The Hormone Goddess Samantha Hadidi - Heal your hormones to heal your heart...

We have a truly special episode for you this week, and a distinctly personal one... For anyone that hasn't encountered the soft-spoken joy of Samantha Hadidi, you're in for a treat...

Sam, otherwise known the Hormone Goddess, is one of the most compellingly-kind, human-oriented  specialists I've come across in recent years. A space-holder for women across the UK and a true light-bearer for female empowerment. 

Her mission is simple - to provide women the space, tools and permission to connect with their hormonal health, sacred femininity and latent magic. For Sam, coming back to self, deep truth and powerful healing, lies in connecting to not only our biological nature as women, but particularly - the power of the womb.

Our talk gets very personal, very quickly; so go gently listeners if any of these themes resonate.  As Sam says, her open-hearted nature is something she has come to embrace - along with the importance of sharing her voice, her history and her learnings.  In our conversation we explore the painful life circumstances that brought her to rock bottom, lost and silenced - and the portal that this crash offered for her deep healing. Scan forward, she now teaches what she lived - an ever-evolving journey in self-care and alignment that has her leading women back to their sacred centres. And for Sam, it all started with healing her hormonal fracture, and the emotions that lived beneath.

Click in for an episode rich in heart-break, laughter and the tender encouragement to embrace ALL that you are.

Remember to rate, review and re-share the episode if you appreciate Sam - it makes a huge difference and we'd be enormously grateful; this is for you, and we need your voices. 

For more information about Sam's work, you can reach out to her directly at:

sam@thewellnessgoddess.co.uk 
Instagram: the_hormone_goddess 

And for all the insights on upcoming speakers and events at Finding Your Way Home, along with opportunities to work with me as an Embodiment Coach, visit ww.ab-embodimentcoaching.org 

Transcript

Anthea: 0:15

Welcome to Finding Your Way Home, the secrets to true alignment. I'm your host, Anthea Bell, movement teacher, mind body coach, and lifelong spiritual seeker. This is a podcast about the depth, weight, and profound healing power of connection between mind and body, spirit and soul, and from one human to another. Together with an incredible range of inspiring guests, we'll explore just what connection and alignment mean. How to get there in a world full of the temptation to conform, and how great challenge ultimately can lead to life changing transformation. Get ready for groundbreaking personal stories, conversational deep dives, and a toolkit of strategies to build not just your inner knowing, but your outer world. Let's dive in.

1:07

Welcome everyone to this week's episode of Finding Your Way Home. I am gazing at the gorgeous coral coloured clothing of Samantha Hadidi. otherwise known the hormone goddess. her big, big passion is, really educating women and empowering women around the topic of hormonal health. And beyond that, it seems to me gaining a beautiful understanding of your body so that you can be in your most authentic self. You summarise it so beautifully there that's exactly what it is, I think. yes, I, I love talking about hormone health, but the biggest passion is just helping women to understand their bodies and their cycles, their hormones, and just getting to know themselves intimately realizing how sacred and how beautiful we all are. Um, and I think that, that, that's my biggest passion, my biggest love, the thing that excites me the most. You can kind of see it beaming out of you, which is gorgeous. And we, got a little bit dangerous just before we started recording because actually we started getting into it and then realized we needed to turn on the recording what we were beginning with is just a. A little dive into Sam's story. So Sam, you haven't always been, let's say the version of yourself that we find you to be now. I wonder if you'd be happy to tell us a little bit about that story. So I have, I have quite a layered story. I think like most people, But, I think fundamentally, I, I was lost for so much of my life, you know, I, I really, really struggled with who I was, I'm a sensitive person, I'm an emotional person, I cry at everything, um, and I, I, I, I'm naturally quite introverted, and I think I really struggled to be myself, to recognize myself, and As part of that, I got into relationships, which really didn't serve me, um, didn't serve me well at all. Um, and I found myself in a lot of situations again, which didn't serve me well at all. And I think what, for much of my life, I mean, I'm 38 now. Um, so I've still got hopefully a lot of years ahead of me, but for much of my life before that, I was, You know, I wasn't in tune with myself. I didn't really understand myself and I was wearing this kind of mask, you know. I didn't want to let that down. Um, and then what happened is I was a stay at home mum for a long time as well. Again, I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life. I didn't know who I was. I was in this period of, trauma after trauma, and this was in my late 20s into my early 30s, and it, there was no let up. It was, I mean, I'm happy to talk about that trauma, but it's a long story. Um, But there was just a period where it just didn't stop, it didn't let up. And I think because I had young children at that time, because I was so focused on being a mom, I wasn't able to process that trauma. So I just kind of numbed out. Everyone in hindsight, everyone said, you're coping with this so well, but I don't think I was coping with it at all, if that makes sense. I just kind of numbed it out and got on with it. And then at the end of this trauma, at the end of this period, my hormones fell apart. And I, you know, I'd worked in health and wellness for a long time. I understood nutrition, I understood diet, I understood exercise and movement and all of these things. But my hormones still fell apart and I was, I was, I was suicidal at stages. I was so low and I was really rock bottom. I'd howl sometimes I was, I was that low. Um, my periods were incredibly painful and heavy. I couldn't leave the bathroom at some times. I had, um, a really large cyst on my ovaries, which I had to have an operation to remove. My thyroid health was a mess. So I gained all this weight that wouldn't shift no matter what I did. So basically all of this had just led me to this point. And like I said, even though I've eaten the right things, moving and doing all these things, my health was an absolute mess., it just made me really realize. That it's about so much more than what we just eat. It's about so much more than what, you know, than what we're prescribed almost by society. They tell us to eat these things. They tell us to move and we'll be okay. We'll be healthy. But it really, really made me realize it's so much deeper than that. So began my journey. You know, it's a never ending journey. My journey hasn't stopped now, and it will never stop. But so began my journey, and I did so much learning, and so much healing, and working with myself, and working on that trauma. And it really, really made me realize just how much Our nervous system matters for our hormones, and it's not talked about enough because if our bodies don't feel safe then our hormones aren't gonna be, you know, firing on all cylinders, we aren't going to be at our best. Our bodies need to feel safe for us to feel healthy, as women, for us to to be free of period pain, to be free of PMS and to feel, to feel good about ourselves. So I think part of what drew us to each other initially was not just this shared love of cacao and Costa Rica it was a real awareness of the mind body relationship, which is the entire ethos of this podcast, and there is something in what you're describing about compounded trauma sustained over a period of time and a lot of what it's creating within the person is a closure, is an inability to have a voice and is a gradual dwindling of, let's say, individual energy, individual agency. And of course, a system that is traumatized in that way is fundamentally on a complete path to management mode. It's constantly trying to escape the danger which is impossible given that usually one is still living within the environment, which is triggering the fear. And that was the same for me as well. And so when you start to notice, That actually the system is not regulated and we are not feeling okay, that moment for people can be really quite destabilizing because they have been operating under the assumption that this is just life. Yeah. They have a gateway moment of identifying that something actually isn't quite right. And I wonder, what was it for you that gave you the opportunity to begin to look inwards? Did it just get so bad that it was required? kind of, but there was a last straw, if you like, so, um, COVID didn't help because all this happened around COVID as well, and I was homeschooling four children, trying to run my own business at the same time, and that, that, that took me over the edge as well. Um, but the, the thing that really, really, really pushed my body into Well, it was in trauma mode anyway, but it pushed it right over, was an abortion. And, um, that was, it's, even now, it's the most traumatic thing I think I've ever been through. I've had, I've experienced a miscarriage before, so I've experienced both sides of it. Um, but it was an abortion that I didn't really want. I felt I had to have it. I didn't feel like I had another choice in it. And I think that was what really caused that, almost that fracture in my, in my psyche, I guess, if you like. Um, knowing that I had to do this thing, but feeling like I really, really didn't want to do it. Um, and after that abortion, it, like I said, it was the most horrendous experience I've ever been through. Um, and I felt so lonely and so isolated because even now I think abortion is so, it's got a stigma attached to it even now, and I think we kind of assume, maybe people don't assume, but again, it's not talked about that if a woman has an abortion, then it's her choice, you know, so, you know, it's her choice. So she's going to be okay. It's her choice. It will be okay. She'll get through it. But actually, like I said, it really, really affected me. It I was suicidal at certain stages after that. Um, and I think it was having had that and the ovarian cyst, and I'm, I'm 100 percent sure because when I had that cyst removed, it was almost to the day that that baby would have been born. I am convinced it was my body trying to grow something, if you like, in place of that baby., It was like that aha moment, okay. I was like, this is all connected. it all threads together. that was the last straw, if you like, I can't live like this anymore. I can't do this anymore. I have to do something. God, Sam, I'm so sorry for, um, for anyone that's listening that, you know, that's, that's going through that and, and to share that, uh, to share that publicly, that's huge. And, um, And I'm really so sorry that you went through that. It's just unimaginable, actually. Um, it, it, I don't think there's anything that quite prepares you for it, because again, like I said, not many people talk about it. And, and I get it, because even now, I mean, years on, I get teary talking about it, and I've done so much self work on it. you know, I've held ceremonies and, and all sorts of things to process that trauma. It is difficult to talk about, but because of that. Like I said, I don't think you're ever quite prepared for the emotions that come afterwards. Um, and actually I was reading something that in, um, a lot of Chinese cultures when that happens, they encourage women to almost live like they're pregnant and to honor that, um, what would be that birth date. And I found that really, really beautiful. all of these things. I truly believe it happened for a reason, and it's why I'm here, it's why I learned these things, it's why I started healing, and I think that in itself is a beautiful thing. I'm lucky enough to be at a place now, where I'm grateful for it. That's a huge place to get to, and uh, You know, I know that very well from different circumstances, and what's amazing is when you're in the thicket of that darkness, you cannot imagine that anything positive is going to come from it. And so again, for anyone listening that feels as though they're traveling that at the moment, you probably wouldn't be able to conceive of how your life will As things unfold, transform, and how many people you'll be able to support and share with intimately by virtue of the fact that you've lived through that, that transformation that comes afterwards. There's also something that you're talking about there, Sam, which I love for us to, to dive into a little bit. It's this concept of honoring. And you and I were really fortunate last year to do a little bit of work together, and Oh my goodness, you, like, you are so Just for anybody, you are the most skillful, most beautiful worker. You, you just, yeah, the space you hold, everything about you is just so beautiful and so powerful. Just, yeah, you holding that space and you working with me, it just shifted so much just in that in one session. So I just want to really take a moment to honor that as well. And to say how incredible you are. You're just. The most beautiful person and that really shines through in your work and I feel really lucky to have had that with you. You're so sweet. I am. I'm going to be doing that British thing where I, I received the compliment and then immediately we go into a different conversation topic. One of the things that we, that we talked about when we were connected in that way and a little bit afterwards was this thing of, verbalizing your no to yourself and to others. In what you're describing about that context, you know, there was a decision that you had to make and there was a deep inner no, yet there was also a feeling of a necessity to it. And it feels to me as though the power to say no, or at least the power to check in to identify what you're, inner feeling is what deep belly womb instinct is that that forms quite a core part of your public message. I'd be fascinated if you'd be up for talking us through a little bit of that I think it's a large part of my journey actually. And I'm still, again, I'm still on this path. No, we never really finished our work, have we? Um, and you know, when I was younger, I was really fiery. I was really feisty and headstrong and I knew what I wanted. I was not afraid to say what I wanted. I was not afraid to just be completely myself. I was, I was really, really confident with that when I was younger. And then for various reasons, I kind of had that squished and squashed out of me and dampened. And again, like I said, I got into relationships which didn't serve me well. And again, over time That confidence in myself, that headstrong ability, it didn't soften, it eroded completely. I lost sight of who I was, I didn't really know who I was anymore. So I'd gone from being this really fiery, really passionate, um, young girl, to this This woman who just was scared of everything. I was a classic people pleaser. I said yes to everybody and everything. I, you know, I did, I did what I thought I should do. I didn't do what I wanted to do, or I didn't even listen to myself. If you like, I never stopped to tune in and go and go back to that abortion. I think. Now, if I was in that situation, I would handle it differently. I probably wouldn't have had the abortion in the first place. I would just think, okay, it's not ideal, but this is what I need to do. Um, so yeah, I'm in a completely different place now and it's just taken that. step back and sitting in I think for me it's that feminine softness because you know sitting in that space of stillness and of quiet and just listening to myself listening to that inner voice listening to my womb what I always wish I'd listened to, um. like I said it's a journey, I'm slowly getting there, and I'm slowly learning now to say no, to put my foot down a bit more, and to just be unapologetically me. and I think this is what I'm so passionate about, helping other women to see that as well. It's okay to be yourself. It's okay to say no. It's okay to listen to your body. I mean, Being a mom of four boys, I, I put my own body, my own needs on hold for so long, and I'm not willing to do that anymore. I think that was a huge pivotal thing as well, realizing that that self care, self love, doing the things for me, it's not selfish, it's, it's so needed. I think it's especially difficult for women because we are kind of, we bear that weight of society on our shoulders, don't we? Where we're told to people please, we're told to be nice, to play nice, So it's kind of ingrained in us. From a young age as well, to be nice, to not be angry as well, that's another thing, not have that anger. I think that's something that came up in my session with you. I had a lot of anger and that anger is still, it's still bubbling and simmering and it needs to come out. it's okay to have all of these things, all of these feelings, and it's okay to look after yourself and put yourself first. it's amazing to hear you talking because I'm reminded of something that we see in the physical studio, in the physical practice, were very high achieving women in their late 30s, 40s, 50s. Often very slim, did a lot of running, HIIT training, Very, very intelligent and really very committed to thinking. Thinking, strategizing, and fantastically effective at it for every area of their lives. For their families, within their professional context. And What a lot of them didn't know until we began to explore this concept of softening into the body and from there finding deep power, connectivity, and strength is that this tendency of living in the adrenal system is creating quite profound physiological changes. And one of the things that they always reported, and so we would play with this, is that when they sat down it was almost impossible for them to feel heavy on the seat. Saying when they were standing, they couldn't feel heavy in their heels. They were always in some forward momentum. Mm. In front of their feet. So the ball of the foot was very heavy into the floor. And then there was kind of this scrunching toes of expectation of what's to come. You know, you're watching for the danger all the time. And as we started to train in. Being,, supine on the carriage, beginning to do footwork, you know, pelvic clock, all of those things, as we actually began to mobilize through the hips, through the pelvis, really getting some of those bones moving and getting the connectivity back there, and bringing their minds and their visions into the bowl of the pelvis, not only did movement begin to change, but how they stood, spontaneously, their posture began to change and how they inhabited posture began to change. I'm curious as to what your perspective is on, let's say general pelvic, womb, hormonal health education, because that is a huge part of. Your practice, your day to day work at the moment is educating people around those topics and my, my sense from my memory, and we're about the same age bracket, is that that was very minimally covered when we went to school. Oh my goodness. I can't even remember. being taught. I, I, I mean I must have been. Um, I think we all were, but again, I can't remember being taught any of these things. And I, I'm a hundred percent sure that that's why so many women struggle with their hormones now, because we were never given that education. We were never taught about our beautiful bodies. We were never taught about the intricacies of our hormones, about even the structure. Of, you know, of our pelvic bowl and, you know, it was always very much, I don't know about you, but I think I got, I always got the feeling that it's, this is how not to get pregnant. It wasn't, it wasn't ever, this is what's going to happen in your body, this is how you might feel, this is how you can, you know, you can deal with it. This is how you can move forwards or, these things aren't right, so then you deserve to get support or help or things like that. It was very much a, this is what. will happen each month. It'll be horrendous. Your, your period is like the source of suffering, it's a source of shame. Don't ever let anyone know you're on your period as well because that's the worst possible thing you could imagine, um, because your period is dirty and all of these things. And yeah, it was never Your body is beautiful. Your body is absolutely incredible. Your period blood is sacred. Your period is sacred. Your womb is the source of your power, you know. It's not just this biological process, you know, where you hold babies or you shed your, your uterine lining. Your womb is powerful and sacred and It's where you hold your emotions, your traumas, as you well know, in your pelvic bowl. We were never taught any of these things. We were never taught that we shouldn't have painful periods, heavy periods. Again, there's so much about being a woman that we weren't taught. And, you know, it's difficult to, learn to love your cycle, learn to love your body, if you're not taught about these things, if you're not taught about their innate power and wisdom that goes alongside them. What do you see, Sam, on a regular basis in terms of what it is, what the factors are that are giving people so much discomfort in those periods within their cycle? Common thread always is high stress, whether that's in the form of trauma, or like you were describing about a lot of the women you've worked with as well, there'll be high achievers, They're amazing at their careers. They're incredible at their jobs. They juggle it with motherhood. They juggle it with elderly parents. All of these different things. And yet there's never any time for themselves. there's almost that disconnect between, okay, I've got to do this. I've got to do this. And then, There's never that time to, to slow down and to find that stillness, um, whereas other women, like I said, you can, you can see from early on they'll share, um, and I'm not a therapist at all, so sometimes I do need to pass women on to therapists and things like that, but they'll share traumas from their childhood. or experiences when they were young women as well, which becomes, then becomes that period pain, those cysts or fibroids and things as well. our hormone health isn't just about the foods we eat. It's so tied up in our emotional health. It's so tied up in our thoughts as well. our bodies listen, our bodies listen, our cells listen. And that's not woo woo. That is. It's rooted in science, you know, it's all interconnected and I always say on the very simple level, how can you expect to have a good period if you hate your periods? How can you expect to have a good period if you hate being a woman? And I get it. Believe me, I get it because I've been there. Um, I know how it's not that easy to just, okay, I'm going to enjoy my periods now. Um, But it's so entrenched and it's all interconnected it all plays a big part. There's also something in what you're describing about this template that we seem to have. I don't think it's just as women. I think it's across society that as you very well articulated, the body is always listening. And in that model, your thought patterns and your, your nervous system, equilibrium and your hormonal health are telling the wider body a story all the time. And the body is then acting on command because it is designed to have this feedback loop to the brain. So they found that, When looking at chronic lower back pain, one of the most common collective factors was somebody's temperament. So if they had a lot of perfectionism, black and white thinking can relate to that. I had severe back problems when I was younger. Um, and again, I was a perfectionist when I was younger. So yeah, I can completely resonate with that. And I remember us talking about this actually during your session. And Those, those traits led to, or at least they were correlated with, a far higher propensity for chronic back pain. And not only that, from a biological perspective, when your adrenals are through the roof, your level of pain receptivity will be much greater. And other things alongside, so you won't be able to sleep all that well, et cetera, et cetera, if your body is feeling like it's in danger, everything will contract. I think that sits almost as a surprise to people because what we're generally led to believe across the board is that we can control the body. So a huge amount of importance is given to the mind and to achievement and to, uh, even to academic achievement. That's a huge one for most perfectionists. That was, that was my one. That was where I was a perfectionist. Likewise, likewise. I had so much. It was that self esteem, wasn't it? I didn't feel good about myself, so it's so tied up in that self esteem I needed to, you know, achieve really well at school and do well in my exams to feel good about myself. And all of that means that then even if we're thinking about body image, we are telling the system on a conscious and an unconscious level what we think it should do, and we're creating a lot of confusion and fog in the process. I'm wondering if you'd be happy to, to tell us a little bit more about this, this opposite framework where we start with what is, we're really going to start with noticing what is, what does my body look like? How do I feel within it? What does my hormonal health need in this moment? And using that almost as a place to structure the life that you live. Tell us about that experience for you. So it's not been an easy one for me, I don't think I'll ever stop learning and exploring this because I think it's my hardest one. It's the one I struggle with the most. So, for example, at the moment now, I'm just starting to become hyper aware of how tight and tense my pelvic floor is so often. And, you know, I Like all women, I've heard you have to do your pelvic floor exercises to say it, and I agree, it's the opposite. You need to soften your pelvic floor. the amount of damage I must have done to my pelvic floor, which was already tight and tense from stress and trauma, by tightening it even more, you know, it needs to soften. So that's what I'm working with now. I'm starting to become more and more hyper aware, for instance, of Is my pelvic floor tense? Is it tight? And just drawing that awareness down into my pelvic floor and just softening and telling my body she's safe if it's things are tight and tense, which invariably they are. Um, so just telling her she's safe, she can soften and let go. Um, but that's what, that's what I'm working on currently. But before I, you know, I would just stop by dropping down into my womb. Um, and breathing into my womb space because again, it's something as women, we live in this such a masculinized world and you know, we all know about breathwork and everything like that, but it ignores that beautiful womb space, which for most women felt. All women, you know, even if we don't have wombs, it's that energetic bodily centre. and just connecting to that space, and Seeing what answers lie there, if you like, doing that on a regular basis, even when I don't feel like it, even when I want to be busy all the time, or I want to go, go, go, which again is my kind of trauma response, you know, it's my go to, I just push through, I just, I just do more, I add more to my to do list, um, so even when I don't feel like it, it's just taking that time to just step back, to find that stillness, and to drop into my body, and to ask my body those questions, so. How are you feeling today? what emotions are there? And sometimes that will come to me in images. Sometimes it comes to me in colors or words, you know, other times. Memories will come out of nowhere. They'll just pop up into my head. Um, so it's just having that faith in my body as well. I'm 100 percent sure that's why so many women suffer with prolapses and again incontinence and things like that because our pelvic floors are so stressed and so tight and tense and they get to a point where they can't hold that tightness anymore, you know, they can't be like that anymore. It's amazing to hear you talking about it because the contraction that you're describing to a large extent is involuntary. for sure. It absolutely is. I wasn't even aware of it for so long at all. what's the book? Wild Feminine. I don't know if you've read that book. Really, really powerful and it talks about giving, um, yourself like vaginal massage and things like that. And I, I did that massage on myself. Sorry, this is like a lot of information. I am an open book. I will tell anyone anything. Um, and, and it was doing that massage. I couldn't feel anything. I was completely numb, um, I couldn't feel anything, um, I was like that, that's not right, I shouldn't feel numb, and again that's for a variety of reasons, it's trauma related, but yeah, that's what I'm really working with, like even now as we're talking, it's just softening, letting it soften, letting it relax and not be tight and clenched. And it's in moments like this where one is the most aware of it actually, because for almost anyone. Gazing. I mean, I love this, you know, gazing into the eyes of somebody else, being in that moment where there's potential skin in the game, because there's a degree of vulnerability, you know, that's when the nervous system is going to, it's going to let you know if this feels like an unfamiliar environment. And, you know, I spend a lot of time helping people to understand that often, when they're feeling physiologically or psychologically unsafe, it's because they're coming into contact either with something that is negatively familiar or with the great basking unknown that is, how will this person relate to me? And how will this podcast be received? And it's the most wonderful thing to be in communication with someone and almost just to. Verbalize it. Oh, okay. So Sam is dropping into her pelvic floor. I'm dropping into the floor of my belly. it's how actually holding space began for me by doing that self practice because I was disassociated from pretty much my entire body, but definitely my female organs and my heavy base. I was disassociated from that for my entire life. And I've recently been, exploring, emotional freedom techniques. just some fun, joyful process oriented tapping. And one of the things that this particular book that I'm studying it from has been talking about is the profound power of the first chakra, which is the area that we're talking about. What I'm loving is that all of these disciplines, you were talking about Chinese medicine before, all of these disciplines have different ways of coming at the same. Deep understanding. Exactly. it's in connecting to these parts of ourselves that we find our true alignment, our true integration. And it's only from there, really, that knowing and decision-making and impact can happen in a sustainable way. Otherwise people are achieving a lot from really a very cerebral place that is creating huge dysfunction in the body, most of which they're disassociated from feeling until it gets so painful That the body kicks into a higher degree of making you aware. It's your body's language. Exactly. And then most people resist that. And that was me too when I had the same kind of chronic pain that you had. Is we resist it rather than welcoming it in. Well we, again, we're not taught. Again, it's a society issue partly as well because we're taught to medicalise pain, you know. Take paracetamol, pop a pill. We're not ever taught. Your pain carries wisdom. Your pain carries messages. I don't think I've ever been told by anyone. It's just something I've learned from, I love learning. I love reading. And so it's just something I've picked up, but I've never been told by anybody that I've worked with, for example, sit with your pain, let really, really feel that pain and ask your body, what wisdom, what messages. Is it carrying in that pain? Because it's not happening for no reason, it's coming from somewhere. We're never ever taught to just sit with the body, and get curious about where it's coming from. Um, I always say that you know, that your symptoms are your body's language. They happen because your body loves you, not because your body hates you. They happen because your body loves you. Um, it's trying to show you the way towards what needs healing, what needs work. And we all need healing. We all need work. We've all been through traumas. We've all been through pain. I don't think there's a single person alive that's not struggled with something along the way. So we all have that in common as well, which when you see it like that, that's a beautiful thing because there's more empathy, there's more love, there's more compassion, there's more opportunity to be vulnerable with one another. Nobody will ever know your body as well as you do. Nobody will ever understand it quite like you do. And whatever comes up, trust it. Trust what's there. It's almost like inner parenting. Yeah, yeah. That's exactly what it is. And I think when you have that in yourself, I'm not saying you're unshakable because you're not, but once you know that you always have yourself, that you always have your body to rely on, And that you can always come back to that. It, it's such a powerful thing. It's such a powerful thing because you can kind of face almost anything because you know you've got yourself. Well, and also it creates integrity because if you're that connected to yourself, your decisions have a degree of alignment with your interior. As a human, I, I sense into and trust and work with people who I perceive have that equal commitment to integrity. Integrity is not easy. Requires making quite a lot of difficult decisions and, and often I found, and this was something wonderful that someone shared with me a few years ago, that a lot of the time when you're saying no to something from a place of your ethic or your principles in a, in a positive way, you know, that actually you are opening up the space for the opportunity that is aligned. We're so trained into a loss mentality that it can be very easy to think well, I'm losing something. I'm giving up something and you're not, you're just paving the way for something to come in I completely agree. I experienced it last year to like, I, I had, I had a really hard time last summer. It was summer, I think it was actually when, after we'd had our session, and I don't know whether it stirred things, it was kind of testing me, and there were people in my life that were not the right people in my life, you know, they weren't making me feel good about myself, and Again, I come from a people pleasing background, it's really hard to just say that's it, I can't do this, and I don't deserve this as well, I don't want to feel like this. And so I did do it. I, um, you know, I kind of closed that door. And then so much of things I'd dreamed of my whole life came in the week after, literally the week after. As in, like, childhood dreams, just, It happened the week after. And so I'm now a big believer. Sometimes you need to close the door on one thing to welcome in what you really, really want.. And again, it's living that, in that integrity and just believing in those thoughts and in what you, what you're really feeling and actually honoring them in your body, and yeah, like I said, childhood dreams, everything. It really can happen when you do that. Um, and it's beautiful. It's the extension of what you were talking about, you know, learn that your body loves you all the time and it's giving you signals trusting in the unknown. Um, there's something I'm really curious to ask you, which is completely on the topic of faith and belief So, As I scour your beautiful feed, one of the themes that regularly comes up is the idea of ceremony, mythology, Oh, I'm obsessed, I'm obsessed. Literally, my whole free time I could happily just spend reading about Greek mythology. I love this. Is this something that you've been interested in since you were a little one? So ever since I was a child, I've been writing my own stories. I, I was, I would illustrate my stories. when other people were, you know, playing with their friends, I would have a book and I'd write my own stories and illustrate them. So I've always had that interest in storytelling and, um, you know, all our stories stem from those things. Those legends and things that get passed on. Um, but I, I, I didn't really know much about Greek mythology and, um, and then I kind of stumbled across, because I, I'm a big reader, I adore reading, non fiction, fiction, anything, I love reading, it's my favourite thing. I used to be a librarian, it's my happy place. Um, so, and then I, I think I read a fictional book, um, that was about Greek mythology, but in a more feminine, from a more feminist perspective. And I was obsessed. it just spoke to me on so many levels, just talking about all these goddesses, all this mythology, and I, like, I just devoured everything after that on Greek mythology. I also love ancient Egyptians, but I don't, I don't know quite as much about them., my eldest boy, he's due to start high school this year, and we were looking around his high school, um, in, what was it, last, last September, I think it was, his new high school, and what I didn't know is they now study classics as part of the curriculum, and I must have embarrassed him so much, because I walked in, and they'd laid out all of these Greek mythology books, all of these amazing books, and I just stood there talking to his tea, these teachers for hours, like, I'm just going to grill you. I think so many women get drawn to that Greek mythology. So many women get drawn to tales of those goddesses. I mean, there's a lot of Celtic myths and legends and things as well. Something speaks to, speaks to our soul, I think, in them. There's something that really, really resonates in so many women. It just, yeah, it fascinates me. It absolutely fascinates me. On, on that note, do you find that people that come to see you, they have a level of resistance to exploring in that kind of story, mythology, emotional way? I mean, I'm picturing quite a lot of the people that often encounter health problems and there's such an emphasis on control and like you say, medicalizing the problem. I wonder how receptive they are initially to the idea of curiously exploring the vast magical unknown. I think there is always going to be an element of resistance for most people, isn't there? Because we can't control the unknown. for me, myself, for example, that was. partly what was driving my, my hormonal issues. I wanted to control everything because that was my trauma response. You know, when everything in the world is out of control, I want to control some things. it's very difficult to, to come from a place of control to suddenly, okay, my body is magic, my body is sacred, my body is powerful., there's so many stories and, and tales and things. If you go back to pre Christianity, where there would be shamans who would ingest menstrual blood, for example, It's really difficult when we have grown up in a world that's very opposite to that, if you like, to kind of wrap your head around that. So somebody had told me, I think, when I was at the beginning of my journey. With hormones. Yeah, your period blood is magical, you know, people used to drink period blood. I'd have been like, no, it's just no, that's, that's too much. because it is just difficult, isn't it? When we live in a world that's without that magic to actually feel into it. Is that part of what you're learning on your priestess training? Am I right? You're, you're in a deep, long immersion, aren't you? Yeah, it's a 13 month spiral, it's 13 month spiral. which I started in October. We work with goddesses the last month I was working with the Crone energy. So again, Crone is a word I'm, that's a word I'm so passionate about reclaiming for women because it's, It means old crown, it's powerful, the Crone used to be so sacred and revered in, in cultures and now it's become twisted and warped and, you know, nobody wants to be a Crone now, but actually. The Crone was the wise woman. so we've just been working with that Crone energy. So the goddesses such as Hecate, for example, She's one of my favorite goddesses. Um, but you know, and, and, and then, you know, um, those birds, so ravens, crows, magpies, So the darker energies, the darker shadows, when you go into those shadows, we can. We can fear them, but they're actually where we can really start to grow and plant those seeds. And presumably doing that within a container creates the connection and community that allows you to still feel safe while you're being gently guided through. Yeah. What's quite an individual process. Oh yeah, it's definitely a very individual process. I think we all do the same, the same things at the same time, or roughly the same time. But there is that support there. I think women can generally empathize and listen and it's such a beautiful trait. It's one of the reasons why I love being a woman Our stories are our medicine and they can be medicine for others as well and when we sit in that circle and when we share, when we're open, it's really powerful and really healing in itself so I think just by the very nature of sharing what you're going through or what you're experiencing that in itself causes huge shifts I'm a big believer in the power of the circle. We were talking about that at the beginning before we turned on the recording that because you're an open book as a temperament, um, that actually you found a niche. which allows you to really work toward your skill set, towards what naturally resonates within you, your zone of genius, let's say, as opposed to trying to force yourself into a box that probably would have involved more control, more restriction than. was useful for you. Absolutely am an open book. I tell anyone anything. And then afterwards I'm like, should I have said that? I don't know. Last year, for example, at a wedding, I was talking to strangers about period blood and then I came away and I was like, I'm not sure that was a wedding appropriate conversation. But that's what I'm like. But then I also love listening to other people tell the same stories. I used to be a journalist, and it's why I became a journalist, because I love talking to people, I love hearing their stories, and maybe that's why I love mythology as well, it's hearing those stories, and seeing those common threads that like, that bind us all, It's that humanity and that compassion that I think is the most beautiful thing. I think it's one of the reasons that you're so adored. Is this warm open receptive energy that you have that also allows them to feel that there's a degree of comfort and softness if they do reveal parts of themselves, That's what I really want to create with people to feel that safety and you're not going to be judged. To be honest, I've heard it all. I'm the person that. I have strangers come up and across the road to talk to me and tell me everything. There's no judgment. There's just love there, and I do really, I feel privileged when people tell me their journeys, when people tell me their stories, and I really, really love it. Um, and, and then that is part of the reason why I am an open book, I think, because I want people to know that it is okay to share that, and it is okay to, to say what you've been through, yeah, you're modeling it really beautifully. Thank you. I, uh, I wanted to bring us on to the topic of body image, if that's something you're comfortable to talk about. What's your experience of that been like? What do you feel are the really important messages for listeners to receive by virtue of this recording as to how they view their bodies, the pride that they take in them? Tell us a little bit more about that. I think this is such a complex one, isn't it? It's especially, again, especially for women. I know a lot of men also struggle with body image. But for me, I really struggled with my body image from a young, from a young age., I developed before all my friends. I got breasts before anybody else. I started my period before anyone else. And so I was always hyper aware that I look different to everybody else, if you like. And I was always very self conscious about my body. I hated my body, if you like. For so long, I hated my body. you know, I grew up in the 90s where there, it was that era where it was heroin chic, I think it was called, where you had to look a certain way and I just didn't look like that. I would never have looked like that. Um, and it made me so deeply sad I had eating disorders when I was younger. They were never diagnosed. Again, my body type, when I lose weight, I can only get to a certain size. there were times in my life where I was eating nothing but drinking coffee. but the outside world, I wouldn't look healthy, but I'd look okay. So, for instance, after I had my first child, I was really not okay, I literally survived on coffee, I didn't eat any food, and I think that was the first time I actually realised I think I had a problem, that I properly realised I had a problem with it. So, Body image has been a long, long journey for me. I think I've come to realize again, it's not necessarily how you look that causes that conflict with body image. It's how you feel deep down in yourself. It's how safe you feel in your body or how out of control you feel in the outside world. So for me, When, my eating disorders were an issue, it tended to be times in my life where I did feel out of control. And so it was putting that control in place. And body image is such a difficult one because, again, we live in a world which tells women they have to look in a certain way. And there is no certain way. We are all beautifully different. So, for example, even our vulvas. They're different. They're beautiful. And we, you know, we grew up with these pornographic images where women look in a certain way and we doubt ourselves. We question ourselves. Why don't I look like that? But actually. It's learning to love your body, and I think that starts with acceptance. Okay, I don't have to adore what I'm seeing, I don't have to feel super sexy, it's just standing in front of there and thinking, okay, I'm going to accept. I'm going to accept my body as it is right now. Um, and then slowly from that acceptance, you can start to learn to love your body. Um, and I'm not saying it's perfect all the time. There are days where even now I still I'm not there. I think we all are. we all have days where it's hard, but for the most part, i, I really love my body. I can see it as magical now. And I never thought I could reach that. So, again, it's going beyond the aesthetics, My body might look a certain way, and that's fine, but it's Going beyond those We are all pure and utter magic. take the aesthetics away and start to see that and start to see how beautiful your body is inside and how much it does for you, how much it does for everybody, we all have that impact on other people as well. And, and for women, I think it's something I'm so passionate about. Um, making them see the intricacies of their hormones, the intricacies of their cycles. How, you know, just the very fact that our menstrual blood is rich in stem cells and all of these amazing properties. We're amazing. We're truly, truly amazing. It doesn't matter how you look. We're truly amazing. Just, just as we are. What I was, reflecting on as you were talking was that when we can start in that place of acceptance, then there's also something about picking up the actions that correlate to the mentality that you're wanting to grow. So if I think about you, you know, I think about you as someone who does consciously structure in various forms of physical self care, baths, um, the nutrients that you put into your body, having cacao in the mornings rather than immediately a coffee before breakfast. So there are practices, and what I would say for anyone listening is if you are finding yourself stuck in terms of thinking and belief, one of the best ways of beginning to shift that is actually not by trying to necessarily go direct to the reverse of the painful thought, because it's going to feel like too much of a mental leap. But actually to come into the incremental actions that prove To you, to your system, I do hold myself in sacredness and privilege and, you know, I think we often get that wrong, thinking before action, a lot of the time action is going to create the thinking pattern that we want over time. Oh, you're absolutely right. I think it's just getting those fundamentals sometimes, isn't it? It's taking it back to basics. for example, picking up on what you just said, One of my favorite things to do is to run myself a ritual bath. So, not just a bath, a ritual bath. So I will put in flowers, essential oils, candles, crystals, everything, you know. I'll make it really special, really sacred. My bathroom's not anything fancy, but I just make it as beautiful as I can. And I don't think it's possible to have one of these ritual baths and to get out of it and not feel like a goddess, no matter how you feel about yourself when you do this. Especially if you apply oils to your body afterwards as well. Um, yeah, I really echo what you said. It's those fundamentals. Okay. Sometimes maybe I just need to start with a breakfast. What shall I eat that will make me feel better? What, what shall I eat that shows I love my body and I respect my body and, and these things. Um, I think breakfast is often, you know, the, the, the cornerstone for everything and the cornerstone for your day. If you like, It really helps to set up your mood for the day. It helps to set your energy levels for the day and, and everything else kind of falls into place from there. And also what you're saying about breakfast, you know, from a hormonal perspective, that's huge. I wonder if you'd be happy to just tell us a little bit about, for example, how, what you're eating in the morning and what you're doing in terms of movement, how those things. will impact your hormonal system and anything else that you feel is maybe lesser known by people that are struggling with a lot of hormonal dysregulation, that would be your key takeaways for people that are curious as listeners. So for a long time, um, and I think a lot of women will be able to resonate with this or relate to this. And this is just before I had all my thyroid issues. So I thought intermittent fasting was like, The godsend, you know, I believed all of it. I'd gained weight that wouldn't shift. And I thought this, this is it. This is the answer. And so, um, unbeknownst to me, the impact it would have on my hormones, I wouldn't eat breakfast. And then I would have a cup of coffee. So on an empty stomach. Um, and then. Just carry on about my day, you know, I would get on with work and rush and be busy and always do things I felt horrendous. I really felt horrendous. My moods were all over the place. In the afternoon, awful brain fog to the point that I couldn't work past one o'clock because my brain just would not function.. And all this weight I'd gained that wouldn't shift, I gained more weight. And again, it wouldn't shift no matter what I did. And it was really, really frustrating because I was doing this fasting which, you know, I've been told would be really, really good for my body. It'd be really good for me. unbeknownst to me, I was just fueling my, those stress hormones. I was pushing my body, which was already overwhelmed by stress, by trauma and all these different things. I was just pushing it over the edge. Um, so breakfast is so fundamental for women. when, when I'm working with clients, I always say, we'll start with breakfast because when our stress hormones are high, it's pretty much impossible to have the cycle that you want. You know, it can lead to PMS, period pains, and all of those problems. One of the first things I did when I was working on healing myself, I started having high protein, healthy fats. complex carbs breakfast. Everything changed almost immediately. You know, that weight came off, not instantaneously, but it, it, it, it all came off within a few weeks. And again, I was telling my body it was safe. By eating that breakfast, I was giving my body all the right nutrients it needed to build those healthy hormones because our hormones need plenty of protein, our hormones need plenty of healthy fats. if like me, you grew up in the 90s where you were taught that fats were evil and were gonna make you unhealthy and fat, whatever. We need those healthy fats. And if women do like to fast personally, again, I think. Having a background of disordered eating, I don't like to fast at all because it's a slippery slope for me. and actually I love food. I love food. So I don't fast at all, but if you do enjoy fasting, there are times and places where you can do it where your hormones aren't quite so sensitive to that, um, so you could either do an overnight fast, for example, so eat about five o'clock at night and then go through to the morning, or you could do like intermittent fasting in your follicular phase, for example, where your body's not quite so sensitive to those stress hormones and where it doesn't need as many calories necessarily anyway. So in your luteal and your menstrual phases, you're a lot more sensitive to stress hormones. You're a lot more sensitive to blood sugar issues as well. Um, so insulin and things like that. So, yeah, so there are, there's a time and a place I love that point about the timing of the fasting because for anyone that isn't aware of this, your waking cortisol response is one of the ways that they check into really how, how much is your system in its fight or flight state. And for a lot of women, especially if they have poor sleep and imbalanced blood sugars from the night before, that cortisol awakening response will be exceptionally high, which means the system cannot bear any extra load at that stage on top of the existing stress, as you say, restriction or hard cardio training, or even, social media scrolling, you were just mentioning about how different phases of your cycle you might want to modify your activity or your lifestyle relative to that and I'm curious about whether you also advocate that within a working context? I think we are all different right? I'm like your typical person that I fit through, all those four phases and menstrual cycle, everything that's described, it fits my energy levels. But there are some women, for example, that will struggle at ovulation because of various reasons, such as inflammation in the body, or they might have, you know, PCOS or, or things like that. we're not all the same and that's important to remember. So if this doesn't fit for you, then that's okay. It's about finding what works for you. but invariably, yes. I, am. so productive the week before my period. I'm like a hurricane because I'm just getting everything done. I don't mess about. I just, you know, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun. Um, in my follicular phase, for example, I'm really, really creative. I am bursting with ideas and things like that. Um, I'm ready to create. I'm ready to, brainstorm. I have too many ideas, to be honest. I have whole lists of ideas and things in this phase. And then in ovulation, I'm a lot better at talking. I'm a lot better at that public speaking or socializing, engaging with people And then in my period, I do try to take my period off. off work wherever I can, um, which isn't always possible, but I do, and just have that stillness, have that slowness, and have that rest where I need it. If I do work, I try to do, writing and things like that, where I can go, where I can go more into myself, if you like,, we all almost have four different personalities, four different sets of super skills, through our cycle, when you start to see it like that, it can really change your life, and it can really change your relationship with your cycle, your body, your period, because you start to realize just how amazing you are, because This is a phase where you are really creative. This is a phase where you are amazing with people, where you can literally talk to anyone and heads will turn and you're magnetic and all of these things. This is a phase where you can just get things done and then this. This is a phase where you can reflect on the things that aren't working. what do you need to let go? Of what isn't working, what do you need to do differently? You'll be that bit more honest and a bit more in tune with yourself. And, and it can be amazing for businesses I love that because you're also talking about giving yourself permission. To really personalize and, and let's say, uh, sexualize, but in the good way, and then allowing your life to dovetail towards that. Oh, it's so wonderful to hear you and to have you here. Literally, I could talk to you for hours. I'm really shocked at the time. I could talk to you all day. I honestly, I really could. But we are going to have to get you back for sure. But in the meantime, you've shared so much, but is there any last message that you'd like to leave the listeners with? I I just, I really want to reiterate Nobody will ever know your body quite like you do. Nobody will ever understand your body like you do. So just trust in your body. Trust in what comes up for you when you sit with your body, just trust those messages and trust that they're real. you always hold the answers in yourself, you always hold the answers, so just trust in yourself, trust in your magic, wherever you are in your journey, just how beautiful, how sacred and how powerful you and your body is. if I could help all women to feel like that, that's what I'd do. Well, we're with you in that mission, sweetheart. Thank you so much for being with us and no doubt we will speak soon. And listeners stay tuned for some sneak announcements of our season three speakers. I can't believe we're there already. How wonderful this is.

Anthea: 58:48

Good. Just listeners. Thank you. So. So. much. For your ears. I hope. You enjoy today's. today's. episode. To find. More about our. Featured guests. Have a look in the show. Notes.