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Summary
In this conversation, Anna Sneed discusses the concept of cycle syncing, emphasizing the importance of understanding the menstrual cycle’s four phases and how they can be applied to daily life. She highlights the need for body literacy, especially in children, and the significance of breaking generational cycles of disconnection from one’s body. The discussion also touches on the impact of trauma on body awareness and the empowerment that comes from knowing and trusting one’s body. In this conversation, Adrienne and Anna Sneed M.Ed discuss the broken education system, the importance of empowering children to learn how to learn, and the challenges of parenting in a mainstream society. They explore the significance of understanding perimenopause and tracking one’s cycle, emphasizing the need for boundaries and living authentically. The discussion also touches on the wisdom gained in midlife and the liberation that comes from embracing one’s true self.
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Read the Transcript:
Adrienne (00:00)
Hi everyone, welcome back to the show. I am so glad to be here with you today. Can you give me a little intro about you, what you do, the agenda period? Go ahead.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (00:09)
Yes, hi, I’m so hyped to be here with you, Adrienne. My name is Anna Snead. I’m one half of the A team at the Agenda Period. We are a cycle syncing app and we are basically, our app is the answer to the now what? There’s a lot of cycle syncing trackers out there that just say, hey, your period’s coming, hey, you’re fertile. And we understand that you’re like four people every month.
Adrienne (00:31)
Mm-hmm.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (00:34)
and we give you the now what, like what to do with what’s happening with your body. So we’re all about reclamation, because this stuff is not innovative. We’re reclaiming what our great, great grandmothers knew already and making it practical in the 21st century.
Adrienne (00:39)
I love it.
Mm-mm.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Okay, which we are so disconnected from and honestly, I hadn’t heard about cycle syncing till this past year and I’m 40. So can you please give everyone a rundown about what cycle syncing is? think even so many of us don’t even understand the four parts. Like we know about our period and the menstrual part of our cycle and everything else kind of just gets ignored. And as you said, like four different people, hormonal changes, whatever. So give us a little like a brief overview that would be so helpful.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (00:54)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
awesome. I can talk all day about this. So stop me if I go on too long. But so a lot of us, focus on our period, but your period is your report card. We all understand once the grades come out, they’re set in stone and your ovulation should be the star of the show. So your period, once it comes, it lets you know how you’ve been loving on yourself in the other four phases. So we’ve got four phases and you can think of them like the four seasons. Your menstrual phase is like your internal winter. Your body is literally the coldest it will be all month. Your basal body temperature is super duper low. And this is the time that you need warm things, warm foods, warm clothing. You need to rest and stay in. When you look outside in the winter time, that should be kind of your guide to how to move about the cabin during your menstrual phase.
Adrienne (02:09)
Which we don’t do, we just do it during physical winter time, right? We don’t do that every month.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (02:23)
Yes. No, we don’t. And when I tell you it’s like biohacking once you figure out how to, how to sink your life to your cycle. And historically, before the patriarchy kind of got their hands on things, most indigenous cultures had like a red tent. Are you familiar with the red tent?
Adrienne (02:26)
Mm-hmm.
Yes,
I’ve heard about this and I feel like it was always framed in this Western view as, we put these girls away because it was shameful and blood is dirty and period blood is dirty. And so we’re right. Like, I feel like that’s how it was portrayed to us. And we don’t do that, right? Because we’re so civilized over here. Yeah. Okay.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (02:40)
Yes, yes. Well, obviously, know, misogyny and the patriarchy got their hands on what was going on. But what’s happening when we’re in our menstrual phase is we’re kind of like this portal. I mean, we’re already a life portal, but like your brain is ripe for downloads from spiritual guides from whatever higher being you believe in, you’re completely ripe and open and fertile for it. And this is the time that you’re supposed to be relaxing. Your body is shedding the lining of an organ. And our ancestors understood this and said, you know what, now’s not the time for you to be cooking and cleaning and running after kids. Go to the tent with the other bleeders and download all the things that you can and rest and the women were all huddled in there very introspective very reflective and they would leave the red tent with solutions to the problems of the tribe or the village and the next steps to walk it out the red tent the The separation was this beautiful time to come back to yourself. It wasn’t like you’re bleeding get away. It wasn’t that and so we were kind of tricked into believing that I’m not weak. I don’t have to go lay down when yeah, you do go lay down, please.
Adrienne (04:05)
Yes, right, right.
Yes, that like pendulum swinging to the other side, but I can work out, I can still be CEO, I can maintain my capitalist productivity 24 seven, which no, who’s doing that? Like, it’s unsustainable.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (04:11)
Listen, it is, it’s untenable, it’s unsustainable. And now women in our 40s, we are paying the bill for living that way in our, you know, our fully reproductive, you know, phases. And so the menstrual phase is this time and it’s a beautiful time when you lean into that.
Adrienne (04:29)
Mm. Mm.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (04:41)
Once you come out of it, you’re in your inner spring because spring comes after winter and that’s your follicular phase. And this is the time that your brain is super like a sponge for learning and applying things. So all of the things that you just sat and did in your red tent, now you’ve got the energy and the brain activity to actually walk it out. So for the next week or so, you’re in your follicular phase, your inner spring. Just think of traipsing through the fields and painting and creating things and the things that you just journaled about. Yes. Yes. The things you just journaled about and meditated on and spoke to your higher power about. Now you can go do those things. Yes, because you’ve got about a good week and then your ovulation phase comes after summer, after spring comes summer. And this is the warmest that your basal body temperature will be. You’re super hot during your ovulation phase, literally and figuratively. Yes, your skin is clear. Your voice has a different pitch. You’re more fluent in your speech. Your pheromones are drawing people to you because your body, we’re still mammals. It’s like make a person, make a person, make a person.
So your ovulation phase, just think of what you want and like to do during the summer months. You like to be outside and socializing and connecting with people. And that’s what you should be doing in your ovulation phase. So it’s the perfect time to pitch a new idea. It’s a perfect time to ask for that raise or to be at those happy hour networking events. That is when you should be lights, camera action.
Adrienne (06:05)
Okay, okay, collaborating, connecting.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (06:27)
And you know you’re yes. Connecting and collaborating. It’s super you’re super hyper social during this time your estrogen is really high and that is when your your body is cravings Socializing the most
Adrienne (06:33)
Okay. Okay.
Okay, okay, yeah, the most.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (06:55)
Yes, so yeah, so leaning into that energy is going to prepare you for the next phase Which is your luteal phase and it is your inner autumn or fall
And it’s two weeks long. It’s the longest of the four phases. And so we like to say that there’s Luteal and then there’s late Luteal. So the first, yeah. So the first week of your Luteal phase, you can lift super heavy if you’re, you know, in the gym and working out like you’re, you’re yeah. Ovulation is like hit cardio, go, go, go. Like, yeah, let’s crank this out. in early Luteal, it’s you’re stronger.
You are in this task completion mode. We feel like we’re rage cleaning or you know, the kids toys are everywhere and why is that? No, your body is literally like nesting like get ready because there’s probably a baby coming or a period coming in either way in a couple weeks you have to be laying down. So prepare, get your ducks in a row. So it’s we’re like this well-oiled efficient machine knowing that there’s a time and a place for everything. Like I know my pantry’s a wreck, but when I’m late luteal, that’s when it’s going to be fun and I’m actually going to want to clean it out. So it can wait.
Adrienne (07:51)
Mm-hmm.
That makes sense. That makes sense. And I remember reading about how like, well, not to be exclusionary, because I hate just being like, it’s binary, it’s men and it’s women and it’s male and it’s female, because obviously there’s a spectrum and there’s people going to fall in between. But from what I understand, like male hormones are more reset in a 24 hour cycle, which is why, it’s a nine to five. start, have the same routine every day and we start over every single day and we are not like that. We live in a society that’s like that, but we’re not.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (08:28)
We aren’t. And we used to not be like before. I’m an old history teacher back in my former life once we moved through the Industrial Revolution and we moved inside and stopped living off the land, we stopped syncing our activities to the moon. And men are like, you know, more are like the sun and we are like the moon. So they’re doing this if they’ve got healthy testosterone levels.
They’re doing the same thing every day and it’s taking us about 28 days. If you’re a menstruator, takes you, you’re cycling every 28 and not every 24. And so if their testosterone levels are high, they wake up with the highest their testosterone is going to be during that day. And it kind of dips and then it goes back up in the evening.
What do you know? That’s when happy hour is at all the bars because that’s when the men are feeling their testosterone go back up again. And then by eight or nine, it drops back down and they’re hiding in the bathroom and they don’t want to talk to you and they don’t have the good words because their testosterone has dropped and they do that every day. And when we try to do that, we kind of kick ourselves like I’m failing. Like last week I was crushing it on the elliptical and this week I just want to do yoga. Like what is wrong with me and we’re cyclical and they are circadian and we’re infradian and so there is, you’re right. And during the late luteal phase, we need 89 to 289 more calories. And again, we kick ourselves cause we’re binge eating because we don’t know. You need to pack some extra walnuts and an apple when you’re taking the kid to the park cause you’re going to get hungry. Don’t stop through the drive-through, you know, those types of things. But once you know, you can plan and it’s biohacking. We like to call it biohacking. So those are your four phases.
Adrienne (10:12)
So let’s get into, like, if someone’s trying to apply this practically to their life, you and I both unschool. So if we look at it through a lens of home educating, let’s say, I think most of my listeners are either home educating or interested in that lifestyle. what does that look like? What do you do?
Anna Sneed M.Ed (10:24)
My gosh, I’m obsessed with this question because I didn’t realize that I was actually doing it until I was like, wait a minute, I’m syncing our homeschool or unschool to my cycle. And my daughter has just kind of fallen in line with it during my menstrual phase. There’s a lot of baby, what you’re reading. that’s a good, there’s a new Disney show or something called Jane. And it’s like, all about endangered species and it’s, you know, we’ll sit and cuddle up in bed and we’ll watch those things and have discussions. We do a lot of journaling and coloring and artsy things that I feel like doing from the comfort of my bed or the couch. And I’m not beating myself up like my kids not learning anything. And I just, you know, I don’t have these well-polished curricula. No, this is just where our energy is right now. And, and I follow my energetic flow and the beauty of it is now my eight-year-old has the words to use. She has the example to follow once she’s going through this. She’ll already have this built in and the boundaries and the expectations set up for herself on how to care for herself in a way that I definitely didn’t have at eight.
Adrienne:
my son’s 11, almost turning 12, and he knows everything about my cycle. He knows what menstruation is. He knows, right, all those phases. He knows, oh, it’s this time, mom needs rest. She needs a heating pack. She needs, right, more quiet, whatever. And it is as normal as anything else. It is not gross. It is not weird. it is normalized, right? And part of daily life. And that is huge. And it’s one of those things. I don’t know if you keep a list in your mind of like, when I sometimes start to doubt what I’m doing or as a mom or whatever, and I keep this list of like, okay, but here’s all the things I’m so, so glad that my kids know, or the skills that they have that I’m just like, okay, this makes me feel so much better. And that is one of them that my son and daughters know everything about cycles and periods and that it’s not gross and that it’s natural and that it’s yeah. So I’m happy to pass on all this new information that you’re giving me today. I love it so much.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (12:45)
Girl, but I mean, body literacy is gonna keep your kids safe. that, them knowing their bodies and knowing what’s going on is, I feel like it’s a safety issue. Like I need my daughter to know and to normalize these things. I need her to know what her vulva is compared to what her vagina is. Because if her vulva is itching, it’s different than if her vagina is itching. you know, and to just normalize it and to have the words and the actions to go along with it. So bravo for doing that with your with your kids because it’s the most normal thing.
Adrienne (13:22)
Well, and April is Sexual Abuse Awareness Month too, and I always see that in parenting accounts that talk about preventing abuse, that the kids who know the correct terminology, the kids who grow up in environments where these issues are talked about, which is counterintuitive to what we hear, right? We hear that that is grooming and that’s inappropriate and that’s bad parenting and, you know, call child services, whatever. But we see the exact opposite with statistics with abuse. Those are the kids who are more secure in standing up for themselves, more secure in telling and reporting because they know exactly where they were touched, what happened, you know, there’s no fake child words that we use to replace that don’t mean anything, right? Like it’s very, yeah. That’s right, okay. That’s right.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (14:12)
I love it. Yeah, he touched my cookie. Okay, like yeah, what’s your cookie? No, that’s your vulva and yes, and I firmly believe that her understanding and knowing about her body and I love that your son does too because of the body literacy curriculum that we wrote is for boys and girls to learn together because the only way to normalize it.
Adrienne (14:27)
All genders, all identities, yeah.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (14:39)
Yes is all all genders exactly. The only way is for everybody to have the same, to speak the same language and to know the words and to know and to understand what’s happening. And we’ve, yeah, no, that’s so good. I love that.
Adrienne (14:43)
Okay, so you cycle according to your energy with schooling. You know, we actually do the same with our custody schedule between my husband and I, which is like very flexible to begin with, but we do it according to my cycle, which is everything we do is so unconventional and people just don’t get it. But honestly, that’s what makes sense for us and that’s what works for us.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (15:01)
I’m so obsessed with this.
Tell me, tell me like, what do y’all do?
Adrienne (15:14)
as like bizarre as it is. So we’ve done different ones. We’ve done where I took luteal and menstrual and I wanted that to myself. And so it was a little bit longer without the kids. And then I took spring summer with the kids. And then I was kinda like, well, I don’t know. Like, I just felt like it was a really, really long time. So then I tried doing like I would have menstrual to myself and then, then follicular, was ready. had more energy, but then I wanted summer to do my girls nights and my girls trips and my hiking and my like alone, really energetic time. And then back to the kids when I was luteal because then yes, I needed rest, but I was, you know, deep cleaning with them. We were organizing with them. We were decluttering. So we’ve done it like all sorts of different ways and it continues to change, which is fine and great. And he and I both have the privilege of working for ourselves so we can adjust where we need to but as soon as I, like I’ve been disconnected from my body my entire life. I grew up Mormon, I grew up in an abusive household and I went to a French Catholic school. So like, I didn’t know anything about one standing up for myself or like listening to my body. I dissociated my entire childhood. It was my nightmare when, even when doing exercises and people like, okay, really engage your whatever. And I’m like, don’t even know what that means. I can’t, my brain to body connection was severed. And it took me really until the last, I don’t know, like four or five years as I’ve started to therapy and microdosing and psychedelic assisted therapy that I’ve really been able to be like, okay, my body is a safe space. I’m getting to somewhere where I trust myself and I’m starting to listen to my instincts and being more present and all of that was so, just so far from what I understood and what I grew up with and that’s something that trauma really does, which is why I’m so, so passionate about breaking those generational cycles and talking about childhood trauma and healing from that trauma because, you know, capitalism, white supremacy, just thrives on us being disconnected, one from each other and community and family, right, they get us to hyper be hyper individualistic, and two to separate from ourselves. Because if you’re not listening to your gut, to your instinct, your brain, you are going to mindlessly follow, you are going to obey without question, you are going to follow orders, right, we see ice now trying to get away with everything they’re trying to get away with because they’re just following orders. Like it’s not anyway, I can go on. hear myself like doing tangents, but that connection.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (17:45)
Yeah, no, yes. No, no, no, no, I’m here for it all. Yes. And I love that you’re making that connection because this was so counterintuitive for me. And I found that becoming a mom helped me reparent myself. And I’m like watching every little thing my daughter does. I’m like, okay, yep.
Listen to your body, man. It’s time to go potty. Like go to the bathroom. Like those simple things, like being a former teacher, like I could hold it for 18 hours. And that is me betraying myself. And it’s a slippery slope. And you’re just like you said, you disassociate. You don’t realize what you actually need and what your body is actually saying. And the practice of cycle thinking teaches you to kind of come back to yourself. And I got getting off birth control and all of those things brought me back to who I was. I was like, there she is. And I started to like the color pink again. you know, like I found, I just.
Adrienne:
Is that a thing?
I saw that on TikTok and I was like, is this real? Is that a true thing?
Anna Sneed M.Ed (18:54)
For me personally, it definitely is. And my little, small little case study, I have a couple of friends who are like, ugh, pink, that’s just so, and they are so completely out of touch with what their body is and does and needs. And when you kind of…And for me, it was pink because that was a color I loved as a little girl before abuse and neglect and patriarchy and capitalism. And I felt like I needed to operate in my masculine. And so I had to abandon that. Of course, pink is for little weak, you know. And so, yeah, something about leaning into your cyclical nature is it’s like a permission slip to listen to your body and be and embody who you were put here to be and what better testimony for our children to see you living authentically yourself because how can you be the best highest version of yourself if you’re not even listening to yourself?
Adrienne (19:53)
That’s right, if you’re not in touch with it and you’re not in tune with it. And it starts young. It’s honestly why I have such a problem with schools, with religion often, with this authoritarian parenting, because it relies on telling children that we know better, that we are of a greater authority because we’re older, more powerful, richer, in a different position, more experienced, anything, we know, I know that you’re cold, I know that you’re hungry, I know that you’re tired, I know what’s best for you. So you’re going to listen and you’re we’re going to train you essentially to stop tuning in to your own body. I’m going to tell you at school when you can eat, who you can talk to, when you can stand up, what like everything essentially right from from the most basic needs of going to the bathroom and eating and moving our bodies to other things of who you’re allowed to sit by because you distract this kid and not and whatever.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (20:47)
and how you should feel and oh, yeah.
Adrienne (21:15)
even when like, just logistically, I mean, you’ll understand this as a teacher, there’s absolutely no way logistically that I can have 30 kids meeting their own needs all at the same time, all in a school day, even if I wanted to, even if it was a priority for me. There is no way that 30 kids can be free to have a meltdown, to go outside, to eat, to talk, to do anything that their body needs them to do. And, and then as far as religion goes, if you’re constantly learning to trust God, not yourself, to trust parents, not yourself, to trust your church leaders, to trust scripture, like any other source, any other external source, you should trust above yourself, above your own intuition, which just goes against everything indigenous, everything sacred, everything matriarchal that we know.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (21:49)
I love that. I do. And that is when I did exit public education, when I was like, the system is broken. And I was talking to lawmakers last year, about a year and a half ago, saying, fix the system. Like you’re giving us a new steering wheel to a hundred year old car. Like we need the new car. Like a new steering wheel is not going to fix this broken system. And so there’s teachers that love it and are passionate in our we’re here to connect and teach children, the system that they’ve been placed in does not allow for that. And I, raising a little black girl in Texas, I said, there’s too much at stake. Give me my baby back. I’m not going to give you the opportunity to break her spirit and to rob her of her autonomy and to have to stand up and say all the pledges, the Texas pledge. Like all of, yeah, all of that stuff.
And I want her to learn how to learn, not what to learn, because that is going to make her a good steward of this planet. And we need good people. And I just want her to be a good person who understands how to move about and to make this place even better. And you’re right. Like, it does start with listening to your body and having the ability to, but you can’t do that in a setting of 15 kids, let alone 30. And yeah, yeah.
Adrienne (23:12)
No. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that’s right. They end when they have to have the space like we tell them, Hey, I want you to stand up for yourself. I want you to we even started inserting into curriculum, like we’re gonna talk about emotions, we’re gonna talk about feelings. But do they actually have the space, time and freedom to express those emotions? Right? Do you have the ability as a child to yell in frustration at your teacher, to get that anger out that you’re feeling about maybe, you know, corporal punishment in the classroom that one kid did something and instead the entire class is going to be punished and no one’s getting recess. I see that as unfair. I want to scream and tell you how unfair that is. Am I going to be encouraged to do that? No. And am I going to be given that space and, and, you know, applauded for standing up for myself, for standing up to a bully, even if I feel that bully is you, my teacher, or my parent even, we have to look at, it’s the same thing at home. Like, are we just being police in our own home? And are we looking over here criticizing police brutality and then being at home and replicating that system and being oppressive in our own home, right? Like how much freedom do they actually have?
Anna Sneed M.Ed (24:14)
It’s so hard.
Adrienne (24:29)
Yeah, it is so hard. It’s not, this isn’t easy, particularly because we’re going against the mainstream by doing it. We’re fringe, already fringe from homeschooling and unschooling and, you know, sinking our lives to our cycle. Like we’re already doing so many unconventional things. And then to also give our kids as many rights and freedoms as we have as adults. Society hates that. Adults hate that because it’s inconvenient. It’s loud and messy and unruly and it messes with their world order. And as we know, anyone in power, when you mess with their world order, they just want to crush that.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (24:54)
I was just saying, I’m doing this without a model to follow. Like I’m raising my child differently than I was raised. And the healing and the friction that comes along with that also compounds, you know, the difficulty of what we’re trying to do. But to me, it’s just too important. It just, and I’m just the hard-headed enough person to do it. So why not me?
Adrienne (25:14)
You and me both, you and me both.
But it’s true, you have all those layers. have the parenting layer of just being sleep deprived, the noise, the mess, like just that, that every parent deals with. You also have no blueprint that you got from examples of parenting. You also are trying to heal while you’re doing this and triggers are coming up every day that you weren’t aware were triggers for you and stuff leading back to your parenting. So it’s like this three leveled system that we’re trying to deal with and all these layers and complexity of all this work. But like you said, I can’t do it any other way. just, can’t unsee it. I can’t unhear the things that I’ve heard and I just can’t go back.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (26:05)
No, I’m not built like that. I’m not. It would be so much easier to, you know, backhand her and send her to a room when she has it outburst.
Adrienne (26:20)
Yeah. yes. Fear and control is way, way easier and more effective in the short term. Yeah, yeah. it, ⁓ gosh, as we know, doesn’t work.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (26:44)
And, yeah, it’s so much easier. Yeah. Can’t do it. Can’t do it. Okay.
Adrienne:
Yeah, okay, I wanted to ask you, does this change during perimenopause? Okay. Okay.
Anna Sneed M.Ed:
Everything changes during perimenopause.
No, the perimenopause is the time, if you haven’t started already, what do they say? The best time to plant a tree is 10 years ago, the second best time is today. That is how I feel about tracking your cycle and syncing because that’s the only way you’re going to recognize all of the things. There’s like 150 perimenopause symptoms. And if you’re not, yes, it’s crazy. Like in our app, we’re like, we’re going to have a little scroll for people and their symptoms. Our app dev team was like, we don’t have enough space for all of these symptoms. I’m so sorry. So tracking and writing it down, making a note of all of all, anything that’s new. Anything that you’re feeling that’s new that you’re experiencing that’s new physically feeling emotionally feeling Tracking it and knowing the day of your cycle that you felt it So when I was talking about the four phases Day one of your cycle is the first day that you need a period product So the bleed is there and you need a product to support your bleed That’s your day one and you’re gonna count all the days until that bleed starts again and that lets you know how long your cycle is. A lot of us were taught to call our period our cycle, but it’s your period. Just call it your period. Nobody cares. Your cycle is all four phases. Okay, so your menstrual phase is your period. It’s one part of the entire cycle. So my, my very first life coaching client came to me and said, I need you to coach me on divorcing my husband. And I was like, Whoa, as far as I knew she was happily married and I was on my own little, holistic health journey at the time, but I was just a general life coach and I just said, you know, I’m asking all the intake questions and we’re getting into the meat of things and I’m like, well, where are you on your cycle? Like what day are you? And so we count back and she’s like day 26. I’m like, okay. And we move on. We meet each week and day 14, she’s, they’re going on date night. And I was like,
things are good and she’s like, yeah, you know, maybe it’s not that bad. And they’re at date night and they’re, you know, having a great time. Come around is day 25, day 26 again. And she was like, no, let’s go back to what, you know, we gotta go. I gotta leave. It’s, it’s, I can’t take this, this and this anymore. And at the time I was really firmly in like entrenched with boundary building. I was, that was my thing. I was the badass with boundaries. That was my key offering. And I said, okay, well maybe we need to build some boundaries. And looking back when you’re happy, what’s going on on date nights that made you want to go on a date with this guy that you now want to leave.
Well, you know, he was doing this. I was like, but was he still leaving the seat up and still snoring and forgetting the things that you taught? Like all the things that she wanted to leave him for, right? She was like. I guess he was doing those things, and I was like, but they didn’t. They weren’t deal breakers two weeks ago, but they’re deal breakers now. OK, so we go through another cycle. We make it through three cycles that we realize between days 24 and 26, she wants a divorce.
So like I said, period is your report card. Yes, and we all understand because sometimes breathing makes you want to leave your partner. Why are you breathing that loudly when you are, you know, a couple of days from your bleed. And so we realized that’s what was going on and that she needed to, number one, we love to tell like bleed on it.
Just bleed on it. If you have a really big decision to make, don’t sleep on it, bleed on it. Take it to your personal red tent. Let the downloads from the universe, from the spirit guides, whoever, let them speak to you then and journal it because it’s going to be the perfect time to do that. Bleed on it. And then when you’re follicular and then you’re in a great mood, if it’s still something that bothers you, this is the perfect time when you are less biting in your tone, a little bit more flowery with your words in the springtime to address those things. Like you say you’re gonna take out the trash, but I always have to remind you, I am carrying the mental load for this whole family and it feels hard to me. And you are in a better mood to talk about it when your estrogen’s high and you’re hyper social and connective. And we know when we’re ovulating, we’re more attractive and we get more of what we want when we’re ovulating. So that’s the perfect time to bring it up because everything sounds sexy when you’re ovulating and people receive you better. So she did that and they’ve literally about three, four years ago, built their dream home. They’re still happily married. She feels seen and heard because she realized that she needed the boundaries. He was in love with her. He would do whatever she said, but she didn’t have the words to say when when our hormones are just doing this weird thing, because we are, we’re a different person every week. And we kind of, we forget that. And it’s a surprise every month, like, why am I crying watching Mulan? Like, you know what? And it’s like, yeah, the feel good hormones are gone and everything is wrong with the world.
Adrienne (33:23)
You know, something that came up while you were talking was with my ADHD. I also feel like it is actually such a good skill because ADHDers, we live according to how we feel. We, you cannot get us to do anything if we don’t want to do it. If we are not connected to that vibe, that energy, whatever it is. Like we essentially, I feel, are always living in the present. And we crash when we need to crash and we’re motivated when we’re motivated. And so I actually, I do find it very disabling in some ways, but as you were talking, I’m like, you know, the more I’ve leaned in to that neurodiversity and the more I’ve allowed myself to be more ADHD, and like not try and fit into what’s convenient to my ex-husband or convenient to society or nine to fives or whatever. I feel like I’ve, it’s perfectly suited for me to live according to my cycle. Cause I feel like I live according to my ADHD brain.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (34:43)
my gosh, I’ve got full body chills. I’m so glad you brought up ADHD, neurodivergence. I mean all of that because I feel the ADHD brain, the autism spectrum brain lives according to like leans into energy and feelings the same way that I’m talking about with living cyclically and you it’s a permission slip. It is. It’s like do what you feel because you’re going to do it more efficiently. You’re going to be happier and people are going to respect you more. You’re living your authentic self. How can you argue with someone that says this doesn’t feel good to me to do right now? I think I’ll plan that for when I’m in a better mood or I have more energy or you.
I’m not bleeding and cramping and have a headache. Like, no, I don’t want to come to your playdate and sit on a hard bench while I’m shedding the lining of my uterus. No, thank you. And it is, it’s a permission slip of sorts to live accordingly and to honor yourself. And I think our first loyalty has to be to self. You betray yourself when you when you don’t honor and lean into what your body’s calling you to do. And I understand that there is a sense of, there is some level of privilege. Not everybody can work from home and set their own schedule and decide to do and not to do. And that’s why with our app, we teach practical applications to this. If you have to go into an office or you have to head up a meeting and your day two when you’re super crampy and have a headache and you’re bleeding, you know, there are certain things you can do to support your symptoms. And again, your period, your report card. So how you love on yourself in the other four phases are gonna dictate the level and intensity of your menstrual phase symptoms. so knowing that lets you plan accordingly and it just helps you prepare your life for when that stuff happens.
Adrienne (36:43)
Mm Well, and I think once you start leaning into that, it really speaks to this deeper, you’ll feel a deeper connection to where the kind of life that you actually want to lead. And for me, and for so many people that I’ve seen, it actually starts you to lead away from, you know what, maybe this corporate job isn’t working for me. Maybe, maybe we need to move states or move countries even or you know, you really start to unpack that and go from a place of well, this is what everyone else is doing or everyone else has this house with the white picket fence and the two cars that are new and the you know, lashes and extensions and all these things and really start going why am I doing this? Does this job bring me happiness, you know, my kids being in school, does this work for me? And I, again, always with the caveat that it’s not just a matter of personal choice all the time. We are constrained by our abilities, our race, our many, systemic barriers that exist, absolutely. But the more we start to be in tune with Indigenous practices with matriarchal practices with anything that’s connecting us more to our body and nature, the moon, whatever, you actually almost start to naturally drift toward things that are outside of that system and maybe start to rethink, you know, maybe we don’t need this big house. Maybe we don’t live in the city. Maybe we make these changes with our wallets, with our priorities, with how we’re spending our time. Maybe our kids don’t need to be in three different sports a week, right? And we start to do things that feel more aligned and more and more aligned. And do you know what I mean? Like it just keeps going. And suddenly you might find yourself doing something completely different 10 years later.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (38:24)
I love that. And perimenopause is kind of like an extended luteal phase. You start, the filter is a little bit more, is, is less present. You’re not filtering your words and your wants and your needs so much anymore. And it’s a beautiful thing because you’re your body is basically like, okay, you you can’t have kids anymore. So you don’t have to doll yourself up and you don’t have to be worried about what so-and-so thinks and what, you know, you’re not tied to the same constraints as you were before. And it’s, there’s something beautiful that happens because it does allow you to come back to yourself and perimenopause. And then post menopause is the time that you come back into yourself and your energy is more, self-focus. It’s your you’re less inclined to be worrying about the needs and wants of other people. And there’s something beautiful that happens with that because you do get to sit down and examine, do I need this big house? Do we need two cars and one that’s no one drives, but we have it because it’s like you do start questioning the things that everybody around you is telling you that you should love and want and care about. But the only way you realize you’re doing that is when you start tapping into your energy and your mood and you know all the things that make you you if if you don’t take the time to stop and track and focus you’re not even going to realize that you’re feeling these things you’re just going to feel like crap and not understand why
Adrienne (39:52)
Well, we start to see that though, I feel like with women over 40, so all of a sudden, saying no becomes a lot easier all of a sudden, you know, and someone online pointed this out that it’s also the same time that men stop being interested as in us in the same way. And they stop catcalling us in the same way. And they start harassing us less right that we’re not as fertile to them. We’re not as attractive to them. We’re getting old and gross and that coincidentally, right? At the same time that we start to being like, yeah, we don’t actually care. It like, we start to shed the weight of all these people’s opinions. start to, yeah, just being so much more unapologetic. And it’s really too bad that all of that wisdom in our 40s, 50s and 60s, all of that, like, don’t give a fuck. We couldn’t exactly harness when we were younger and young girls and preteen and teen girls, right? It would be so, so powerful, which I know is what you and I do with trying to raise really strong, unapologetic children, but it’s just so bittersweet, right? To see that happening for people in their forties and just like then all that wisdom really needs to exist from day one.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (41:13)
It does. And it’s hard. They say that the youth is wasted on the young. And I get it. Our species needs to continue. And so it doesn’t bode well if you’re walking around telling everybody to fuck off and you’re, you know, you don’t care how your hair looks and you’re not worried about, you know, attracting a mate. You’re not going to, you know, further the species along. But there’s just something beautiful about the fact that we have we really do have these big chunks of our lives that are supposed to be dedicated to certain things. And perimenopause and menopause is the time that we’re supposed to be dedicated to passing on our wisdom and our knowledge. It’s not the time that we’re supposed to be making human beings and nurturing and caring for them. Like that part is over. Men, still, they say that men get better with age because they can procreate until they die. They have to still look good. We don’t have to look good anymore. Because we’re not making the babies. We’re now imparting our wisdom and our knowledge on the next generation. So we’re off the clock for the baby making stuff. And there’s so much freedom in that on this side of it that we can live this new fuller version of ourselves. Because, you know, in my 20s when I was the hot girl getting caught, cat called at and all of that stuff, that felt good.
And my weird auntie that didn’t wear a bra and, you know, didn’t care what anybody said and cussed and smoked and drank and did all those things. She was this weird person to me. I did not understand why she’s like that, but I am becoming her and I, and it’s nice over here too.
Adrienne (42:53)
Different phase, different phase. I just, wanna end with, Alok Menon, do you know them? They’re like a non-binary, amazing, amazing account. I’ll send you the link. They often talk about how people that are trans and people that are non-binary are kind of those in the world who are living the most authentically. They’re really living outside of so many constraints and boundaries and just being full of expression, very in tune with who they are and connected to themselves. And that is threatening to people who aren’t living that way. And so I think in that same way, you know, the women who are, or, folks who are menstruating who are leaning into that cycle and talking about the moon and the red tent and leaning into that intuition like it is so weird or different or threatening to people who aren’t fully liberated and fully living in ways where they are connected to themselves and connected to each other and connected to community. And so that way of life seems so threatening and different and odd and bizarre and we just don’t get it. And so what I love about what you know, the trans community is showing us and the non binary community is showing us and the autistic community, everyone living outside of what’s mainstream and what’s expected and what’s essentially being imposed on us by Western systems by white supremacist systems, right by colonialism is this free, complete freedom and liberation to be ourselves, to really live in the present, to rest when we need to rest, to, you know, storytell, to pass down wisdom, to do all of that. And I mean, we see it as the biggest threat to fascism, to those, to those systems, right, that are thrive on control and order and one way of thinking and getting people disconnected. It’s such so much easier to control a population when they’re not connected to themselves and each other. And so whenever I look at something that’s like, thank you, whenever I look at something that, know, homeschooling is getting criticized or trans people are getting criticized, I always tend to look like, okay, well, who’s being liberated and who’s being oppressed? And that’s kind of what my guideline is, right? If this is something that’s leading people to be more free, which, cycle cyncing is then I’m all for it. It’s just whatever makes more people free. I am just all over.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (45:30)
I love it. I love that connection that you made. it’s the first time that I’ve considered that. what a beautiful parallel because it is so true. how, I mean, you and I are kind of of the same mindset. Like, how are you mad at anybody who’s living authentically themselves without hurting other people? Like, how does that anger you? And the only way that that angers you is because you don’t possess the gumption, the whatever, to do that for yourself, to seek it for yourself. And again, paying attention to who’s the one criticizing is more important than who’s being criticized. that’s what I do. When someone has something to say about our unschooling, because my husband’s still a public school teacher and he’s a hundred percent on board with the fact that our daughter’s not going to public school. And the people that are criticizing, that is, you guys are the star of the show, not what you’re criticizing. So I love that juxtaposition you just mentioned. Thank you for that. That was wisdom.
Adrienne (46:27)
Thank you. Okay, Anna, I’m going to link your app and download it right away because that’s amazing. And any other resources that you send my way. Okay, I will. Is there anything that you want to leave with my audience with like what you wish people knew your like last message that you just scream from the rooftops all the time?
Anna Sneed M.Ed (46:43)
my gosh. I wish everybody that lists, that’s listening new and understood that it is easy. It’s not one more thing you have to do because we’re wearing all the hats. We’re doing all the things. We’re trying to keep our adrenals and our hydration. We’re trying to do all the things. This is not this extra thing that you just have to do to figure out you paying attention. That’s all.
The number one thing you could do today is just start tracking. Whether it’s in an app, we understand that everyone’s risk profile is different. It’s scary out there now. We don’t know what everyone’s doing with everything. We don’t sell your data. We will not sell your data. But if it’s still not a comfortable place for you to have your any type of health information online, we have physical planners. We have this really cool tool that I made that sticks on the mirror and it’s great.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (47:47)
It’s super cool. got to send you one and just start tracking. Start today. Know when the last day of the first day of your last period was not so you can tell your medical practitioner, but so you know what phase you’re in and how to to love on yourself. Just start tracking. It’s super easy.
Adrienne (48:02)
I love that. Thank you. Anna, I don’t know you very well, but I love you very much.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (48:10)
Your messaging is amazing. Your work is amazing. And I’m just so I feel so honored that you’ve you’ve taken this time to chat with me today because this is important stuff
Adrienne (48:13)
Thank you.
Yes, absolutely. Okay, we’ll chat soon. Thank you so much.
Anna Sneed M.Ed (48:23)
All right. All right. Bye.
