medicine comes into play, because, yeah, okay, of course we're going to give you supplementation, but medical, great food to coincide along with your diet and alongside your training, to make sure you're getting the bang for your buck And we're not just going to prescribe you supplementation and give you nothing else.
Speaker 1:There's going to give, there's going to be a slew of guidance, because your training needs to compliment your supplementation, because you can out train your supplementation to the point to where you're supplementing but you're not eating enough, or you're grinding through all the supplementation while you're training because you're overtraining, where you're stressed out. So it all needs to coincide together. And that's what we do on, like doctors who just prescribe and diagnose, we well, you can't prescribe nor diagnose, but we can get to the root cause of your problem by analyzing your blood work, your your Dutch test, your GI maps, and then we take a functional approach which combines holistic training and what Western medicine together, because sometimes both are necessary And we get to the root cause of the problem. And a lot of people have been going to the doctors for years now and still have seen no change, but yet they still believe everything the doctors tell them. Maybe, just maybe, it's time to take a different approach, that of a more natural path, and try to heal yourself through nutrition and lifestyle factors.
Speaker 2:But you know, how did I say my little piece?
Speaker 1:And you know, let's say, but hopefully you enjoyed Stephanie's podcast episode. It was very informative for Mel and Feebel, because Mel she needs to know this too. And if you liked this episode, don't forget to like, comment and share this episode and do that. five star review And until next time, see ya.
Speaker 2:Hopefully you enjoyed the episode and have already left your five star review. If you want more knowledge like this, make sure you join our free Facebook group.
Speaker 1:Where we give out freebies, go over more topics and answer all your questions. Lastly, make sure you follow us on all social media platforms. Usernames will be in the show notes.