Ladies, hormones are serious. AND they seem to cause temporary amnesia. :)
I’m starting to loose track of how many times one of my students has said to me something like, “I’m a off this week. I don’t know, I don’t feel like my usual self. My thoughts are really dark. I can’t shake this fear. I just feel really in drawn. I don’t think my intuition is working.”
This is always the point in the conversation where I say, “Where are you at in your cycle?”
And this is ALWAYS the point in the conversation where they reply with some rendition of “I’m just about to start. Or I am on my moon.”
It’s become sort of comical to me: This funny amnesia that takes over a woman’s brain about something that happens to us EVERY MONTH of a very LARGE portion of our lives.
I’m no different. For me, it took my husband to point out the consistencies in my behavior. I’d be making some comment about my unpleasant mental state and he would calmly, almost off-handedly say, “Honey, you’re about to bleed.”
I’d be like, “What!?” (seriously caught off guard). Followed by a glance at the calendar where I inevitably discovered that he was right.
The only way I can account for this general amnesia that we as women seem to face is to say that hormones are drugs people. For real. By the time we are in this depleted or fearful or small or irritable state every single woman’s body has already been taken hostage by her hormones. We can’t remember. We’re like a woman’s body on … well, female hormones.
I’m making fun of us a little bit, because seriously, it is funny that we forget. But also I’m writing this because for some reason we do not come equipped with an invisible stamp on our foreheads that only lights up for us when we are looking in the mirror and are now operating under the full influence of hormones. There is no, “Use extreme caution– hormones in control” light. Or the slippery road sign– that could be useful too. Apparently we need a little reminder. So here it is:
Hormones are real, honey. And they are serious. They can cause you to think and do all kinds of things that you really wish you’d rather not have. They can quite literally change the tone, feel, and flavor of your thoughts– rewriting the feel-good chapter of your life into a dark and treacherous novel where no one, least of all the heroine, gets her needs met, and everything around her is total shite. Or something like that!
I know—in my cycle I call it “waking up with my fangs out.” For me, my hormones seemed to really take over full throttle after I had my second child. (That could be true—or I could have forgotten all the time before! 😉 ) After I recovered from the hormonal roller coaster of nursing and no sleep I started to recognize these days where I would, “wake up with my fangs on.” I knew they were different because I would open my eyes while laying in bed next to my husband whom I love, across the hall from my children who challenge me but whom I adore, in a house I find cozy and welcoming, on land where I also do work that I love– and the world would look different. It was like even the air was irritating! It felt as though a filter, or a lens had been placed over my eyes and I couldn’t see the naturally pervasive light. There was a dark grey screen on everything. I noticed it especially because a lot of the time when this happened no one had even spoken to me yet! It was like I would open my eyes and the first thing that arose was an internal snarl.
One of my students identified that when she was under hormone hostage she always went into scarcity mode and thinking. She was panicked that the next free-lance work wouldn’t come in. Or that things wouldn’t work out the way she had hoped. Every other day of the month she was more at ease and trusting andher experience had shown her that it did always work out. And yet, for a few days a month right around her moon, her days were filled with doubt and terror.
So ladies, I’m here to say this because from the number of conversations I’ve had about it, I see that it warrants underscoring (I’ve already said it several times but): HORMONES ARE FOR REAL. They are a drug that can alter you. They can color your world a different way than it usually is. If you are pregnant or breastfeeding, or you’ve recently had a baby—let’s just say you are even more modified than the rest of us on our monthly cycle.
So what can we do about this?
First off, I tell you what I told my student who erred into scarcity mode, “Don’t believe that shit you think during that time.”Just notice it. Depending on the flavor of your hormone strong-arm, you may want to add what I try to do when I’m around my family during these days: ZIP IT! As in my mouth. Shut. Like, not open to say all that B.S. I’m thinking. Because seriously, who wants to hear snarling? Poor things they haven’t done anything but get a good night’s sleep and I’m growling already! It’s not their fault. They’ve got nothing to do with this take-over. I’ve learned that under the influence of my hormones I may not be able to help that every little thing causes me to internally growl and come back with surly retorts. But I TRY to keep a lid on saying them out loud. For all of our sakes. And I get on the phone with my acupuncturist STAT!
So that’s the next thing. But let me break it down for you in simple steps. Here are some things you can do about it– to break the cycle of amnesia AND help yourself.
1.Notice your pattern—it’s a bit different for every woman. For example my hormone take-over generally starts 3 days before I bleed. And it goes away when I’m bleeding. For you it might be the first few days of your cycle. Just start noticing when it is– for maybe the first time ever! 😉
2. Notice the flavor– mine is “This world is irritating. Everything bothers me.” Yours might be, “I’m scared.” Or “I feel small.” Or “There is not enough.” Or whatever.
3. Give yourself more time and spaceif at all possible—like schedule it in during this time—so you can be easy with yourself. You might need a little more time away from people for example, or a few more happy-making rom coms, or uplifting books, or baths.Fill in the blank with whatever your jam is.
4. Zip it! (If this applies to you!)
5. Don’t believe those thoughts. Just let them go on by– they may be the current record playing– but give it another 24-48 hours and they will lose their hold on you.Sometimes just remembering this is enough to create a lifeline.
6. Perhaps most importantly, make a plan. For example, the moment I noticed the rhythm in my cycle (see #1.) I started scheduling acupuncture on or before those days.And guess what—no fangs! I’ve discovered that I can eradicate the snarls with a regular trip to the acupuncturist every month. I HIGHLY recommend acupuncture. Did I mention acupuncture!? 😉 Or, there are other free tools that you can use on yourself or get done to you as well like Jin Shin Jyutsu or tapping. If you can make a plan and stick with it every month (or as many as you can) you can start to avoid the hostage program altogether. Phew!
For some reason I feel like I need to end this post with a little cheer.
“Hey ladies!”
“Let me hear you get down!”
“D. O. W. N. that’s the way you get down. Uh-huh!” (funky dance)
“D.O.W. N that’s where your hormones can take you. Down. Uh-huh” (thumbs down)
D.O.W. N. just remember it won’t last for long. Uh-huh!” (thumbs up)
You can chant that to yourself next time you are bleeding. 🙂 Envision me cheering for you on the sidelines—or if I haven’t had my acupuncture just give me a ring, I’ll kick the beep out of those pesky hormones!
Love,
Aimée
Aimée Cartier is a psychic guide, author, and the founder of Intuition University where she helps her students learn to trust and flourish by understanding and using the guidance of their own innate inner knowing. More about her and her work can be found at www. AimeeCartier.com.
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