I'm Hormonal | Hormone balance, gut health & nutrition insights

[Mini] FAM As a Non-Hormonal Birth Control Option | Ep. 113

• Bridget Walton, Women's Hormone Coach • Episode 113

Share episode

Send us a text

Earlier this week, Bridget interviewed Nat (@fertilityawarenessproject) about all things fertility awareness. This episode recaps Bridget's main takeaways from the conversation.

• Fertility awareness works even for those with irregular cycles like PCOS
• The method tracks three key indicators: cervical mucus, LH levels, and basal body temperature
• Rising estrogen before ovulation changes cervical mucus quality and quantity
• LH strips help predict when ovulation is about to occur
• Basal body temperature rises after ovulation due to progesterone production
• FAM differs from the rhythm method by using your body's specific signals, not calendar predictions
• Temperature can be tracked with devices like TempDrop or traditional oral thermometers
• Fertility awareness and cycle awareness complement each other

Connect with Nat on Instagram @FertilityAwarenessProject or visit fertilityawarenessproject.ca. Grab her freebies:

FAM Fundametals Freebie - https://fertilityawarenessproject.ca/fam-fundamentals
Mindful Mucus Method Waitlist - https://fertilityawarenessproject.ca/mindful-waitlist
Mucus Made Easy Freebie - https://fertilityawarenessproject.ca/mucus-made-easy

TempDrop Discount Code: 10% off

CONNECT WITH BRIDGET

LinkedIn | Instagram | Website

Apply for 1:1 Coaching | Sign up for weekly tips via email

Speaker 1:

Hello and welcome to this episode of I'm Hormonal. I'm your host, bridget Walton. I'm so glad that you're joining me today for this episode, number 113. This is a mini episode, which normally comes out on Thursdays each week, where I just real quick cut to the chase. We talk about the longer form episode that you listened to on Tuesday this week, but we just recap it, make it more actionable, practical, whatever it is that makes it just bite-sized and digestible for you.

Speaker 1:

Now, earlier this week, I had Nat on the podcast. She is the cervical mucus queen and what she does is she educates her clients about the fertility awareness method. So that's what we talked about the fertility awareness method, and that's what I'm going to be recapping today and just sharing with you. What were some of the main takeaways that I got out of our conversation that I would love to reiterate here with you. I think the biggest takeaway for me from our conversation was the fact that fertility awareness can be a good fit for everybody, regardless of what's going on with your hormones right now, regardless of if you want to conceive, if you want to avoid conceiving. It's just a great tool to help you get to know your cycle more, to understand your hormones more, and you know, one of the questions that I had for her going into it was is there any decrease in efficacy of using this method for somebody who has irregular cycles? And Nat shared with us about how she has PCOS, so her cycles are quite irregular or sometimes can be more irregular, but despite that, it still is a reliable method to understand. Okay, when am I in my fertile window, when am I outside of my fertile window? Or the terminology that she used was closing the fertile window and I think that is again my biggest finding and what I want to convey to you, because if you're somebody who you don't want to use hormonal birth control, maybe you're not feeling an IUD, maybe you're just not sure if fertility awareness is right for you. Well, I think it could be, and that could start off with even just going in and finding an app that best suits you. Nat mentioned that Read your Body is one that she uses and so you can start off by becoming more familiar with the method. I'll talk in a little bit more detail in just a moment here, but, of course, if you want to have that extra vote of confidence, if you want to have a container, have a guide to walk you through how to implement this method. Then Nat is your girl and, again, you can connect with her on Instagram at Fertility Awareness Project, or you can check out her website, which is fertilityawarenessprojectca. She has a couple of freebies there that you can check out on the fertility awareness method and on cervical mucus. So if you are just trying to dip your toes in, then she's got you covered.

Speaker 1:

Now, what is fertility awareness? I want to cover that really quick because essentially, what you would be doing when you're practicing this method is charting certain information, like collecting certain data about your cycle, about your cervical mucus, about your basal body temperature and potentially using LH or luteinizing hormone strips. All of these things the temperature, the strips and the cervical mucus help to inform you about if you are in your fertile window or Are you outside of it. Right, and I want to take a step back from that to explain a little bit more from the perspective of hormones. What does that actually mean? So what we are thinking of here when we say okay, let's talk about cervical mucus first, in the lead up to ovulation, so during that five, six days ahead of ovulation, which is your fertile window, that's when you will oftentimes notice a change in your cervical mucus, and that mentions that. It can, yes, be what you see when you go to the bathroom, but it also can be the sensation that you feel when you're just going about your day, walking, like doing nothing specific in particular. So that's all to say that, as your estrogen levels are rising just before ovulation, that is, for most gals, going to result in a larger amount or a different consistency of cervical mucus. Now, next, coming back to the LH strips luteinizing hormone strips that she mentioned what those do is help to inform you of when your luteinizing hormone is spiking. This is important because just before you ovulate, your luteinizing hormone spikes. So this is another predictive aspect that you can collect to say, oh okay, looks like I'm about to ovulate.

Speaker 1:

And then you're bringing in the third piece of this equation, basal body temperature, which can confirm if you did ovulate. And that's because, after you ovulate, so the egg is released from the follicle on your ovary. That follicle turns into the corpus luteum, and it's that corpus luteum which is the brand new little endocrine gland you just made, that corpus luteum that produces most of the progesterone that your body produces. And when you have more progesterone floating around in your system, for lack of a more technical term. That's going to result in a higher body temperature Not drastically so, maybe a third of a degree Fahrenheit higher but you will notice that your basal body temperature, so your lowest body temperature at rest, is higher.

Speaker 1:

Personally, I use temp drop to track my basal body temperature, so I use it's an armband that has a thermometer in it. Before Maybe you've heard me talk about it, because for me it's the most convenient. I put it on before I go to sleep, I wake up in the morning, I sync it with my phone and it tells me what my temperature was. Of course, you could also use an oral thermometer and just first thing, right when you wake up, you take your temperature and then you would, you know, log that wherever, you log it in your chart, in your app. But that's all to say. There are a couple of different methods. And coming back to why, what are we taking our temperature for? Because that's what would confirm that ovulation occurred and that's what kind of closes that fertile window.

Speaker 1:

One thing that Nat reiterated or explained for us in the conversation was that FAM is not the same as the rhythm method. It's not the same as natural cycles. Those aren't super specific to your own cycle, right. It's more detailed, it's more in-depth, it's a science-backed method, and so I just think that's important. It's not like, oh, let me just count a certain number of days on the calendar and that's when I'm going to ovulate, right, because that's not necessarily the case for everybody or for every body. So it's using the signs and the changes in your own body, your own temperature, your own hormone levels, to make those conclusions.

Speaker 1:

I asked Nat a little bit about the similarity and difference between fertility awareness and cycle awareness and how she looks at those two different things. I've talked about cycle awareness on the podcast before, which is yet slightly different or, depending on how you look at it, from cycle syncing, where cycle awareness is just being cognizant, being familiar with how do you change throughout the cycle, what are the differences in your energy levels, in how you're feeling emotionally and what you need as far as nourishment goes, etc. She explained that fertility awareness and cycle awareness really go hand in hand and are kind of reinforcing, whereas then we have cycle syncing, on the other hand and maybe you've heard me express the same thought here too that cycle syncing can be another great way to, you know, help you get into this rhythm of identifying what your body wants, what it needs, how it feels when you make certain changes. And I'm actually being slightly generous when I say that, because I do think it is so important to understand that cycle syncing is not actually helping to balance your hormones. If you already have nice balanced hormones with a little bow tied on top, psychosync your heart out. If you are at a point in your learning, if you're at a point in your journey where you are trying to bring your hormones back into balance, then psychosyncing might not be what's up for you, but this practice of fertility awareness, that could be a better fit for you at this point.

Speaker 1:

All right, my friend, that's all I've got for you today. As I said at the start, thursday episodes are just quick and to the point. Definitely go back and listen to the longer episode that I had with Nat, because she was really fun to talk to. I think you're going to love it. You're going to get a lot more detail from that episode, of course, than what I went through today, so you can take a quick peek at the show notes to get links to connect with Nat Again. She's at Fertility Awareness Project on Instagram. And thanks for listening. We'll see you on the next one, as always.

Speaker 1:

If you have questions, if you have requests, I would love to hear them from you. So send me a DM at. I'm underscore hormonal. All right, we'll see you on the next one. If you loved today's episode and got something good out of it, make sure you subscribe so that these episodes show up automatically in your feed. No work needed on your side. Let's put it on autopilot. As always, I need to give you my reminder that the information I share with you here is for educational purposes only, and it should not be used as a replacement for medical advice or diagnosis. Now, if you are, on the other hand, in the market for some one-on-one support, then I would love for you to take me up on my offer for a free strategy call. You can find these links and more in the show notes.