645: Dr. Jolene Brighten on Is This Normal: Hormones, Sex, Periods, and Using Your Cycle to Your Advantage

Child: Welcome to my Mommy’s podcast.

This episode is sponsored by Hiya Health, which is my go-to source for multivitamins, especially for my younger kids, before they can swallow pills. Typical children’s vitamins are basically candy in disguise, filled with unsavory ingredients and things you would not give to your children otherwise. Most brands on store shelves are filled with sugar, unhealthy chemicals and other gummy junk that growing kids, or frankly, anyone should never eat. And this is why I’m so glad I found Hiya Health. Hiya makes children’s vitamins with zero sugar and zero gummy junk and unsavory ingredients. Yet they taste great, and they are perfect for picky eaters. They’re also nostalgic and remind me of the children’s vitamins I took as a kid, though I probably wouldn’t love those ingredients. Hiya is unique because it fills the most common gaps in modern children’s diets to provide full body nourishment for our kids, with a yummy taste that they will love and you will not have to fight them over. They manufacture in the USA with globally sourced ingredients that are each selected for optimal bioavailability and absorption. And the best part? They arrive straight to your door on a pediatrician recommended schedule, so you never have to worry about running out. Your first month comes with a reusable glass bottle that your kids can personalize with stickers. So in the case of my kids, with six of them, they never get them confused. And then every month after, Hiya sends a no plastic, eco friendly refill pouch of fresh vitamins. Which means that Hiya isn’t just good for your kids, it’s also great for the environment as well. So you as a mom no longer have to worry about running out of vitamins, and they will automatically arrive when you need them. You can check them out and get them for your kids by going to Hiyahealth.com/wellnessmama. And you’ll also save 50% on your first month.

This episode is brought to you by Apollo neuro. If you haven’t heard of this, I have been experimenting with and they utilize a new touch therapy experience by creating the Apollo wearable device. It was developed by neuroscientists and physicians to help improve sleep, increase energy, improve recovery, and focus through soothing, gentle waves of vibration that mimic the body’s natural ones. The Apollo wearable helps your body relax and reduces feelings of stress, which helps put you in a state that allows you to have more control over how you want to feel. The Apollo wearable will give you more energy to power through your day and to help you sleep better at night, an effect that I have felt personally. And all you have to do is put it on your wrist and feel the soothing vibrations. It’s basically like a remote control for how you want to feel throughout the day, whether it’s more energetic, less stressed, a better mood, or wanting to feel more calm and relaxed and sleepy.
It’s a new technology and brand to the world, which is a game changer for both health and wellness in the wearable tech space. The new initiatives from Apollo include two new scientific research studies with groundbreaking results. Their sleep study demonstrates that Apollo users can get up to 30 more minutes of sleep per night when it’s used consistently for at least 3 hours a day, five days a week. In a peer reviewed study validating the Apollo wearable as the first wearable to significantly increase heart rate variability, or HRV, accelerate athletic recovery (which is what I’ve been using it for), and improve cardiovascular fitness. And this again is proven by a peer reviewed trial conducted at the university of Pittsburgh.
From a health and wellness perspective, it is a safe and noninvasive alternative to natural and or pharmaceutical sleeping pills. And it’s been tested across thousands of users in the clinic and in the real world to help address conditions like insomnia, trauma, PTSD and ADHD. And from a wearable tech perspective, Apollo is unlike any other fitness health wearable because it doesn’t just track your health biometrics, it actively improves your health by strengthening your nervous system. And all you have to do is wear it and feel the vibes. You can use it in different ways. You can wear it on a band around your wrist or ankle or on a clip attached to your shirt collar, bra strap, or waistband. It’s like a hug for your nervous system that helps you to be calmer and more mindful. And it works in tandem with our mobile app to help you transition through the day with goal oriented modes like sleep and renew, clear and focused, relax and unwind, rebuild and recover, and more. The science and technology are the real deal, and Apollo was created by neuroscientists and physicians who have successfully completed six clinical trials with nine more underway. You can check it out and find the effects that they have validated, including 40% less stress and feelings of anxiety, 19% more time in deep sleep on average, 11% increase in HRV and up to 25% more concentration and focus by going to wellnessmama.com/go/apollo and you can save 15% with the code wellnessmama15.

Katie: Hello, and welcome to “The Wellness Mama” podcast. I’m Katie from wellnessmama.com, and I’m here today with a good friend of mine, Dr. Jolene Brighten, who is a women’s health and hormone expert. And she’s a prominent leader in women’s medicine in the U.S. She’s a licensed naturopathic physician, and she’s board certified in naturopathic endocrinology and clinical sexology. And she takes an integrative approach in her clinical practice.
I love her message around a lot of this, and she has a new book that we talk about today called “Is This Normal?” where she tackles a lot of the misconceptions and myths surrounding women’s health in medicine when it comes to hormones and periods and sexuality. And we go deep on things like that, like what women are told that are normal that are not when it comes to their health, why many of the things women are taught about their bodies are wrong and why women were not included in medical research for a long time. And we’re still far behind on research.
We talk about what periods symptoms are common but not normal and how to fix them, why things like urinary incontinence… they don’t have this in France because they do postpartum therapy to help with this. We talk about thyroid health and adrenals in relation to hormones, what to know about periods and our cycles. We talk about menstrual pain. We talk about seed cycling and how to use it to help your hormones. And then we talk about vaginal health, microbiome, pH, scent, etc., what’s normal, what’s not. We talk about libido and how to support it, and she goes through her 28-day plan for better hormone health as well as much, much more. She has such a wealth of knowledge. We get to cover a lot in this episode. So without any further wait, let’s join Dr. Jolene. Dr. Jolene Brighten, welcome. Thank you for being here.
Dr. Brighten: I’m so excited for this conversation today and to actually get to see you again. I mean, it’s been several months, but it was such a treat to actually be in person together again. The little things in life these days.
Katie: Yes, and hopefully again soon. But we’ve done episodes before and we got to go deep on hormonal birth control, which you are definitely an expert. I will link to that in the show notes. If you guys have not heard our first episode, full of so much important information. But you are an expert in so many other areas of women’s health as well. And my audience ranges from moms in their 20s to moms in their 60s and everything in between. So, I get a gamut of questions, and I’m, of course, not qualified to answer a lot of them because I don’t have the expertise that you have. So, I’m really excited for this conversation. I think in your new book, you cover so many topics, and we won’t be able to get through all of them in this episode, so I’ll make sure we link to it.
Dr. Brighten: Definitely not.
Katie: But maybe to start broad, I know you did a ton of research for this book. Maybe give us some of the common issues that women are told are normal that aren’t, and we can just start as broad categories because it seems like this is a massive problem in the medical industry, is that women have legitimate problems and are told, “No, that’s just normal. That’s just normal.” And I know I was told after, you know, giving birth, like, “Oh, those symptoms are completely normal. It couldn’t be thyroid disease, that’s just postpartum,” or whatever it may be. So, let’s go through big categories of things that are considered normal that maybe aren’t.
Dr. Brighten: Totally. Well, I mean the thyroid disease, right? Everything from brain fog and heartburn to constipation. You know, I think this is such a great place to start because most of the things that we are told about our body that’s just like part of being a woman, and the only hope you have is like some, you know, medical intervention is all wrong. And we’re told like, “That’s it, that’s just normal. It’s a normal part of being a woman.” And this goes from, you know, things like PMS to really any period problem, right, that you put in the bucket. Like if you are struggling with your period, you’re having fatigue. If you’re having mood swings, anxiety, trouble sleeping. And there’s even the other things that aren’t really recognized as hormone issues.
So like brain fog is one of those symptoms of hypothyroidism or low estrogen that oftentimes gets kind of brushed to the side. Same with things like, you know, having mood symptoms, so depression, anxiety, insomnia, the sleep issues I talked about. You know, I mentioned heartburns, so digestive trouble, feeling like you have flu-like symptoms before your period, which is what a lot of people refer to as period flu. These are, you know, as I list this, I think people are probably gonna be like, “This is like everywhere in your body,” which is true because every single system in your body has receptors for these hormones. And so if you have a hormone imbalance of any kind, it can really show up in any system. And while it comes to, you know, when it comes to like estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, we often think like those are gonna be very, like, ovary, uterus specific. They really can impact every part of our body from our bone health, to our brain health, our cardiovascular health.
And, you know, as you were mentioning being a mom, you know, some of the other things that people don’t commonly think of as a hormonal issue of anyone who’s under 50 or, like, you know, not anywhere near menopause are, you know, the pain that we have… So, the issues that we have like painless sex or vaginal dryness or urinary incontinence. And, you know, we were just chatting before you recorded about being in Europe, and like if you’re in France, urinary incontinence is not a thing after having a baby because you’re gonna be prescribed postpartum, this physical therapy visit so that you can rehab your pelvic floor. In the United States keen when you giggle, that’s like a ubiquitous joke.
If anybody watches “Workin’ Moms,” so apparently that’s in Canada too. So, there’s all of these symptoms that, yes, that can be pelvic floor dysfunction and it can be musculoskeletal, but it also can be related to your hormones. I mean, that’s part of the healing postpartum as well, is that our hormones have to come back online after, you know, having a little switch, not a hiatus] the little switch in their agenda of like, “Let’s nurture, grow small human to, oh, we gotta get back to being the cyclical creature again.”
Katie: I’m glad you brought up that one as something that’s considered normal because you’re right, the memes abound on, you know, peeing when you jump on a trampoline, or sneeze, or laugh. And I didn’t know that about France, that it’s not common there because they have a plan for how to actually rehab the body. And I feel like that doesn’t get talked about here. So, I would guess a lot of women listening maybe are like, kind of nodding their heads like, “Oh yeah, that happens to me.” What are some of the steps that women can take proactively and/or maybe like my youngest is six, you know, people who have older kids, that we can do to help rehab our pelvic floor and help our hormones in that postpartum phase?
Dr. Brighten: Yeah, well, there’s no point that is a bad time to go see a pelvic floor physical therapist if you’re struggling with painless sex. If you’re just having pain like sitting, if you are having urinary incontinence, you’re having fecal incontinence, I mean, this is like part of why I wrote, “Is This Normal?” It’s because like we just… We try not to talk about these things, just accept them as normal. And then it’s always like I’m at a party and it’s this like hush whisper of like, “Hey, so I’m just wondering, like, is this normal?”
And it happens a lot on social media because people can be anonymous, but I think that unless you really trust someone, you’re not having these conversations, which is why not a lot of women are having these conversations with their doctors as well. So, seeing a pelvic floor physical therapist, absolutely a must. I think working with them and then maybe in tandem, I think Pilates reformer or, you know, actual individual who can train you beyond just the PT because you got a whole body, and they’re very specific for what they’re working in, in terms of like helping rehab, but you gotta keep things going. So, you’ve gotta keep working in the long haul. When we’re talking about hormones, so postpartum is all about taking care of the adrenals, monitoring the thyroid. The thyroid is stressed.
It is definitely taking a hint during pregnancy because it has to make thyroid hormone that’s going to take care of baby into the second trimester. It’s super, super important for baby’s health, and we wanna monitor that in postpartum because postpartum thyroiditis can come up. That’s how I developed Hashimotos. And, you know, when I was taught about Hashimotos, there wasn’t a lot of emphasis on what can happen postpartum, but some of the research shows that 1 in 12 women can develop postpartum thyroiditis, which is an autoimmune condition affecting the thyroid. So those are two glands that we wanna keep track of big time. And then, you know, you’ll hear me say this time and again, that insulin regulation, making sure your blood sugar is balanced, we’ve known this for a long time, how important it’s for hormonal health, but I feel like the research is really exploding in the last decade, that, like, it’s everything for your health.
So, anyone who’s a new mom… So I have a soon-to-be 10-year-old and a toddler. So, if you’re like, “I don’t have time to eat,” I feel you on this, and yet, you have got to prioritize yourself with that so that you can support your hormones. And then as we’re talking about pelvic floor, if you’re in your cyclical years, which, you know, I would assume you are because you just had a baby. Some women start perimenopause, depending on their age as they start menstruating again postpartum after breastfeeding. But for the most part, we’re gonna wait for those hormones to come back online. That is when the brain and the ovaries start dancing again. So, you produce estrogen and you produce progesterone. However, bioidentical hormone replacement therapy or even just hormone replacement therapy, if you can get access to that, can be really helpful. If you are struggling with vaginal dryness, the vagina can become very dry.
And it’s not just that you had a baby and that there was trauma if you had a vaginal delivery, but also that after having a baby and having that estrogen low, you can have pain with sex because of that. And so vaginal estrogen, that can help. So, using a hormone replacement therapy, vaginal estrogen, very small dose, that can be helpful. Also, can DHEA. So, a topical DHEA, which is an adrenal hormone, that’s a precursor to estrogen and testosterone, there’s research to show that not only can it help with vaginal lubrication, so bye-bye vaginal dryness, but also supporting the musculature of the pelvic floor. And so, just because you are in your cyclical years, so to speak, doesn’t mean you can’t benefit from those therapies if you are having extreme symptoms.
Katie: Yeah. And I know I just got a chance to read an advanced copy of your book, and you go through some specifics on how to know and how to find a practitioner, how to work with someone, what to ask for. I think those are super, super important. And for me, with my number six, it was a pretty intense delivery. She came out cross, like breach. So I had some pelvic floor pain.
Dr. Brighten: What was she thinking?
Katie: She has always marched to the beat of her own drummer, for sure. But seeing a pelvic floor therapist helped so much because I always thought, “Oh, just do Kegels.” Turns out she told me like, too many Kegels can actually make the problem worse, depending on what’s going on. And I did a lot of like deep core and pelvic floor stuff, and I don’t experience any of that, like, problems jumping on the trampoline, but I had to be proactive about it.
So, I definitely like echo your recommendation on that, and also, I agree, like it’s amazing how even for adult women, some of these topics feel so taboo when these are completely normal things about our bodies. So, for all the moms listening, this is something I was aware of and I’ve tried to, with my daughters, sort of normalize the conversations about our bodies and what the parts are called and how they work so they don’t ever hopefully have fear about asking legitimate health questions about their own bodies. And they hopefully come from an understanding of their bodies being good.
Dr. Brighten: Yes.
Katie: And working properly, and that if something’s not, that’s a great time to ask for help.
Dr. Brighten: I wanna just applaud you. I know you have another question, but everybody, like, wherever you’re at, if you’re in your car right now, you can do one-handed clap, just applaud her for that. So I get a question a lot. Like, I talk about, you know, the premise of, is this normal? And people said, “Great, I’m gonna give that to my teenage daughter.” And I’m like, “Please read it first, because it’s explicit at times.” That I’m like, “It’s not.” I had a friend that was like, “Oh, my 10-year-old could benefit from that.” And I’m like, “No ma’am, not yet.” But really, I wrote it for the adult woman. It is like sex ed that you should have gotten for the adult woman. And how I really hope moms use it, is they read the book, they own that knowledge and they become an expert in their own home so that they can share this information with their daughters.
I think, you know, I have two boys. I don’t hide tampons from them. It was very funny at Thanksgiving, there was these girls, like, shut the door, they don’t want my son there. They were like, “We’re gonna talk about period.” He’s like, “I’m know all about period.” Like, “Let me explain that.” Like, that is awesome. And he’s like, “Periods are awesome.” Like, very period-positive. Why this is important, I think a lot of people, the way we treat sex and we treat reproductive health and we just treat bodies, in general, is like, you know, we give them a message very early on that it’s a source of shame. Okay? So like, teaching that like “Your body is good, your body is awesome,” that is amazing, that is so necessary, especially when you consider that one of the biggest blockers when it comes to sexual desire for women, is actually how we perceive our body.
So that one, kudos, that is gonna serve them over a lifetime, but with, “Is this normal?” What I’m really hoping is that when moms have this confidence to speak in a nonjudgmental way with their children, when things come up, they are the trusted resource. And, yes, dad’s too, but you’re a mom and I’m a mom and we’re talking about being moms, but I want parents to be the trusted resource before the internet, before their teacher, before anyone else because I want these children to feel secure with who they are before the rest of society comes around and starts challenging that. And always know that like home-base, like my home, my parents have my back and I can trust them as a resource. So, big applause to you. I’m like so excited to hear that.
Katie: I love that. Yeah, I think very important topic for moms and parents in general. And I do think of that with my boys too. Obviously, conversations are a little bit different and geared towards their experience that they’re going through, but also making sure, like I’m sure you have, that they know and understand female body and the cyclical nature of it and how it’s gonna work. Because I was in a relationship for a lot of years where it was kind of always like, “Ew, period, gross. I’m not gonna be in the bathroom when you’re around there.” And I was like, “I don’t want my sons to have that, you know, experience with their partners one day.”
But speaking of periods, this is a phase that I’m guessing I’m going to soon encounter with my daughters, and I still am getting my monthly cycle as well. And I feel like there’s so much under this umbrella of what’s normal with periods, what’s not. And like you said, they’re just not talked about much. So, maybe give us some of the big things of, like, these would be warning signs to watch out for, and then how can we support, in a foundational healthy way, a healthy cycle. I know it’s a great insight. I view it as a great insight into my health every month to be able to follow my cycle and see what’s going on. But what do we need to know about normal periods, not normal periods, and how to support them?
Dr. Brighten: Okay, so, firstly, for all the moms that you’re like, “Okay, I imagine this is something coming up in the future with my daughters,” what we know based on the research is that once breast buds begin, we’re about a two-year countdown. Like, we’re gonna expect a period within the next two years. So, if anybody’s like, “When is this gonna come?” And I say this because I have friends that are like, “Well, I think my daughter’s gonna be a late bloomer, so I’ll just like worry about talking to her about stuff later.” And I’m like, “Okay.” I’m not like, “I don’t wanna be that person to say like, you should probably say something sooner, but like understand that like things are gonna happen much quicker than I think we’re even ready for.”
Like, my son is turning 10, and I already see the pre-teen. I already see testosterone first coming through, and I’m like, “I’m not ready, I’m not ready for it,” but it doesn’t matter. It’s coming anyways. So, when it comes to periods, I wanna separate this because… And I do this in the book where there’s a whole chapter about periods and then there’s a chapter about hormones and the menstrual cycle. Because the menstrual cycle, it includes the period. But so often, like if we’re having headaches around ovulation, it’s more the PMS stuff though, that PMS is like, “Oh, we had these period issues,” and then we have to kinda, you know, dissect it out and then we’re like, “Oh no, no, no, that’s pre-period issues. That’s the PMS phase.” So, when it comes to period itself, that’s day one of your cycle, and that’s when you start to bleed. So, you might see a little bit of spotting. We don’t really count that as day one. It’s once the flow starts and that then is what gets called your period phase.
It’s part of the follicular phase, but, I mean, your uterus is doing something separate. The follicular phase, the ovaries, have one agenda, and that’s to get you to ovulation. And I wrote this all down in the book because I feel like we also… I mean, I see on social media gynecologists that are like, “There’s only two phases, the follicular and the luteal phase.” And I’m like, “Well what about ovulation? Like, are we just not gonna talk about that?” Like, I mean, for that individual that I saw, their recommendation for everything is to put everyone on the pills. So, I was like, “There is no ovulation in their world.” Like, I get it.
So, with the period, we can see issues like heavy bleeding. So, you’re changing a tampon every hour or you’re having to double up with like a tampon and a pad. You’re waking up at night and you’ve got heavy periods that are causing you to either bleed through, and, you know, there goes your favorite sheets, or you are having to get up to change a pad. Those are signs that your period is too heavy. And clots, while they’re normal to a point, we shouldn’t just accept them as normal. It’s something that if you have clots, and they’re small, that’s fine. But if they’re large, just because, you know, everybody’s like, “Well, clots can happen, ” if they’re larger than a quarter, your periods are too heavy.
So, heavy periods, that’s one thing that I think medicine does a pretty good job in not just acting like it’s normal, although there are lots of stories out there as like, you’ll see the videos on social media of women talking about almost hemorrhaging in their doctor’s office, and their doctor’s still like, “Your period can’t be that heavy.” So, this is where I walk through like how to quantify your period because these are the things that get a doctor to listen and take you seriously. And then there’s period cramps. I feel like this is one that we’re all just told like, “Oh, that’s normal.” I mean, I… Oh, man. Okay, so back when TikTok…like, I don’t know, “What is this like? 2020?” I put this video on TikTok, and I was so sad because it was about how period pain should not keep you from going to school, from going to work. It shouldn’t make you vomit. It shouldn’t make you cry. And how many young women were like, “No, everyone’s threshold for pain is different, and it is normal. Of course, it hurts.”
And I’m like, okay, in the comment like, “Where’d you get your information from? Help me understand.” And they’re like, “My teacher told me. My doctor told me.” And I’m like, “They’re all liars.” I’m like, “What is this?” That, like, this is such a pervasive myth. And I’ve heard this from patients as well who are like, “Yeah, you know.” I ask what their period’s like. And they’re like, well, I can’t leave the house. Like, I need to like really schedule things differently.” And I’m like, “Wait, what?” And that’s what they’ve been living their whole life. Like, if you think about how long you are menstruating in your lifetime, like approximately 39 years of menstruation, and every month you are being hijacked by your period, like that whole shit, like we should not accept that. That shouldn’t be acceptable.
So, period pain is usually due to prostaglandin. And prostaglandins are actually a really easy fix in terms of eating more omega-3 fatty acids, maybe supplementing with an omega supplement, like a 100 or a 1000 to 2000 milligrams, increasing magnesium in your diet, which can be a little tricky, like if you’re dealing with teenagers, I’m like, just give magnesium supplement, like just give them like 300 milligrams of magnesium if they have painful cramps because… Oh, and magnesium glycinate people, that’s where the PMS and the cramp research is at. If it’s citrate, it’s gonna cause period poop to get worse or you’re just gonna poop all together, not a good thing.
So, those are like really easy switches to make, but, in some cases, we’ve got endometriosis, we’ve got, you know, fibroids. We’ve got other things going on. And so, people are aware, I mean, it’s about, like, 70% of us are going to develop a fibroid after age 50. Like, it’s very common to have fibroid. So, if you’re menstruating in your later years and your periods are becoming heavier and heavier and there’s big clots, it can be an imbalance of estrogen and progesterone, but that doesn’t mean it can’t also be a fibroid. So that’s like two of the biggest, like, period problems we see. There’s certainly a lot more that I cover in my book, but I think that most of your audience is going to be like, “Those are some of the biggest issues I face.”
Katie: And you also talk in the book about seed cycling. Can you explain what that is and how it can be a tool?
Dr. Brighten: Mm-hmm. I do love seed cycling. It’s a very easy food is medicine kind of intervention. So, with seed cycling, you’re going to take fresh-ground flax seeds, about 1-2 tablespoons, and then fresh-ground pumpkin seeds, or you can really just chew them up super well. And you’re gonna eat those during your follicular phase. So, days 1 through 14-ish of your cycle. Let me just be clear. Not everybody has a 28-day cycle and not everybody ovulates on day 14. So, we use this framework to talk about things, but you always have to ask, “Is this information true for me, or how can I morph it so that I can actually use it and it fits my body?” Instead of the message we often receive, which is like, you know, you should always be fitting in into like whatever, whatever the norm is, whatever, you know, anyone else says.
So, then we’re gonna switch and we’re gonna go into the… So after ovulation, and that is when we’re to eat sunflower seeds and sesame seeds, about 1-2 tablespoons of each, and those are gonna be fresh-ground well. And, you know, before anybody’s like, “Where’s the randomized control trial on seed cycling?” I would get that. And I’m like, “Who wants to pay for that?” Like, seeds are so cheap, they’re so economical. This is so simple to do, and like, who wants to pay for this study? There’s really like no return for them on doing that. But we do have studies on the benefits of flax seeds, of sesame seeds, the lignans that are in these things with supporting conditions like PCOS, with menopause, with estrogen metabolism.
We do have studies on the benefits of consuming pumpkin seeds, especially for the zinc that’s in them that’s gonna support your testosterone. But also, all of these omega fatty acids that are in these seeds, they’re gonna support ovarian health. There’s prostaglandins again. And there’s fiber. And fiber is so good at supporting your gut health. So, it’s gonna feed the little critters that are in there, and those little critters, they make up the estrobolome, and they’re interfacing with your estrogen, and what they’re doing with your estrogen, and what your estrogen’s doing, that’s gonna influence your vaginal ecology as well. So, you know, your susceptibility to yeast infections, your propensity towards vaginal dryness, these things are all connected.
One of the things I get really excited about with seed cycling is that we’re gonna support your gut health as well, and by doing that, we’re gonna support your vaginal ecology and your vaginal health. And, you know, it’s like the whole kit right there to like overall supporting you. And for people who got… I think one of the biggest questions I get is like, “Well, what if I don’t have a cycle?” That’s when we say just follow the moon cycle and act like the full moon is ovulation and the new moon is menstruation. And the moon cycle is about 29-1/2 days. And for the, you know, an average menstrual cycle, we’ve all been told it’s 28 days. There was a study that came out that showed us that like, no, just barely over 10% of us are having 28-day cycles, and that is also normal.
Katie: Yeah. I think in the last six months, I’ve actually synced up to the moon in that pattern, and I was like, “Whoa, this is great.” I think maybe finally optimizing my circadian rhythm and getting morning sunlight and all those things I’ve talked about so much on here have helped me, like, become more light-sensitive and sync up to the moon, which is just convenient because it’s even easier to track now. But I’m glad you brought up the vaginal microbiome as well.
Feel like there’s certainly so many myths when it comes to this. First of all, not even a lot of understanding about the separate vaginal microbiome and how amazing it is and how it’s self-cleaning, but because of that, I think we get all this weird advice about what it’s supposed to smell like, and be like, and the things we should do or not do to it to make it change. And I feel like this, especially, you mentioned TikTok, seems to be a thing on TikTok that people are talking about so much right now. So, what do we need to know about keeping our vaginal microbiome and pH where they’re supposed to be and not disrupting that?
Dr. Brighten: So, firstly, vaginas should smell like vaginas and taste like vaginas, and there’s nothing wrong with them. So, you know, once upon a time, like way back in the day, I talk about this in my book about vaginal douching. And, like, doctors were the ones that were like, “You should douch, it’s dirty.” This was a time, by the way, where they were like, “We’re not gonna wash our hands.” Like, they’re rejecting the notion of washing their hands. Even with men in medicine, I just can’t with this.
But that idea, that concept that vaginas are just inherently dirty and they need to be detoxed, they need to be cleaned, or they need to be, like, you know, they have stuff sprayed on them or in them, I mean, that is really pervasive in our society. And there are always these jokes. I just laugh because men really tell on themselves. Whenever I hear a man that’s like, “Oh yeah, like it’s like a fish market,” or like any kind fish joke, I’m like, “You really don’t understand anything about the female body, do you? Like, and you’re telling on yourself, like, stop it. You think your joke’s funny, but it just makes you sound like an idiot.” And mind you, I think if men were better educated, they would make less of these jokes. At least that’s my hope for them.
So, yes, we’re all given these, you know, these myths, this shame. By the way, if there is a fish-like odor, it’s not you, it is generally Gardnerella, so a normal bacteria that lives in the vagina, very important layer. However, given the opportunity, just like I think most people come to understand yeast is opportunistic, whether it’s in your gut, on your skin, in your vagina, given the opportunity, it will overgrow. And when it does, its releases amine, and those give off the scent of fish. It’s not even you, it’s this bacteria that’s imbalanced. And if you are someone who gets exposed to ejaculate, like you are gonna be at a higher risk for that.
So, it’s funny to me men make these jokes because I’m like, “You know, you’re causing this problem, right? Like, your semen is basic.” And not basic like that, but basic in pH, and the vagina should be acidic. And so, when you introduce semen, it can shift the pH, and that can allow Gardnerella to grow. At the same time, this can be worse if you’re closer to your period. So, if you’ve just finished your period or you’re on your period, that blood can shift the pH as well, and that can disrupt the microbiome of the vagina. So, there’s the sex component, right? And then people will say, “Well, like I don’t have sex.” It still doesn’t mean… And by the way, none of this means that you’re dirty. Like, that’s not what’s going on.
These are normal organisms that reside in there. These symptoms are just symptoms of imbalance. And so, on the flip side, we see yeast problems, and with yeast, and this could be someone who’s taking the birth control pill. This can be because you took an antibiotic and you started to wipe out those lactobacilli. The lactobacillus species are what produce the acid, the lactobacilli acidosis, but we also have rhamnosus, those are the main players in there. Those produce acids that keep the vagina acidic. And so, they have to be there to keep things in check. And they depend on estrogen. Estrogen is going to really take care of those cells so that they produce glycogen or sugar in the vagina, which is they gonna feed these little critters. And so, your hormones can also be related to why you’re seeing that you have a higher propensity towards a vaginal infection. And so, this is all to say, number one, don’t douche, because that can definitely disrupt things.
And number two is, it’s not a state of your vagina is inherently dirty, it’s an issue with like, we have an imbalance. Can we meet that with some curiosity and say, “Okay, well what can we do about that” rather than shaming people? Because that’s often when they turn to using…I mean, all kinds of things that you see. As we were talking about TikTok, you’re right, people… I kinda giggle because I’m like…you get these people that are like, “Ooh, vaginal milk.” I’m like, “Your vagina is not supposed to taste like a creamsicle or smell like a clementine orange. Like, what is this, like, messaging?” I think it sounds really good to, like, I imagine like “Mad Men” style, like men being like, “This is a good idea, let’s say these things.” But in reality, you really think about it in reality, it’s no good. Like, nobody should want any of that.
But whenever you see the, like, oh, vaginal melt or like, I’m gonna spray perfume up there or do these things, I’m just like, I’m waiting for your next video to come out that’s like, something’s burning down there, something’s not right down there. Like, something happened, which maybe they won’t share that, but some people do. Because we run the risk of disrupting that vaginal ecology.
The last thing I wanna talk about is that there is no evidence that if you eat a pineapple or a dozen pineapples, that you are ever gonna shift the smell of your vagina. Now, if you smoke cigarettes, when it comes to like both… I talk about like the iconic “Sex and the City” Funky Spunk episode, if you’re old like me, then you know. And, you know, some of the causes, so I do… There is some penis semen talk in there as well of like, “What’s normal with semen?” Because I get these questions a lot as well. But smoking is one of those things that can make things not only taste off, but smell off down there. But outside of that, there’s, like… I wish I could just tell you just eat tons of pineapple and everything would be great. It just doesn’t work that way.
Katie: What about when it comes to like menstrual options? Are there ones that are better or worse for vaginal health? Like I know I’ve been using a menstrual cup for years, and I’m a huge fan of that just because of how easy and eco-friendly it is. But I know that there’s a whole lot of options out there now. Are there ones that are specifically better or worse for vaginal microbiome?
Dr. Brighten: Anything with fragrance. Anything with fragrance, you just wanna walk away from, because those are going to have endocrine disruptors in there. For some women, you know, using tampons is problematic for them. You know, if you think about like the tampon sitting in there, the vaginal blood is sitting in there. Whereas, you know, using like pads or products where you can flow freely, like they had swimsuits now where they’re like, there was period panties and now there’s swimsuits, and I’m like, “Where are we all 20 years ago? Like, what is actually going on here?” I love the option of menstrual cup.
There’s also discs that you can use if you do wanna have sex on your period. Your hormones shift sometimes to where that seems most desirable, but you’re like, “I don’t wanna deal with blood or anything.” Totally get that. So there’s discs as well. And there’s a big myth that’s floating around telling women that they’re going to end up with a uterine prolapse if they use a menstrual cup. There’s absolutely no evidence of that. If you have an IUD, there is a possibility that some of the suction might pull the… You know, if you have suction there, if you don’t break it, it might pull in the strings and dislodge the IUD.
But if you wanna remove a menstrual cup, the first thing you have to do is break the suction on that. But, you know, there’s a lot of fear around like, “Is my uterus going to fall out?” And there are definitely times when the uterus does fall out, and that can happen. But menstrual cups, that’s not where we see that primarily. And, you know, I’m gonna say there’s not a lot of research, like there’s not even a lot of access to your problems as it is. But there’s not a lot of research on, you know, examining the organic versus non-organic, and it’s something that, you know, I just have a lot of pause about what we’re putting inside a mucus membrane. And the fact that the way that whole industry is regulated is not very good.
And, you know, I would love to see like all products have full disclosure and to be a lot less inundated with chemicals. And I don’t wanna sound doomsday, but we’re facing a potential fertility crisis for our species. And I don’t think we’re being critical enough of everything we’re getting exposed to. And I think that when it comes to the lifetime of using tampons in a mucus membrane, we really do need to be questioning that cotton being sprayed with pesticides. Not to mention the farm workers who are being exposed to those pesticides while they’re harvesting, you know, the cotton, and coming in contact with that. And just looking at everything that goes into it.
And I know that there are critics out there who are like, “Oh, this is just some elitism stuff, and like, you know, we’ve got period poverty, and how dare people even speak about like using organic, like that just, you know, hurts marginalized communities.” And I’m like, you know, as somebody whose family immigrated to the United States, I really take issue with an argument that’s basically like, “Let’s not fight for all of us to have access to better stuff, but instead, let’s just not talk about it.” Because we don’t have any evidence right now. We don’t wanna make people who don’t have access to those things feel bad, especially when we consider that women of color have really high exposure rates to endocrine disruptors.
So, that was a lot of information, a long-winded way to say that, like, we dunno on something, but I’m just, for one, I’m like, we should be critical and cautious because we have a track record as a species of introducing things, saying they’re fine because there’s no evidence they’re not and then finding out generations later that it was one of the worst things that we’d ever done, high microplastics.
Katie: Yeah, it’s case in point, for sure. And yeah, every time I see the stats about fertility rates, I’m like, why are we not talking more about this for men since even the last 30 years, to have a 62% reduction in testosterone and semen and sperm count, that’s really drastic. And if you look at the projections going forward for that, this is not a good thing in 20 years for us, as a society as a whole. And I think this really good primer on things to avoid putting in your vagina for the sake of your microbiome, and your pH, the fragrances, the colors, the artificial flavors, and all these things. Are there any things that are beneficial or things that women can do if they’re worried about an imbalance to help bring things back into balance?
Dr. Brighten: Yes. Well, one thing I will say, you know, since we’re… You talked about the sperm conundrum that we are facing right now, is that if you are struggling with an infection, it’s best not to have sex, but if you are going to have sex or if you just healed from an infection, so yeast infection, or DV, these are some of the most common ones that, you know, women are facing and dealing with on a day-to-day basis. There’s gonna be somebody listening right now that’s dealing with this, is wearing a condom, even though people don’t totally love those, but reducing things that are going to cause imbalances in your pH.
So, you know, when you’re… So, overall, lemme just say your vagina can handle itself. You know, we’ll say things sometimes like joking, like, “Oh, it’s a self-cleaning oven,” but, like, even yourself-cleaning oven takes more work than your vagina does. Like, your vagina has a great way of just handling itself and clean cleaning things out itself in terms of like whether it’s menstrual blood or ejaculate. If you’re putting other objects up there, there are times where you might need a doctor’s help with that, but, otherwise, it can handle itself.
So, we wanna really look at, you know, what are things that you can be doing lifestyle-wise? So, what are the clothes that you’re wearing? What are the underwear? I mean, oh, my God, the sports bras with BPA. And I’m like, “Great, great. So glad I dropped 60 bucks on my sports bra that will contain my breastfeeding boobies.” And now I’m like, “Great.” And now I’m like putting BPA into like this system. So, you wanna think about that with your underwear, but number one is we wanna make sure our underwear can breathe. We wanna wear material that can breathe. If you are someone who has a tendency towards yeast infections, making sure that like you get out of your gym clothes, you get out of your swimsuit. Like, we were at the pool and this mom was like, “Oh, like you know, you are all gonna sit in your swimsuits and you’re gonna end up with a yeast infection.” And I was like, “Friend, that shouldn’t happen. Like, let’s talk about that.”
That somebody who has a propensity towards that. And sometimes yeast infections can actually be an early sign of diabetes because blood sugar imbalances can be causing yeast to flourish in the vagina just like it can in other parts of the body as well. So certainly, like, you know, blood sugar balance for the long run so that we can avoid diabetes. Eating the fiber so we’re tending to that microbiome because again, anything that’s gonna support optimal estrogen levels. So, like eating your cruciferous vegetables as well, these kinds of things, that’s gonna support optimal vaginal health.
And then in the book, I do go through like, you know, if you have a yeast infection, if you have BV, here’s different things that you can try. Like, maybe you don’t, maybe you’ve used Monistat like a lot and it’s not working for you. Or, you know, maybe it’s something where you don’t have access right now to a doctor to get a prescription, and so, you know, you wanna try like a vitamin C suppository.
So let me just say, generally speaking, I don’t tell people like, “Oh, use a probiotic intravaginally.” In my patients where they’re like, “Every time I have sex, a couple days later, things are not right or they’re, like, after my period,” sometimes I’m like, “We’re gonna work on your gut health, we’re gonna wear all this other stuff.”
But using an intravaginal probiotic just to help seed basically the vaginal ecology there. And that is something that like… So, you know, you’ll find lots of probiotics out there. I have a women’s probiotic as well, and I just say like, take the cap off of it and you can actually just put your finger over one side of the cap and then insert it. And then that way it just is falling out, you know, into the vagina as you’re removing your finger to help with that.
There are times that we compound probiotics, supposed to get really expensive to compound a probiotic suppository. And you and I come, you know, from back in the day where women used yogurt and they used other things like that. And these days, yogurt has a hell a lot more sugar than it did like back then. I think about like, you know, what the health food stores were like, you know, when I was a kid, and then now like what yogurt looks like, and like, yeah, yogurt’s gotten crazy, yogurt’s gonna become its own industry altogether.
Katie: And let’s talk about libido as well. Because I feel like this is another area where the memes abound, but there’s a lot of information and misinformation out there and it seems like it’s often thought of as normal that women just have lower libido than men or that it’s something that sort of goes away postpartum or as women get older, or etc., etc. So, what is normal when it comes to libido, and are there ways to support that naturally, or when should someone be concerned?
Dr. Brighten: So, there is this myth, right? That women are just not sexual creatures. We’re not that into sex. That we have lower sexual desire. None of it’s true. In fact, like really what it comes down to is that we’re just a lot more complex. And when you consider that, like, okay, so for people who don’t remember their biology or maybe weren’t taught this, so in utero, and I do talk all about this in the book, so basically in utero, we’ve got a hormonal watch that comes through, and while you were on your way to like labia, and clitoris, and vagina, wash of testosterone activates genes that are linked on the Y chromosome, and then they go, “Oh wait, let’s detour. We’re gonna go penis, scrotum.” Like, that’s…
So we’ve got the same tissues, right? Except that the penis, it has to urinate and it releases ejaculate and it’s for pleasure. But the clitoris, my friends, is only for pleasure. So, this argument of like, oh, women just aren’t that into sex,” I’m like, “No,” but like mom in nature was like, “I’m gonna give you this organ. It’s only purpose is to bring you pleasure, and that’s it.” And I feel like we kind of need it. Like, we are complex, and there’s lots of things that can impede our sexual desire. So, I talk about in the book, I have a whole chapter on this topic of sexual desire and understanding responsive versus spontaneous desire. So spontaneous desire is what men are told they’re supposed to have.
And what media shows us is like the archetype, right? And it’s like we just looked at each other, and now like, “Ooh, like my underwear coming off,” and like, “Ooh, like two seconds later, sparks, it’s fireworks, I’m having an orgasm.” It’s not like that. Like, that’s not the reality. So spontaneous desire is like, it doesn’t take much to get via you in the mood. And little things can get you the mood, and you just don’t have a sensitive of breaks. So, I talk about you know, this really complex science model in the book. I did not discover this, but I talk about it in terms of the breaks and the gas pedal, and basically, we as women, we can have more sensitive breaks at times.
And so that spontaneous desire, a little bit of less of that. We also sometimes feel more spontaneous at the beginning of a relationship. We feel more spontaneous around ovulation. And then other times, it might feel more of that responsive desire, or that might be your baseline archetype. And responsive desire is that you’ve gotta get things going in order to like really get those signals. And you’ve gotta look at, like, and I have these exercises in the book about what puts the breaks on for you? Because reality is, is that everything we’re marketed to and we’re told is like, oh, yeah, just put on like the Mavin Gaye and light the scented candle. Also bad for your hormones, don’t do that. But, like, “Oh, here’s all of these things,” and that’s gonna get her in the mood. Just wait, everybody, and like for Valentine’s Day commercials and watch those because that’s what men are being told. And the reality is, is what women actually need is to have more of the brakes released.
Like, you ever try to drive a car with the e-brake on and your foot on the gas and on the brake at the same time, like this is not gonna go anywhere. And so those breaks can look like things like, you know, and I I’m talking about like heterosexual relationships because this is where the orgasm gap exists primarily. It’s also what I dwell in and, you know, it looks like leaving your clothes on the floor, not helping with task-sharing in the house. So that, like even if you… Like, I get arguments from men who are like, “Oh, well, you’re discounting, like I have to go to work and I have to do all this stuff.” And I’m like, “Really? All you have to do is actually get your underwear in a hamper, and she’s gonna be more into you, and you can’t manage that? Like, what is actually wrong with you? Like, how is this logic?” So with that, we’ve got to start looking at disengaging those breaks.
And there’s a relationship component, but that’s not all. Two of the biggest things that really can impede our desire, our ability to get aroused, stay aroused is, one, fear of pregnancy because we are taught to be afraid of that at all times because we’re not actually taught the truth about our bodies and how everything works. And then the other part is our body image. And we are told before we ever get even near puberty that there is a way you should look and a way you should be. Which, by the way, like let me just say, okay, so like I’m in my 40s, my watching the Kate Moss was the body to be like when I was a teen. And then it was like Kardashian, Beyonce, like, be full, be thick, like, they want a thick woman, and now we’re swinging back to Kate Moss. And I’m like, “No, no, to all of this. This is awful.”
But I’m just like looking back at this of like, “Wow, this like,” no wonder we struggle with sexual desire because there’s a phenomenon known as spectate dataring where you’re like worried while you’re having sex, you’re like, “Oh, how does my cellulite look? Like, oh, can they see my stretch marks right now?” Spoiler, if somebody is like in the moment with you, and they’re getting down, they have a flood of hormones in their brain, they don’t care, care about any of that. And if they do, they don’t deserve to have sex with you, so forget them anyways. But all of these kinds of things, this negative messaging that we’ve got, that also plays a role in our libido.
And so, you know, I go through all this stuff because it’s so complex, but it’s just to say that just because you’re not in the mood all the time doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you. It doesn’t mean that you’re abnormal. And if you think… We’re often told like, “Oh, you just have a low sex drive.” Well, firstly, that’s like you have a low appetite, it’s not the same thing. Like, you have a lower desire point based on what? It’s your normal that matters. So if that’s been your normal your whole life, that’s normal. If you found that like, “No, I’ve been like way more interested in my partner or way more interested, you know, in seeking out an orgasm,” whatever that looks like for you, like, I’d be way more interested in that. “And I’ve had way more fun having sex in the past, and now I’m starting to, like, I’m not that interested in it.
I’m having a hard time orgasming, or, like, I just don’t even care to do it,” like, that’s a change, that’s a shift. If it’s dropped, now we don’t say like, that’s just normal, which is so much what medicine does. “You’re a woman, that’s normal, that’s just how it’s supposed to be.” That’s not, that’s not true for you. And so now we need to look at that because that could be a shift in your hormones. It could be relationship dynamic, it could be environmental stressors. Like, it can be a gamut of things. And we have to investigate why that is. So that’s to say that there’s a whole lot of normal on this spectrum, and the only time that we get worried is when it’s not normal for you. I could care less what the rest of society says. I could care less what “Cosmo Magazine” is telling you. I could care less about any of that. As your medical provider, I just wanna know, “Is this normal for you? Are you satisfied? Are you happy?” Like, these are the important questions.
Katie: And it seems like there do seem to be some natural ups and downs based on women’s cycles or postpartum, for instance, your body, you’re in intensive newborn phase. Your body’s not like, “Let’s make more babies at this exact moment.” So libido could be down, or as we get older, it seems like that is a more common experience, but it seems like there are also ways to mitigate that if a woman’s not happy, to help her get her libido back.

This episode is sponsored by Hiya Health, which is my go-to source for multivitamins, especially for my younger kids, before they can swallow pills. Typical children’s vitamins are basically candy in disguise, filled with unsavory ingredients and things you would not give to your children otherwise. Most brands on store shelves are filled with sugar, unhealthy chemicals and other gummy junk that growing kids, or frankly, anyone should never eat. And this is why I’m so glad I found Hiya Health. Hiya makes children’s vitamins with zero sugar and zero gummy junk and unsavory ingredients. Yet they taste great, and they are perfect for picky eaters. They’re also nostalgic and remind me of the children’s vitamins I took as a kid, though I probably wouldn’t love those ingredients. Hiya is unique because it fills the most common gaps in modern children’s diets to provide full body nourishment for our kids, with a yummy taste that they will love and you will not have to fight them over. They manufacture in the USA with globally sourced ingredients that are each selected for optimal bioavailability and absorption. And the best part? They arrive straight to your door on a pediatrician recommended schedule, so you never have to worry about running out. Your first month comes with a reusable glass bottle that your kids can personalize with stickers. So in the case of my kids, with six of them, they never get them confused. And then every month after, Hiya sends a no plastic, eco friendly refill pouch of fresh vitamins. Which means that Hiya isn’t just good for your kids, it’s also great for the environment as well. So you as a mom no longer have to worry about running out of vitamins, and they will automatically arrive when you need them. You can check them out and get them for your kids by going to Hiyahealth.com/wellnessmama. And you’ll also save 50% on your first month.

This episode is brought to you by Apollo neuro. If you haven’t heard of this, I have been experimenting with and they utilize a new touch therapy experience by creating the Apollo wearable device. It was developed by neuroscientists and physicians to help improve sleep, increase energy, improve recovery, and focus through soothing, gentle waves of vibration that mimic the body’s natural ones. The Apollo wearable helps your body relax and reduces feelings of stress, which helps put you in a state that allows you to have more control over how you want to feel. The Apollo wearable will give you more energy to power through your day and to help you sleep better at night, an effect that I have felt personally. And all you have to do is put it on your wrist and feel the soothing vibrations. It’s basically like a remote control for how you want to feel throughout the day, whether it’s more energetic, less stressed, a better mood, or wanting to feel more calm and relaxed and sleepy.
It’s a new technology and brand to the world, which is a game changer for both health and wellness in the wearable tech space. The new initiatives from Apollo include two new scientific research studies with groundbreaking results. Their sleep study demonstrates that Apollo users can get up to 30 more minutes of sleep per night when it’s used consistently for at least 3 hours a day, five days a week. In a peer reviewed study validating the Apollo wearable as the first wearable to significantly increase heart rate variability, or HRV, accelerate athletic recovery (which is what I’ve been using it for), and improve cardiovascular fitness. And this again is proven by a peer reviewed trial conducted at the university of Pittsburgh.
From a health and wellness perspective, it is a safe and noninvasive alternative to natural and or pharmaceutical sleeping pills. And it’s been tested across thousands of users in the clinic and in the real world to help address conditions like insomnia, trauma, PTSD and ADHD. And from a wearable tech perspective, Apollo is unlike any other fitness health wearable because it doesn’t just track your health biometrics, it actively improves your health by strengthening your nervous system. And all you have to do is wear it and feel the vibes. You can use it in different ways. You can wear it on a band around your wrist or ankle or on a clip attached to your shirt collar, bra strap, or waistband. It’s like a hug for your nervous system that helps you to be calmer and more mindful. And it works in tandem with our mobile app to help you transition through the day with goal oriented modes like sleep and renew, clear and focused, relax and unwind, rebuild and recover, and more. The science and technology are the real deal, and Apollo was created by neuroscientists and physicians who have successfully completed six clinical trials with nine more underway. You can check it out and find the effects that they have validated, including 40% less stress and feelings of anxiety, 19% more time in deep sleep on average, 11% increase in HRV and up to 25% more concentration and focus by going to wellnessmama.com/go/apollo and you can save 15% with the code wellnessmama15.

But is there some truth to libido changes throughout the cycle? And another thing I’m seeing related to that right now is women cycle-syncing their workouts. What is your opinion on that, both libido and exercise at different points in the cycle?
Dr. Brighten: Yeah. Okay. So, firstly, the exercise piece, whatever’s true for you is what you wanna respect. There are certainly times where lifting weights, like, you’re gonna be closer to ovulation. You’re gonna be in that later follicular phase. You’re gonna be able to lift more weights. Your testosterone is coming up. You don’t got progesterone. Progesterone’s also a libido blocker, but it also helps you sleep at night. So, like, we love progesterone. We need progesterone, and we also love that progesterone makes us feel more chill and calm. That’s disengaging breaks, so you can receive these signals. But when it comes to working out, I think that tracking for yourself, and that’s what I really encourage in the 28-day program, is tracking for yourself to understand what’s true for you.
Because high-intensity exercises, all these things might work for you really well around ovulation. And then, you know, leading up to ovulation and then come in the late luteal phase, you may find that, like, you know, you’re doing better with Pilates, with yoga. You’re doing better to dial it back because progesterone is making you crazy, hungry with how it’s interfacing with insulin. And it’s also like, you know, shifting your body temperature. Like, who wants to go and do high-intensity exercise that’s gonna get you really hot when post-ovulation, progesterone’s cut your body temperature up. And that actually, that little thing right there can make it so that you feel like, “Okay, maybe I can’t go as hard.”
But this isn’t always true. Like the women’s soccer cup, the winning goal, the woman, she was the day before her period, scored that goal. So it’s not always true, and it doesn’t mean that your menstrual cycle is a hindrance, but I do think tracking and seeing what’s true for you, because the U.S. soccer team actually uses this data to be at peak performance. And you can be doing the same thing. You just don’t have to go on soccer field. I love that. I don’t wanna wear cleats. I don’t wanna like run around with the soccer ball, but I do wanna be showing up, writing my book, like doing all of these things, and, like, how can I do that in a way that works with my cycle?
Now, the libido piece actually ties in here because it’s kinda similar, where like you’re gonna… That high intensity, you’re gonna be high intensity, you know, around ovulation. So in that late follicular face, there’s actually really interesting research showing that there’s a window, like, basically a peak like, you know, sexual desire window for women. And that is leading up to ovulation, ovulation itself, and maybe a couple days after. So when you understand that in the follicular phase, your estrogen, and so you’re starting your period, even though you’re bleeding, your estrogen is now rising, and then your testosterone’s gonna be coming on and progesterone’s nowhere to be seen. And because of that, that is why some women like period sex. Also, there’s no threat of pregnancy when you’re on day 1, 2, 3 of your period and having, you know, heavy bleeding.
There’s no endometrium there. Don’t worry about that, like, we’re gonna be good. Like, that’s the signal that you’re getting from your brain. And so that can also help with sexual desire. Now, once you ovulate, it’s exactly what you said, like postpartum. Like, your body, just like whether or not you want a baby, your body doesn’t care. Your body’s like, “I’m gonna ovulate. I want a baby.” That’s what all this work is for. And you’re like, “I’m not gonna tell you we’re not gonna have one, but I’m gonna enjoy all these amazing hormones.” And so, progesterone’s gonna come in, and it’s gonna be a libido blocker, and you’re gonna have… If your estrogen is in balance with progesterone, that’s the way it’ll work. Does that mean that you’re not gonna be interested in sex at all or you’re not gonna have good orgasms or any? No. It just means that you might need more foreplay if vaginal intercourse is your goal. You might need more stimulation to the clitoris.
So, this might be something where you have to change positions, you might have to bring in toys, like you might just need more because there’s a little more of a threshold to get over. Or it might be, and I go through this in the program, like these different exercises you can do, can also be an opportunity just to like not engage in intercourse and explore everything else.
Katie: That was awesome. That was like so much information in one answer and I know there’s so much more even in the book than you are able to throw into that answer. So, I definitely will make sure that’s linked. But I also wanna make sure we get to talk a little bit about your 28-day plan. Because I think no matter where a woman’s coming from and if maybe she’s struggling with any of these things we’ve talked about, this is such a cohesive solution. So, can you explain what your 28-day plan is?
Dr. Brighten: So, the 28-day plan is based on the framework of a 28-day cycle. So, again, yes, I know we don’t all have a 28-day cycle, I said that, and yet I give you the nuance of like how to follow this plan based on your cycle. But I use that framework because it’s a good way to educate and to teach and to bring you into awareness with your body. So, of course, having a background in nutrition, we have to make nutrition like a pillar in this program. And unfortunately, the book is so big that we could not fit any recipes or meal plans or anything. But I am giving away a full 28-day meal plan, all the recipes, everything you need, that’s at darkbright.com/is this normal? And you can grab that and it is a way of eating that’s gonna support where you’re at in your cycle, but it’s also going to support your hormones.
And we joke on my team that it’s a literal sex diet because it is all the things you need to eat to be supporting your hormones, your libido, your mood, and everything down there as well that we’ve talked about in this interview. But the program goes so much more beyond food. So, you’re gonna be tracking throughout your cycle different aspects. So, things that we’ve talked about, whether it’s period problems or PMS issues. And there’s actually a whole section is a cycle symptom relief chart. That’s like if you’re dealing with headaches, here’s everything you can do, diet, lifestyle, and the whole program is really diet, lifestyle, and supplements and like what you can bring in all together with that. And then as you go through each phase of your cycle and taking you through like, “Okay, yes, we’ve got the symptoms, yes we need to focus on the hormones.” But also like what is going on in your love life and what kind of exercises and practices can you have so that you can really understand more what’s true for you, what’s your normal when it comes to your sexual health and well-being?
And for anybody who’s listening, there’s actually a whole part in the book where I’m like, “Listen if this is not for you right now.” If you’re like, “I just want my hormones fixed,” and if your hormones are seriously off, then I get that and you’re like, “I don’t care about this sex talk at all.” Like it’s there for you in the future. You can always come back and do it. But this program is one that I really wanted to marry, like all aspects of ourselves. I think that so many hormone books are like, “Let’s just talk about hormones,” and then we’ve got books that are like, “Let’s just talk about the vagina” and like there’s books on just breast health and it’s like we’re all these pieces and I just wanted to pull it all together and take you through your cycle and how to support yourself in your entirety and over your lifetime. So you can resolve all of those TMS issues there’s mood swings, being insomnia and also get to access to that sexual health information that so many of us are never provided in our lifetime because that’s a very important aspect of our health. And you certainly deserve pleasure.
Katie: Well, I will make sure that link is included as well. You guys check it out. Jolene, you have so much information on your site as well, well beyond what we’ve covered here. And I love following you on Instagram too because you’re always answering questions and engaging, and it’s a great place. Like you said, in the beginning, to anonymously ask questions even if you’re nervous about something. You’re just such an incredible resource for this and I’m so grateful for your time. A couple of last really quick wrap-up questions. The first being if there is a book or number of books that have had a profound impact on your life, and if so, what they are and why?
Dr. Brighten: Wow. So, I would say, you know, one book is “Traction,” which is not a health book whatsoever, but it’s actually like how to set up your company and how to like run a company in a way. You know, it’s about like they’re like looking at profitability, but I really wanted to look at like, how can I streamline and run a company so that I have energy to pursue my passions. Like writing a book, being with my children, and you know, one of which has gone through pandas. I’m a homeschooling mom. And so I would say like that is a book that has profoundly affected my life because it’s allowed me to continue my mission of serving women and really changing women’s medicine for the better by putting this information in their hands. While also showing up as the mom that I really wanna be and the mom that my kids need me to be.
Katie: I love it. I’ll link to that as well. And lastly, any parting advice for the listeners today that could be related to something we’ve talked about or entirely unrelated life advice?
Dr. Brighten: Well, or completely unrelated. Let me just throw out some random things. I would say, you know, you are the only one that lives in your body, so you are the only one that knows what’s normal for you. And I think what you need to recognize about all of the women’s medicine is we are severely lacking research. So, when your doctor says to you, “No, that can’t be true or that’s just normal, or just.” No, they’re basing it on the current deficit of research that we just don’t have. And so really I wanna encourage everybody to trust their body, trust their instinct, not just in medicine, but in everything in life. I think far too often, and I will say this is what I learned from my patients who were in their 40s. So, I was a doctor way back in the day. You know, I’m still in my 20s and I am hearing from patients who are, you know, telling me like, “I wish I would have followed my passions. I wish I would have stopped listening to other people’s ideas for opinions about my body, about my life, about my life choices.”
And I really in that moment was like, I wanna embrace the audacity of a 40-plus-year-old woman to just live her life, full out in the way that serves her best. And I will tell you it’s been a journey, but that’s what I challenge a lot of the people in my life and people in my practice is like, “Have the audacity, have the audacity to have boundaries, to live your best life, to go after your goals and to say no.” Like have the audacity because there are certainly people out there having the audacity to do things that when you look at you’re like, That’s ludicrous they would even do that, but they didn’t. So, why not you?
Katie: I love it. I think that’s a perfect place to wrap up and I know we could do many, many more episodes and I hope we will in the future. But for today, thank you so much for graciously sharing your time and your knowledge and for everything that you shared today. Always a joy to talk to you. Thank you for being here.
Dr. Brighten: Yes, thanks so much for having me. It is always wonderful to speak with you and your audience. You have some of the best people on the planet who join you on this podcast, so it’s an honor to be here.
Katie: Well, I definitely agree. Thanks to all of you for listening, for sharing your most valuable resources, your time, your energy, and your attention with us both today. We’re so grateful that you did and I hope that you will join me again on the next episode of “The Wellness Mama Podcast.”
If you’re enjoying these interviews, would you please take two minutes to leave a rating or review on iTunes for me? Doing this helps more people to find the podcast, which means even more moms and families could benefit from the information. I really appreciate your time, and thanks as always for listening.