The Fifth Vital Sign Turns On In Puberty!
We all know that when we go to the doctors our vital signs are taken: heart rate, blood pressure, respiratory rate and temperature. These 4 simple measurements can tell us so much about our overall health and wellness. They can be sign posts for any underlying conditions from a simple cold to something more integral.
Did you know that there is a 5th vital sign and that it “turns on” during puberty? Wondering what that vital sign is?
The fifth vital sign is the menstrual cycle and it is one of the best sign posts for girls/women’s overall health and wellness and yet most of us know SO VERY LITTLE about it!
Why is that?
You may think that it’s because it’s to hard to understand, it is for the “experts” or maybe that there is no point in understanding, unless something is going wrong, or maybe it’s just something that happens to us rather than something we have a relationship with, or maybe that it is meant to hurt or that it is a bummer part of life or some variation of any of this.
After years and years of supporting both girls and women with establishing a relationship based on curiosity and an understanding of their body and menstrual cycle what I realize is that, so many of us simply think that it just isn’t that important to actually spend time on. It is just something that happens to all of us and we have no real ownership, “control” or relationship with it.
In some ways this comes from a culture of indifference and a story around this being a secretive, nuisance and maybe even shameful part of being a women…the “red curse” the “blob”. In fact if you look back deeper in history the messaging around our menstrual cycle was one of dirty and dangerous. It’s no wonder that speaking about having a relationship that includes understanding of the signals or how a lack of communication is occurring, how to listen and how to respond then seems so foreign to most women I meet.
Celebrating, communicating and being curious about it helps shift this. Especially in a day and age when it is hard for ovaries everywhere! Because at the end of the day we all desire health and wellness for our kids!
So…why is it so important?
It’s a vital sign for your daughter’s overall health, wellness and longevity: This vital sign in particular and the hormones that govern this system, contribute to the overall health and wellness of the body. When a menstrual cycle is in homeostasis and running well this means that all systems are communicating well. When there is an imbalance in this system it is a signpost for things in the overall body being out of whack; this may be due to a variety of things including: blood sugar issues, a disharmony with the biorhythms of the natural world (i.e blue light….), nervous system dysregulation (anxiety/stress), nutrient deficiencies and more!
It is empowering to know about our bodies: It feels powerful to be in tune and in rhythm with our body. It makes a time period in life that is shaky as it is feel more balanced. To understand what the body is communicating and how your actions can influence that homeostasis within the body feels deeply connecting. When some girls go through this time period and feel at the whim of and “in war” or bombarded by their body it feels really disconnecting.
To form resilience: When we feel connected to our bodies we can weather the normal storms of insecurity, body image and comparison thoughts that come. These experiences feel more like storms clouds that gather, release weather/energy and that the winds blow through; rather than a hurricane that comes and rips us a part inside.
Girls in puberty are “extra vulnerable”: We are mammals and as mammals our bodies need to be able to travel in and out of homeostasis. Our bodies have naturally designed ways to keep us safe and protected, we sweat when we are too hot, we shiver when to cold, we release cortisol and adrenaline in stressful situations etc. Our bodies are a beauitful symphony of interactions. We are not just isolated hormones that need to be checked in on isolated and balanced, everything is interconnected and communicating with each other, and in puberty a “new” system turns on; the endocrine system. As this system is turning on and the communication channels are getting established the girls are more suseptible to outside influences affecting them. There are large studies that conclude how much more impactful endocrine distruptors are to a girls hormones in puberty than in a well established system. It is the same for stress and brain development. In this transition phase of life they are simple more vulnerable. The other side of this is that they are also more resilient which means when a cycle of disharmony occurs it is easier to bring it back into alignment. Once the patterns become established after years of ignoring or thinking it is normal then it can becomes more work to discover to unwind those patterns in the body.
The menstrual cycle is the “report card” from the previous month: So many women don’t know that the color of blood that comes out, the length of the cycle, the symptoms you have are all sign posts to hormones that are or aren’t in harmony in your body, in fact all of this is a “report card” for the month that you have had. Not only that, it is not only that one hormones was low or high but rather, it is the inter relationship with all of them and even more that so many things can impact this from blood sugar and beyond.
So….How can you support your daughter and possibly yourself in understanding this vital sign better?
Curiosity- I know that most of us want to just the the solution! However, in order for the information to even begin to make sense and a true relationship to be established curiosity needs to be ignited. One of the most powerful ways of establishing a deeper relationship with your body is to actually be curious about it. In fact when girls hear that it isn’t just happening to them but that they are in a relationship with it and that just like learning any new skills (volleyball, spanish, chess etc) they just need to learn a new language that involves both the listening as well as the responding, they feel so much more empowered and connected.
Education: Again this isn’t rocket science. Although it is a symphony of information and may seem like “so much” in reality there is a simple nature to all of it and there are many, many women out there in the world that are helping teach the language of the body including what is normal, what isn’t and how to support the body in various ways to reestablish harmony. You can check out there super educational and simple books to learn more about the menstrual cycle: Woman Code (Alissa Vitti) and/or Fix Your Period (Nicole Jardin) just to name a few. For girls I teach all about the menstrual cycle in various “levels” in the in person, online puberty and perimenopause classes I teach.
Support: We all need a little support sometimes. Many of us don’t know much about our own bodies and no judgement it’s simply because we weren't taught, and even more than that we weren’t shown how important this relationship actually is to feed. Again the women listed in the education piece are here to support you as are many women out there who are showing up to help change the narrative and support women to understand their bodies better.
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Your Free Menstrual Care Guidebook
How to support your daughter’s hormones before she even begins her cycle.
How to support her cycle with natural tools for her over all health and wellness.
What you can specifically do to help her cycle not suck and to be in greater balance.
PLUS a bonus tip on WHAT maybe contributing to the imbalances and symptoms!