The Winter Issue; January 2024 > Well-being > Feminine

The menstrual cycle, your period, is often met with derision. Disappointment. Frustration. Exhaustion. Perhaps even trauma for those who have a condition that worsens their period. I have spent years surrendering this time, occasionally unwillingly, to God and begging the question, "Is it really supposed to be this way?" Since the curse of Eve, women have been enduring the wildernesses of their periods and chalking it up to hormones, bouts of temper, and cursing the woman who caused it all. While I do believe God didn't intend on childbirth to be easy, nor the cycles that keep the womb available for child-bearing, I do believe there is beauty to be found in every wilderness. Manna to be eaten of the desert. God to be heard in unique ways that might otherwise be stifled by the noise of our lives.

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A few years ago, I abandoned my birth control and was relieved to be experiencing my Godly design again through hormone cycles and periods. Shortly after, I discovered, it wasn't quite that simple. I've been on a journey since then to not only learn how much hormones, nutrition, and spiritual health play a part in how we experience ourselves and our periods but how to accept the invitation  that God is extending to me during this time. It has been my reflection that God is here in all the days of my cycle. It has been my experience that He knows me even on the days where my emotions are in the drivers seat and logic is being drug behind me in the dirt. It has been my awakening that women were as much cursed with childbirth as they were blessed with it.
 

In the spirit of hygge, I propose this comparison between the value of the Danish lifestyle and the menstrual cycle. It would seem that hygge, in my evaluation, is often about recuperation, prioritization, and rest. Winter is the best time for this. As the trees stand strong awaiting their time to bloom again, as animals slumber in hibernation, as humans tuck themselves into cups of tea, books, and card games with friends, you can see where the true values of us all, really lie. The value of the tree protecting its roots by shedding its leaves, the bear only leaving its cave for food when necessary, the human only leaving the house to see their treasured loved ones.

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In menstrual, it is winter. It is a time where physical energies are naturally lower, emotional capacities are less, and often, suppressed disappointments rise to the surface like oil in boiling water. God says "not this, but that", "less of that group, more of this friend". It is a time to tuck into ourselves and meet God by the fireplace of our hearts. It can get mucky here sure, much as the roads slosh with icy mud, and skies are clouding our vivacity. In winter, come late February, we are all hungry for the warmth of light. This is the time to look more closely for it. Your period may feel this way at first when you are learning to work with it and not painfully endure it. I encourage you to accept the invitation, and perhaps even the challenge, because all winters bear good soil in spring. And all springs bring blooms of fresh colors.

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A few invitations for you in your next menstrual cycle:

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Journal twice a day, once in the morning, once at night. With emotions running higher its easy for the day to get away from us in a way we don't want. Taking a few mindful moments to usher feeling to paper, we open up the voice of God into our narrative. 

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Take one thing off the to-do list for someone else and put something on it for yourself. The world doesn't stop for women's cycles, but we cannot abandon our design. While it may be tempting to "keep the ball rolling", I promise you that the world won't fall apart if you take a little time to give your mind, body, and spirit, what it needs in order to steward well what you've been given.

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