Category: MENSTRUAL CYCLE

Inspiration – My Periods have Returned through Returning to the Real Me; Joy!

~ womeninlivingness

by Shevon Simon, London, UK

There has been extraordinary change in my body in that my periods HAVE (NOW) RETURNED after some time of absence….

I never thought of myself as a person with difficulties with their period. Yes there was pain, but doesn’t everyone experience pain? And I’ve only in recent months contemplated that experiencing such excruciating pain during my periods could be my body telling me that I was out of sync with the way I was choosing to live and be with myself. An extraordinary concept for me!

I began having my periods around age 11. I was still in primary school and was geared up and excited to have them. My Mum openly had pads and tampons in the house and as she mostly wore pads, I knew this was what I would wear when my periods began. I was so excited to have my period as I could feel my body preparing for it to come, and two of my friends had already started theirs. I wanted to be one of the first so I didn’t get left behind – I was already running the race of competition! My periods began during the Easter break whilst at my grandma’s, but what a shock I received…. Continue reading “Inspiration – My Periods have Returned through Returning to the Real Me; Joy!” →

Endometriosis – Experiences and Observations on Women’s Health – Part 1

~ womeninlivingness

by JK, UK

I am a woman who has been a women’s health statistic – I had endometriosis for over three decades, which I found was an extremely painful and debilitating condition.

I recently re-visited some statistics on endometriosis and found that approximately 176 million women and girls worldwide suffer from endometriosis; 8.5 million in North America and 2 million in the UK and rising. ‘Endometriosis; the presence of tissue, histologically similar to endometrium outside the uterine cavity and the myometrium, is one of the most common gynaecological conditions in women of reproductive age, but it remains one of the most complicated and baffling’ (Rizk & Abdulla, 2003). I too had found the condition baffling…

I started my periods at age 11 in my first few weeks of starting senior school. I knew something didn’t feel right within my body not long after I started my periods, given the amount of pain and discomfort I had each month at the time of my period. I found it debilitating and sometimes had time off school (or work), lying on my bed with a hot water bottle and taking painkillers. My tummy was sore, my breasts were sore and my period cramps were extremely painful; with often no painkillers touching the pain, to the point that on a couple of occasions I went to A&E even in the middle of the night, desperate for some pain relief. I would sometimes nearly pass out with the pain. I remember walking home from school one day and having to lie down on the pavement as I was in so much pain I couldn’t walk. I would have hot sweats and feel nauseous from the pain as well as having thick clotty lumpy dark brown period blood. I would get bowel pain at the same time, diarrhoea and lower back or right hip pain. I knew some of my friends had painful periods but they didn’t seem to have the other symptoms, and often for them a painkiller would do the trick.  Continue reading “Endometriosis – Experiences and Observations on Women’s Health – Part 1” →

Time to Change My Period

~ womeninlivingness ~ 5 Comments

by Anonymous

I’m going to talk about the horrors of my period, what I have been through and how over the years I have been able to change it according to how I live on a daily basis.

At first I didn’t have the same dreadful pain that my other friends had. I was really happy to have my period but as the years went on the symptoms started to really kick in. I didn’t get any of those hormonal periods where you shout and groan about the pain. I remember that as the pain got more and more intense there was still a level of enjoyment of it, even though it was strong.

I felt I understood the nature of its process as I began to observe each aspect of my period. (blood clotting, different colours that the blood came out as, I was also interested in the fact that a woman had to lose a lot of blood each month coming out of her own vagina). It helped me give attention to my body and also respect it by looking after it with a pad. I thought I was too young to use a tampon and I remember seeing what it had looked like in a movie called ‘She’s the Man’ where the main character pretends to be a boy and gets caught using a tampon and then sticks it up her nose, I found that quite funny and disgusting at the same time. The characters were playing around with this thing that you stick up yourself, which put me off a bit. It’s quite nasty the things you can do with a tampon.

Before I had started my period we had a class at school about how to use one and the health rules about applying a pad every three or two hours. It was a whole other responsibility to take other than just doing daily tasks like homework or the chores. It felt like a period of growing up. Continue reading “Time to Change My Period” →

Understanding Me through My Period and Our Cycles App

~ womeninlivingness

by Jennene, Brisbane 

Being connected to my period cycle is something that has always been very normal for me. I grew up with a mother who encouraged me to be connected to my monthly cycle – and not to interfere with it in any way.  She encouraged me to question why ‘The Pill’ was something that was so easily handed out to women without the understanding of the long term effects this would have on women’s bodies. It was a great foundation to have – and I am deeply appreciative of this.

So for the last 30 years of menstruating I stayed comfortable in this awareness of my cycle without really going any deeper than that. Whilst attending a recent Esoteric Developers Women’s Group (EDWG) meeting something amazing revealed itself to me; that is, I could feel how important it is for this awareness to be built upon, and not just be a laurel on which to rest. Continue reading “Understanding Me through My Period and Our Cycles App” →

Commitment to Myself – Through My Monthly Periods

~ womeninlivingness

by Aphra Heron, Product Development, Cosmetics Industry, Melbourne, Australia

A few weeks ago I attended an Esoteric Women’s Group presented by Natalie Benhayon, open to women of all ages. The theme of the event was “Nurturing the Woman Within” and it was to launch a new Period App called ‘Our Cycles’.

This App is designed for women to be able to track in detail their monthly, natural body cycles. It has a range of different functions making it appeal to a broader audience, even stretching to men, and also other than women who maybe are just trying to get pregnant. Continue reading “Commitment to Myself – Through My Monthly Periods” →

Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon App brings ‘Rebel Without A Cause’ Home

~ womeninlivingness

by Lucy, Sydney

Four weeks after Sydney Esoteric Developers Women’s Group (EDWG) 3rd February 2013 and Our Cycles –Period and Full moon App Presentation

We had an Esoteric Developers Women’s group in Sydney recently where we were discussing the possibility that the pressure we felt to fit in at school was still with us even though we left school many years ago. It was a ‘tumbleweed’ moment and then a dawning realisation that there were many areas of our lives where we were still trying to fit in – around the school community, in the office, with our friends, with our families.

I found myself sitting with, what we decided, was a group of ‘rebels’. As we shared our stories of life with each other we found we had each rebelled against what we perceived to be society’s and our family’s expectations on us in one way or another. We had rejected what we were told life should be, only to make up our own picture of what life should be and then create ourselves into a group of rebels searching out other rebels! Continue reading “Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon App brings ‘Rebel Without A Cause’ Home” →

The Mystery of the Migraine and Me

~ womeninlivingness

by Francene Cartaar, Australia

Have you ever felt you were going a little crazy? – well, I have. My world shook in September 2001 when I started experiencing migraines with such force and power that I felt like my head was going to split open. This was the beginning of a decade of searching for answers and cures. Each time I would ‘plant’ myself on the table of a doctor or health practitioner with the belief that they could ‘fix me’.

Then I had an appointment with Serge Benhayon at Universal Medicine about 3 years ago. As well as being eager and nervous at the same time, I must confess to going to the appointment with the hope of being ‘fixed’ and ‘told the answers’. Never before had I experienced a consultation like this. Continue reading “The Mystery of the Migraine and Me” →

My Period, Pain, Depression & Endometriosis: Supported by Esoteric Breast Massage

~ womeninlivingness

by Rowena Stewart, Somerset, UK

The initial elation at beginning my menstruation at 13 soon evaporated as month after month brought increasing pain. To begin with I could just about tolerate it. As I grew older I started to take paracetamol to control the pain, but as this was only a management strategy things got steadily worse. Eventually I would prepare for each period with paranoid dread, always making sure I had a huge stock of painkillers to see me through, often taking time off school and in later years, days off work, in order to cope with the pain. Looking back on it now, it seems odd that no-one in my family considered this to be abnormal or sought any professional advice. It was just considered to be bad luck and to me, an unavoidable curse that was destined to continue month in, month out, year after year for the rest of my fertile life. Continue reading “My Period, Pain, Depression & Endometriosis: Supported by Esoteric Breast Massage” →

Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon Diary

~ womeninlivingness

by Sara Harris BHSc, Cert. NFE, Melbourne, Australia

To meet with women is a very beautiful thing – there is something very ancient about gathering and being together to support one another.

Recently, this February, we had a gathering such as this in Melbourne. It was a presentation for women titled: “Nurturing the Woman Within: Reclaiming Your Natural Rhythm within our Modern Times” presented to us by Natalie Benhayon.

This presentation was also the launch of a new ‘tool’ that is now available as an App from iTunes called ‘Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon Diary’. The creation of this app and what we can use it for is nothing less than revolutionary. We now have the opportunity to record our period, menopause and full moon cycles in great depth, all at the convenience of our finger-tips! Continue reading “Our Cycles – Period and Full Moon Diary” →

Going With The Flow

~ womeninlivingness

by Sarah C, London UK

While I was showering this morning, I was gently washing myself and started to feel myself from the inside out – a concept I find extremely challenging because for so long I have always felt myself from the outside, in.

I remembered that in March 2012, after hearing and reading the concept that pads (sanitary napkins) allowed the natural flow of a woman’s period, and my being a tampon user since teenage years, I found this concept weird, to say the least. But I thought, hey, why not try napkins and see what happens?

Reflecting on this today, the change has been profound and I really only fully appreciated that in my bathroom this morning. I have had eleven periods since that time and can honestly say that I have truly felt my flow and the joy of that cleanse. I love having my period now and actually look forward to it each month. What a turnaround! Well, there’s a first time for everything, even as a 44-year-old woman. Continue reading “Going With The Flow” →