The Postpartum Health Risk That Nobody Talks About (Postpartum Thyroiditis)
When my son was about 4 weeks old, I started noticing pain while swallowing. It wasn’t the usual type of sore throat, on the inside by my tonsils and tongue. Instead, it felt like a big sore lump at the front of my neck. It was tender to the touch (especially when his little…
3 Reasons for Painful Periods (and What You Can, and Can’t Do About It)
Period pain is considered normal for many otherwise healthy women, but it doesn’t have to be. In fact, I would even argue that it shouldn’t be. Sadly, the medical system is broken when it comes to women’s health, and taking a deep dive into the root cause of problems like painful periods isn’t the…
Basal Body Temperature 101 (How to Track Your Cycle)
The two most common questions I get about women’s health are with regards to contraception and its opposite, getting and staying pregnant. There are so many birth control options out there (with risks/benefits to each) and so many conflicting pieces of advice for women who are trying to become pregnant. Amid that sea of…
Progesterone Deficiency (the delicate relationship between stress and fertility)
Progesterone is a tiny molecule that plays a big role in the hormonal picture. When levels start to go awry, our health and well-being suffers. Understanding how our hormones affect wellness is not only an important tool for self-care, but this knowledge also gives us the power to advocate for ourselves so we can…
Estrogen Dominance (what it is and what you can do about it)
Women’s health concerns tend to follow predictable patterns. In healthy women, cyclic changes in sex hormones throughout the month make it possible to track fertility—everything from ovulation, to an expected period, to optimal days for conceiving or avoiding pregnancy. In the same way, dysfunctional cycles tend to follow predictable patterns according to measurable imbalances…
What Your Period Reveals About Your Health (it’s way more than just fertility)
Your period might be something you prefer not to think about. Maybe you even feel uncomfortable talking about it. (I know I did for a long time!) I thought it was gross, or embarrassing, or impolite, and I’d always feel my face flush when the subject would come up—even in the doctor’s office! When…
Natural Alternatives to Fertility Drugs
Trying to conceive is an extremely emotional and stressful process, especially when things don’t progress as easily as planned, or hoped for. The pressure put on women from diagnostic tests, prescriptions, and monitoring can sometimes be too much to bear. Whatever your reason for avoiding fertility drugs, I hope that this post serves as…
5 Ways to Balance Your Hormones, Naturally
Hormonal balance is a buzzword in today’s wellness culture. For about $50, you can subscribe to anything from a “hormone balancing” workout, to a juice cleanse, to an expensive regime of supplements. But the only thing you can be sure about with these sorts of programs is that they are gimmicky and ineffective, and…
Female Fertility 101 (Hormones, Cycle Tracking, and Getting to Know YOUR Body)
I find the physiology behind intuitive eating to be really fascinating. I love the concept of our bodies having a natural rhythm and an internal sense of regulation. Healing from my eating disorder and really committing myself to intuitive eating has been a really empowering experience for me. I know so much more about…
Hormones 101 (The Great, Big, Web of Connections)
Have you ever wondered why stress can make you miss your period, or why you’re totally exhausted after busy seasons at work? Well, you can thank your hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal-thyroid-gonadal axis for those things, along with quite a few of the other physiological phenomena we experience in this life. “Okay, okay, hypothalamo-whatta-whatta?“ If that’s what you’re…
