IUD Side Effects and Switching to Fertility Awareness for Birth Control (Episode 434)

Full Transcript: Episode 434

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’m outspoken about hormonal birth control 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. I know, I’m a busy girl, but I managed to fit it all in. 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 brand new episode in my Fertility Awareness Reality series. I’m sharing my interview with my client, Sydney, and we get into some of the specifics of her charting journey using fertility awareness for birth control primarily. But we also get into a little bit of her personal experience with hormonal contraceptives and non-hormonal, particularly the hormonal IUD followed by the copper IUD. So you’ll hear the contrasting experiences of the hormonal versus non-hormonal IUD experience, as well as what led her to jump into fertility awareness. So lots of really great and important information in today’s episode. So without further ado, let’s go ahead and jump into my interview with Sydney.

I’m really excited to be here today with Sydney. She is a member of my current Fertility Awareness Mastery Live group program. And we’re actually recording this in our — we just had our second last session. So we’re actually towards the end of our program together, which is kind of fun to have one of these kind of check-ins towards the end. So without further ado, welcome to the show.

Sydney: So great to be here. My name is Sydney. A little bit about my background and how I came to FAM is, you know, I’ve been on birth control since about 14, 15. I started out on the pills and I hopped around from pill to pill trying to figure out what would be the best side effects, and I just sort of really never felt like myself. But I had never had enough time trying to cycle naturally to really know what normal felt like, but I just knew that I didn’t feel normal the way that I was. So I also had really heavy periods and just a lot of hormonal dysfunction, which is why I was put on them in the first place. And I hopped from the pill to another pill and then I decided to try the vaginal ring and I liked that one for a while and I kept it until I was about 20. And for whatever reason I just got tired of changing them out all the time, had some other hormonal — just this one isn’t quite working for me in the long term — I had some other issues come up. So I decided to try an IUD. And the one that was recommended to me was the hormonal one because it was smaller, and it was the Kyleena. So I tried it. The insertion was horrible. I can honestly say that that was one of the most painful things that I had experienced in my life. And I stayed about a year on it. But the biggest reason I came off of that one was because I literally had these super sharp pains in my general low abdomen area to the point of if I were driving I’d have to pull over to the side of the road because I was afraid I was going to crash. It was awful. And you know, I got checked out for everything and they said everything was fine — no obvious issues that you should be experiencing raging pain in your abdominal area. And so I just kind of go, I wonder if it’s the IUD. So I actually had it removed and I never had another pain again after I had that particular one removed. But I was still looking for a good form of birth control. I’d heard good things about the copper IUD from a few friends because they didn’t want the fake hormones. And I thought I did some research and I thought I could manage the more influence on your own hormones that it has, because I knew it wasn’t hormonal but I knew it still could affect my hormones. So I tried it. I liked it for the most part and I kept it for about a year and a half, and in the last half of the year that I had had it in I started to experience all this weight gain and anxiety and just really awful period symptoms, cramping, bloating. And I go, this just still isn’t working for me. And I still freaked out about being able to use it as a valid form of birth control, even though it was over 99% effective. And I really just couldn’t figure out, oh, this is the most effective, basically without having your tubes tied, why am I so worried about this? And it finally came to me from watching the movie Jurassic Park. And, you know, the thing is, just nature will always find a way. And I go, that’s it. That’s why it bothers me so much, because I’m trying to circumvent nature. So then I thought, you know, there’s this whole fertility awareness thing I should look into that. And that is how I found Miss Lisa and her wonderful book, and her podcast, and I’ve been on an amazing journey ever since.

Lisa: Wow. Well, thank you for taking us through that. I always find it fascinating. I love this part of all of the episodes, and I always say that with clients as well, because in sessions I ask all kinds of questions and gather lots of information, but when you’re able to just share your experience kind of front to back, there’s a lot of additional details that we get. I want to ask you a couple of questions. My favorite question: how old were you when you had your first period, and what were your cycles like before? It sounds like they were heavy, and that’s why you were put on the pill, but maybe just deep into that a little bit for us.

Sydney: Well, I was a bit younger than most of my friends. I wasn’t really sure what the normal age was, but it was around 12. And I actually remember it because it was Christmas Day that I got my first period. And I was going, wow, what a great gift. And I remember the first few cycles being okay. I wasn’t super thrilled about this whole new awkward process of liquid coming out of an orifice that you couldn’t really control. And then the pain set in, and it just seemed like I had really heavy periods. I was using the super max tampons and bleeding through them even in the middle of the night when gravity should be your friend. And it was just awful, and I had hormonal acne, I had the whole works. And I remember asking my mom about it — there wasn’t a ton of discussion, but basically, yeah, that’s just the way it is. I’m sorry, sweetie, our genetics stink, was the general reaction. And when I was a little bit older and going for my first wellness checkup, they ask all those questions, and they go, well, are you experiencing XYZ? And I go, yes, down the line. And they go, well, birth control can magically turn all of that off for you, and you won’t have to experience any of this anymore. And I go, that sounds like a great idea. Let’s do that. And that’s basically how I started on the birth control pill.

Lisa: Yeah, this is the world we live in, right? And I mean, did it help with your symptoms?

Sydney: It depended, because I hopped from pill to pill. Originally, yes, it made the cramping slightly bearable, to the point at least I wasn’t laying in bed all day whenever I had the first few days of my period. But, you know, I just would fix one thing and something else would pop up. Like, if I fix the acne with this one pill, then I would be really bloated. Or I would just feel lousy on it. I didn’t have a great descriptor or really good language to even use with my healthcare professionals — I’d just say I don’t feel good on this one. And they go, okay, well, let’s just try a different one. And honestly, I battled with such severe depression and anxiety throughout my entire late teenage years that it really wasn’t worth it. And now, looking back, I go, I wonder if it was the synthetic hormones. That was probably a significant factor.

Lisa: You know, to be honest with you, I wonder that myself, because I was on hormonal birth control around the same age that you were. If I got my notes correctly from what you were saying earlier, you started on the contraceptives the first time age 14, 15. So ironically, you did have a little bit of cycling under your belt. So although you were on it, put on it quite early, quite young, it sounds like you had somewhere between one to two years of cycling prior to using it.

Sydney: I did. And I applaud my mother for this, because she goes, I know that it seems like the miracle pill, but let’s just give it a year or two and see if you can naturally do this. And she didn’t have any of the what I would refer to as, you know, crunchy alternative perspective on medicine and women’s wellness. She just — I think her mother instinct knew that, hey, you know, this could resolve on its own. And let’s just wait and see. Well, it never did. And honestly, I would say I was pushy about it, because just everything in our culture from movies to what I was hearing about my friends doing, I go, it’s the answer to all my problems. So I need to be on this thing. I want to be fixed.

Lisa: So, I think the challenge, especially when you’re young, is that you really don’t know what else to do. I mean, it’s not easy when you’re young and trying to live your life to be dealing with really heavy periods or having such — it’s never actually convenient to have excruciating pain, whether you have to miss school or work or whatever. And so, at the end of the day, we’re all doing the best we can to function. And so, it would have been different if — similar to your story — my mom didn’t necessarily know anything about functional medicine and her care and all this stuff. So she did her best as well. But it would have been different if you had been presented with an option, like an alternative, that would have actually helped to reduce potentially the bleeding or to reduce the pain for you to actually be able to manage, right? Then that would have been like a real choice, a real alternative to contraceptives. If it just feels like you didn’t necessarily have an alternative — it was either the pill or I’m just going to continue to experience all this pain and anguish. Right?

Sydney: Yeah. I didn’t really have any external even nudges to go on a deep dive on research, because I am the type A person who loves to know everything. And if I had even a slight idea that this whole world was out there for women to support them naturally, I don’t think I ever would have gone on contraceptive. Just not my personal preference, especially after experiencing them. But even if I had never experienced them, if I knew this was out there, never would have done it.

Lisa: And what you’re saying is you switched from pill to pill. So maybe share with us why. I mean, I’m assuming it’s because maybe you didn’t feel great on them and you were trying to find the best thing, but share a little bit about that hopping from pill to pill kind of thing.

Sydney: Right. So I had tried to tough it out for those one or two years and things weren’t getting any better. So I went on it for really the heavy periods and the pain. And I remember that they helped — I would say significantly depending on the pill. The first one it did, but then I got acne and I got bloating, and I kind of had more of the PMS sorts of things. And they go, well, you know, that can happen. We just have to find the right pill for you, because there’s so many different kinds and I’m sure we can figure it out. And I don’t remember really specific brands or which ones I hopped from, but there were at least three in there. And I remember settling on one particular one and I still didn’t feel wonderful on it. I just had this overall feeling I couldn’t shake from every single pill that I just didn’t feel like myself. And if that’s the one thing I could say I didn’t enjoy about the pills from birth control, was I really felt — I have language for it now — I felt totally disconnected from my body. And it was just like feeling blah, a steady, straight blah for all the periods of my life. And now I understand that you know you’re supposed to be able to go up and down, because your hormones fluctuate and so does mood, energy, all those things. And that’s what I was missing.

So looking for that, I was hopping from pill to pill, and I finally found one and settled on one because it was the least offensive — that’s the best way to put it — of all the ones I tried. You know, I didn’t have bloating in reaction to trying to fix cramps, I didn’t have acne in reaction to trying to fix how heavy my periods were. I just had moderately heavy periods and I’d have one or two days of cramping that I could offset with some Advil. And I actually had to take prescription level pain medication. I call it Advil, but it was, I think, 400 milligrams per pill. And after that I’d be good. And I figured, ah well, you know, this is as good as it’s going to get, and we’re just going to settle here.

Lisa: Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. And then you had shared a little bit about your IUD experience. So ironically, you had the full gamut of the IUD experience because you had the hormonal IUD, the Kyleena, as well as the copper. So a couple of things about your story. Of course, you mentioned painful insertion, which is a point that is very, very consistent in the IUD kind of pill reality slash FAM reality series episodes. And also something I picked up on what you were talking about was the kind of random abdominal cramping. And so some of these things are things I didn’t necessarily know about before I started doing these episodes. But you’re not alone, because I’ve had many episodes about the IUD and it’s interesting. So some women have the IUD and then they’ll have — particularly, I think a little more so with copper — heavier periods, more cramping, that kind of thing. We all kind of, hopefully, know that that’s a side effect potentially of the copper IUD. But I feel like what we don’t always hear about is the other stuff, kind of like the random cramping that’s not related to your period.

Although I did have a friend in my early 20s who was using an IUD, and I think it was copper at the time, and she started getting these ovarian cysts that were extremely painful. So there would be days where she would just not be able to function because she’d have this horrible pain. Anyways, so yeah, share a little bit about that. If you want — the insertion, what you would — and maybe the difference, if there was, because you went back for the other one. So maybe share a little bit about how that copper IUD insertion compared.

Sydney: So for the insertion, I did a lot of Google. I was going, you know, on the scale of one childbirth, what are we talking? I was trying to prepare myself because I was a little bit frustrated. I want something I could, you know, quote, set and forget. It would have been nice. It would have been easy. And I go, well, it’s maybe five minutes of my life. I feel like I could do it. And I read everything from it didn’t really bother me to that was the worst thing that I’ve ever experienced in my entire life. So I was really nervous and probably pretty tense when they were going to insert it. And I will say it is a pain that I didn’t know how to prepare for, especially while I was experiencing it. It was sharp. It was concentrated. And there was no amount of relaxing, I felt like, that I could do that would make it easier while I was experiencing it. It was definitely like sticking a red hot poker up into my uterus. It was not comfortable, absolutely no fun. But it was, you know, one to three seconds of that kind of feeling. And then it was just, well, I feel crampy and gross — it wasn’t fun. And I go, well, you know, in the grand scheme of things, because I had planned to have it — I think that one was good for five years — I had planned to have it for five years, so it was worth it in the end.

And then I was probably a few months into having it. I hadn’t really had any issues yet. Things were fine. Hadn’t noticed any specific differences. I did have a lighter period, didn’t really have menstrual cramps, so I was pretty happy. And then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I wouldn’t even call it cramping. It felt like someone was stabbing my abdomen. It was sharp. It was very painful. It was not like digestive pain. It’s a very specific pain, I think, you feel when you have blocked gas or just an unhappy tummy. This was awful. This was, I had to pull over on the side of the road because I couldn’t function. And I was a little bit afraid. I’m going, oh my gosh, am I having organ trouble? Am I sick? Cancer? And I got checked out and they said, you’re perfectly fine, you’re perfectly healthy. And I just could not figure out what it was. And I go, well, I had this new thing in my body that I’ve never had before. Maybe I’ll Google, and maybe I’ll ask in my next appointment. And of course, they assured me that there’s no possible way that the IUD could be causing that pain. And I was even gaslighted to the point of, you’re probably just imagining it. You know, you’re probably just exaggerating too. It might just be a little bit of cramping and that’s perfectly normal. And I’m going, this is not my imagination, I guarantee you. And I tried to tough it out quite a lot. And the worst part was, I couldn’t get a rhyme or reason. It’d be any time of day, any point in your quote-unquote cycle, or quote-unquote month to month. And it was scary. It would happen while I’d be driving. It’d be happening while I was in class. It would just happen whenever it wanted to. And I honestly, looking back, just kind of wonder if my body was going, we don’t like this, and we’re just going to try to expel it. And it was sharp contraction of the muscle, whatever it was. It was awful. And when I did eventually get it out, went away, didn’t even have it later that day, didn’t experience it in the week after. No issues.

Lisa: It hurts my heart how many times I’ve heard women say basically that kind of gaslighting piece of it couldn’t possibly be related. Like, what does that even mean? Like, you’re saying there’s no possibility in Heaven and Earth that it could — like, what is that, right? You could just feel like the heat coming off my forehead. Like, I’m just like, why? I just think it’s interesting that there’s so many things in life that people will kind of put that to, like there’s no way, there’s no possibility, it’s impossible, when that’s literally the only thing that changed. And it’s literally in your uterus, the place where you’re having these spastic — what is it? Is it that they don’t know? Or is it that they’ve never had someone say it? Or is it just that they don’t believe people? So even if they have all these patients that have this symptom, they just say it’s not related. I don’t know what that is. But even just from doing the podcast and interviewing many women over the years who just share their stories, this is a consistent thing that I’ve heard a lot of women say who use the IUD. Not everybody, so it’s definitely not like 100%, even a 50% kind of thing. But it’s a thing. So it’s always like the public service announcement that’s attached to this episode is, yeah, these are some of the symptoms women experience. Obviously not everybody does, but if you do start to experience stuff like that, it’s not in your head. It’s a thing.

And the only other thing I would say is, I think it’s two things. It’s always my public service announcement with the IUD stuff: you can talk to your doctor and ask for a numbing agent. That’s a thing that you can do. And of course, it’s not advertised. I mean, your doctor may just kind of shut you down — oh, it couldn’t possibly hurt, and all that kind of stuff. But now that you’re listening to the podcast, you know that that’s nonsense. Like, obviously it can hurt. And even if it’s only a few seconds, just imagine if they shoved it up a man’s penis and offered him nothing. Like, I’m just saying, right? Like, that’s not happening. So why is it that we’re expected to just deal with the pain? It makes no sense. And the other thing, just as a practical thing, if it applies or if it could possibly apply — if you’re thinking about getting the IUD inserted, there is a point of your cycle where the cervix is naturally soft and a little bit open, and that would be around ovulation. And obviously, as a society, we have not sorted it out to figure out that that might be the time to recommend for women to get their IUDs inserted. Public service announcement over.

Sydney: Well, those things aren’t convenient in a big business that is now healthcare.

Lisa: And it’s not — I can’t say that it would guarantee that it wouldn’t hurt, but I’m just saying that for anyone who has tracked their cycles, if you’re kind of brave enough or interested enough, curious enough to check your cervix daily, if you’ve tracked that as a sign — optional — you can feel it with your fingers. Like, it is softer during that time. For many women, it’s not exactly the same for everybody, but for many women it is a lot softer during that time, and you can feel a little indent, a little opening. Whereas outside of that, even during your period, when I feel like that’s when they typically recommend for you to get it in — even on your period, it still doesn’t feel that soft. Like, it’s still pretty firm and closed. Like, it’s open a little enough for the bleeding to come out, but it’s not the same as at ovulation. It’s a lot softer. So, something to think about.

And I’m just checking to see if I had any other questions about your story. I had one more question, because then when you switch to the copper IUD, because you had a history of heavy and painful periods, I’m curious what that was like, because it’s kind of well known, as I had mentioned before, the side effect is to potentially increase the bleeding or cramping. It sounds like you eventually took it out in large part maybe because of that. But share a little bit about what that was like as someone who already had a heavier period to have the copper IUD.

Sydney: So I will also note that on the insertion, it was different. They prepared me a little better. They did have me take some pain medication before and after, and they did use a numbing agent, which I think helped some for sure. And I had a little bit better idea of what to expect, so I think I was naturally more relaxed. And then for whatever reason they were better about it — but I think there was still no way to fully be relaxed and pseudo-energetically open to having something rammed up your cervix. So it was definitely still painful. I would still say, even though it was larger — I don’t know if it’s because it had been open before — it was less painful. Whatever variable is attributed to that, more relaxed, a little more expectant — but it was different, which was better to me. Because I was going, I can’t believe I’m doing this again to myself. But, you know, I really want to give every option a try. Because by that point I was sexually active and I wanted something for birth control. And I had actually done a little bit of a break in between the hormonal IUD and the copper, and had a little bit of healing work with a practitioner. So my cycles were pretty good going into the copper. And I go, well, if I really just stay on top of stuff, if I sleep, if I eat well, if I do all those things, maybe I can kind of counteract the possible effects of the copper IUD, which I had a little bit of education about. I knew it could exacerbate my estrogen dominance tendency. So I kind of knew that walking in. And I kind of just approached it — I’ll eat a little bit extra zinc than I usually do, maybe I’ll take a tincture, I’ll try to be really good about sleeping and eating — which all sounds really great. And I think I did well for about three months. And then, well, you know, life takes over. I was a college senior, really stressed all the time, just trying to do all the things, and sleep wasn’t really encouraged. So I think for some women maybe it might work if you can be on point all the time and maybe your body is just typically less sensitive, but my body couldn’t sustain it. And I gained 30 to 40 pounds in the span of three months. It was insane. There was some stress component to it, but I’d never gained weight like that in my life in that kind of extreme reaction. And when I had experienced anxiety before with all the different methods I’d been on, it was worse with Kyleena than any of the others, but this was the worst of all of them I’d ever had. And I just could not relax about anything. I started having OCD kind of tendency thinking, just panic attacks. And I noticed that I’d be breathing quickly in the middle of class and I had no idea why. I noticed that I was tense when I was doing homework and I had no idea why. I would be at home and just trying to relax in the summers and I just could not. And I was going, this is not doable. I am not me anymore. This is to the point where my life is not enjoyable. And there is no reason for that. So that’s why I decided really to get it out.

I will say, like, menstrual cycle wise, the biggest thing I have noticed was my cycles were getting longer, and not necessarily because of bleeding. They were just — I usually was around 30 days, and then I was starting to hit 35 days, and then I was starting to hit 37 days. And I was kind of going, this isn’t very good. And I didn’t really have cramping and I didn’t really have ridiculously heavy periods surprisingly, but I would attribute that to I did a ton of work to be super healthy up front. And then I was also seed cycling and trying to do some hormonally happy things while I had it in. And I think that was able to somewhat counteract the effect. But you know, it’s a foreign object in your uterus that is copper, and it causes issues. And I think it just accumulated for me, and my body can’t keep up with it, and it just became too much copper. I wouldn’t call it toxicity for me, but there was definitely enough of an effect that I had too much copper, in my opinion, in my body.

Lisa: I interviewed a woman years ago about the copper issue, and it was a very interesting interview. She termed it copper excess, which makes sense. But then she also shared that many women on the pill have the same issue, meaning the pill depletes zinc, therefore your copper goes up. And so even though there’s no copper inserted in you, you still end up with copper excess sometimes, which I thought was interesting.

So, to kind of wrap up your wonderful hormonal contraceptive experience — it’s interesting with the copper IUD because everyone’s experience is very different. Many women have an excellent experience with the copper IUD. Like, when it works for someone, they’ll rave about it day and night, because it’s non-hormonal. And when it actually works for your body, I think it can be this great option. But obviously, on the flip side, there are many women for whom it does not work. It sounds like you were sensitive to it for a number of reasons. But ironically, you had all these kind of hormonal-type symptoms with a non-hormonal method. So do you have a comment on that one? Because I think it can be very surprising when women use it, because they chose it because it’s not hormonal for the most part. But then many women end up having hormonal symptoms because of the hormonal disruption, or the nutrient deficiency, or the localized inflammation that’s caused by the insertion of this foreign object.

Sydney: Right. No, absolutely. Honestly, I did, like I said, a little bit of research and I had an idea that some of that could happen walking into it. But I thought, you know, I could just eat really well. I can just sleep. I can do anti-inflammatory habits and magnesium baths and all these different things. And I could combat it. And maybe now that I’m better about taking care of myself two or three years later, I could. True. But, you know, back then, in the demands of the system and the demands of being a student, I just could not match my body’s needs or put extra on my body. And so I knew it was an influence. I really had absolutely no idea for me how big of an influence it was going to be. I was thinking, oh, it might be a little bit of a push here, a nudge there. No, somebody pushed me down two flights of stairs kind of reaction to it. So I did have an idea — I just really underestimated how significant it would be. And I’m sure that’s different for every woman. I think that my body is particularly sensitive, like you said.

Lisa: Yeah, I think it’s so interesting. I feel like we always have to have caveats in everything. It’s like, oh, you know, but it’s not for everybody. And I feel like for any of the kind of regular listeners of the show, I think we’ve established already like these stories aren’t ever to say everyone experiences these things. This whole fear of like, well, if we tell them the symptoms, they won’t use the method — there’s always this fear that if we talk about some of the side effects, it means that we’re going to scare women off of contraceptives and they won’t ever want to use them. I think that’s the pharmaceutical industry’s fear, to be honest. And I mean, fair enough, but at the end of the day, informed consent — this is what is required for informed consent. We need to be able to have these conversations and recognize that there are plenty of people who take these hormones or non-hormonal methods, in this case, and experience these symptoms. And then the flip side of that is that there’s plenty of women who are literally on them right now and are having these symptoms, are being told that they couldn’t possibly be related, and are basically kind of losing their minds because it’s like, am I going crazy? Because you start to wonder sometimes when a degreed, credentialed professional tells you that it’s impossible to have symptoms with this thing that you know is causing your symptoms. You start to wonder, like, maybe I am crazy. But you’re not. No, you’re not.

All right. So let’s transition over then into the session part of our session today. So we’ve had a number of opportunities for connection. We’ve had a number of hot seat sessions together in class. And I feel like we had a really great discussion in our last hot seat probably a week ago about exercise and all that. So I think we’ve made some great kind of strides. But let me know what you’d like to focus on today. I’m just going to pull up your charts — I know the listeners can’t see them, but it’s happening.

Sydney: So to focus on today, I want to say reaction of my cycle, but I guess the effect of — we talked about last time exercise, how much protein I’m getting, those sorts of effects on my cycle. And I know, looking at my new cycle, that I think, honestly, the biggest detriment currently is either sleep or how much protein I’m getting, because I had been traveling and I noticed I wasn’t getting stellar sleep, but I also wasn’t eating super great, which also meant, hey, I’m not probably hitting the 80 to 100 grams of protein I should. And it was really interesting to see how my temperature just straight plummeted.

Lisa: Well, I think there are different stages of this whole learning process of fertility awareness. And one of the things I try to go on about in the program is that the goal for me isn’t perfection. I don’t — I think that many of us want to have that kind of perfect chart, obviously. That’s often why I think charting attracts type A individuals like yourself and like myself, because we have the patience for this because it’s really interesting and we want to kind of figure it out. And I think that once you get the basics down and you start to kind of recognize what’s going on, how to chart like the basic stuff of tracking your mucus and your temperature and all that good stuff — and then of course in our program we go into some of the lifestyle factors and other strategies specifically to improve hormonal health — so it can feel a little daunting initially. But I feel like you’re at an interesting stage because now that you have the information, you can kind of see how it plays out. And I feel like this is where we’re getting into that fifth vital sign concept from my perspective, which is more of an ongoing lifetime conversation with our bodies. So it’s helpful to not think, I failed this month, because you’re literally traveling and doing your thing and living your life. So of course there’s going to be times in the cycle where you’re not able to do all the things. I mean, I’m a human being as well — there are times when I’m not able to do all the things. When you see how your cycle responds, it’s very educational because then it shows you what you need for your body, how you respond. And it also gives you confidence, like, oh, all that stuff I was doing is working. Look at that.

So how do you feel about that? Because I think it’s a fine line that I walk in this field between encouraging my clients to do things that are going to support their hormonal health, but also not creating a monster and making my clients feel like they always have to be perfect, because that’s not reality. I think that what I hope that everyone kind of takes away from it is that kind of dance, like that conversation that’s taking place. So that now you know what happens when you’re not getting great sleep. Now you know what happens when you skip breakfast for a month and work out three times a day. Now you know. So now you have the power to do what you need to do, like when you’re ready to focus on those things.

Sydney: I think that’s such an important distinction to make, and what I’m really trying to internalize, because my first reaction is, you didn’t do every little single factor perfectly, and now look at your chart, and now look at your menstrual cycle health. But you know, I just need to breathe, take a moment. It’s just information. It’s not good or bad. It’s just good to know. And I think what’s also really cool is now I know which — I’m starting to know at least — which things are the most bang for my buck. So if I don’t have any energy really on a given month, or I’m traveling, or I’m really busy, and things are just hard to try to do all the healthy, good things for yourself — I know I need to sleep. Like, if I do nothing else, I really need to zero in, dial in, and sleep. And that means going to bed before even 11. And it would be awesome if it was around 10, because I noticed if it’s later — and the weird thing is, I had been syncing my circadian rhythm up really well, been doing my nice 20 minutes in the morning outside getting real sunshine, real light, been wearing my blue light blocking glasses at night. I just did all the really good things for that. But now in the mornings, I don’t even wake up with my alarm. I wake up earlier. I wake up at seven. So it doesn’t quite work to try to catch up on sleep if you had stayed up while you were traveling and you were out having fun and you got to bed around midnight or later, and I go, and I’m still waking up at seven, and this is going to suck. There’s no sleeping in.

Lisa: Yeah, no, I feel like that’s — I don’t know — in my experience, as you get older, that seems to be more and more like that, where it’s harder. But I think that’s a really good point to try to take a step back from it. And the other thing I would say is, I tend to look at things from a bit of a different perspective because of the longevity of my time in this field. So when I’m working with clients, I think of things in an arc. So when I’m able to support someone over the course of three to four cycles or more, then we have an arc. Because the first cycle is information. We need a baseline. We need to figure out what’s really going on here. So we need to figure out, okay, what’s going on, how much mucus do you really have, where your temperature is at, are we seeing ovulation, are we seeing a shift, do all these things match up, et cetera. So from my perspective, the first chart is a baseline, kind of like when you get a lab test and you kind of see where your levels are at. And then from there, obviously, we’re having conversations, so there’s different changes, different things we might be able to identify. And then you start to see whatever’s going to unfold, unfold.

The tricky thing is that we’re not robots, and healing isn’t always in a straight line. So when you think of it, not like, it’s Tuesday and my temperature is low, what’s going on — we can move past that. Zoom the lens out. It’s hard because you live your life obviously in a series of days. So especially at the beginning of your charting journey, it’s really easy to get caught up in like, why is the temperature high today, why is it low, what’s going on? But hopefully I’m here to be like, okay, it’s okay. Let’s wait three days, let’s see what’s going on. But basically by the time you get to the end of that cycle and you’re able to analyze it — if I go back to your previous cycle, we can kind of see what was going on. It does take patience, obviously, to wait six months down the line to have six months in a row of charts. But it’s so informative when you actually have three months of charts, six months of charts. Because what happens is that you realize that you never really screwed it up that much. If you went on a vacation, I’m always like, have fun, enjoy your vacation. You deserve it. I know how hard you work. I see your charts.

So, you know what I mean, like we have to live our lives. But what’s interesting is when you look at things in an arc — if you’re making some changes, let’s say you’re working on your sleeping, you’re working on your eating, and let’s say you’re doing some things, and you have that one month where something goes haywire, your dog swallows a golf ball or something, you have to deal with all that. So in the moment it feels like you’ve ruined everything and it’s all for nothing. But then when you actually look at that arc of cycles, like that three to six cycle arc, you realize that that was kind of an anomaly, but it didn’t mean that everything you did was thrown out the window. Like, you were still doing other things within your capability. Like you said, if you’re on vacation, focus on sleep when some of the other stuff goes to the wall. But then over that period of time, you can see the gradual improvement, assuming that you’re making some positive changes.

So I think that would be the message that I would love to impart, because truly you’re kind of at the beginning of that charting journey, especially with this method and how specific it is with all of it. I think it caters perfectly to your personality, to be honest.

Sydney: Yes, it’s perfect. There’s a lot of data that you’re able to gather if you choose to. And so it’s kind of like — the hard part is the patience at the beginning of your journey. Because even by six months from now or this time next year, you’re going to be in a completely different level of confidence, a different level of mindset. You’re going to have seen a lot of different things, and you’re going to be a lot more confident about, well, now I know a lot better what things affect my cycle. And that puts you in the driver’s seat. And then you actually — one of the big pieces of learning also is that it doesn’t have to be perfect. Like, it really doesn’t.

Lisa: Yes, but you are totally right. It just has to be what — if we can switch from having, like, because we all have bad habits, it’s all of us. We all stay up too late sometimes. There’s all these things. But ultimately, if we can switch from six days a week doing the quote bad habit to one or two days a week, we don’t have to be perfect, but we’ve switched it around. I think that’s what often happens for my clients, where they’ve switched it around. So now more often than not, they’re doing the good habit, like they’re doing the kind of things that are supportive for their hormonal health. I try not to do good and bad, because ice cream is neither good nor bad. It’s ice cream. But maybe eating it six times a day is less opportune for your hormones. So when we switch that relationship, then you start to see the benefits. And you also start to realize, like, for certain things, okay, if you have celiac, don’t eat gluten like ever. But for a lot of things, if we just switch it up, then it’s okay. So it doesn’t mean like go rogue or whatever. Sometimes if you’re dealing with a serious issue, there’s a period of time when you need to kind of cut stuff off. But I think for the average person, it can be really helpful just to switch up some of those habits and not be so hard on yourself.

Anyways, I feel like I’m going on a tangent. So back to your chart — let me know what other questions you had, what you wanted to make sure that we focus on.

Sydney: Well, I’m not sure if it’s really a focus, but I wanted to kind of celebrate. I hadn’t found a way to quite mark it on a chart other than in my journal. I had been having issues with cervical dysplasia, that wetness, the dampness on the toilet paper, and I discovered it last cycle. But I can say with happiness it’s better this cycle with even just a little bit of intention, a little bit of added habits. And I actually only last week — or the previous week — had just talked about these strategies to combat that, and from your book, and ordered those things like the vitamin A, HCC, things like that. And I’ve already been able to see some improvements just from the sleeping habits from last cycle, the eating habits, magnesium, just really simple things I had added last cycle and they seem to have already had an effect. So I’m excited about that. And also I had had spotting the previous cycle and it had been brown right after my period — I had the actual bleeding and then it had tapered off to brown spotting. I had a day less of it this cycle, and it was not brown at all. It was really just finishing up blood, but it wasn’t heavy enough to keep my cup in. So I just kind of counted it as spotting. And I attribute that to the vaginal steaming I had been doing the whole past cycle. And I’m really excited about that. So it’s just really cool to see the improvements in such a short term.

Lisa: Well, that’s awesome and exciting. It always depends — I think what I always say is, if you hit the nail on the head, then you start to see those improvements right away, if you kind of correctly identify and you’re doing the thing that needs to be done. And I think that’s one of the encouraging things about charting. Very empowering, because then you start to realize that there are things that you can do that can make a difference. It’s not — I always say you don’t go from having a really out-of-control cycle to this pristine, perfect cycle, if there was such a thing, in two days or anything. But when you’re doing the things that are actually affecting your cycle in a positive way, then you do tend to see some movement in the right direction, even very early on. And within a few cycles, then ideally you would see some of those results. And if you’re not seeing any change, it means that we haven’t identified the correct issue and you still have to figure out what that is. So I’m really glad to hear that. That’s very encouraging. And yes, you did it in the midst of the travel and all the things that were not going quote well.

Sydney: Yes. The other thing that I guess I’m frustrated about is the temperatures. And so I’m trying to breathe my type A tendency down, and it’s just — it was really frustrating. It seems to be the sleep, but it could also be the protein intake. I’m not exactly sure which is a stronger factor, or both of them. But overall, even from my last cycle, the temps were low pre-ovulation and then post-ovulation. I didn’t have a big spike post-ovulation. It took me a little while to get over the hump, and then it didn’t really go very high. So I guess I was just kind of curious — do you feel that I should just focus on the sleeping and the eating of the protein and see if it’s better this cycle and then the subsequent cycles, or if I should add something.

Lisa: So I think what we had spoken about in the previous cycle was kind of the different factors that can affect temperatures. So we went through some of the basic things. Of course, I always want to check in on sleep, want to check in on the overall protein and overall caloric intake based on your activity level. So we had talked a little bit about that. And those are things that I like to focus on first before we jump to any conclusions. So at this stage, because we’re only in the beginning of the cycle, and I know there was just a couple of things going on here — now, I’m looking at your cycle, what we have so far. During your period, the temperatures we don’t really look at too much. There’s a couple days here where the temps are low, and that might correspond with one of these days you didn’t have as much sleep. But here, the last three days, which still look to me to be pre-ovulatory, are actually over that 97.4 line, just to put it out there. Right? Which is good. You want it over 97.4. Right. So I think that from a general standpoint, it may — we may have to, before we assess like, okay, it’s not working — we’re going to need a little bit more data. So I would say that it’s not to say don’t do anything. I would say you’re doing stuff. It’s been one cycle. So we still have a little bit more time in terms of seeing the strategy through to see what it’s going to do for you. And so I think I’d be able to share more of a comprehensive answer maybe in a week or two when we actually see what is happening and see what those post-ovulatory temps are like.

Basically, for anyone who hadn’t picked up on the concern that Sydney is raising here, is that her temperatures were a little bit on the low side, and we didn’t see much of a shift in the post-ovulatory phase. Although there was a shift and it was sustained, the temperatures just were kind of hovering close to the line as opposed to kind of going higher. So the concern, obviously, is are the temperatures high enough. So in this particular cycle, because we’ve just implemented a few things, it would make sense to wait to see if those things are working, because we’re still kind of on day 12 of the cycle. And we really haven’t seen enough, I would say, because I like to give things one full cycle. So then from that perspective, in a couple of weeks, tag me on Slack and we’ll take a peek at it together and see what’s going on, to kind of evaluate. And a few other things to check on — I always talk about potentially nutrient deficiencies, potentially thyroid — there are other things that we can check on. But before we jump to those things, I feel like it’s still a little too soon to make that call. But we still have some time together. So we’ll check back on those things. Because like I said just a couple minutes ago, when you’re addressing the issue and you’ve identified the correct strategy, then you do tend to see it moving. So if we are seeing lower temperatures and we do some strategies and we don’t see any improvement, then we do have to move to the next thing and check out what other reasons could be causing that.

Sydney: Right. That makes total sense. Well, I feel like it’s kind of a short session today, but I’m really glad that we spent a lot of our time talking through your story. I feel like it was really powerful and really helpful — going through all of those details with your IUD experiences, contraceptives, the different changes, was really helpful for the listeners. Did you have any other questions before we wrap up today that I can help with or comment?

I don’t think so. Maybe just to note that I have in fact been able to feel like I’m working with nature. Am I anxious? More type A, even without any hormonal influence on my anxiety, I have been able to relax about using FAM for contraception in a way I never had been able to with even the most quote-unquote effective methods out there, like the IUDs. There really is no substitute for just working with your body. Like I said, I think nature will always find a way. And I would rather not — what felt like to me — roll the dice every time. So if anyone is really battling every month about, did it work, did it not work, am I good — I would say that FAM provided me more comfort and relief than anything I’ve ever tried.

Lisa: You know, that’s interesting, Sydney. I really relate to that. That was my personal experience as well. I know that that’s not everyone’s experience. So just to put that out there. Yeah, because I was thinking back to your Jurassic Park comment of nature finds a way. The challenging thing is that there’s no method that’s 100%. But I feel like sometimes people forget that. And so even with the copper IUD, yes, the risk is very low, but you’re still ovulating. And then if you do conceive, and if you’re that rare person, the chance of it being ectopic is higher. And I did interview a woman where that was her experience. And so that — there’s all that. So it’s more just to say that I resonate with what you’re saying. And I’m curious — for me, what helped me to feel more comfortable wasn’t that I was controlling my body, but it was that I was understanding what was going on in my body. And then I was able to make choices around that. And then also, because you’re tracking, if anything did happen, you would know right away. So I’m curious — for you, what is it about fertility awareness in your case that has started to make you feel even more comfortable with it than some of the most effective quote methods?

Sydney: I think it’s a lot like what you said. It’s not trying to force my body into this quote sterile state that is not its natural form. You know, it always wants to go back to what it was built to do, what it was made to do — ovulate, and potentially have babies. And I think that is where my relief comes from. Is just — I know I can only get pregnant one day of the cycle, on ovulation, and then there is the potential for the fertile days for sperm to be conserved for that one day of the cycle that you can get pregnant. And I can just plan accordingly. That feels so much more empowering to me than the fear I used to have of every single day of a cycle. It’s like, oh, you know, could it happen, could it not happen? Am I always going to deal with that possible one percent or less than one percent a day that I could be pregnant without planning for it? And it’s just so much more comforting to know what my body does, how it works. And there’s just so much more information than just, do I want to be pregnant yet or not. You know, there’s the health aspect, there’s the maximizing your wellness and how you feel every day aspect. And that’s just so much more than, here, take a pill. And by the way, here are all those negative side effects that could possibly come with it.

Lisa: One of the things that we didn’t focus on in today’s call is something that we spent a lot of weeks focusing on in class, which is the birth control aspect — managing the fertile window, understanding the rules, having a pre-ovulatory double check option plus the post-ovulatory cross-check option. And so kind of dotting all those i’s and crossing all those t’s that we need to, to have that opportunity to achieve that 99.4% efficacy, which is possible. And although I just mentioned all these things that we learned, it’s not that complicated. It’s kind of like — I always think the great analogies are driving standard or something like that, because they’re driving a car and in general there are all these road signs, all the steps, but no one’s overwhelmed. Like after they’ve had their license for a year or even three months, we just get used to those things. But first the first step is having to learn them. So I’m glad that you’re feeling a lot more confident at this stage with the method itself, and also having that secondary part of being able to have that window into your health.

So, final couple of questions — for someone who’s listening, maybe because I think I’m going to title this episode something related to the IUD, so maybe they tuned in specifically for that. Maybe they’ve used hormonal contraceptives but they’re still scared of switching, which is perfectly normal, to a non-hormonal fertility awareness type method. What, if anything, would you want them to know?

Sydney: Well, I’m definitely the person who liked the numbers. And even from a mathematical percent perspective, like you said, it’s 99.4% accurate. That is rivaling some of the most effective things on the market. So it is a valid choice in that respect. But to me, underneath that number, is that 99.4% really just applies to that particular window in the month. Whereas I think the difference for me was, not being educated before and using even the hormonal or non-hormonal IUD, I felt like I could be pregnant any day of the month. I felt like I had that percentage hanging over my head every single day. And I think that’s really the biggest difference. And that’s what I would ask someone who is thinking about coming off it and looking at FAM to really ask yourself — do I want to be worried every day? Because for me, as someone who was already kind of anxious, and then multiplied by the effect of those IUDs on my anxiety, I was not a functioning happy person anymore. And I think there are quite a few people who are just typically more anxious nowadays. This was a relief. And I think it can be for anyone. It is so doable. It is so learnable. It is really equivalent to going to driver’s ed, and you will be comfortable within a few months of driving, and I would equate it to the same thing.

Lisa: Well, for someone who’s thinking about taking the class, it’s kind of like, well, this is different, we’re going to be talking about mucus on an online call. So maybe share for anyone who’s kind of thinking about the class as well.

Sydney: Well, if you’re a little bit more of a private person who doesn’t like talking about secretions of the body and like where your cervix might be — it’s totally okay. You’ll get so used to it. And she does such a great job of creating a little space. It feels like a little friend group going for coffee, talking about really normal stuff. And she really does such a great job of, this is natural, this is normal, this is your body, this is stuff we should be able to talk about. And she brings that comfort level. So I think that’s really important to note. And she breaks things down in such an easy to digest and learn kind of way. Even if you weren’t someone who was really great about watching her online modules or looking at her extra papers that she prepares for you, just being there on the phone calls is really awesome. And it’s easier than any of my classes or any of your classes that you probably have attended.

Lisa: Oh, that’s so sweet, Sydney. Thank you. Well, such a great note to end on. Well, thank you so much for being on the show today. I really appreciate you for sharing your stories so openly. I feel like this episode is really going to help a lot of women, and I think it gives a really interesting perspective that is very different. I think I haven’t necessarily come across that many people who I feel like shared that experience of like, I actually feel safer on this method than the other one because of these reasons. So I think that’s really interesting. So it’s a personal interest to me as well that we were able to connect in that way. So thanks again.

Sydney: Thank you so much.