40. Your body wasn't meant to be numb

Holly Lamb (00:00.704) Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the No Fucks Given podcast with me your host Holly Lamb and this week I wanted to talk more about synthetic hormones and how I truly believe they have been designed to suppress your power and disconnect you from your body. I think it's time, the time has now come to liberate yourself from this bullshit narrative, get off the synthetic hormones and tune back into your natural rhythms as nature intended. So I wanted to start off by talking about the effects of hormonal contraception because when the pill was created, there was a bill that was passed through so that Holly Lamb (01:03.95) So I want to dive in about the effects of hormonal contraception, mainly the pill, because this has been around for the past 50 odd years and it hasn't changed since it was developed. And the only reason it got passed through was because what they suggested is women have that week break and it mimics the bleeding that you have your period, but it's not your period. It's just a withdrawal bleed because what hormonal contraception does, the pill, it stops ovulation and the pill prevents your ovaries from releasing an egg each and every month. So it's not harmonizing or balancing your hormones as it suggests, it's completely turning them off. Now you may think, you know, why does that matter? Why does it matter if I'm not ovulating? I don't want to get pregnant. That's the whole point. But there's so much more to ovulation and your natural sinking abilities than just getting pregnant. So this will affect so many different areas of your body that you're not even aware of. Holly Lamb (02:21.442) The pill has been linked to many different side effects. you're currently taking the pill, if you go into that box and open up that massive sheet that has all the disclaimers on them, there are literally reams and reams of paper about the side effects of birth control. You know, your mood. be really really affected. The pill is linked to more depression and anxiety than any other contraceptive methods. I know when I was on the pill for so many years I felt like a completely different person and the list literally goes on so it can affect your stress, it might interfere with your ability to adapt to stress, and if we look at nutrition, the pill is linked to vitamin and mineral deficiencies, and that can lead to fatigue, brain fog, low mood. So not only is it affecting our brains, it's affecting our gut. And we know how important the gut and brain connection is. And there's also been studies where there are links to gallbladder disease. So long-term combined pill use can increase the risk of gallbladder problems and it can also affect your weight, can increase weight gain and Holly Lamb (04:05.198) I remember when I was on the pill, whenever I think it was every six months or every year, you'd have to go and get your blood pressure checked to check for deep vein thrombosis and any clots in your body. Now, all of these things that we are taking this pill for is just to not get pregnant, but there's all these different side effects. Like in what reality is it normal for us to experience all of these side effects just so that we don't get pregnant. Holly Lamb (04:48.238) There's so many other ways that you cannot get pregnant that don't involve taking hormonal contraception. So one is the fertility awareness method, which does involve you actually understanding the four seasons of your cycle. So if you aren't sure, then you can go back and listen to the last four episodes, which were Allie and I talking about the four seasons and how you can embrace each season and how you can start to lean in and honor each season. And you need to be practicing my menstrual cycle awareness before you even get to this. But fertility awareness is understanding your cervical mucus. And so many women can't even touch their own vaginas, but this really does involve getting up close and personal and understanding your body because It's your body, you shouldn't be afraid to touch her, you should know her intimately. Because if you know her intimately, it's going to help you open and surrender for your partner, whether you have one or not. But if you're in tune with your body already, it's going to make connection with the partner so, so much better and so much and you're going to be so much more open, which is what I've found as I have dived into this work and my relationship with my husband has grown and flourished as I've understood more about my body. So you need to get up close and personal with your cervical mucus because it changes throughout your cycle due to hormonal fluctuations, your estrogen and progesterone. So things to look out for would be... Holly Lamb (06:37.772) what we would call dry days. So these are your infertile days. So this is usually right after your period, you may notice little to no cervical mucus. And these are typically your non-fertile days because you you've just bled, you're nowhere near ovulation. And it isn't just about noticing the cervical mucus that is maybe on your knickers. It's actually getting inside in close and personal and understanding what it feels like and what it looks like. So dry days, that's pretty self-explanatory, there's not going to be much there. But as we start transitioning through our inner spring, it may start to become like sticky and thick. And this is estrogen levels rising and the mucus starts to appear like sticky or tacky or even crumbly. So usually at this time, fertility is low, but it's starting to increase. And then what happens is we start to transition into summer, it becomes creamy or even like cloudy. And this is usually when you are starting to become fertile. So you're closer to ovulation, mucus becomes creamy or even like lotion-like, and that is indicating that you're at a higher fertility part of your cycle. And then once you're in full-blown summer, you're ovulating, it's going to look like... egg whites. And this is obviously ovulation. Mucus becomes like clear and stretchy and slippery and it almost resembles like raw egg whites. And this is when you are at your most fertile and this is when you want to avoid having sex so that you don't get pregnant. And then once we're past this phase, it starts to become dry or sticky. This is post ovulation because what happens is progesterone is rising and the mucus decreases and it returns to a sticky texture and this is indicating that it's low fertility. So that is understanding your cervical mucus and tracking it and understanding your body. And it's about observing and recording it daily. So if you're practicing menstrual cycle awareness, then you can just add this in as part of your journaling. So check your cervical mucus at least once a day, ideally at the same time. So either the morning or the evening. Holly Lamb (09:06.27) and you can check it on toilet paper before or after using the bathroom. You can wipe and observe the consistency. But the best way to check is to insert clean fingers into your vagina to collect the mucus and assess its texture and stretchability. And that is when you're gonna really understand what is happening to your body. And now you can use... There are fertility tracking apps, natural cycles, but I feel that these apps don't always give you the best overview and they can be wrong. So I think you doing this yourself and noting it down and writing it and getting close and personal and understanding it is going to be a lot more beneficial. And then what happens is you'll get to learn your fertile window. And your fertile window is usually five to six days. So it's, know, main like a week out of your cycle roughly. And it's the five days leading up to ovulation and then the ovulation day itself. So this is when sperm can survive in fertile cervical mucus and this is going to increase your chance of getting pregnant. So avoiding unprotected... unprotected sex during this time if you don't want to get pregnant. If you do want to get pregnant, then have lots of sex at this time. Holly Lamb (10:44.172) And then once you're kind of comfortable with that, there are other ways you can start to track to see when you are ovulating and you can check your basal body temperature and you track your waking temperature daily. a sustained temperature rise after ovulation confirms the end of the fertile window. So you would take your temperature every day. And when the temperature your temperature has risen after ovulation, this confirms the end of your fertile window so that you know that you're usually safe to have sex. And then another way of checking is actually your cervical position. So your cervix becomes soft, it becomes high, and it becomes open during your fertile days and firm and low post-ovulation. again, getting in there, feeling... what your vagina feels like, feeling all the different parts of you and understanding where everything is and what's going on in there. So if you are new to this, I definitely wouldn't be doing this like straight off the bat. I would be doing this for a few months to get to understand what your body feels like and where you know you are in your cycle. So either have a different method, a barrier method, so like condoms for example, during your foot fertile window. Don't just rely on this straight off the bat because I don't want to be responsible for any women getting pregnant. Disclaimer. So it's about really understanding your body and tapping in and listening to what she is telling you because you can only get pregnant for five to six days out of your whole cycle. So why would you put yourself through Holly Lamb (12:47.16) taking hormonal, synthetic hormones just for that reason. And if you're taking it for another reason, there are other ways that you can fix the issues that you're having, that you can fix the menstrual problems that you're having, whether it's heavy, painful, cysts, fibroids, PCOS, all of these things are just an imbalance that your body is asking you to look deeper into. because all these synthetic hormones do is suppress you. You've been sold this thing, but all it is is suppression. And I want to guide you out to liberation. No more outsourcing your power to doctors who do not listen. You know something isn't right in your body, yet you're just told it's part of being a woman and you're handed another prescription. The time for that. To stop is now. It's time to take the lead in your own healing and break free from this cycle of suppression. It has gone on too long and we need to make a stand. So if you do this, if you break free from these hormones, you can experience the kind of pleasure and creativity and magnetic energy that makes life just worth living again. Your body wasn't meant to be numb. You're not supposed to be cut off from this power within your womb. It's really time to reconnect with your cycle and reconnect with your full feminine power. And this is possible because I did it. I was on HRT. That's the thing I was given for my early menopause. And that was horrible. I was disconnected. I felt like I turned back into the girl who was on the pill and I did not like that. So I took the radical responsibility of finding the solutions to the problem and not just taking a pill the doctor gave me. And it takes faith and time and surrender and Holly Lamb (15:02.712) Taking that leap of faith to invest in yourself and your health and not do another year of this, another year of feeling like this. And this is exactly why I created the Sacred Cycle Collective, my group program starting on the 7th of April, because this is what I want you to be able to experience without having to go and find all the information and like connect all the dots. I've done that for you. I've created this program that would dive into all aspects of hormones, the energetics, the lifestyle, the embodiment piece, and how just making these few tweaks, ditching the synthetic hormones, and bringing your body back into alignment literally allows you to become a magnet for everything you truly desire in life. And it really, really is that easy. It's not difficult. you just have to take that leap of faith and say yes. So if you would love to join this and join the other women who are already in, the details are in the show notes or you can drop me a message on Instagram, underscore Holly Lamb, and let's have a chat about what it is that you need and if this program is right for you. Or if you just need maybe some more in-depth one-to-one support, because I have some spaces available for that as well. So I hope this was helpful and thank you so much for joining me and I'll speak to you all next week.