Moment 166: What Men (& Women) NEED To Know About The Menstrual Cycle: Dr Mindy Pelz

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0:33I'm some advice then, because I'm in a relationship and I want to understand. I guess this goes both ways. I want my girlfriend to understand how the hormones are influencing my behavior. Yeah. And I want to know how hormones are influencing her behavior. Yeah. What advice have you got for me? Well, the first is, do you know her cycle?

0:53Moving on, we're going to talk about sugar again. No, no, you, this is too good. So sugar, it's really bad. It needs to blame. No, seriously, no. Tell me about your childhood. No, get to know her cycle. I'm going to give you, I'm going to give you gold now. I should mention I. Let me give you gold. Okay. So day one of her cycle, day one to day 10, she's building estrogen. First couple of days of her cycle, just let her be. Like she, you know, that she's transitioning out of the back half of her cycle. She might be having some heavier bleeding. You know, she's moving into that extraverted place.

1:29So the first two days, give her some space. Now day three, estrogen starting to build. So you're going to notice she's more verbal. She's going to be more present. She might feel more outgoing. She's going to feel like she wants to connect with you. That's going to go all the way through the ovulation. Like in the middle of ovulation, which is about day 12, day 13, where all of a sudden, estrogen is at its peak. If you have any conflict you want to resolve with her, do it between like day two and day 12 of her cycle. She's going to be so ready to handle any conflict with you. Between, let me write that down.

2:06Day two and day 12. Like literally, I had a dad come to me and tell me that he was struggling to understand his teenage daughter. And I said, well, do you know her cycle? And he's like, no, I don't. I said, well, you would never, ever bring a conflict to her on day 18 or 19 of her cycle. Bring it to her on day 10. And now she's going to talk to you. I'm going to say something which is really embarrassing here. I know nothing about menstrual cycles. At no point in my life did anybody teach me about menstrual cycles? The only insight I have in my life to what a menstrual cycle is, is overhearing my sister when I was younger talking about it.

2:47Yeah. And when I say overhearing, I mean, maybe ascendance. And then maybe my girlfriend, once in a while, she'll say, oh, I'm coming into my cycle or whatever she'll say on my period. That's for most men. That's in fact the extent of the education we have about the female reproductive menstrual cycles. Yeah. So talk to me like I'm an idiot about the menstrual cycle. Yeah. How long is it? Oh, I love this. And do you know that most women don't know? Oh, really? So, I mean, most women are ignorant to their own cycles. So it's 28 days, anywhere from 28 days to 32, every woman has a different length.

3:20Okay. And what date does the period come on? Day one. So the day one is the first day she bleeds. Okay. Then how long, that lasts for seven days? Everyone's different, anywhere from three to seven days. Okay. So, you said, day between day two and 12 is when to pick my battles? Yeah. So day two, you're going to start to see her be emerge a little more gregarious. Okay. She may be a little more outgoing. So, I mean, as she gets closer to day 12, you want to go party with her, you want to take her out, make her feel good. Like, that's the time to wine and dine her. Okay, cool. We'll put all the dates then.

3:53And then after day 12, what am I doing? Then after day 12. Okay. So day 12 is right when she's ovulating. So you're going to have to choose your battle there. But the ovulation occurs for most women between day 10 and day 15. There's a small little five day window there. That's if this is the one. Once I figured this out, I was like, why don't I don't men know this? That's when she's going to be her libido is going to be the highest. Okay. So we're having sex on a day. So if you want to have sex with her. Just write this down. Yes. Have sex with her around that time. Around that time. She's willing.

4:26Yeah. She's going to be more motivated because she has testosterone. She's going to feel more like it. Okay. Then after she finishes ovulating after day 15. Yeah. So then there's going to be a crash of hormones. You might see a change in her personality. She might feel a little low. So. Go stay in her hotel. But you could ask. You know, like if she's having a bummer day, like a low day ask her, do you know what day you're cycle you on? Be really nice. Be really nice. Really nice. And then here's the gold. Here's gold. This is so good. You're going to have to report back to the hell this world.

4:54Okay. When around day 17 or 18, progesterone's coming in. This is where you got to give her foot rubs. You got to be extra special and cater her. Like, like, she's the queen that she deserves to be. Okay. So all my compliments, that's where I pull out the note pads. Yes. But what you need to know is she's probably going to be like, if you're like, oh, you look so beautiful today, she might at that time be like, no, I feel horrible. I'm bloated. I don't feel beautiful. And I should disagree. I should say, no, you're, no, you don't. Yeah. You look amazing. Okay. Cool. And you do that. So she bleeds.

5:28And you can take amazing care of her in the back the week before her period. And you will get kudos like you, you can't even imagine. And then start it all over again. Yeah. I mean, just once you understand our patterns. And then it also helps you understand that we're going to be more outgoing in the front and half of our cycle. We're going to be more introverted in the back half. What about men? You guys every 15 minutes. You're pretty, you're pretty black and white. Really? Yeah. You're pretty straightforward. So she was asking you the same question about me. Would you say anything to her about my hormone cycles at all?

6:01You just say. It really depends on the issue at hand. So if it's a, you know, you're going to be like, you're going to be like, a mismatch of libido, then the best time to have sex with a woman is during ovulation. Okay. Which is because she has the most amount of testosterone. Day 10 to 15 of her circle. Yeah. It would be really handy, wouldn't it? Just to have a little menstrual cycle chart on the wall at home. I know that sounds a bit strange, but just so I know what's going on inside her body. I, the first time I discovered this, I started using an app called the clue app. Yeah. And it shows you in a circle.

6:35It kind of shows a little cloud and then it shows you where a PMS clicks in. And it actually has a button that you can share it with people in your life. And I thought, not only does my husband need this, but my staff needs this. They need to understand where I'm going and what if all the women on my, on my team actually shared it with each other. And we could see where each other was at in the menstrual cycle. We would understand why a woman's moods can be so up and down. It's really, you know, because of these three hormones, our moods are much more volatile than yours. You guys are pretty steady atty.

7:11I mean, this is general, you know, this is I hate to be sexist in this conversation. But this is hormones than the way they work. It's actually really helpful to know this because without this insight, it's very easy to fall into the trap of just assuming your partner is, like a moody or that they are. They have like mood swings or that they're, you know, people say things like they're too emotional or whatever it might be. But with this, I actually think it creates a ton of empathy. Yeah. That's the certainly the reaction that I get from hearing that there's a significant hormone fluctuations in my partner and they happen at certain periods.

7:49It actually now would change my behavior. The way that I receive certain times where I come home where I'm, I notice that my partner is just different. And it's almost, it catches me off guard sometimes. I've actually spoken a lot about this and we're very open. We're very much the same person in terms of our willingness to talk about everything. And very difficult things as well. And there will be times where I come home or we go through a patch where just a week, you know, things are making her upset, which wouldn't normally make her upset. It's tiny things that I'm doing. And I go, what? That's it.

8:28So see if you can track that to a certain part of her cycle. I'm kidding. So like the week before our period, we're pretty, we're irritable. And every time I say that, men go, well, you said it. I didn't say it. Well, but that's because progesterone, you know, we're meant to be more inner. We're meant to sit on the couch. We're also meant to believe her not glucose goes higher the week before our period. So we crave carbs. There's a reason we crave carbs because we need to bring glucose up to be able to maintain. And we're going to make progesterone. So we crave carbs. We're irritable. We don't want a lot of cortisol.

9:00So generally, we're a little bit slower. We don't want to, you know, we don't have the desire to push through stress and push through exercise. And so we're going to be, we're a little, we're different that week. So if you come up and you just put your hand on our shoulder and you're like, I love you. You're amazing. I'm here if you need anything. That's all you got to do. But if you're trying to resolve a big conflict or you're trying to come out as in too aggressive a way, we will shut down the week before our periods. So interesting. Whereas if you have something you want to resolve with us, make sure estrogen's there because estrogen makes us great, great verbal, our verbal skills are incredible when estrogen's around.

9:42Ask any menopausal woman, she'll tell you what it's like when she loses estrogen. And I have to say this is because women have this incredible power to create life that us men don't have. It's like women are superheroes for being able to carry a baby for significant amounts of time. And then give birth to this baby. It's just the most magical thing that I can think of in existence. And women have that superpower and with that comes the cycle. So it's a wonderful thing. It's beautiful. And in the book I called it the manifestation phase ovulation because when all of those hormones come in, we can manifest anything we want.

10:25But it's not just a baby. This is a great time. Abulations an amazing time to start a new business project. Interesting. It's a great time, like as an author, like I'm going to write during those five days because my creativity is going to be at its peak. So we're highly creative. If you want to talk about something about life and how to create something with us, do it during ovulation. Your husband is behind that wall here in my home. And is he aware of your menstrual cycle? He is until I started to lose it. I'm 53 so I'm starting to go. But yeah, we talk like this all the time. And the way I like to take ownership over my hormonal moods.

11:12So I will say to him after a long day of work, I will say, hey, it's been a test, austro and driven day for me. I don't feel like I have a lot of estrogen right now. I can't handle a lot of stress. I'm going to need to just take some time to myself. We literally talk like that.

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