We deserve to be valued in all our seasons

You can’t have spring without autumn and people with periods deserve to be valued, loved and accepted when we’re 'nice' and ovulatory as well as when we’re fiery and premenstrual.

We're not mental, we're elemental and we all know that nothing in nature can bloom all year round, the tides cannot be in a continual flow, there must be an ebb and so why would it be any different for us?

I get it. One day I'm all 'good morning, I love you, I've made you a coffee, do you want a head massage?!' and then boom suddenly you ask me if I'm ok and I'm like: 'YES, I'm FINE. Why are you asking?!'

There's a big difference between using the premenstrual phase as a free pass to be a dick and responding less well than you would like to because you are experiencing mood, energy and sensory input changes that dramatically change your experience of the world and the people in it. Learning to wisely and safely wield the power of fire can be very testing but it is so important to remember that you are no less good, worthy or valuable because you wax and wane and you deserve to be met and valued through all of your seasons.

Our wider cultural narrative states that we're not important or valuable when we're not fertile ie. premenstrual, on our period, menopausal... and that is just not ok.

Autumn and winter are fucking powerful and sensational seasons of our lives, cycles and nature. The colour of autumn leaves provides a richness and an unmatched beauty to the year in nature, over winter many plants and creatures survive the winter with NOTHING but their own nourishment to sustain them and bulbs and seeds pulse with life and potential beneath the soil whilst seemingly doing nothing under a blanket of snow. Autumn is a powerful exploration of letting go and winter is a quiet space where it seems as though nothing is happening but from where all life arises.

The autumn and winter of our cycles and lives infuse a richness, beauty, power and strength into our lives that simply wouldn't be possible if we existed in a perpetual summer.

Part of overcoming PMS is to bring our premenstrual, menstrual and menopausal selves out of the shadows and into the light so that we can be whole and integrated humans rather than living a half life where literally half of our lives is about overriding, hiding, denying and suppressing.

Another part is letting go of the 'good girl' narrative that so many of us have been assimilating through all mediums for our entire lives, that of the domestic goddess who never complains or says no and is endlessly giving, sacrificing and tolerant. I thought I had to live like this for a long time and every time I failed (because I 'failed' every time... because it's pretty much impossible) I felt guilty. Guilty about my very nature.

Say no, let go, drop the weight, release expectations, step into the fire and let yourself be forged into something new.

I certainly don't always get it right but over the years of consciously working with my luteal phase and some pretty intense premenstrual change symptoms I've learned that for me the things that help are: