Using Your Menstrual Cycle for Weight Loss
If you're trying to lose weight, you absolutely NEED to track your cycle. I’ll show you why this is so important and how you can use your cycle to your advantage to release extra weight.
So let’s talk about tapping into the power of your menstrual cycle, starting with understanding the four phases!
Four Phases of Your Menstrual Cycle
Let’s talk about the rise and fall of our hormones. If you’ve been following me for a while, I’m sure you know that there are four phases of your menstrual cycle because I've probably banged it into your head a million times!
So let’s quickly break them down.
1. Menses
The first phase is Menses, which is your period. This is the phase most of us associate with our menstrual cycle.
2. Follicular
When you’re done bleeding, you head into your follicular phase, meaning the follicle is getting ready to release the egg.
3. Ovulation
When you start creating egg white cervical mucus, you head into your ovulatory phase, meaning you’re going to ovulate during this window.
4. Luteal
Finally, you release the egg and the follicle that releases the egg forms what's called the corpus luteum, which is why this is called your luteal phase.
So that’s a quick overview of the four phases of your menstrual cycle. This is super important because I know a lot of times we just think about our period as our menstrual cycle, and that's it.
I remember going to the doctor once and being asked what day of my cycle I was on. And I said, “Well, I had my period like seven days ago.” They looked at me like I had three heads and told me, “Okay, so you're on day seven.”
At that point, I just thought my period was my menstrual cycle, and I didn't realize it was actually an ongoing cyclical thing. So when you understand these four phases, you can tap into what your body needs during each one, and that's when you really start to transform because you're finally in flow with your body!
How to Use Your Cycle for Weight Loss
So many women struggle to lose weight, so if that’s you, just know you’re not alone, and this is going to help you!
First, we’re going to talk about the difference in caloric burn at different phases of your cycle. And then we'll talk about utilizing this with things like working out and setting goals so that you can really tap into the power of your menstrual cycle.
After Ovulation
After you ovulate, you are burning upwards of an extra 100 to 300 calories per day (I know, pick your jaw off the floor!). So if from your period to ovulation, you're just going about your life, and then after ovulation before your period, you're going, “Why do I want to eat the entire cupboard?!”
That's because you’ve entered the luteal phase, and the increased progesterone is causing you to burn upwards of an extra 100 to 300 calories per day. Your natural progesterone is literally increasing your metabolism during this time!
And I know you're going, “Awesome, Leah! I'm trying to lose weight and now I’m in a bigger caloric burn!” No, okay. During this time, you’re not only burning more calories, you also need to EAT more calories.
Because what happens is that progesterone is kind of a sensitive hormone, and it needs to be given a lot of love so that it can rise triumphantly during this phase.
For example, when you are stressed, your body wants to prioritize cortisol (aka your “fight or flight hormone”) over progesterone. Your body wants to save you from a bear more than it wants to help you make a baby.
What that means is that when you are in too big of a caloric deficit, it puts stress on your body. And unfortunately, your body doesn’t know the difference between that type of stress and being chased by a bear.
So instead, your cortisol levels increase and bring on inflammation. Now all of a sudden, your progesterone is being ignored, and instead of getting the weight loss you're looking for, you may experience weight gain, inflammation, bloating, and PMS.
You can avoid all that simply by prioritizing increasing your calories a bit from post ovulation to your period. It’ll also help to focus on eating really good, healthy fats because fats are literally how your body makes hormones like progesterone.
Balancing your blood sugar and increasing your healthy fat intake will really make a difference during this time! Here are five simple steps you can take to balance your blood sugar for weight loss:
Eat protein, fat, and carbs at every snack and meal
Increase your healthy fat intake
Eat breakfast within 30 to 60 minutes of waking up
Prioritize healthy fats and protein for breakfast
Drink coffee after breakfast
You’re going to be amazed at the difference these steps make!
I also recommend seed cycling, if you’re not already doing that. After ovulation, you’ll seed cycle with sesame and sunflower seeds and increase your healthy fat intake with things like grass-fed butter, avocados, nut butter, and eggs. And I suggest adding some good chocolate in there (raw cacao is especially great!) because it’s really high in magnesium.
You can also slow down your workouts during this time. Maybe you lift less weight and do higher reps. Or instead of running 5 miles, you run 3.5 or just slow down your pace. You can also replace your regular workouts with things like yoga, pilates, stretching, and any other lower impact exercises.
You'll feel so much better heading into your period if you try these things out!
Luteal Phase
When you head into the luteal phase, often your motivation is not quite there, and your discipline has faded at that point. This is part of that ovulation to period phase where you want to increase your healthy fats a little bit, maybe back off the intensity of your workouts, prioritize your sleep, and really make sure you're focusing on blood sugar balance.
Period to Ovulation
The next phase is from your period to ovulation, which is when your estrogen starts rising. Estrogen helps you become more sensitive to insulin, so you are literally utilizing carbs better AND building muscle easier during this time.
Follicular Phase
When you’re done bleeding and you enter the follicular phase, you can go hard on those workouts! Use those carbs to help you have an amazing, healthy ovulation, and of course, listen to your body and continue focusing on your blood sugar balance.
The follicular phase is like the first day of the rest of your life. It’s when you’re like, “I'm going to sign up for the marathon; I'm going to do the Ironman; I'm going to do blah blah blah...” It’s a great time to start making new habits because you have about two weeks of really high motivation and discipline.
If you need to lose weight, your body tends to release it when you follow these steps.
But if, after all that, you’re thinking, “But Leah, I don't actually want to lose weight!” That's okay too! If you DON’T need to lose weight, living in sync with your menstrual cycle and incorporating these things won’t force you to lose weight if you don't need to. It’ll just help you feel better and avoid things like PMS that come up when our hormones are out of balance.
What About Birth Control?
I also hear you if you’re like, “What about if I'm on progestin birth control — am I just having all sorts of extra caloric burn?” Sorry, no. This info only applies to your natural menstrual cycle.
If you're taking bio-identical hormones, like birth control, you can just throw this advice out the window because it truly doesn't apply to you. Of course, you can still live in flow and attempt to adapt to your pill bleed. But when I talk about biohacking your menstrual cycle, I'm just talking about your body’s natural production of progesterone because bio-identical hormones don’t actually work the same way.
Now that you understand your full menstrual cycle and how to live in flow with your body, it’s such a superpower! You know exactly why you're so hungry before your period. You know why after your period, you have all the motivation in the world to do all of the things and can hit those PRs in the gym.
What’s next?
You can start to implement this advice and become a badass at using your menstrual cycle for weight loss. But of course, there is so much more to learn when it comes to balancing your hormones and making sure they’re working for you!
Download the FREE Painless Period Prep Guide to learn more about balancing your hormones throughout your cycle.