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

No, You're Not Fertile Every Day: Learning About FAM with Nat | Ep. 112

• Bridget Walton, Women's Hormone Coach • Episode 112

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The Fertility Awareness Method (FAM) offers a science-backed approach to natural birth control that helps you understand your fertile window through tracking biological markers like basal body temperature and cervical mucus. Nat, a fertility awareness educator, explains how this method empowers women by providing deeper insights into their cycles and hormonal patterns.

• FAM is not the rhythm method or natural cycles, but rather tracks ovulation signs specifically
• Reliable ovulation signs include basal body temperature, cervical mucus, and sometimes LH tests
• Manual charting is preferred over predictive algorithmic apps
• Daily tracking takes only minutes but provides powerful insights about fertility status
• FAM works effectively even with irregular cycles or PCOS
• Ovulation can be confirmed through temperature shifts, making it possible to identify safe periods
• Cervical mucus observations don't require large amounts - subtle signs are equally important

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

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Speaker 1:

If you're someone who wants to avoid taking hormonal birth control and you want to plan for or avoid conception more naturally, you need to listen to this episode on the Fertility Awareness Method, or FAM. I'm interviewing Nat and she's breaking down what FAM is and why it can be an insightful resource, regardless of where you're at with your hormone balance, period, regularity or desire to get pregnant. Let's dive in. Welcome to I'm Hormonal, your source of information about women's hormone health and how to support your body naturally. I'm your host, bridget Walton, and I'm a certified functional hormone specialist and menstrual cycle coach. I am on a mission to hold these hormone conversations with as many menstruators as possible, because you deserve easier access to accurate information about what's up with your unruly menstrual cycle and with your fertility mysteries. Don't you think it's time that we figure this out once and for all? Hello, hello, welcome to this episode, number 110 of I'm Hormonal. I'm your host, bridget Walton. I'm so excited, as always, that you are here with me today and we're going to jump into this conversation that I had with Nat here shortly. You're going to love it. But first of all, I just want to say thank you so much for sharing the episodes that have meant the most to you, with your friends, for helping me to expand the I'm Hormonal community. Thank you for those of you who are listening for the first time. Again, my name is Bridget and I'm a women's hormone coach. I started this podcast over a year and a half ago because I think that we all deserve more information, better information, easier access to that information about how our bodies work. So that's what we are up to here.

Speaker 1:

As you've heard, we're going to be talking about the fertility awareness method today, and I'll just introduce Nat real quick. Nat is a fertility awareness educator. She's also the cervical mucus queen. Her business, fertility Awareness Project, is one that works with women who are looking to use yes, you guessed it the fertility awareness method as a real, reliable birth control. Right, if you want to do things more naturally without hormonal birth control, or if an IUD isn't for you, if you don't want to rely on condoms, then it's a great tool to help you understand when your fertile window is and when it is not.

Speaker 1:

Also, it's a great tool, as you'll hear us talk about, to just understand, like, let me get in touch with my body, let me get in touch with my cycle and understand what's happening for all of this time between one period and the next, because, well, you already know if you're listening to the podcast here, but there's a lot that's changing. So this is not the rhythm method, this isn't natural cycles. This is a science-backed, effective method to understand your fertile windows, and I can't wait to get into it with you. You can connect with Nat on Instagram at fertilityawarenessproject, or you can check out fertilityawarenessprojectca, her website, where you can grab a hold of some of her freebies there. So, with all of that being said, enjoy this episode and I will see you on the other side. Why don't we really start from the start? And for somebody who isn't familiar with the fertility awareness method, hasn't heard of that before what is it? What should they know as we dive into this conversation?

Speaker 2:

I think a lot of people get natural cycles ads or hear about the rhythm method or hear about maybe their grandma's natural family planning. There's a lot of misconceptions out there around what exactly fertility awareness is. So I think just laying the groundwork from my perspective on what FAM is is, I teach, a secular, evidence-based approach to charting ovulation. So it's your ovulation signs and knowing when you're fertile and when you're not, and you can use that information to avoid pregnancy, to get pregnant or to just understand your body and your cycle. So it's not woo, it's not relying on an app. It's using your own knowledge to interpret your body, specifically your ovulation sign, so that you can get in touch with more than just when your period is happening, but also everything that happens between one period and the next, but also everything that happens between one period and the next.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, excited to break down what does happen between one period and the next. And why don't we start off by also looking at what are you actually charting? What are those signs of ovulation that are really important? And then, when we were talking about charting, what does that actually mean? Are we like we've got a paper chart up on the wall, or is this a digital thing? What's common? What's simple?

Speaker 2:

So there's a bunch of different ovulation signs that are ranging from less reliable to more reliable and signs that point to ovulation about to happen or confirming it in the past. So I call those retrospective or prospective ovulation signs, without getting too too deep. The signs that I really like and that have the most evidence behind them are going to tell you the best data about your cycle. So, for example, you'll hear people talk about changes in their cycle, like changes in libido or painful breasts or bloating, like things that do change with the cycle. However, they're not reliable in that they're going to show up reliably every single time when you do ovulate. So things that I prefer to track are basal body temperature, cervical mucus and sometimes LH tests. So basal body temperature is going to tell us when ovulation has happened in the past and cervical mucus is going to tell us when it's coming.

Speaker 2:

And LH tests are a little bit less reliable. They're not going to be great for everybody, but for a lot of people they're going to be another prospective ovulation sign or telling you ovulation is coming. So tracking this in a way like there's so many apps out there that have algorithms and if you follow me on Instagram, I'm like anti algorithm. It's not that I hate algorithms. It's just like I think I have irregular cycles and I'm always testing these apps and they're just like. I think I have irregular cycles and I'm always testing these apps and they're just like getting my cycle so wrong and I'm always sharing all my stories about what's actually happening and how the apps are working.

Speaker 2:

So I really steer clear of any algorithm they're usually not great and instead fully manual charting app. So an app like Read your Body is my favorite. You can also chart on a paper chart, but it's less convenient because you can't go throughout your day and then update your chart as you go you need to wait till you get home.

Speaker 2:

So I really prefer the apps and there are other manual charting apps out there. I just really like Read your Body, but something that allows you to fully mark up your chart so you can take your data, have somewhere to put it things like base body temperature, cervical mucus et cetera and then you can actually interpret that information and it can tell you something about your fertility. And being able to manually put things into the chart is going to give you that decision-making information.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think that, or something I think about. Something I experienced myself is that with an app where I'm like, okay, I'm going to go in and log, I'm going to learn some things from what the algorithm is suggesting to me or assuming for me, that can be kind of helpful at the start. But then there's a point where it's like well, unfortunately in some situations it's like well, unfortunately in some situations it's like, okay, I guess I need to pay for the upgrade to premium so that, instead of just giving a random algorithm, it will like actually do more math from my basal body temperature or otherwise. But read your body. I hadn't heard of that one. So that's a good one to be aware of. And you know, I kind of really just jumped into the questions on what is FAM. I didn't even ask you to introduce yourself. Do you want to give us a rundown, like give listeners the rundown of how you work with clients, like what's your jam? Give us a little bit on you, nat.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, well, I'll start with the things that people actually care about, which is that I'm a Virgo, I'm an over responsible eldest daughter, I live in Canada, I have a wobbly cat named Kurt and what else. I am really obsessed with color analysis, like I got my colors done last year and everything that I see around me and and like really obsess over I. And yeah, i'm'm just a very creative person. I really enjoy marketing. I really enjoy social media. I love A gift. Yeah, I love women's health and I love fertility awareness, and when I get obsessed about something, I have to tell everybody. So, for example, learning my colors was one of them, but also learning fertility awareness was another, where, when I learned it, I was like I need to tell everybody about this.

Speaker 1:

This is crazy.

Speaker 2:

I didn't know there was an option that was not hormonal birth control, I didn't know I could chart ovulation, and so I just became absolutely obsessed when I this was about nine was it nine years ago?

Speaker 2:

Nine years ago, when I first learned to chart with fertility awareness and online, there really wasn't a whole lot. There was the community tab of Kindara and there was a few Facebook groups and I just was like, oh, I really wish I could teach people in my living room, Just like one day I would love to be able to teach this to people, and I was also a social worker. So I was like I know you have your past life of your like previous work. Mine was in social work and in mental health and I was really just on the side, like passionate about fertility awareness, learning everything that I could. And then I took a couple of trainings to certify as a fertility awareness educator and specializing really with folks who want to avoid pregnancy with fertility awareness, and obviously there's other things that come out of it. But I think like there's a need for, I guess, secular charting approaches for folks who want?

Speaker 2:

to avoid pregnancy, so that's really where it came to be. It was something that I wanted to learn personally. I didn't want to go on the pill, I didn't want to only use condoms, and so I was like, oh, is there like a third option? And fertility awareness was the third option. So that's kind of how it came to be, and I teach clients in a program called Cycle Love, and that's really the bulk of what I do. I also teach fertility awareness educators in Fertility Knowledge Collective. We just started a certification program, which is super exciting, and I love cervical mucus. My Instagram bio is cervical mucus queen, and so that just tells you everything you need to know.

Speaker 1:

I saw that and I loved it. Yesterday, when I was kind of getting my notes together, I was like, oh yes, finally we know our cervical mucus queen. The day has come, we're ready.

Speaker 2:

I never thought I would be talking about cervical mucus, but it's just like not even a thing now, really yeah.

Speaker 1:

I feel you, yeah, when I mentioned my like itchy vagina. That started my whole transformation into learning about hormones and things and I'm like well, who would have thought it's just normalized now.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, a couple of questions before I get back to fam stuff um uh, wobbly cat.

Speaker 2:

Why is kurt wobbly also? So kurt also confusingly is a girl. Um, it's very confusing, but kurt has a syndrome called cerebral hypoplasia and so her back legs when she was a kitten and her back legs like were not developed and her like coordination part of her brain wasn't developed. It happens to dogs too, and so we picked her up at shelter, like we just went one day looking for cats and we saw kurt and she was like stumbling, like running into the wall, but like so cuddly and just like crawled right into her laps and so we took her home that day and she walks like she's drunk that's the best way I can describe it. She can't walk in a straight line and she's falling off of stuff all the time and it's very endearing and very sweet and also very funny.

Speaker 2:

So that seems really sweet it's the wobbly cat and she's like like she slips on the floor, like her back legs won't like, yeah, she's not very graceful, I'll just put it that way.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's got to be super cute, though I know that when you started it charting, when you started learning about FAM, that you you said that you weren't on birth control, right. And so then there are these years of like you realizing okay, this is what I want to show out from the rooftops. I need to make this switch. And so I'm curious, what else? Because I know you mentioned you have irregular cycles, like, what did you learn about your irregular cycles? And before I let you answer my last, last nugget on that, is that a lot of folks listening to I'm Hormonal are here, right, because they're trying to understand how they can have more balanced hormones, like make sense of what's going on in their bodies, and so a lot of them have irregular cycles. So, anyway, that's all to say. What did you learn about your cycles and about PCOS?

Speaker 2:

I didn't really know that I had PCOS until I started paying attention to my cycles. I used to just circle on a calendar like the day my period would start and I had a sense of how long my cycles were. I didn't feel that they were very irregular. But when I started in-depth fertility charting and having all this data and being like, okay, your cycles can sometimes be over a hundred days long, even longer then I started realizing like okay, this is definitely something and it really pushed me to get a diagnosis, to get labs done and to like I know you talk about the root cause a lot, but to really like dig into why my cycles are the way they are. And I don't know. I think you're asking me right now when, like, my cycles are back to being really irregular. So I feel like it just depends on the day.

Speaker 2:

But I think I really walk this fine line between acceptance and action. So action in that finding out why cycles are the way they are and changing lifestyle stuff, doing what you can to address those things. But also I've had a lot of experience in my years of charting where I've done all of this stuff and my cycles have still been really irregular and somebody in the hormone healing and fertility space. It's this like voice in my head constantly where it's like, well, there's all these things that you should be doing, like surely your cycle should be regular by now and if not, then you're doing something wrong. And so then I go into that acceptance like swing back into the acceptance side, where it's like trusting in my body and trusting in that my baseline is not regular.

Speaker 2:

And it never has been.

Speaker 2:

I've had more irregularity than regularity, no matter what I do.

Speaker 2:

So and like also being again in this space where it's I'm thinking about all the all the time, looking at people's charts all the time, like it's just very present and so having that acceptance and grace for myself where I'm at and and knowing that, yeah, like I'm stressed right now I was just telling Bridget like lots of life things happening right now and I know I'm stressed, I know my cycle is long because I'm stressed and that's okay Like I don't need to create another tension where I'm starting to like see that pressure as another form of stress, like the pressure to have a perfect cycle. So I think that's like the long answer of what my journey has been like with PCOS. My PCOS is not great, like my cycles are still really irregular and my journey, or like my lesson, has been around really accepting that. And it's like being the over-responsible eldest daughter where, like everything in my life is like I need to fix this, not letting my cycle be another thing to fix, and really just like letting myself be a messy human.

Speaker 2:

That isn't perfect, so really just like letting myself be a messy human that isn't perfect, so. But charting has, at the same time, like that's where this balance is, because charting has really given me the tools to advocate for myself and work with different providers, and I do know what's underlying it and that's things to fertility awareness and charting and like really being aware of it. It and that's thanks to fertility awareness and charting and like really being aware of it, but that awareness can sometimes be like almost too much information, you know.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, where you're a little hyper fixated, exactly, yeah, I think, though I mean so well said and, I think, inspiring, hopefully for listeners out there who are like, hey, yeah, we don't have to have it all together all the time. Like there are just no matter how much you know about, right in my case hormones like cervical mucus, all of the things like sometimes life happens, sometimes we're stressed and then we say, oh, okay, well, body, I see that you're like getting these. You know you're trying to send me a little message so I can respond to that in whatever way that works for my lifestyle, for some folks and even, admittedly, for myself too a little bit. I'm not sure about like, or the question that comes up in my brain is when cycles are irregular, is there a more or let, or is it just requiring more observation and more proactivity in those?

Speaker 2:

cases. No, it's not less effective. It just means you may have less available days to go unprotected. So when the follicular phase or the first half of the cycle is drawn out. So if you do have longer cycles, it's typically because it's just taking you longer to ovulate. So the first half of the cycle is going to be longer and a lot of symptom thermal methods.

Speaker 2:

You'll use a calculation rule to open the fertile window or a dough ring rule and once you pass that date then you can't go unprotected until you confirm ovulation, and that can be an undetermined amount of time if you have a regular cycle. So it just means you're relying on barrier methods or alternative sex or whatever you're using in the fertile window if you're avoiding for more of the time. But every single I want to say every single cycle that I've had, that's been really weird, like even as like months and months and months long cycle when I do ovulate, because I'm charting reliable, evidence based ovulation signs. It shows up in my chart every single time. Ovulation is never ambiguous if you're charting in the right way. No matter how long or short your cycles are. It just means if you are avoiding and you have long cycles, you may need to wait longer till you can go unprotected.

Speaker 1:

Got it. And just to make sure that I'm clear, I guess and listeners are clear too about what you're charting, that's your cervical mucus, that's your well temperature. I'm curious too if you track your temperature every day or just like after you see a change in cervical mucus. And then you mentioned LH strips and I wonder, do you track cervical positioning? But I guess, kind of all of that thinking, could you walk us through what, in an average week or whatever frame of time, does it actually look like to be practicing FAM and how that fits into your normal life?

Speaker 2:

There's two sides to charting with fertility awareness. One is gathering the information about your body and the other is interpreting it. So the gathering of information doesn't take very long. It takes maybe two or less minutes a day and the interpretation is upfront information that you need to learn to understand your chart. So it's like understanding, for example, what a temperature shift is, what a cover line is, what peak day is, how to open the fertile window, how to close the fertile window, and the information that that gives you about your body and decision making. The data collection or charting these signs like cervical mucus, basal body temperature that takes very little time. So it's like an upfront learning or an upfront investment in understanding how these play together. So we're not just charting cervical mucus in isolation, we're looking to see if the cervical mucus pattern is also reflecting the temperature pattern and what those two things are telling us about when we're safe to go unprotected. So everything is working together. And so cervical mucus, we're charting with my mindful mucus method. We're charting throughout the day, essentially all the time. So it's sensation that you feel throughout the day and anything that you happen to see when you go to the bathroom, and then basal body temperature is your lowest body temperature attained during rest and you'll want to chart it all cycle. So you'll want to see a pattern that changes before ovulation to after ovulation and you can use a regular oral basal body thermometer that goes to two decimal places or you can use a wearable like TempDrop. Right now there's no other wearables I would recommend. Tempdrop is the only one that I've seen consistently matches up with oral temperature patterns. But you'll want to chart. So in a week you'll be charting when you wake up in the morning, taking your basal body temperature before you get out of bed and then throughout the day paying attention to any sensation you happen to notice, as well as anything you happen to see when you go to the bathroom, and then at the end of the day, typically you'll put that in your chart. So you'll put your most fertile cervical mucus observation in the chart, you'll upload your temp drop temps or you'll record your oral temps in your chart and then that will give you a picture, like a little sliver of information, as to your fertility status that day.

Speaker 2:

You asked about LH testing and cervical position. Lh testing will offer some good information. I recommend it in some cases, but a lot of people struggle to get positive. So either, like you easily get positives with lh tests, or you are really unsure and confused with ovulation and the reason is it's about catching your surge. So everybody's LH surge is going to be a different length and the trick is to test during your window where LH is surging and if you miss that window you can still ovulate, even if you didn't get a positive or you missed your positive. So that's where it's like a little bit tricky. Sometimes it takes a little bit of coaching to get it right, but it's a very clear, objective sign when you do get a positive. I've also had long cycles where I've had positives and hadn't ovulated. That's more, I would say, a PCOS consideration.

Speaker 1:

LH strips. Are those exactly the same as ovulation strips or is there something slightly different? I don't know if it's like tomato, tomato those.

Speaker 2:

There are a bunch of different kinds.

Speaker 2:

So, the regular threshold. Lh tests read as positive or negative and you read them with your own eyes. There are also ovulation predictor kits that interpret that reading for you. So they're usually like the clear blue plastic kits and they're typically more expensive. They do the exact same thing but they just give you like a smiley face. Some of them also measure estrogen. And then there's also stuff like the Mira fertility monitor that measures a bunch of different hormones, but essentially it will also give you like a reading as to the level of LH. And there are also LH tests that will give you, instead of a positive or negative, they'll give you like a number.

Speaker 2:

So the most basic LH tests that will give you instead of a positive or negative, they'll give you like a number. So the most basic LH tests are usually just fine. They're called threshold LH tests and they're in like little foil packets. You can buy them really cheap in like a box of 50. Yeah, those are usually fine.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, okay, and for somebody who isn't sure what we're talking about when we say LH, I'll just decrypt that super quick, lh being luteinizing hormone, which is one of the hormones that, just before you ovulate, will spike. So that's why, right, that would be a good indicator that, hey girl, you're about to ovulate. Or, like you were saying, sometimes there will be an LH spike but no ovulation, which would be noted by an increase in your basal body temperature, and that could be for any number of reasons. But whether it's tied to PCOS, or tied to stress, or tied to whatever other fluke of our cycle, of our hormones, sometimes we just don't ovulate in a cycle, and so that's. I just wanted to add that in case somebody's like what's LH Go?

Speaker 2:

ahead. I think I cut you off too. Did you have something else? There's one more question. You asked about cervical position. I don't teach cervical position. It is a less reliable ovulation sign. Some people do find that there's some fluctuation in their cervix height and softness throughout the cycle. However, it is less reliable than other ovulation signs, so I don't typically teach cervical position.

Speaker 1:

Is there a certain amount of time that somebody would want to practice charting before they, I guess, rely on their observations to prevent pregnancy? I'm sure that within the first cycle they're like okay, cool, I see it, I see the ovulation happened, I see these signs. But yeah, what's that normal time span look like before? Somebody is like all right, I'm ready, we're doing it.

Speaker 2:

It depends. It depends on how you're learning. So if you're working with a fertility awareness educator closely who's coaching you through meeting with you every two weeks or every month, then you'll probably feel more confident to go unprotected sooner. If you're self-teaching, then if you have regular cycles, you could theoretically go unprotected. The first cycle that you confirm ovulation Depends where in your cycle you start charting. But if your cycles are, if you're just coming off birth control, if you have PCOS, if you're postpartum, a lot of those scenarios are going to make it trickier to self-teach or to DIY and go unprotected quickly. A fertility awareness educator will get you there faster. It just depends like where in your cycle you start charting and other factors. But as soon as your first ovulation is confirmed is like the soonest that you could go unprotected. Okay, cool.

Speaker 1:

So different for everybody, but once you see the first temperature change, then you're in good shape. One thing I wanted to talk to you about is fertility awareness, like compared and contrasted with cycle awareness. I'm curious if those things for you are basically interchangeable terms or if there is any difference there and like, maybe if that's important to the fertility awareness journey.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think they definitely go hand in hand. I think knowing your ovulation signs intimately just means that you're paying attention to your cycle naturally, and I think with that comes an awareness of the phases of your cycle and how you feel and how that changes throughout the cycle. I think fertility awareness can make your menstrual cycle awareness practice more accurate. So a lot of people who are just charting their cycle or cycle awareness are estimating when they ovulate and when we think about the phases of the cycle and how our energy shifts throughout the cycle, fertility awareness offers that more pinpointed window of ovulation, no matter how long or short your cycle is. So I think they definitely go hand in hand and I think a lot of people come to fertility awareness and then the natural next step is to really pay attention to how they feel throughout the cycle too.

Speaker 1:

Do most people who come to you like most of your clients or gals in your program? Are they mostly coming to you because they want to avoid pregnancy or because they want to become pregnant? I'm just curious what most people are interested in when they come to you.

Speaker 2:

Most people are interested in avoiding pregnancy, or they've just come off birth control or they're looking for a bridge after coming off birth control. But I've been doing this for a while and now I have folks who learned with me to avoid pregnancy and they're reaching out and they're like hey, I'm looking to get pregnant or I use the same information to get pregnant, so it is a lifelong thing. But most people will come to me when they're wanting to avoid.

Speaker 1:

Okay, yeah, definitely In my mind I imagine in your mind too is a tool like literally any phase of life. This is a fam is a tool to get to know my body, to get to understand what my body's trying to tell me and then to, yeah, accomplish any sort of family planning or avoiding goals there.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely yeah, what are some like myths or like just absolutely insane things that people ask you? Or maybe something that you see I don't know some other creator on social media or whatever saying, but like what's something that you see I don't know some other creator on social media or whatever saying, but like what's something, if anything, that you're like oh my God, I can't believe that somebody posted about that. Or just like this is something that is we got to rewrite, we got to like correct the story on this.

Speaker 2:

This isn't exactly what you're asking, but something I've been thinking a lot about lately is cycle syncing, especially in longer, irregular cycles, and this very like prescriptive approach to cycle syncing.

Speaker 2:

So when you're in, when you're ovulating, like this is the list of things that you'll experience and when you're premenstrual, like this is the list of all the things that you'll want to do.

Speaker 2:

And, as somebody who has like tried and failed to plan my life around my cycle because I never know when I'm going to ovulate, I really like push back against this prescriptive cycle singing because I'm approaching it more as like what do I, how do I feel today and what do I need?

Speaker 2:

Knowing where I am in my cycle, but also knowing that I could be follicular, I could be pre ovulatory for a very long time, and so I really think that social media has kind of like created this monster with cycle syncing and like almost like a new shame or guilt when you don't do the things that you're supposed to do, say in your premenstrual, when you don't rest on your period. And I think there is another way. There's like a more gentle, real life way, because we can't always plan around our period and we can't always plan around ovulation and I would love to be able to schedule my launches around my period. But the amount of times that I've done that and then I have gotten my period the week of a launch, it's like you just you roll with it and you check in with what you need every day and just be more flexible around it.

Speaker 2:

So I know that's not exactly like a fam myth, but something that I've been thinking a lot about lately.

Speaker 1:

Now I think that's something that is maybe not tippy top of mind, but something I think about a lot too, because, from my perspective, when gals are asking about how they can restore balance in their hormones and I think psychosyncing is a really great tool to help you kind of reflect on what you're feeling but at the same time it can be overly prescriptive and it's not necessarily going to fix something what is there that we haven't talked about that you think is important to touch on? You wouldn't want somebody to finish this conversation without hearing, or do you feel like we've covered most of the bases?

Speaker 2:

I feel like there's so much more that we can talk about. I think. I feel like there's we haven't talked about. We haven't talked a ton about cervical mucus, but I do have a free intro to cervical mucus. It's a free video course, so people want to learn more about that.

Speaker 2:

It's called Mucus Made Easy and I feel like, just yeah, I love what you said to Bridget around apps and algorithms being a starting point. And then if people are wondering, like what is my app actually doing to give me this information, that's what I'm always looking at when I'm testing, like the ultra human ring right now and using the app or natural cycles experiments. It's like how and why is the app giving me this information? If you're starting to have those thoughts and questions, diving into an in-depth fertility awareness method is one way of kind of closing that loop and going a level deeper. So I have a bunch of resources on that on my blog and freebies that go more in depth into like how you can actually learn the rules and all of that. So if people are curious after listening to this, there's just like so much more under the surface that you can dig into and get excited about.

Speaker 1:

Okay, perfect, so we'll put the link to that guide in the show notes here. Let's just chit-chat on cervical mucus for a hot sec to give a sneak peek. Why might somebody want to or need to investigate there more? And I've talked about cervical mucus on the podcast here before, so probably maybe a listener isn't totally new to the conversation. But what's the thing that most people get wrong about cervical mucus? More is better.

Speaker 2:

They think that more is better. So we see these pictures of copious amounts of clear egg, white, stretchy mucus and I think people look at that and they're like I just came out of birth control. I never see that. Am I still fertile? Like, am I ovulating? And the answer is yeah, like you probably are still ovulating, your signs are just going to be a lot more subtle and you're focusing on sensation is going to really really help you. So it's the thing that we feel throughout the day and we don't necessarily pay attention to or think of as reliable information, because we're taught that more is better and like this subtle sign is not something that we really learn how to chart. So I teach that inside of mindful mucus method, but really it's like you're charting all you're aware all the time and you're paying attention to the more subtle signs as well as what you happen to see.

Speaker 2:

But a lot of people don't see a lot of mucus, and if you've had, like, a leap procedure or if you're just coming off birth control, you might see very little. You might have a lot of unchanging mucus day after day, and so it's just about finding a way for you to actually know when you're fertile. All that stuff is happening.

Speaker 1:

Okay, and there's nothing bad about having, like, more cervical mucus. That's just. Some people are at some phases of their life. It's just that it's not necessarily an indication of their fertile window, is that?

Speaker 2:

the just in most cases. No, it's not a bad thing If you have lots of cervical mucus.

Speaker 1:

I think this has been a helpful conversation for folks to just dip their toes in a little bit when it comes to FAM and know that they have a resource out there in you to learn more about it and actually put it into practice when they're ready, regardless of what their life stage is or what their goals are or what their period is like right now. So that's really valuable. How can listeners connect with you?

Speaker 2:

So, yeah, this has been a great chat and thanks for having me Bridget. You can find me on Instagram at fertilityawarenessproject, and then my website is fertilityawarenessprojectca.

Speaker 1:

All right, my friend. That is it for today. I hope that you loved this conversation between Nat and I. Again, you can connect with Nat on Instagram at fertilityawarenessproject. You can check out her website, fertilityawarenessprojectca. Both of those and more are going to be linked in the show notes below, so make sure that you connect with her. If you have any questions for me, for Nat, then send them our way and I will leave you with that.

Speaker 1:

Thanks again for listening, for subscribing, and 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. All right, we'll see you on the next one.