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I'm Hormonal | Hormone balance, gut health & nutrition insights
Welcome to I’m Hormonal — the podcast where we make sense of your bloating, brutal PMS, and missing periods… without blaming it all on “just stress” or “being a woman.”
Hosted by Bridget Walton, Women’s Hormone Coach, this show is your no-BS guide to decoding your cycle, calming your gut, and actually balancing your hormones (not just crossing your fingers and hoping for the best).
Each week, we break down what no one taught you about hormones, nutrition, and gut health in your 30s — especially if you're tired of guessing what your body is trying to tell you.
Expect solo episodes packed with real talk and root-cause tools, plus the occasional expert guest to help you feel less confused and more in control.
Because you deserve better periods, better digestion, and a better shot at getting pregnant — without burning out trying to figure it all out alone.
I'm Hormonal | Hormone balance, gut health & nutrition insights
Your Next Step Towards Balance & My Story | Ep. 114
Not your usual episode of I'm Hormonal today because today (June 24th) is when you can join me for a free class! Save your seat here.
Stay tuned for your normal long-form episode on Thursday! Enjoy this story about me and how I got here in the meantime. Love you guys -- thanks for listening to the pod! - Bridget
CONNECT WITH BRIDGET
Hi friends, hello my hormonal people out there, welcome to I'm Hormonal. This is episode number 114. I'm your host, bridget Walton. I am actually a little plot twist bringing you a mini episode today. Normally Tuesdays are for the long ones, thursdays are for the minis, but we are flip flopping it this week because today I'm really excited to bring to a free class. If you have not yet registered, you still have the chance to do so if it is Tuesday, june 24th and before 5 pm Pacific. We haven't started yet, so check out the link in the show notes to register for the class, or if you want to be in the loop for any future classes that I have, then that is a really great place for you to start.
Speaker 1:The whole reason why I started I'm Hormonal, why I started this podcast back in 2023, was because I think that you all, like you I'm looking at you, I'm pointing at you you deserve more information and better information about how your body works, what your hormones are trying to tell you, how you can better support them so you can feel good and live your life and like, focus on all of the other stuff that is bringing you joy and that has so much more to offer you than just like what's the thing I should be eating, or how do I not feel so much pain in my cramping, those kinds of things. That's what I want for you. That's why this podcast exists to share that information with you, so you can figure out what's going on. And, as an extension of that, that's why I have created this class that's going on this afternoon, on Tuesday, june 24th, at 5pm. So this is just a little mini reminder for you to reserve your seat at the end of the class. If you stay all the way through the end, if you join live, then you will have the opportunity to win a free one-on-one coaching session with me. I would love for you to get in on that, and it's going to be a fun time.
Speaker 1:This class is going to be all about the rooted method, which is the method that I use with my clients that I've developed over the last year plus, in order to help them see the transformations in their period, in their acne, in their bloating that they do. So it's going to be about the rooted method and a 100-day blueprint for more energy, easier periods and less bloating, without googling or without guessing, because we're done winging it. We're done with these blanket recommendations, blanket approaches. What you need to feel better is a plan that is tailored to you, personalized to you, and you need a structure or most gals out there, I know I sure as hell did need a structure of accountability, this framework that is going to guide me through these changes that I'm making, or that you're making, to the way that you eat, the way that you sleep or your bedtime routine All of these things that impact your hormonal health, the quality of your period, the quality of your digestion, and more. So that's what you can expect from the class today.
Speaker 1:I want to spend just a couple of minutes talking to you a little bit more about myself and my own experience with my digestive issues, with my hormonal issues, so you can understand where I'm coming from, how I got here, and it really starts back in 2016. This was a time in my life. I was a brand new officer in the Marine Corps. I was working out a lot. I was taking this pre-workout powder that absolutely ruined my stomach. I can't believe I kept taking it for so long after I was having like absolutely stabbing stomach pains almost daily. Man, the things you do when you're young, I guess. But it was that, plus a run of antibiotics that I had to take which, like, threw just my gut and my digestion into absolute chaos and the first presentation of that chaos for me, aside from, like, the stabbing pain, I'd already had acne basically my entire adult life, but then I had this new experience of having a super itchy vagina, which not fun. I mean most gals like maybe you can relate to that, it's happened at some point to most of us. Most people have a yeast infection at some point, but for me it wasn't a yeast infection. There was nothing that I did that actually helped it to feel better and I would bring this up with my providers and there wasn't really anything that they could do to help me because it wasn't presenting as a yeast infection or BV or anything else with a name on it. So that was really frustrating.
Speaker 1:I went to I lived in Japan for a couple of years If you've been listening for a little bit, maybe you know that, but that's where I was first stationed in the Marine Corps. Once I got there, I had an appointment with, like, my primary care provider kind of physician, and he also happened to be an OBGYN just nuance of the military's medical system, I suppose. Anyway, he had recommended to me that I do a surgery called a labiaplasty, just thinking like, okay, if we kind of make things more symmetrical here, well, that will reduce the irritation, it'll reduce the friction. And I was really enthusiastic about this because the nurse who was like in on the appointment too, because the doctor was male, so they have a female nurse in with you Anyway, she was like, honestly, like I've had this surgery myself and it did fix my irritation. So I was like, okay, heck, yeah, this is it. Like, let's do it, let's do this thing and you probably know where I'm going with this. But we did the thing, did the surgery, and nothing changed. Nothing changed at all for me. And I just was like, okay, well, we really did, we did the damn thing. And then I'm still here at square one Now, this kind of compounding after years, also years of stress, of travel, of living in a really sweaty, hot location.
Speaker 1:I was certainly not eating the best diet. I really ate a lot of sugar, looking back at it, and so this was kind of compounding what was going on with my digestion and I started to experience a lot of bloating and I always had acne. But even when I stopped using hormonal birth control, I still had more and more acne. It just wasn't going away and it wasn't something that recurred at a certain time of my cycle, it was just ever present. Right, maybe that's the same for you too.
Speaker 1:But all of this to say that, as my irritation, as my itchy vag, was getting worse, so was my gut health, which was resulting in a lot of bloating, and that was just like a big hit to my confidence, a big hit to the way that I felt in my own clothes. I remember a handful of years ago I was on the way to one of my friend's birthday parties. It was the first time, like one of the first times after COVID, when I properly got dressed to like go out for drinks kind of thing, and I just felt so in my clothes that I didn't go, like I was on the way and I decided not to go. So that's kind of man, not super fun. Let me fast forward and kind of get to the point, or maybe the next phase of this, which is that I had this irritation, I had this bloating, I had this acne, and this was also around a time when I noticed that my PMS was a lot worse.
Speaker 1:When I would cry before my period started, I would just, you know, something insignificant would happen, I would cry and I'm like I know that this isn't a big deal, but I just literally can't help the fact that I'm crying right now and a time when I'd go down the stairs in my house and my boobs would hurt from going down the stairs. So clearly there was some things that were off with my digestion, there were some things that were off with my hormones, and it really took putting together two and two the fact that my gut health was intrinsically tied to my hormone health. Realizing these two things and realizing that my symptoms were all stemming from my hormone health. Realizing these two things and realizing that my symptoms were all stemming from my gut health. Naturally, that inspired me to get a hold of my gut health, bring things back into balance, which I did through a series of shifts to my diet, shifts to my stress. I pulled alcohol out of my diet, pulled all these sugars out of my diet, incorporated some botanicals and foods that would be more supportive of a balanced gut microbiome, and that is what totally turned the tables for me.
Speaker 1:I had already been on this path to becoming a women's hormone coach by that point, because I'd even, in my quest to understand my own body, I had started to take practitioner level training in order to see, like, okay, what do I do for myself? So I'd already done my coaching program, I was already working through my functional hormone specialist training, but this is when I was like, okay, we have to do this. Like for me, I've spent almost a decade almost a decade of my life trying to figure out how I can feel better. Like this shouldn't be rocket science. How do we know so much about I don't know? What do we know about Mars, like the, what the surface of Mars is made of? But yet none of my physicians knew why my vagina was itchy and why it's so much acne. And so that's all.
Speaker 1:To say that it really solidified for me Like I need to share the things that I know about hormone health. I need to share the things that I know about hormone health. I need to share the things that can help other women have easier periods and have better digestion and just feel confident in their bodies and like themselves again and support their health for the long run. So I guess I'm really sharing that all so that you have a better idea of where I'm coming from. It's important to me, too, that I share with you, like why I'm so passionate about what I'm doing and why I'm a women's hormone coach, and why I think this is important and why I'm here talking about it every week with you guys. But also, you know, if any part of what I shared with you resonated, if any of that sounded like you, then I would love for this next step, or maybe even this first step for you in your hormone balancing journey, to be to join me for this free class that I have today, which is June 24th, so I will leave you with that. I will be back on Thursday with a normal episode that has more actionable and practical tips for you all, but that's all I've got for today.
Speaker 1:If you're listening to this in the future, after the 24th, then you can always connect with me on Instagram at I'm underscore hormonal. I would love to hear your thoughts, would love to hear your questions and, if you did attend the webinar, would love to hear what your main takeaway was. So thanks for hanging out with me today, thanks for letting me talk about my vagina a little bit here, and I'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.