So-called "PMS" is your body's way of telling you to divest from capitalism.
On the medicinal Inhale-Exhale of menstruating bodies...
Menstruating bodies are always moving through a kind of slow-motion, inhale-exhale rhythm.
Over the course of each cycle, our bodies are on the upward for a bit, they reach the peak of the inhale, and then they come back down.
The inhale-exhale of our cycles is represented by the two “halves”:
The follicular phase, which moves along the pole from menstruation, to ovulation…
…and the luteal phase, which moves along the pole from ovulation, back towards menstruation.
It helps to imagine these two halves, oscillating over and over again all through our menstruating years, as a proverbial pair of lungs.
Inhale, exhale.
Inhale, exhale.
Menstruating bodies will not be the same on a day-to-day basis.
We will change, drastically, week to week.
Menstruating bodies are not linear. They do not function on a consistent day-to-day rhythm.
Menstruating bodies are cyclical.
We are consistent, yes, but our consistency happens more on a month-to-month rhythm.
Like a big breath, slowed all the way down.
The facts of our physiology have us already at odds with a culture built out of colonial capitalist patriarchy.
Because as we all well know, colonial capitalism is mechanical, linear, hierarchical, and most importantly…
…exponential.
The values we inherit from our culture tell us that in order for us to prove our worth, we must always be outwardly productive.
Beyond that though, there’s a not-so-subtle drive for more, more, more, constantly.
If we’re not growing, if we’re not expanding, if we’re not always getting more of the thing, or doing it faster…
…we’re doing something wrong.
Up, up, up, always.
More, faster, better.
Inside of colonial capitalism, there is no exhale.
We can only ever go up, if we want to perform to the standards set down by our oppressors (and the conditioning that our oppressors indoctrinated us all with).
Anything that looks like stagnation, stillness, slowing down, or, god forbid, shrinking…
…oohhhhhh no. We don’t want that. We can’t ever have that.
Gotta always be on the exponential up and up.
While our indoctrinated minds are addicted to the constant exponential up and up…
…our bodies always know that the exhale is coming.
Imagine what happens to a body that by virtue of its existence will always be oscillating on an inhale-exhale rhythm, but the exhale is forbidden.
Imagine what it would look and feel like to be constantly forcing the inhale, directly at the expense of the not-allowed exhale.
Probably won’t go so well, right?
Particularly since our wonderful wise bodies say colonial patriarchy be damned, I’m gonna be exhaling whether your like it or not, and we berate and shame the fuck out of ourselves for that process?
Today, we’re going to explore the overlap between the actual immutable physiology of menstruating bodies, and the harm done to us by thousands of years of colonial patriarchal indoctrination.
And if you’re someone who’s ever struggled with so-called “PMS”, this one’s for you.
The Womb’s Breath:
How our literal physiology is innately subversive…
As we know, our menstruating move through two distinct halves each cycle.
(And overlapping those two halves are five distinct seasons, but that’s for another post)
The follicular phase (the inhale bit), which is nourished and complemented by the luteal phase (the exhale bit).
Cycle reclamation is a deep as fuck rabbit hole, and our cycles innervate with literally every other system and process in our bodies, from mood to creativity to dopamine receptivity to sleep to appetite to libido to mystic access to muscle building and shaping to sociability…
…and there’s so much more going on than I could possibly ever fit into one post…
…but for now, we’re just going to look at what could be called the Main Driving Hormones of each “half”.
Side note here: there’s no more empowering rabbit hole to dive down that cyclical consciousness and cycle reclamation. If you’re wanting the whole nine yards, get yourself inside REWILDING. I’ve built out a vast body of work dedicated specifically to this.
It contains literally everything you need to know about your cycle, how it works, and how to learn from it as your first and best teacher in stepping into the revolution.
As of now, there are already 45+ classes in there, with more being added all the time, and we gather every Monday for live workshop and ritual.
No stone has been left unturned. Go get yourself inside.
Just for here and now, let’s look at the dance that plays out between oestrogen and progesterone.
(Again, there’s loads more going on than this, but please indulge my slight oversimplifying here)
The follicular phase, the inhale bit of our cycles, is for the most part ruled by oestrogen.
The luteal phase, the exhale bit, is in turn mostly ruled by progesterone.
Oestrogen and progesterone, and the balancing act they play, are the “main characters” when it comes to the health and nourishment of menstruating bodies.
And everything you need to know about how to divest from the linear indoctrination of colonial capitalism can be found in the oscillating dance between these two hormones.
Oestrogen is straight up magick juice.
It’s very outward focused. It wants to be out in the world, seeing the sights, playing the games, doing the things.
Oestrogen keeps us high energy, and can often tint the world in a rosy optimistic glow.
It’s biological imperative is to prime us to fuck, and to hype up our fertility so that if and when we do fuck, we can conceive.
Mythically and poetically, oestrogen is the force that gets us up and attem and chasing after the shit we want, that we don’t yet have.
This could be translated to anything from a free and decolonised world, to a new fruit market that doesn’t underpay it’s workers, to an idea for a creative project that’s been feeling exciting but elusive for a while.
Oestrogen is very good friends with dopamine. When oestrogen is in charge, dopamine flies freely.
During your follicular phase, you might find yourself pinging with ideas, or chomping at the bit to get amongst it.
For the activists and change makers here: your follicular phase is a great time to go to all the protests and do a bunch of organised mobilising. Aside from being your get-up-and-go juice, and being amazing at streamlining with dopamine, oestrogen is also a great social lubricant.
In short: the oestrogen-ruled part of our cycles, the inhale bit, is very easy to celebrate inside of colonial capitalism.
By it’s nature, it’s very up and up.
It wants to get going, and keep going. And the capitalist coloniser inside our minds laps that shit up.
(Quick one here: there’s nothing inherently bad about the up and up go-go-go we move through. Spring does it every year. It’s beautiful, and natural, and regenerative as hell, and NECESSARY. It only becomes toxic when we force it to stick around longer than it wants to, and when we shame literally anything and everything else. Imagine a world without Spring! Everything would die! But then again, Spring forever with no Autumn and no Winter… equally as deadly.)
Our bodies LOVE oestrogen. But… only in juuuust the right amount. Too much, and we start getting sick.
Ironic, eh?
Too much of the thing that is the somatic metaphor of everything colonial capitalism praises and pushes relentlessly, and we start getting sick?
I love that. Our bodies really go hard with the anti-colonial teachings.
On the other side of the coin, we have gorgeous, luxurious, hot-bath-at-sunset, nesting instinct Progesterone.
Progesterone is everything that oestrogen is not.
Where oestrogen is footloose and fancy free, progesterone is pragmatic and grounded.
It’s detail-oriented, it’s sharp, it’s often vengeful, and it’s cosy.
Progesterone’s biological imperative is to make sure that if we did fuck, and we did conceive, that we’re doing absolutely everything in our power, both inside of our bodies and inside of our immediate environment, to keep that little bud of life safe and nourished.
Progesterone doesn’t want to be out and about so much. It wants to stay home, get it’s house in order, and stay nice and warm and safe.
Progesterone is on the lookout for anything that could pose a threat to our health or safety, on the off change that we’re carrying some offspring.
(Remember here, we evolved all of these delightful somatic quirks about a hundred thousand years ago, when our nomadic hunter-gatherer ancestors were literally focused on staying physically safe and carrying on the species. Use all of it as a poetic metaphor now, please.)
During your luteal phase, the exhale bit of your cycle, your digestion slows right down, your metabolism slows down, your dopamine receptivity begins to dim as you near menstruation, and you’ll find yourself naturally have fewer spoons and needing more sleep than during your follicular phase.
For the activists and change makers here, progesterone makes the luteal phase an ideal time for immediate-community-type organising (in the early luteal phase), and deep self-care, and anti-colonial self-inquiry (in the late luteal phase).
Progesterone also does an amazing job of balancing and regulating the amount of oestrogen our bodies are producing.
The role of progesterone, physiologically, is literally to stop the over-production of the thing which capitalism prizes above all else.
Let that sink in for a moment.
Your body is already showing you how to decolonise your mind.
When we are producing too much oestrogen, and not enough progesterone to balance it out, our cycles start manifesting some not-so-pleasant symptoms.
They are talking to us.
Oestrogen dominance in menstruating bodies can look like…
extreme cramping
breast tenderness
vaginal or cervical pain
lower back or hip pain
constipation
free-floating anxieties
depression
existential ennui or despair
painful bloating
headaches or migraines
…all in the week or so leading up to our next bleed.
Oestrogen dominance has also been linked to some much scarier long-term health issues, like breast / cervical / ovarian cancer, PCOS, and endometriosis.
This list of symptoms will be familiar to anyone who’s ever been told “it’s just PMS”.
Let me be very, very clear here.
In 99.9999999999% of cases, any so-called “PMS” is actually the result of an over-production of oestrogen, and not enough progesterone.
Not a mystery.
Not a “disease”.
Not “just part of the deal of having a menstrual cycle”.
And definitely NOT something you are condemned to forever, simply because you have a womb.
All that’s happening here is that your body is begging you to divest from the colonial capitalist addiction to exponential growth and constant productivity.
Listen to your body.
How to get back on your body’s team:
Living cyclically, paying attention to the inhale-exhale of your wise and wondrous menstruating body, will work wonders for your progesterone production.
What this means tangibly, is working with your follicular phase to celebrate and go all in on the dopamine and oestrogen…
…and then LEANING IN to your luteal phase, slowing yourself down, and grounding into the progesterone and serotonin.
In a world of hustle culture and worth-is-productivity conditioning saturating the air we breathe, this is going to be a bit of a workout at first.
Your mind will fight you. It’ll say you’re being lazy, that you’re wasting your time, and that you’re being too self indulgent by letting yourself slow down for a week or so each cycle.
It’ll take time, and it’ll take conscious effort on your part to keep orienting back to the truth of your body, OVER the ferocious indoctrination of your mind.
Before any of that though, step zero is taking up a cycle tracking practice, if you don’t have one already.
We can’t be aligning ourselves with our body’s needs if we have no idea what they are or what our bodies are even doing.
To start, keep your cycle tracking practice simple.
Record what day of your cycle you’re on (the first day of your bleed is cycle day 1).
Underneath that, answer two questions:
What felt easy today?
What felt challenging today?
No shaming, no judgement, no agenda, no “added context” needed. All we’re doing here is witnessing.
Keep that up for at least three or four cycles, and patterns will start to emerge.
Remember though, what we’re doing here goes way beyond healing our own physical and emotional pain.
We are doing MORE than making our premenstrual and menstrual seasons into a time of bliss, rather than a time of suffering.
We are actively divesting from a paradigm that is destroying us, destroying our planet, and destroying and repressing anything that doesn’t match with it’s mechanical, hierarchical, exponential-growth-agenda.
Healing yourself of cyclical pain and suffering is almost a fun side bonus.
What you’re really doing, is setting yourself free from thousands of years of patriarchal indoctrination, and taking your place in the collective as part of the revolution.
As ever, thank you for being here. I love and need you.
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