DOES YOUR PERIOD MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE THIS?

Claire Baker believes understanding your cycle is the key to success

Time of the month, lady days, being ‘on’… the list of slang terms that skirt around periods is endless. We’ve tended to see our monthly bleed as shameful, rather than a welcome sign our bodies are healthy, but over the past few years the (crimson) tide has been turning: we’re more open about this most natural of bodily functions than ever before. In 2015, photos of 26-year-old Kiran Gandhi completing the London Marathon during her period without a tampon went viral. In 2016, Newsweek published an issue with ‘There Will Be Blood: Get Over It’ emblazoned across the cover, and a picture of an (unused) tampon, and we’re finally talking about period poverty – where girls miss school because they can’t afford to buy sanitary products. Heck, you can even buy a T-shirt with ‘I’m on my period’ printed across it in vivid scarlet, if you want.

The ‘woke’ world is becoming period-literate (meaning no more scurrying to the toilet, tampon stuffed up-sleeve), but how much do we really know about the whole cycle, and how it affects our bodies, emotions and lives? For many of us, the answer is, well, not a lot.

‘It’s complicated’ best describes my relationship with my period. Two years ago, I was diagnosed with an underactive thyroid and my periods, when they deigned to arrive, were erratic. At 25, I wasn’t ready for kids, but I was certain I wanted them. An endless cycle of blood tests and a thyroid-boosting prescription later, my period began to return regularly and I used the app Clue to track them. When I felt that familiar dull ache in my stomach, signifying my period was imminent, I felt overwhelmed with relief: my troubled body was back in action.

Fixated on my five-day bleed, I barely noticed that there were three other weeks in my cycle. Enter menstrual coach Claire Baker, who founded her platform

This Is Lifeblood in

2012. Her approach is underpinned by the idea that we should all develop a connection with our whole cycle in order to find ‘flow’ in life and work.

I don’t know what to expect, but I do know I’d like to understand my cycle better, so I get in touch. Claire sends me a 13-question survey, asking things like: ‘How do you feel about your menstrual cycle now?’ and ‘What’s pre-menstruation like for you?’. I write reams, but a question about ovulation forces me to confess that I wouldn’t know if I was ovulating from one day to the next. She also asks about my life goals. What have they got to do with menstruation, I wonder?

I meet Claire – a sunny, spiritual Australian – at a north London cafe. After a decade on the pill feeling steady, she explains, she came off it only to find she felt different week to week. ‘Just before bleeding I’d be exhausted, whereas two weeks later my energy and libido would be sky-high. I noticed I was more positive and resilient at times, and then more self-critical at others. I started tracking how I felt, what my body was doing, everything.’

Claire was working as a life coach at the time and realised she could ground her teaching in her new learnings. ‘At sessions, clients would be in completely different moods for no particular reason. It was a recurring pattern, so I asked them to start tracking, too.

‘Women understand they’re on a rhythm, but they don’t know how to work with it. We can use how we’re feeling at different times in our cycle to live and work in an optimum way; with our bodies rather than against them. I sync my life, where possible, to my cycle.’

Claire uses a ‘seasons’ analogy to explain the stages of a typical cycle. ‘Winter’ (days one-six) is the period, when we feel like hibernating. Then we move into ‘spring’ (days seven-13), when hormones are steadily on the rise and most women feel more energised and positive. ‘Summer’ (days 14-21) is mid-cycle, at ovulation, and we feel more sociable and our libidos are at their highest. Then, we enter ‘autumn’ (days 22-28), the week before menstruation where, generally, women feel moodier, but perhaps more grounded and creative, too. Then the ‘year’, or cycle, begins again.

When we meet, it’s day 21 of my cycle, meaning I’m heading from summer into autumn. Claire encourages me to track how I’m feeling physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually, so I can begin to see patterns. For the first few days, I’m steady and productive. I get lots done and feel strong, but in my second week of coaching – late autumn and early winter – I tailspin into despair. The stresses of work, planning a wedding and working on | a book project overspill, and I let rip at my boyfriend for setting the boiler to the wrong time. A haircut leaves me beset by anxiety and I’m crabby at work events. I also blame myself for not being cheerier. Eventually, I’m taken out by a chest infection. If there was a sign I’d been railing against my body, this was it. On day 28 in my journal, under ‘spiritually’, I write one word: ‘dead’.

When I tell Claire about my week from hell via Skype, she seems unsurprised: I did practically everything, she says, my body was telling me not to, then blamed myself. The haircut made me feel self-conscious, and the events forced me to put on a front at a time of the month when I felt my least sexy and resilient. Had I planned these things for the feelgood days of my ‘summer’, the outcome would likely have been different. I know day two of my cycle is awful, so why do I plough ahead with meetings regardless?

It feels like a lightbulb moment, but I’m also sceptical about the practicalities of planning my life around my cycle. True, says Claire, but when you can ‘sync’ your calendar with your cycle, do. And when you can’t, know you won’t be doing whatever it is at the optimum time and don’t fall into a pit of self-blame if it doesn’t go the way you want. We can’t stop our bodies feeling a certain way – our hormone levels don’t sing to our personal hymn sheet – but we can plan to maximise the potential of the different phases of our cycle. In other words, go clothes shopping, start a new project, and get a haircut when you feel good about yourself, in ‘spring’ or ‘summer’.

‘What could you do to make the most of the next week?’ Claire asks on day six of my cycle, the beginning of ‘spring’. My mind fizzes with possibilities, in stark contrast to the woe I felt 10 days earlier. I decide to double down on a project I’ve been working on. By our next Skype chat, I’ve refined my idea and sent a proposal to a key contact, something I wouldn’t have been emotionally equipped to do a few days before. It dawns: in order to be my best, I need to pay attention to what my cycle is telling me.

‘WOMEN ARE ON A RHYTHM BUT DON’T KNOW HOW TO WORK WITH IT’

‘WE CAN MAXIMISE THE POTENTIAL OF DIFFERENT PHASES OF OUR CYCLE’

It might sound a stretch to say I’ve recalibrated my life to fit in with the seasons, but the analogy made such sense I now know and feel which season I’m in at any given time, and I’m planning accordingly. A wedding make-up trial happens on day 10, ‘spring’, and I’m so happy I almost skip afterwards. Breakfast with a new work contact? That’ll go in summer. Soul-searching mission with my best friend? That’s for autumn, where real talk is the only kind of conversation I want (it’s ‘zero-bullshit’ season, says Claire).

I have no consciousness when it comes to ovulation, so as I head into my ‘summer’, it’s time to pay more attention. Claire asks me to be mindful of my cervical fluid, a key indicator of ovulation, at this time. On day 18, I feel a wave of it unexpectedly. ‘That was it,’ laughs Claire, later. Rather than waiting for my period, there are other signs my body is working, if only I paid enough attention to notice.

As my autumn draws in and my time with Claire comes to an end, she asks me what I could do to make the coming weeks less chaotic than last month. I need to reschedule plans with loose acquaintances, and I diarise them for summer, when I know I’ll be more up for networking.

‘The key quality to exercise in autumn,’ she advises,

‘is discernment. The summer woman is not to be trusted with a calendar – she feels so great she’ll fill it, but when autumn comes she won’t want to do half of it! In autumn, generally speaking, we like being at home. Be gentle with your body. I like going for a massage, or practising yoga. Lots of women also want to tie up loose ends, and tidy up!’ That explains my urge to sort paperwork the day before.

As I’ve found, being conscious of our cycles can help us bring our A-games to life on a day-to-day, month-tomonth basis, but it can also help us tackle life’s meatier issues. ‘When clients are considering larger life changes,’ Claire says, ‘I advise them to journal for a few months. It’s important to know how you feel about the problem or issue in each season. You might feel decisive in spring, but you’ll feel differently about it in a fortnight’s time.’

‘I broke up with my long-term boyfriend a couple of years ago. Generally, big life decisions reveal themselves in autumn because it’s an introspective time, but that’s not when we should act on them. Bleed on it, consider whether the decision feels true, and then act if you want to in spring. That is exactly what I did. Working with my cycle has given me more authority in my own life.’

Transformative? Yes, but all this is about, really, is having the awareness to be your best self. We talk about our ‘time of the month’ as if our body is only active for a week, but the reality couldn’t be further from the truth. So, in the days after your period, use your energy, and lean into the urge to hibernate in autumn and winter. We have much less control over our bodies than we think we do, so we should blame ourselves less and love ourselves more. And really, what could be more empowering than that?

To find out more, visit thisislifeblood.com, where you can also download her Adore Your Cycle ebook. Follow her on Instagram @_clairebaker_