The Menstruality Podcast - 175. How Chinese Medicine Can Support You in Perimenopause (Kris Gonzalez)

Episode Date: December 5, 2024

In Chinese Medicine, life progresses in seven-year cycles for female bodies, and each of these phases correlates to one of the five elements; water, wood, fire, earth and metal. Today Chinese Medicine Practitioner, Kris Gonzalez describes what it means for us to move from the earth element in our 30s to the metal element in our 40s, and what this transition can teach us about how to create more health and wellness in perimenopause, or The Quickening as Alexandra and Sjanie call it. Kris shares how by the age of 35, our bodies become less forgiving of unhealthy choices, and habits that once had little impact in our 20s may no longer be tolerated by our body, mind, and spirit, and she shares a wealth of practical guidance about how to take care of ourselves, with a special focus on the three major organs that come into play in perimenopause; the kidneys, the spleen and the liver. I especially appreciated her wisdom around how Chinese medicine gives us a map to explore what is happening beyond our hormonal changes in perimenopause - and dive into the spiritual dimension of this rite of passage. We explore:The “Three Golden Opportunities” for those of us with menstrual cycles (menstruation, postpartum and perimenopause) and why it’s so important to take care of ourselves during each one.How the metal of perimenopause gives us a metaphorical sword to cut away the overgrowth of the earthy years of our 30s, so we can see a clear picture of what truly matters to us, and where we want to use our energy. The importance if replenishing your ‘jing’ essence, what happens to our jing in perimenopause, and why we all need to live a ‘jing-centred life’, especially in our 40s by resting when we bleed, nourishing ourselves well during ovulation and protecting our boundaries in the inner autumn. ---Receive our free video training: Love Your Cycle, Discover the Power of Menstrual Cycle Awareness to Revolutionise Your Life - www.redschool.net/love---The Menstruality Podcast is hosted by Red School. We love hearing from you. To contact us, email [e-mail]---Social media:Red School: @red.school - https://www.instagram.com/red.schoolSophie Jane Hardy: @sophie.jane.hardy - https://www.instagram.com/sophie.jane.hardyKris Gonzalez: @thewayofyin - https://www.instagram.com/thewayofyin

Welcome to the Menstruality Podcast, where we share inspiring conversations about the power of menstrual cycle awareness and conscious menopause. This podcast is brought to you by Red School, where we're training the menstruality leaders of the future. I'm your host, Sophie Jane Hardy, and I'll be joined often by Red School's founders, Alexandra and Sharni, as well as an inspiring group of pioneers, activists, changemakers and creatives to explore how you can unashamedly claim the power of the menstrual cycle to activate your unique form of leadership for yourself, your community and the world. Hey there, welcome back to the podcast and oh my goodness, I have such a gift for you today, particularly if you're in your 40s, but it holds gold for all of us at all phases of life. So in traditional Chinese medicine, life progresses in seven

year cycles for female bodies and each of these phases correlates to one of the five elements, water, wood, fire, earth and metal. And today I'm chatting with Chinese medicine practitioner Chris Gonzalez who shares what it means for us to move from the earth element in our 30s to the metal element in our 40s and what this transition can teach us about how to create more health and wellness in perimenopause or the quickening as Alexander and Sharni call it. Chris speaks about how by the age of around 35 our bodies become less forgiving of unhealthy choices and habits that once had little impact in our 20s might no longer be tolerated by our body mind and spirit I'm not sure if you've noticed

I've definitely noticed this and Chris shares a wealth of practical guidance about how to take care of ourselves with a special focus on the three major organs that come into play in perimenopause which are the kidneys, the spleen and the liver. I geeked out so much on this. I learned so much in this conversation. And I especially appreciated Chris's wisdom around how Chinese medicine gives us a map to explore what's happening beyond the hormonal changes in perimenopause and actually dive deeply into the spiritual dimension of this rite of passage. So Chris, thank you so, so much for joining us on the podcast. I've been exploring

your work and it's been blowing my little brain. And I think it might do for quite a few of the listeners. The real rich conversation you're having particularly I mean around all aspects of the cycle and the womb and women's health but particularly around perimenopause at the moment so I'm just so I have so many questions for you and I'm so glad you're here so thank you for joining us oh my gosh thank you so much for the invitation I love talking about this topic it's so so important we're all going to you know show up to the doors of perimenopause and menopause so it's great to be in conversation about it yeah it's coming it's coming so I'm for this conversation be for people who are in it normalizing and supportive

people who have been through it maybe to help them make sense of some of what they experienced and then for people like me who are I'm 42 so I'm sort of looking ahead and going hmm I need to be preparing you know to help us get prepared yeah and also to support the loved ones in our lives who who need support that are going through it so yeah it's for everybody absolutely can we start as we always do which is with a cycle check-in love to hear where you're at in your cycle and how it's influencing you how it's yeah what flavor it's giving to your day oh I love this question um so I'm just coming off of the really juicy inner summer ovulatory phase. Yeah. And just like starting to dip into inner autumn. And I feel like whenever that happens for me, personally, it, it does, there's like this really distinct kind of inward pull that happens and um yeah my body

starts giving me bits of signs of like okay we need a bit of circulation and movement added um um yeah and like a full circle feeling so like projects that I have or, you know, pending emails and stuff and stuff like that. I'm like, okay, they need to come full circle to get, to get ready for my next bleed. I always like to call like the luteal phase, like squirrel energy where it's like, yeah, during autumn time, there's all of the acorns on the ground and you're really kind of scurrying to put the gems in your cave or your tree to prepare yourself for winter. Yeah. So it's kind of like this full circle feeling. Yeah. That I'm going through right now. Yeah. And then just kind of broader speaking of cycles, I'm in my sixth life cycle and maybe we could talk about that. Um, yeah. In East Asian

medicine, they talk about life cycles and, uh, for women and, uh, they cycle in years of seven. So I'm in my sixth life cycle. Yeah, which is the metal years, which is around perimetopause. Yeah, so I'm in that window. Is that 42 to 49? It's 42 to 49. Yeah. Check out me with my times tables.

I've got a four-year-old, so I'm going to be actually having to learn all of these again same okay so I'm 42 so I'm entering into that and actually I'd say that half of the red school community is in that sixth cycle so that's interesting brilliant let's get into it I'll just share a little bit about where I am. I'm on day four. I actually had a really rested bleed, unusually so. It was amazing. And I'm glad because so we're going to release this a bit later. But today is the day after election day, US election day. And, you know, we were both chatting about all the feelings that we're feeling with what's happened but I needed my system to be buffered for this and that menstrual rest gave me it gave me a direct line to myself and what I'm here for and what I'm about and although I'm just personally feeling a lot of feelings, I'm not

surprised, but my body is in a state of shock. And through that, I'm just grateful to know, cool, I know what I'm about. I've been fighting for women's rights since I was 20. I'm going to keep going. And I'm going to keep dismantling the systems within me that are preventing me from being you know a source of change in this world and I'm just going to keep going and that's what we're going to do so I'm grateful for that menstrual knowing really I love this so much it really sounds like you've like rooted in that deep winter rooted system and it's almost like prepping for walking into the unknown walking into the mystery of what will happen it's like who knows but it's scary but if it's so good to hear that

you're rooted in in that deep rest and nourishment and integrity thank you rooted in that is the feeling that is the feeling I'm also just suddenly in this moment remembering something that I heard Brene Brown say which is which she believes and I agree that we're in the death throes of the patriarchy and when something is dying it fights really hard yes so I'm like right okay we just got to carry on doing what we're doing and you know bringing cyclical consciousness back and showing up up for the fight showing up yes so let's get into this beautiful east asian approach to perimenopause which has so much to offer and you mentioned it earlier the metal years the first thing I wanted to ask you about was what does it mean or can you unpack

what it means to be moving from earth to metal in this phase of our lives? Yeah I think one thing that I so appreciate and love about East Asian medicine is that it just really has this language for understanding the human experience through the lens of nature it's so connected like all of the philosophies are just rooted in nature and the deep, deep observation of nature and our relationship to it. So what came from that is what's called the five elements. And so just to name them for your audience, if they're not sure what that is. So there's water, there's the wood element there's fire earth and metal and so all of these elements relate to each other they have checks and balances on each other um in order to sustain this cycle of life and death and rebirth over and over and over again um Yeah. So, you know, starting with the water element, that's likened to wintertime and deep rest and ultimate yin and also this like watery

womb that we all kind of were gestating in before we came earth side. Yeah. So then water essentially feeds the wood element. And so out of winter, we come into the spring time of the wood element. Yeah. So speaking specifically about that concentric circle of the life cycle. So we're coming from like the watery womb and then we come into springtime and that signifies birth and our childhood. So if we think about all the children in our lives, they are full of this like young, vibrant energy. There's so much of it. It's so abundant. Yeah. So then from the wood element that provides like this kindling for the fire element to be born. So that moves us into that summer ovulation phase. monarchy, our first bleed, our initiation in puberty and young adulthood and our budding sexuality. Yeah. And that really just amplifies this like a fire element of, yeah, deep connections, you know, kind of making relationships outside of the home and so forth. Just like exploring ourselves against the backdrop of the world and people. Yeah, and then from the fire element, what we know about the qualities of fire is that it transforms.

So as much as it builds and creates with passion, it also destroys. It's like these kind of checks and balances. You can't have perpetual fire. So then it builds like this ash from the fire. And then that creates the earth element. Yeah. And so the earth element is just, it's like almost like the sediment that drops from our creative processes. And then we start to build on that compost, right? Like we're kind of settling in a bit and building soil. This really represents the time after early adulthood where it's, I call it like our reproductive years where we might start honing in on building a career for ourselves.

Maybe we're starting a family, building a home for ourselves, deepening into community bonds and really building. It's kind of like that comfort years where a lot of abundance happens and we start to like accumulate things. And that's so earth element. It's like, it's a creature of comfort, you know? But yeah, you know, we can't perpetually build and accumulate. So there's these checks and balances. So from like the earthy reproductive years, yeah, we need to come full circle and move into the more yin side of the year, where we're not accumulating so much, but we need to kind of cut away and kind of look at the harvest

and only take the things with us that really are going to nourish us as we prepare for winter. So when earth bears metal, we're really moving from this overabundant phase of our lives, where sometimes this overabundance can be a little stifling. And we almost face like these decisions in our lives where we're like, do I need this? Do I want this? Is this the direction that I want to go? Is this really feeding me or nourishing me or is it really draining at my resources? And all that alchemy and decision-making and parsing out and building clarity for ourselves is such the energetics of metal. So if we think about the earth element and all of the soil that's being compacted, we can think about the further compaction all of the soil that's being compacted we can think about

the further compaction as like the sedimentary rock formations or mountains and deep within the mountains there's all of this compression and pressure happening wow but with that we we start start to, you know, get to like the pearls or the, the gems and the, the precious metals and so forth. And it really is that process. It's all this pressure of like really defining those things in our lives that we're kind of faced with making these really hard decisions, pressing decisions, before we move back into the water element. So from metal, we move back into water. So the metal element really represents like mid to late adulthood. And then from there, like post menopause, we move back into the water element where we're just swimming in all that wisdom that we've gained. And we start to dream again. And yeah, it doesn't stop there actually

from the water element. We dwell there, we dream and almost like kind of reinvent. And then we come into the second spring back into the wood element. And yeah're living out our the second half of our lives yeah so it's just like uh like a second beginning wow what a complete system and my whole like I feel like every cell in my body is singing with it because it's all the intelligence of nature translated into our lives it's in our. Wow. Do you also see like the phases of the cycle and the different elements? Like do they overlay in that way too? Absolutely. Yeah. So usually how it's pictured is with earth in the center. So earth really represents like that pivot where all of the seasons occur.

It's the body that's experiencing all the cycles. Yeah. So the water element represents inner winter. The wood represents inner spring. So pre-ovulation, the fire represents summertime, which is the ovulatory phase. And then the metal element represents the luteal phase, which is the inner autumn. Yeah. And I talk about this a lot, but that inner autumn season of our menstrual cycles is kind

of like a blueprint or a hologram into how perimenopause will be experienced it's like a real tool uh to almost like investigate um what perimenopause will look and feel like yeah yeah this is what we're seeing in our community. Just, I mean, I literally heard it yesterday. One of the women saying, I just feel like I'm in every flavor of autumn. You know, my whole cycle is like a summery version of autumn or a springy version of autumn. But the main tone is the kind of fierceness. And I love the way you described this compression. Yeah. the kind of fierceness and I love the way you describe this compression yeah because that is the sense of the women who are in perimenopause or the quickening as we speak about it at red

school that life feels like like it's kind of tight and it's sort of just trying to kind of distill them down but whilst they're still trying to manage everything in their lives like it creates a sense of pressure for people and that's like the true nature of rites of passages it is like this narrow pathway that we have to walk and it's narrow because it's like everything else kind of falls away and our focus becomes moving forward. Um, but sometimes we tend to look back and want to go back that way. And so then the pathway becomes further and even narrower. But if we were to just soften and, um, step little bits closer, we'll see that there is like a wide opening at the end and that all of the edges that you reach during that kind of walking, they're purposeful. They're really this kind of inner journey of really defining. It's like a mirror. It really puts

up a mirror to your life and to your experiences. And it just starts asking you questions about, is this what you really want? Is this what you really need? Then it's almost like as if we're like, almost like dropping things down and letting them go and kind of lightening our load as we're traversing through the passage. Yeah, ideally, what I'm thinking of is that many live in a culture that has forgotten these ancient, timeless, indigenous ways of being with nature and most of our culture is perpetually looking back at summer and thinking we should be like that all the time we should look like that we should have that much energy our brain should function in that way and i see many women and people like feeling lost because they aren't in that phase anymore but that's really one of the only phases that's celebrated and welcomed and honored in our much of our current culture is painful yeah

yeah um that's a really loud message too so it's really hard to disengage from that. Yeah. And I, I think that's why I love having conversations like this because it gives like a different perspective on the experience of more like embrace and that you are so held and you're going to make it through. Everybody's on the other side cheering for you to make it through. Yeah, and I think about a lot like in the broader context of how we almost strip away our doing the rites of passages or like honoring the rites of passages they're like really bypassed or we try and hack our ways out of it or and I wonder if that's like a real disservice to us and in really building that that grit that shining of you know the coal to come to these pearls of wisdom and then passing on that wisdom to our young yeah it it feels like we kind of completely strip that away or bypass it um yes well well thank you for helping us disengage I feel very disengaged from the story hearing you speak you

know it's you say grit but I think of that word metal it's like these rites of passage are are giving us the metal to be able to move on into the next level of expression and of wisdom and of beingness that's being asked of us in this wonderfully cyclical life it's um yeah the word metal is yeah it points to me of a kind of tenacity courage that we need to have forbearance um yeah if we think about metal we can also think about like a sword or just some type of tool to cut away like the overgrowth of the earth truly matters and really where we want to use our energy because what typically happens at the fifth life cycle, and this is through just like deep observation of the human experience. So for female bodies, what happens

naturally around the fifth life cycle. So if we have seven year life cycles, that's seven times five. So that's around age 35, if I'm doing math correct. And so around that time all over our classics, what it says is that our ability to build qi and blood becomes a little bit more challenged around this time. And we can think about qi and blood as just broad nutrients and energetic force, right? And hormones is a part of that. So I feel like a lot of the conversation these days are just about hormones, perimenopause and menopause are just about hormones and if you just supplement yourself with these hormones and everything's going to be okay and um again i think this really kind of bypasses the the real spiritual emotional journey that this is of perimenopause. Yeah. So with perimenopause, what typically happens at the fifth life cycle,

not to say that you're like straight into perimenopause, but that journey towards the metal years is, is on its way. So around the age 35, we're still kind of very much in that earth element. And the earth element is all about digestive strength. It's our ability to transform and transport everything that we ingest and then make something of it to utilize it. And so that ability to do that is just a little bit more compromised and challenged at the entrance of the fifth life cycle, so around age 35. And so the real emphasis around that time is to really hone in on what we're ingesting. Are we metabolizing it efficiently so that we can build qian blood to sustain us for the rest of our lives. Also, what typically happens is when a system is going through a transition, like how the

digestive system is during that time, the body will always resort to its resources in order to get through that transition and change. And so your resources here in East Asian medicine are living in your kidneys, living in your water element. This is our root system. And you can liken it to the adrenal system. So I call it like the kidney adrenal system. It's our backup reserves. This is our savings account that we're going to live off of for the rest of our lives. And so for a lot of us, what happens is we're kind of approaching the fifth life cycle. Our naturally starts to happen that she and blood production is slowing down a little bit. So we really need to pay attention to that.

Our body will start to pull from our resources to kind of get us through the change because it's all about survival. But a lot of us have resources that are overdrawn. Our savings account is gone. We're burnt out. We've done too much. We've overextended ourselves because that's what culture tells us to do is burn the candle at both ends and you'll sleep when you die. You know, all of these messages of just

go, go, go. And where productiveness is the greatest value. It's like your ability to just work, work and do and do and do. So a lot of us show up to that fifth life cycle with overdrawn savings accounts. So not only is that happening to where our bodies are not able to pull from resources, but then the change is starting to happen. So it's no wonder that a lot of us feel, feel that in our bodies, in our minds, emotionally. Yeah. Something is rocky. Something doesn't feel like it's cycling or rhythmically. So it feels just so different we're not able to adapt to stress as much um we're not building teen blood as efficiently um yeah and then a whole host of other um things can be experienced and then a lot of women like me are having babies at that time. So I had my son when I was 39 and I was already feeling the changes, but then that there's a whole next level of using resources of the body to make a baby and birth a

baby and feed a baby at the beginning of its life. Isn't there. And that's really on the other side of that I'm really feeling it whoa okay I am tired I am tired yeah what you're speaking to is Jing essence I'm not sure if you know what Jing essence is but that's the the substance really that resides in your kidney reserves um it is, um, two parts, uh, you're born with, uh, you know, uh, an amount of Jing essence that you inherited from your ancestry, your lineage from DNA, from your parents and so forth. So you can liken it to like DNA. Um, but then you have this second aspect to Jing, which is postnatal Jing. So from the moment that you're born, um, till present day, you have this second aspect to Jing, which is postnatal Jing. So from the moment that you're

born, um, till present day, you have this ability to almost, um, replenish your reserves, you know, and, and build upon what you came in with. Uh, so you're not the way at the whim of your genetics, essentially. Um, yeah. So Jing essence is a really crucial um substance that should be protected because that is literally uh the stuff that you're going to live off of for the rest of your life and um so there's like this real emphasis in east asian medicine to do anything to protect it and not squander it. And so there's like these three golden opportunities essentially to really have this opportunity to replenish Jing essence or the opposite where it can actually really compromise our health if we're not able to replenish that Jing. And so through monthly menstrual cycles, we lose a little bit of Jing through, you know, the egg that's represented as Jing essence that's ovulated that cycle to shedding menstrual

blood is the manifestation of Jing essence. And so that's why there's all this emphasis on making sure that, um, we replenish the loss, uh, so that we're, you know, kind of whatever is lost, we rebuild so that we can store that for later. Um, and then what you were speaking to with your personal experience and, um, gestating oral conception, gestating, birthing, and then healing postpartum and feeding our young. That is like the greatest Jing loss that we could ever experience. Yeah. So that's why so many traditional cultures around the world have such a strong emphasis and play so much importance on recovery of the mother. It's so important. Yeah. So taking that time, that window of time, the community coming in for full support so that

the mother can replenish Jing essence, because that not only matters for her full recovery, but it also matters for the grander community so that she can show up to the grander community. Um, yeah, fully replenished. Yeah. Um, yeah. And then the third golden opportunity is perimenopause. So that's when our energy allocation really starts to change. And, um, yeah, we need to do everything possible to make sure that our resources are nice and full. Okay, I'm going to pause the conversation with Chris just for a couple of minutes to share a story from one of our menstruality leadership program graduates at Red School and also to share an invitation for you to join Alexandra, Shani and the amazing global circle of change makers,

health professionals, yoga teachers, nurturers, artists that are gathering for the menstruality leadership program in 2025. So this is a profound immersion into the power and magic of the menstrual cycle. It's regularly described as revolutionary and life-changing and it's called a leadership program because it's designed to call you home to your own way of leading authentically and powerfully in your life, in your work, your relationships and all the roles that you play through an intimate connection with your cyclical intelligence. And today I'd love to share a story of transforming menstrual pain into power from one of the Red School graduates, Nupelda Tam. And then we'll get back to the conversation with Chris. Before the MLP, I struggled with long and painful inner winters and challenging inner

autumns and short inner springs and summers. Despite feeling connected to nature, I was questioning menstruality and I felt alone with my challenges. I was hearing about empowering experiences with menstruation and it sparked my curiosity. How could there be power in what I experienced as pain? So joining the MLP, the transformative experience wasn't only one single change, it was many. I peeled back layers, building awareness and acceptance. I gave myself permission on different layers, listened to my cycle, honoured my bleed, harnessed my inner critic, pract practiced self-care and self-awareness. So during the programme, my perspectives changed, allowing me to feel the magic and the greater

holding of my cycle. It was the first time in my life I understand my cycle and find empowerment in every season. Of course, none of this would have been possible without the guidance of Alexandra and Shawnee. They both are incredible inspiring leaders and teachers their approach is both gentle and profound i am grateful for the opportunity to walk this path i wish this knowledge were accessible for you can be a part of it and spread awareness in your community and beyond. It was a blessing and a pleasure to be in the MOP, to be with a great community and to feel the dedication of everyone involved. Unfortunately, I had my first,

like my postpartum in lockdown. My husband had to go back to work after two weeks. So it wasn't replenishing, but I also wasn't going out. So it was just me and Artie. I had a whole freezer full of food. So there was, yeah, that there was some beauty to it. But yeah, I love it when I see, like, I've just seen my sister-in-law, she had her partner with her, lots of people coming to visit and cook. She was able

to fully rest. And I see in her, like now four months on, you know, she is in a really good place. I can see that she was able to preserve her Jing or replenish her Jing. Oh, I love this. So can we talk about replenishing, replenishing Jing? Yes. What your recommendations are, particularly in the perimenopause space and time, what can we be doing to preserve our Jing and to replenish? Yeah. of our jing and to replenish yeah so I'd say that the first thing is from this point forward

to center jing like live a jing centered life where your mindset is a bit shifted to where you consider your jing and so yeah doing everything to pay attention to its messages that it's providing you and then also to protect it from this point forward. And I always tell my patients and clients that the most damaging thing to squandering is to live out of sync with nature. We are so, we're just physiologically linked to nature's rhythms. And so certain organ systems and so forth are primed along like the circadian clock or infradian clock. Yeah, so that's one way to really protect our Jing and to prevent the further losing of Jing is to live as close to you can to the rhythms of nature. And that could be or that could look like cycle syncing you know like deeply resting like you did during the bleeding days deeply deeply nourishing yourself as you're coming into like pre-ovulation yeah just doing something to express your passions during ovulation and then really doing the work to

protect your boundaries and knowing when to say no and inhabiting the strength of the metal, the inner autumn time to protect your energy. Yeah. So cycle syncing is an amazing way to protect your Jing, but also yeah, replenish it. So that's one way that's what it can look like. And also in a broader sense, living seasonally. I know that they say in California or LA, there's no seasons, but there definitely are. They're just a little bit more subtle. But living according to the seasons. Yeah, just learning what nature has to teach us about what it means to be in wintertime. Yeah, are we going to down smoothies and eat really cold salads during winter? Are we going to really take this opportunity

to, to nourish with porridges and soups and so forth. Um, so it's like little things like that. Um, yeah. And then beyond that, um, there, if there's a situation where you, you know, it, and you feel it in your body that your levels of reserves are, yeah, a bit challenged or compromised. I think it's a great idea to, to reach out and to get on maybe like a real custom formula to really replenish because substance treats substance, right? So Jing essence is literally the densest aspect of ourselves. And so it is material. It's like the material that we're going to be really resourcing as we move throughout our lives. So yeah, catering a personalized herbal formula to really help replenish Jing essence. And then also with the spiritual emotional aspect of Jing, this window of opportunity, the fifth and sixth life cycle. And it's really broad and wide.

It's almost like this gift that's presented. And I would say instead of doing more, because maybe doing more might add to the overwhelm, think of ways to almost do less. What can we, it's almost like a pause. Like we are granted this great pause to examine our harvest, essentially. and really discern what is pulling at my already challenged resources. And as much as it's pulling, is it equally nourishing? So maybe those things we will maintain and keep. But if there are things that are super depleting, it might be time to soften around possibly letting those things go so it can free up resources and not further deplete. And I don't want to sugarcoat it and say that this is a very easy process.

Yeah, just let it go. It's not. It's not easy. It could really upend the trajectory. It'll shift things really dramatically sometimes, shift directions. And yeah, so we don't want to downplay the enormity of the decisions that need to be made during this time. And what's really unique is that the metal organs are the lungs and the large intestine, which have so much practice of taking in and letting go, taking in the breath, releasing the breath, taking in food, releasing the food, right? So they have a lot of practice in that. With the lungs, they are said to be the home of grief. And so we really have to name the grieving process of this transition. And so the lungs

really provide this capacity to just inhale and exhale throughout the whole process and maybe even visit the grief or create space for the grief. There's so many people that I work with that didn't have the opportunity to create a life. And so there's a deep grieving process in that. Yeah. And it could be, you know, other aspects of grief that also come up and just letting go of maybe a career that you once loved, but it's not feeding you anymore. Or maybe it could be a really prominent relationship in your life that needs a bit of re-evaluation. Yeah, so lots of questions to be answered during this time

yeah yeah I love that we can lean into our lungs and our large intestines to remember how to take in and let go take in and let go it's just the you know we often say we've got it all within us it's all here within us you're saying very much like the teaching our organs can teach us how to go through these psycho-spiritual processes I love it I'm gonna blow my little brain brain it's so so beautiful yeah yeah thank you for naming that there is a very particular grief around whether people have been able to be mothers or not to create life or not and that's very present in our community too and such a deep and challenging reconciliation process um i had a question about metal oh i can talk about metal forever above anything it seeks clarity

it's a quality over quantity yeah it's it's all about discernment yeah that really integrous like strong aspect of metal really provides us this um embodiment to be able to to inhabit it you know inhabit that strength of metal yeah yeah this is what I was feeling I was imagining us all with our swords cutting back the overgrowth of the earth you know where we've been caring caring caring working working working growing growing but that it's exactly that metal we need to mixing metaphors here, but to swim upstream and say, no, I'm not going to take on the burden of care and responsibility and labor that so as particularly women take on in our world or, or, you know, don't have it dumped on us.

It's like we need that metal and that strength and that warrior self to be able to say no to the collective stories because this is what I hear a lot it's like oh you know I like all of this advice and it sounds really good but how on earth do I actually implement it when I've got um a big job parents I'm caring for kids I'm caring for you kids I'm caring for, you know, whatever it is that people are tending to. And it's like, there's such a secret wisdom and power here in this metal in this, this sword of discernment. Yeah, it really kind of cuts through to the core of what you truly value, what is most important to you. Yeah, And we have practice in this. It's like every menstrual cycle, we go through the inner autumn season, which is like a little minute reflection of what the perimenopausal years really represent. And so we have practice in that compressed feeling of,

of, um, things coming full circle. There's something coming the winter time we need to prepare. We need to reprioritize. We need to make strong boundaries. Um, I like to call it premenstrual strength. I don't like the whole PMS, like premenstrual syndrome, but it really does provide this almost like a backbone of being super clear on what you can handle, what you cannot handle, what you will tolerate, what you will not tolerate. And then moving forward in those sets of values. That's what metal provides, the strength to do that. Yeah. So when it comes to a lot of the physical things that can happen in perimenopause, like I'm thinking cycle length changing. So very unpredictable cycles or very heavy bleeding, or insomnia,

anxiety, like the different things that can happen that make life really difficult. I always want to say, what's the answer, Chris? But is it? It's everything that we're talking about. But I guess the thing is that the essence, it's like if we can do these practices to replenish, can that help with the symptoms too, the physical symptoms? Yeah, the symptoms are really a spectrum and it's so different for each and every one of us. And I think that this is kind of one of the core issues with conventional medicine is that they'll just provide like this one answer for everyone but it's really unique to each and every one of us because we all have different constitutions and we all have different lifestyles and so forth um but yeah like you said jing essence is an important aspect i would say that would be like the root. And then everything else

is almost like these branches. So we always want to pay attention to the root because that's what's going to kind of carry us through the passage, right? Because the body is always, you know, going to prioritize survival. Yeah. And so I would say with all of the other ones at least in East Asian medicine there's always a reason for it they're not like random yeah it's not all in your head as some people would say yeah so when we're talking about symptoms having to do with like a lot of hormonal changes that are happening you know like the length of the cycle is shifting, super heavy bleeding, maybe a built up of masses that you've never had before, like cysts or fibroids, or maybe like fibrocystic breasts, you know, usually that has to do with the liver or the wood element in East Asian medicine.

And this is kind of across all the boards of all the different modalities that as we enter into the fifth life cycle, that's the digestive organs that we really need to pay attention to but as we're entering the sixth life cycle it's really the liver that kind of takes the brunt of the tap and so it's a bit overburdened and so there is this kind of like almost estrogen dominance that that might occur because it's typically progesterone that starts to dip a little bit. And so in kind of relative ratios, if progesterone is down, then estrogen is relatively dominant. And so then you start to feel that in your body. So there's like this temporary place within this transition where we're a bit estrogen dominant. And so, yeah, just unburdening the liver any way that we can by limiting like exposures to,

you know, our ever increasing toxic world and unburdening the liver um you know staying away from plastics and synthetic fragrances is is an amazing first step to unburden the liver I'm so much more bothered by chemicals in these past few years like I feel sorry for aid because he's wonderful at like taking care of our house but I come in and I'm like oh love you've sprayed and I can't stand it I'm like I want to say thank you for cleaning our kitchen but it's like oh yeah it's it and I've noticed it's just increasing and increasing over the years now yeah yeah so that there's three major organs that really come on to play uh or come into play uh during perimenop. It's the kidneys, which is the root system, the spleen, which is all about digestion and being able to build qi and blood, aka hormones, and then the liver. So because the root system and the digestive system, the earth element is really busy. It's

really busy during this time of just trying to make it through. All of the other things are just tasked to the liver to just handle it. And so sometimes it's a bit overburdened. And so we just need to unburden it so through lifestyle, you know, maybe downloading these environmental working group or think dirty apps and go through the house, you know, make it a project, maybe one room a month and just really just kind of analyze, am I exposing myself unnecessarily to the toxins and xenoestrogens, which are just these really, really strong forms of estrogen. Yeah, so that's one way. But another way is to make sure that we're actually really enhancing our body's ability to metabolize estrogen. Yeah, so, you know,

the whole detoxification process of the liver requires minerals and vitamins. So making sure that our digestive system is on par to be able to have all of that full range of minerals and vitamins to be able to kind of lock and key into the detoxification process. So what I find is a lot of people during this time go on super restrictive diets, they exercise a lot. And these are really things that almost work against you. Yeah, you want to continue to have body. We want to resource the body during this change. And then making sure the bowels are moving. So this is where the large intestine comes into play. So the liver and large intestine are a tag team when it comes to estrogen metabolism. So if the liver is doing a good job, it'll send it to the large intestine to get rid of the waste. But if the bowels are not moving, the estrogen can get upcycled again and again and again.

Yeah. So those are just a few ways to kind of unburden the liver. And then other symptoms that are having to do more with like sleep and body temperature, that's really heart medicine. So it's almost like each one of us will have like a prominent element that kind of comes in play, either it having to do with constitution or maybe where we are on the journey. Yeah. So those like more vasomotor things really have to do with like the heart in East Asian medicine. Yeah. So the heart needs lots of blood to be able to pump. Yeah. So if there's not enough blood or yin, then that can create like a scenario where the body is like warmer or has like these heat surges so making sure that yin is completely nourished to prevent like yang from

surging very very high. Wow that's such an interesting take on hot flushes wow okay so the yin needs to be nourished so that the yang doesn't fire up and the yin nourishment I'm kind of sensing that a lot of that comes from rest is that right uh definitely from rest it's almost so if we were to think about like the scale of substances so you have like you have qi you have yang, you have blood, yin, and jing. You can kind of think of it as like a spectrum. Yeah, so yin is like that substance that's a bit less viscous than jing, but not as viscous as blood. So yin is like that part of us that nourishes the eyes, that nourishes all of our mucus membranes, that nourish the skin, the synovial fluid within, you know, the joints and so forth. It's like the undercurrent of

fluidity and nourishment in the body. Yeah, so of course, protecting it as you would protecting through, you know, lifestyle and syncing with rhythms and so forth. But also through nutrition. I don't know how it is over there in the UK, but here, I would say that the broader diet is very yang based it's not yin based and so the the deep hydration in foods is lost here there's not a lot of hydration in food we like crunch don't we we like crunchy things crunchy things yeah or we really like like super yin things that actually bog down our digestion like kind of greasy foods and fried foods and so forth and that just really wreaks havoc on our digestive vigor ice cream and french fries is not good for us in perimenopause damn it yeah this is all very new

to me and I'm fascinated I'm imagining like a big bowl of like squash soup squashing carrot soup with like warming warming spices in am I on the right kind of track there yeah so anything that's super hydrated so like a soup like that would require so much hydration to be able to have the soup. Right. So deeply hydrating foods and young foods would be so like the raw diets are very young oriented. um yeah and then super uh super super spicy uh kind of cuts away yin lots of people like their spicy foods here so yin would be um you know all of the the grains that have like um a little mucit what is the word mucilaginous like um like buckwheat is a bit like yeah yeah like foods that really like like the oatmeals like grains like the the fruits and veggies um when they're cooked down or steamed and then there's lots of particularly yin nourishing foods I can share you know a list

of those to your audience oh my gosh that would be such a gift that would be amazing yeah like yin well actually like yin um blood and then also gene so there's particular foods that really um enhance gene um plus there's like tonics. I would say the thing with tonics, you have to make sure that your digestive system works really, really well because usually, um, yin like superiorly yin and Jing tonics, like herbs are kind of, um, what do you call it cloying and because they're so nourishing that it requires like a really strong digestive system to be able to you know metabolize and transform those so that's the only caveat with those things a strong digestive system yes wow this is so amazing I'm really really grateful I feel like this is a treasure trove um for our community thank you so much and I want to honor your time because I really could

ask you so much more um but yeah maybe just in closing Chris well firstly I'd love to ask you to share how people can get in touch with you if they're loving what they're hearing how can they work with you could you share a bit about what you're up to yeah yeah um so I am in a bit of transition my husband's in a a postdoc right now and applying for jobs all over the country so I have no idea where we're going next. It's a bit of a mystery. Yeah. So I don't have a private practice right now. A lot of what I offer is virtually and online. Yeah. I have a series of courses. I have a really broad blog on my page at thewayofyen.com that you can explore and learn. Um, I have lots of free resources too. Um, yeah, like free courses that you can take. Um,

yeah, just to almost, uh, dip your toes into exploring the East Asian medicine lens and how it views the womb continuum. Yeah. And then two times a year, I do have offerings like virtual offerings. Right now we're immersed in my offering of When Earth Bears Metal, which is all about navigating perimenopause. It's like a six week journey that we're all on where we're visiting each one of the elements and really relating to our changing perimenopausal bodies so that we can actually, yeah, really discern where we are on our journey and what particular things that we need because it's

going to be different for each each one of us um yeah and then I also have an offering called maidens administration where I teach people how to hold maiden circles um yeah in their communities so they they can teach our young about yeah how to view the menstrual cycle as a barometer of health that's so beautiful I mean imagine all of the young ones knowing about the three golden opportunities from the beginning. That's like world changing stuff. Yeah. Imagine that world where our girls and our young ones know their own bodies and how to nourish them themselves and how to tend to themselves from the very beginning. That's

such a beautiful thought exactly yeah and um I I do hear that a lot like I wish I learned this when I was young I hear that from so many people who take the course and yeah so just imagining how we can really make that happen for our future young um to where they're equipped you know with not experiencing their bodies in shame or um as a burden um yeah just flipping the script a little bit you know well everything about the way you're approaching this is the absolute opposite of shame it's like it feels like you're re-embedding us in the naturalness of what's going on in our bodies it's so so beautiful I wonder if in closing Chris if you might have a closing word for someone listening who is feeling the pressure feeling the stretch experiencing symptoms like what could they

I don't I don't even want to say what could they start to do today because they don't need more things to do we don't need more things to do but yeah just some words some warm warm words of wisdom that could buoy them along yeah I was like closing my eyes as the prompt was coming in and um yeah and the word spaciousness came up and like yeah even in tight spaces and pressure there's yeah there's always just a little bit of room for spaciousness um if we yeah if we almost um yeah there's like a deep listening of what can be let go to create the spaciousness so that it relieves some of that pressure um yeah and and that might everybody's timeline is so differently i would say follow the pacing of your body um yeah maybe um tuning in

um really almost following the impulse of the inward draw and maybe sometimes that pressure could be compounded by always looking outwards for guidance and really trusting that there is like this inner draw for a reason because you know, it's like there's a knowing deeply of what needs letting go in order to create that space. And nobody's going to know what that thing is or what those things are more than you. Yeah, so the inner draw and the pressure and the compression does serve a sort of purpose. It's to really just drive to the core of what what it's like excavating what

the core values are um it's like seeking it's searching yeah beautiful beautiful thank you so much this has been really wonderful for me I know our listeners will appreciate it and perhaps we can have a part two sometime down the line about the menstrual cycle too I would love that so much thank you so much thank you love have a good rest of your day bye thank you so much for being with us today i hope you enjoyed this conversation and found it as enriching as i did if you're curious about continuing your studies and exploration into the power of the menstrual cycle then the menstruality leadership program with red school could be for you we have a free event coming up on on Tuesday the 10th of December which is all about how menstruality can support you in your career and your leadership so you can register for that

free event at menstrualityleadership.com and that's also where you can find out all about the menstruality leadership program for 2025. All right thank you again for being with us this week. Please share this episode with someone who you think would benefit from it. And I will be with you again next week. And until then, keep living life according to your own brilliant rhythm.