Using the Menstrual Cycle as a Vital Sign (Episode 437)

Full Transcript: Episode 437

Lisa Hendrickson-Jack:

Welcome to the Fertility Friday Podcast, your source for information about the fertility awareness method and all things fertility. I’m your host, Lisa Hendrickson-Jack. I’m the author of The Fifth Vital Sign and the Fertility Awareness Mastery Charting Journal. I’m a certified fertility awareness educator and holistic reproductive health practitioner with nearly 20 years of experience teaching women to connect to their fifth vital sign through menstrual cycle charting, balancing hormonal health, and optimizing the menstrual cycle without hormones.

I have been consistently outspoken about hormonal birth control over the past two decades and its impact on fertility and overall health because you have the right to know how your body works and how artificial hormones disrupt that natural process. I teach women’s health professionals how to utilize the menstrual cycle as a vital sign in their practices, and I host live coaching programs to help you achieve optimal fertility and health because it’s important to have healthy menstrual cycles regardless of whether or not you want to have babies.

I’m also a wife and mother of two beautiful boys and a brand new baby girl. This podcast is designed to empower you to take full control of your cycles, your fertility, and your overall health. And I’m so excited that you’re here with me today.

Today I’m sharing a special episode on the topic of utilizing your menstrual cycle as a vital sign in your professional practice.

When I first started teaching fertility awareness back in the early 2000s, about 20 years ago, my main goal was to teach women to understand their cycles. A big part of that was because of the incredible transformational, life-changing experience that I had had.

Maybe it feels like a bit of an exaggeration, but charting my cycles has really changed the course of my life in many ways, and it made a huge difference in my personal journey and experience.

Part of the reason it made such a big difference for me was because I did have challenges with my cycle. I struggled with painful periods. I struggled with a thyroid issue that I didn’t know I had until it was picked up on my chart by my chart instructor.

I think that I’m on that spectrum of insulin resistance. With a different diet, I think I could give myself pretty significant PCOS symptoms due to my history of long cycles.

They weren’t necessarily irregular, but they were certainly long. In retrospect, I think it had something to do with both my thyroid issue and potentially some insulin resistance, which I know is in my family.

There are a number of other issues and challenges that have come up throughout the years. And all through those times, trials, years, doctors, health professionals, my charting has been the constant.

For myself, it has given me a ton of confidence in understanding my own body. I really know what’s normal for me and what’s not.

I’m at the stage now with charting, given that I’ve been charting for over 20 years, that I can gauge what’s going on in my body and in my cycles by paying attention. It’s second nature to me now. It’s something that I take for granted.

In my day-to-day behind-the-scenes work, what you don’t see when you listen to the podcast is that’s really what I do all day long. I spend my days supporting my clients to do the same: to understand how to use the menstrual cycle for practical purposes, for avoiding pregnancy as a birth control method with that 99.4% efficacy.

I also support clients who are trying to conceive: identifying potential underlying issues that could be playing a role, understanding correct timing, understanding how to confirm ovulation, and looking for other factors that could be playing a part for clients who have been trying to conceive unsuccessfully.

There’s also the other aspect of it, which is overall health: using the cycle as a way to monitor that and really getting deep into the understanding that the menstrual cycle is a reflection of your overall health.

If you are a woman of reproductive age, having a menstrual cycle that falls into normal parameters is a sign of health, similar to having blood pressure within normal parameters or having a normal heart rate when you’re sitting down. All of these things are real-time measures of what’s happening hormonally.

For the past two years, I have been offering the Fertility Awareness Mastery Mentorship Program for women’s health professionals who want to delve into the menstrual cycle and utilize it as a vital sign in their practice.

Practitioners in this program learn to use the menstrual cycle as a diagnostic tool in their practice and learn the relationship between the menstrual cycle and overall health. By understanding the various parameters of the menstrual cycle and how those parameters vary with a variety of different health challenges, the menstrual cycle becomes this incredible window into your client’s overall health.

Beyond that, it’s a personalized tool. It’s something that’s unique for every woman and is able to match with whatever’s happening in their lives in real time. It’s an incredible tool to add to your practice.

In today’s episode, I’m going to be delving into the benefits and application of utilizing the menstrual cycle as a vital sign in your professional practice.

For many of you listening to the podcast, you are already familiar with the idea of using the menstrual cycle as a vital sign. But I want to start by going through why we should consider the menstrual cycle a vital sign.

At the most basic level, a vital sign is a way to measure how the body is functioning. The most common vital signs that we are used to—and that our doctors use to monitor how our body is functioning—include our heart rate, our temperature, our respiratory rate, how many breaths we take a minute, and our blood pressure.

What’s interesting about these main vital signs is that not only do they provide your healthcare practitioner with a specific window into what’s happening in those direct measures, they also tell your practitioner what to look for.

When your blood pressure is elevated, not only do we know something is wrong in general, but the practitioner would know a short list of things that can cause high blood pressure. So it gives your practitioner a starting point beyond the general information that something is wrong.

The menstrual cycle can operate in much the same way when you are trained in how to identify those subtle changes and how they can relate to overall health.

One of the great examples I often share with clients and on interviews is hypothalamic amenorrhea, HA. HA is what happens when a woman of reproductive age who should be having regular menstrual cycles stops menstruating.

She stops ovulating and she stops menstruating, so neither are happening. When this occurs for a period of six months or more—although I would suggest when it starts happening at all—officially we’re usually looking at that six months or more to show that it’s a condition that’s ongoing.

It not only tells us that something’s wrong, but it also gives us specific information. If you’re a woman of reproductive age and you’re not having your cycle suppressed by hormonal contraception, you should be having regular cycles. Unless you’re pregnant or breastfeeding, you should be having regular cycles.

With HA, we know based on the clinical presentation that some of the most common factors that cause a woman to lose her period would be over-exercise, under-nutrition, and stress. So when a woman of reproductive age loses her cycle—she stops ovulating and stops menstruating—it does tell us where to look for information.

Another example is how this could play out for a young woman or teenage girl who hasn’t yet started menstruating. We know that the average age of menstruation, the first menstrual period, menarche, is about age 13.

When you have a teenage girl who is 16 or 17 and hasn’t had a first period, that can show us not only that there could be something wrong, because that’s well beyond what we would consider the average age of the first menstruation, but it also gives us information to ask questions about how she’s eating, how she’s moving, and what else is going on in her life.

This is not the only reason why women might stop menstruating. Stress can play a role, and there are other conditions that can cause this type of issue. But as a basic starting point, this is one of the most common reasons that we would see that.

Many women are missed with this issue. We’re often taught that if she exercises a lot, it’s normal to lose her period or for periods to be a little irregular. However, we’re not necessarily looking at it as a problem.

There are other examples that aren’t as drastic as a woman completely losing her period. It could be as simple as having a regular cervical discharge or a regular vaginal discharge.

With charting the cycle and understanding what’s normal and what’s not—the normal parameters for cervical fluid, what it should look like, when it should occur—when you’re charting and you start to see cervical mucus every single day, or something that looks like mucus, that can help a woman identify if she has a yeast infection or another type of infection or STI, or in some cases, cervical dysplasia.

There are abnormal patterns of discharge that are associated with abnormal cervical cells. The absence of cervical fluid could also provide information. These are examples of how we can utilize the menstrual cycle as a vital sign.

When you are trained to look for specific patterns and specific challenges and understand the different things that can show up in the menstrual cycle, it can help you support clients and support your own hormone health. It’s an incredible tool.

It’s happening whether we know it or not. Your body is always sending you information and signs whether you are tracking your cycle or not. It is happening whether you’re aware of it or not.

Given that it’s happening already, it’s often a gift to be able to delve into it intentionally and start to utilize it. The way I often talk about it with my clients is that you’re having, in a way, a conversation with your body.

You’re paying attention to the signs that your body is sending you. You might make certain changes to improve your hormonal health or your menstrual cycle health, and then your body responds to give you feedback as to how well your interventions are working.

It really is one of the most fascinating things. I’m biased because this is what I do for a living, but it is fascinating and rewarding to be able to see these changes, especially if you’re science-minded.

You get to see for yourself that the interventions you make can make a big difference in your cycle at times, and that’s empowering, especially in a culture that often tells you there’s nothing you can do and you just have to go on the pill or take a drug.

So that was the first point I wanted to cover: why we should consider the menstrual cycle as a vital sign.

The second point I wanted to talk about is having the menstrual cycle as an important piece of the puzzle. From the professional standpoint, if you are a women’s healthcare professional and you work with women on a day-to-day basis but you don’t fully utilize the menstrual cycle as a vital sign, are you missing an important piece of the puzzle by not focusing on the cycle?

Some practitioners ask whether periods are regular, and that can be helpful to identify some issues, but you’re not necessarily getting a lot of nuance by not knowing what to delve into or going into the level of depth that you could.

It’s unexpected how much can show up in the chart, or how sensitive your cycle can be to a variety of issues. Real-time changes can happen during a stressful month, moving, or something happening in your personal life.

You might notice changes: a change in the luteal phase, delayed ovulation, spotting that doesn’t usually happen. Often, when a client is looking at it as its own thing—what did I do wrong, is there something wrong—I’m pulling the lens back and asking what happened that month.

Many times, it lines up with a major stressor, like moving across the country. It’s not always like that, but it often is.

On a deeper level, there are hormonal changes and patterns that can show up when you are charting at a deeper level: tracking mucus more specifically, tracking temperature more specifically. These are pieces of information that wouldn’t necessarily come up in conversation unless you’re looking for it.

When you track the cycle aspect with your clients, you get an indirect window into that hormonal cycle and what’s going on. It can be different than what people say.

Someone might say, “My cycles are regular, I always know when my period is coming,” but you might not get additional information about period pain, PMS symptoms, potential signs of progesterone issues, or other challenges that would show up only if you’re paying attention to charting.

The third point is how the menstrual cycle helps you detect hormone balance. Tracking the cycle is a great way to get a sense of what is happening hormonally without having to run a whole bunch of diagnostic tests.

It’s not necessarily a substitute for labs, but what’s interesting is that when you’re tracking the cycle you can see what’s happening. If there are indicators of hormonal imbalances or things outside of normal parameters, it can guide you in terms of what testing you might consider.

Instead of starting with a blank slate and doing a barrage of tests if you’re not sure what’s going on, it directs you into what you think could be going on. You have a starting point.

Common hormonal imbalances women may have include progesterone issues, estrogen dominance issues, and issues with detoxification of hormones. Having that window through the menstrual cycle can help identify some of those challenges.

The menstrual cycle can also help identify underlying health issues. It reflects what’s happening in your overall health.

If you have insulin resistance or you’re on the PCOS spectrum and you have insulin resistance or inflammation, that can show up by delayed ovulation and multiple cervical fluid patches leading up to potential ovulation, longer cycles, that kind of thing.

If you have gut issues associated with inflammation and increased histamine, food allergies or sensitivities, that can show up in the cycle in different ways. Thyroid issues can show up in different ways.

The cycle can provide that window and help you identify potential issues that you wouldn’t necessarily know about if you weren’t asking about the cycle.

If you have cycles that are frequently, consistently outside of the normal range, there is a reason for that. There’s something causing it.

It doesn’t always tell you exactly what it is. It’s not like it gives you a printout and says you have this problem. You need support interpreting it. But there is a real connection between your cycle and health issues.

The menstrual cycle can be an important window into fertility problems. With cycle charting and understanding fertility awareness in terms of identifying ovulation, timing sex accurately, those types of things, it’s practical and useful for any woman who’s trying to conceive and has been having difficulties.

Although timing is not the only issue, without correct timing, conception can’t happen. That’s why fertility awareness makes an effective birth control method.

In addition, it can provide a window into potential fertility issues. Tracking cycles can help identify hormonal issues or abnormalities that show up on the chart.

If a client’s cycles are falling into normal parameters and fairly unproblematic, it can help refocus attention on her partner to fully evaluate him.

Up to 50% of the time there is a male-factor piece of it, and 30% of the time it’s completely male factor. The rest is a combination of the two.

Another important point is how personalized and specialized menstrual cycle charting is. No one has the same chart exactly the same.

There are similarities and trends. You can have five women facing a similar challenge and each takes the same supplement or strategy, and each responds differently.

This can help you become a better practitioner. It prevents the idea that everybody with this problem is going to do these steps and it will work perfectly.

With the cycle as a diagnostic tool, you can track the before and after and see how the body responds to interventions. It can be surprising how quickly one woman responds while another has no response.

This helps us realize everyone is not the same. We need to broaden our scope and ensure recommendations are making a difference for the individual.

The menstrual cycle provides a unique and personalized window into what is happening with that client, and it shows how effective interventions are.

If a person is presenting with certain cycle issues, the interventions are either going to work or they’re not. If they’re not working, even though they worked for other clients, it means we’re missing something for this person.

Last, the menstrual cycle can be utilized as a feedback tool to motivate clients. When you want to support someone to see positive changes, something has to change. The person has to do something.

It can be difficult to motivate follow-through, especially when changes are lifestyle changes. Charting can help because it’s exciting and motivating when you make changes and see positive results in the cycle.

It goes beyond “Lisa said so” to “This is actually working. I can see the change in my cycle.” It’s a powerful, tangible, real-time tool.

Usually within a cycle or so, you can see if you’re moving in the right direction. You’re not always at the finish line right away, but you can see positive changes.

It’s motivating because it shows you have the power to make changes, and you’re not doing these things in vain.

It can also help clarify what steps need to be taken when you don’t see results. It can show whether you’re focused on the right thing, and whether what you’re doing is enough.

Sometimes someone has made some changes but not all of them. The cycle can show whether that level of effort is enough. Sometimes it is, sometimes it’s not.

The chart can be a motivational tool to clarify the degree of commitment needed to see change.

Whether you’re a women’s health professional thinking about incorporating the cycle as a vital sign into your practice, or you’re thinking about how charting could be beneficial in your personal journey, I hope you found today’s episode interesting and insightful.

The menstrual cycle is a personalized way to connect with your body and clarify what you need to find your way to optimal health. It takes it away from calorie counting or body size and brings it into something that is unique.

It’s like a science experiment where you can try different things and see how it affects the cycle in real time. Over the years, you get a sense of what you can handle and what it looks like when you push beyond ideal boundaries.

In your early twenties, you can often get away with more. That changes in your thirties into your forties. We can become more insulin resistant and can’t get away with the habits we could in our twenties.

Charting through these phases helps tune into your true limits. Sometimes it can be frustrating because it shows where your weak points are.

All of us have weak points. All of us have unique health challenges and susceptibilities. Although it can be frustrating to admit limitations, charting helps identify what works best for you so you can reach that sweet spot of health.

You can maintain an optimal cycle because it reflects overall health. It is incredible what happens when we start to pay attention to the connection between our menstrual cycle and our overall health.

I’m going to stop there, because I could talk about this all day. I hope you enjoyed today’s episode. If you can think of somebody in your life who could benefit from hearing today’s episode, I encourage you to share it.