The SEEK Podcast
Welcome to the SEEK Podcast – we're so glad you’re here. This podcast is a place of community, collaboration, and inspiration, created to invite and encourage you deeper into a relationship with Jesus. Join these podcasters and many others as we encounter Jesus at SEEK25, Jan 1st-5th. For more information and to register, visit seek.focus.org.
The SEEK Podcast
Rediscovering Women's Health: The Hormone Genius x SEEK
Join the Hormone Genius Podcast on a live stage to explore the intricate dance of hormones that shapes women’s health and identity. From the historical perspectives to the latest natural approaches to hormone management, discover alternative views on handling conditions like PMS and PCOS without relying on synthetic solutions.
We discuss the essential roles hormones play in everyday health, from fertility to mood swings, and highlight the importance of understanding and tracking the female fertility cycle. Listen to transformative stories and expert insights that illuminate the power of being hormone-aware, fostering better relationships and personal health. This episode is not just for the women; it’s an enlightening experience for men to understand the significant hormonal interplay that affects relationships and personal well-being. Join us to uncover the hidden superpowers of hormonal health and embrace a more informed, health-oriented lifestyle.
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Welcome to the Seek 25 podcast, featuring some of our favorite podcasters recorded live at the Max Studios podcast stage during Seek 25 in Salt Lake City.
Speaker 1:Ladies and gentlemen, please gather around because this information, I assure you, will change your life and men out there. I assure you this information is for you too. We are the Hormone Genius Podcast and we are excited to be doing this live podcast at Seek25. First I want to thank Kyle from Max Studios, isn't he? He's amazing. This entire live podcast studio, the setup is amazing. Let's give them, mac Studios, a round of applause for all the incredible work they're doing at Seek 25. If you haven't been over to their booth over there, it's right over there with the University of St Thomas, so please check it out. There's an incredible new woman's health care and gender identity studies. I probably murdered that title, but please check them out over there. Thank you so much for being here.
Speaker 1:We know that most of you already know why this is so important, but maybe some of you out here don't. Hormones are cool and, jamie and I, the theme of this conference. We haven't seen our ladies around with a backpack that says do you know why your hormones are cool? Well, we're going to share that information with you tonight or this evening and we've got some amazing facts about hormones. But I want to tell you a little bit about hormones first, kind of from a historical perspective. I was doing a little research and I was fascinated to find out that the word hormone actually was discovered in 1904, which, if you think about it, really wasn't that long ago. Now we've known that there's these things, these chemical messengers, these like interactions between cells in the body, but it wasn't coined until 1904 that we would call that word a hormone. Now a lot has happened in the last 100 years, 124 years in terms of hormones and, jamie, and I think that in terms of women especially and the identity of who we are as women, that we kind of took a wrong turn with hormones. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, in 1950, around 1956, we developed synthetic hormones, something called oral contraceptive pills, and that intersects almost with every woman on the planet, because at some point many of you out there have been offered birth control pills and not for birth control. You've been offered birth control for PMS, for PCOS, for acne, for heavy periods, for painful periods, and so for those of you out there, in fact, raise your hands right now if you have been offered the birth control pill for a woman's health reason. I know I have.
Speaker 1:When I was in college I played soccer at Briarcliff College in Sioux City, iowa. We have any Iowa people here Awesome. I'm actually from Nebraska, nebraska, of course. Yay, thank you for all my Nebraska people out there. I'm from Omaha, nebraska, but I played soccer at Briarcliff in Sioux City and I was offered the birth control pill because my cycles became irregular as an athlete Very common situation and I can tell you that I did not feel good on birth control.
Speaker 1:And so I'm here to tell you that there is another way. Synthetic hormones suppress our female identity. Synthetic hormones are not the real hormonal you and I want to give you an opportunity to really believe that your hormones were made good. You were made good by God, your body is made good and your hormones are good, and so Jamie is going to tell us some amazing facts. She's going to get us started. But just so you know, again, I'm Teresa Kenney. This is Jamie Rachi.
Speaker 1:We're the Hormone Genius Podcast. Again, I'm from Omaha, nebraska. I am a women's health nurse practitioner and I have practiced in Omaha for 25 years. I have an incredible amount of clinical experience in women's health and I have never in my practice prescribed the birth control pill, and I can tell you that I've never felt that I have not been able to help a woman with any of those conditions like PCOS, like PMS, like acne. All of those things can be treated another way. There is an alternative and you know.
Speaker 1:Many of you out there have not been shared that information. Please stick around at the end of this podcast because I have a free gift for you. We have over a hundred Happy Girl Guide to being Whole books. This is an amazing book, guys. Has anybody read this book yet out there? This book is an encyclopedia to your body. It is a foundation in your hormonal health and we are giving over 100 copies away free. So if you can stick around to the end of this podcast, you can get a copy of this book. So please do, jamie, take it away, girl.
Speaker 2:All right, teresa, I'm so excited to see all of you today because, again, as we were roaming around and people would stop and ask and say, well, what's with your backpack? Why are hormones? Cool? And if you guys received a little postcard, you also have a little snapshot of the cycle and so, if you have that postcard, whip it out. If you don't raise your hand, someone will pass one to you, share it with your neighbor, because we will be able to use that as a guide. But while that's happening, I'll introduce myself a little bit.
Speaker 2:So, teresa and I, we started the podcast in 2020, august, and it has been an incredible four years. I'm from Cedar Falls, iowa. Okay, I was hoping for it to be really loud. Let's do it again, just for my own pride. And go Cedar Falls Iowa yeah, we'll see who wins at the end. Teresa, yeah, and go Cedar Falls Iowa, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll see who wins at the end. Teresa, yeah, huskers, go Huskers. Panthers you and I, panthers. All right.
Speaker 2:So, anyway, we are so excited to talk to you guys about this. We are total hormone nerds and we pretty much guarantee, by the end of this, many of you will go from like maybe a hormone interest. You know you're kind of in the haze to hormone obsessed. So we're going to talk about five cool things about hormones. And Teresa got us kicked off with one of the first cool things about hormones. She mentioned that hormones are chemical messengers that travel through the blood. And what I think is so interesting, you guys, about how God made our body. Our body's goal is to survive. Every day, every day. Our body, the main goal is to survive and to produce. It's why we need sleep, it's why we have a sex drive, it's why we need to eat food, it's even why we get all weird when we travel and that we need to go to the chiropractor. This is an interesting fact. Did you know that our body wants to stay in equilibrium so terribly? And again, our hormones help us stay in balance inwardly, but even outwardly our body is meant to stay in balance. Our eyes. So I'm looking at you. All right, my eyes are exactly balanced. It's not tilted right, but what happens is it's so important for my body to protect a very important organ called the brain and it's very important for me to survive, so I can see that everything else about my body distorts. It's why we need chiropractic adjustments, for instance, as an example. But that's kind of how hormones are. Our hormones adjust to what might be off in the body and our hormones want to keep us alive.
Speaker 2:So I often think about, you know, hormones being a symphony. Teresa, we've heard that before. Right, you know there's a beautiful symphony and there's instruments. There's the clarinets and theets and the flutes. And, by the way, has anybody band? Are any of you guys band players? Oh, yeah, band. So in your early years, do you remember what the band sounded like? Kind of bad, right, Squeaky clarinets, for instance. That was me, but it would ruin the whole experience, in a sense, of that beautiful band or of a symphony, in terms of like, if you're using a violin and it's going too fast. So again, when one thing is off, it kind of affects the whole symphony. That's what happens with our hormones.
Speaker 2:So hormones are chemical messengers. It's more than just estrogen and progesterone, but those are going to be some hormones we talk mostly about today. So, teresa, what would you say we're going to talk about the second very important thing for you guys all to know about how cool our hormones are In terms of our sex hormones. So when we say sex hormones, especially today, we're going to talk about estrogen and progesterone and what's interesting is that we have a fertility cycle and every month there's this main event and we're going to kind of go through that cycle with you especially if you have one of those postcards and I'm going to kick it off to Teresa. But we have this cycle. That's a vital sign of health. And that is the second cool thing about hormones. So the first thing is that hormones are chemical messengers and the main goal is to keep our body in balance and in equilibrium. The second thing is that our cycle is actually a vital sign of health. It's a health diary. So, teresa, why don't you share with our audience here a little bit about the cycle?
Speaker 1:How many of you guys track your menstrual cycles on an app on your phone? Great, it's such a great thing to do. How many of you know what the main event of your cycle is? Great, how many of you think it's your period? It's not. So. If you're thinking in your head that the main event of your cycle is your period, it's not. In fact, without this other thing that women do that's so incredibly special, you would not have a period, and the period is appropriately kind of like the end of the sentence. The period is the end of something, and so first I want to start out with saying that, in order to really be able to understand your hormones as a woman, you need to understand your main event, and I can tell you this your menstrual tracking app isn't probably doing that for you. In fact, the only way for your menstrual tracking app for it to be able to do that is for you to pee on your phone, and I'm pretty sure most of you aren't doing that. So this is really important to understand your menstrual tracking app. As you can see, like you'll put in your bleeding days right. This is the first phase of your cycle. We call it the menstrual phase. That's the first phase. You put that into your tracking app and what does it try to predict for you into your tracking app? And what does it try to predict for you? That fertile window, something we call ovulation, and that's what it can't predict. That is the main event of your cycle, and I want you to understand, by the end of this podcast, that you have the ability each of you out there, as a young woman to track your main event by the biological markers of your own body. Okay, and so when you get to the point where you are a hormone genius this is what happens you come into my office and we sit down together and you start telling me about your cycles. I say, okay, how? What's the length of your cycle? Do you have regular cycles? Yes, I get a period every month and I'll say to you that's great, can you tell me when your main event is? And you'll be like, yeah, yeah, I can see my main event. I make this stuff called cervical mucus and I track it and I know exactly when I ovulate, instead of you looking at me and going, yeah, my phone tells me I'm going to ovulate next week, because often that's the level of information we start with, which is great because it's the first place, but I want you to know that you can track your own main event by biological markers that we will go through. Okay.
Speaker 1:So again, the first phase of your cycle which, by the way, there is four and we have those cards to share with you is the menstrual phase. The second phase is the springtime. It's like the preparation for the main event. We call that the follicular phase. And as you enter in the follicular phase, you're going to notice some changes.
Speaker 1:And this is where we start talking about hormone superpowers, which we're going to bring in St Joan of Arc. Go St Joan of Arc, because she obviously had amazing hormone superpowers. I mean, who just leads people to like conquer the English army and preserve their country France in, you know, 1400. So go St Joan of Arc. She was amazing. But that phase of the cycle is the preparation for something amazing to occur the follicular phase. And it's in that phase that you will start to produce this fluid that we call cervical mucus, which nobody really wants to say cervical mucus, but we do a lot on our podcast and we'll sometimes refer to it as cervical fluid to make it a little bit less mucousy. So again, menstrual phase, follicular phase, and then we're going to go into the main event, right, jamie? And you can take it from there All right.
Speaker 2:So this whole time we're kind of leading up a roller coaster, is what I like to think. So, as the body is progressing toward the main event, what is happening is that we have all these little underdeveloped eggs that are just waiting to mature and to be released, and so that then, I mean again, our body is built to want to receive the sperm, so that we can, you know, it can be implanted into the side of the uterus so that we can have babies. That's the main event. That's why it's the main event is because without it we wouldn't reproduce. So as we ovulate, vent is because without it we wouldn't reproduce. So as we ovulate, then the dominant hormone and again she talked about cervical fluid, cervical mucus, but that dominant hormone is estrogen. Look at that little postcard you have, if you have it, and again you see your period and then you see a line called estrogen and it's starting to increase and then it reaches a peak and then it kind of falls off, and then as you ovulate, the dominant hormone is called progesterone. Progesterone is produced by the corpus luteum. The corpus luteum was the cyst, which is a fluid-filled sac that holds the egg, and as it was developing before ovulation, was producing the hormone. Like I said, estrogen developing before ovulation was producing the hormone, like I said, estrogen and what's really cool. And you guys, this is crazy.
Speaker 2:So I have my master's in community health education, community health education. Okay, I have a women's health certificate, very passionate about women's health when I was in college, okay, and I never once in my life not by the doctor, not by the professors ever heard about one of my most favorite parts of the female body and it's called cervical crypts. Has anyone ever heard of a cervical crypt? Cervical crypts? Give some cervical crypts some noise, cervical crypts. Next year we'll have a shirt that says cervical crypts are cool. Would that be cool? Hormones each year we can have a different part, not so sure. Okay, we're gonna fight for it. Yeah, but cervical crips are what produce the cervical mucus and, again, that's keyed in from our follicle, our mature follicle. So I love cervical fluid, cervical mucus so much and without it we could not get pregnant.
Speaker 2:But after we ovulate, like I said, the corpus luteum, it produces a hormone called progesterone. So you look at that postcard and again, dominant hormone estrogen before ovulation. Dominant hormone after ovulation is progesterone. Progesterone causes a very drying effect. So when you go to the bathroom, no longer are you seeing the cervical fluid. It's dry. Okay, this is very high level.
Speaker 2:I invite you to be looking for people who might be able to walk with you in understanding your fertility cycle. But again, this whole thing happens for the main event, for ovulation. Most women know when they bleed because their period is red. Most women don't know when they ovulate because they don't know what to look for. But I'm going to give you a little trick. When you go to the bathroom, just this seems maybe a little strange. I think it's a genius idea, a hormone genius idea, if I may say so myself. But close your eyes when you wipe after the bathroom. Future husbands of America, don't cover your ears. I mean, it's coming. You'll learn about it. Now you're learning about it. It won't be the end of the story for you all, I guarantee it. Ask yourself the question what does this feel like? And what's interesting is if it feels lubricative. We know estrogen is high, jamie what the heck does lubricative mean, lubricative is um, lubricative is slimy like egg white.
Speaker 2:Is that what you're saying? Like if I were to crack open an egg white on my counters and wiped it with the Kleenex, that would be lubricative. Yeah, slippery, super slippery, super like gushy.
Speaker 1:Jamie, do we want to tell people and this has to do with men like, why, why, why cervical mucus? Like why do we have to talk about it? Do we want to tell people why? Because this actually will bring in men, and it's super important for men to understand this. There are three main ingredients to create a human life, and this is why cervical fluid, or mucus, is going to be important.
Speaker 1:It takes an egg that comes from a woman and it takes something else that comes from a man, right, these little things that are called sperm. Now, listen up, men, sperm, that's what do they do? What do they do? They swim, right, and can you swim in a pool with no water? No, so in order to actually create a human being, we have to have water in order for sperm to get to an egg, up into the female body. So cervical mucus is essentially essential for life, and we call this the window of fertility. And actually, a woman can only get pregnant in a six-day period every menstrual cycle, the entire menstrual cycle. Our fertile window is pretty short. There is only one egg that is released in a cycle and it only lives for 12 to 24 hours. A woman can only become pregnant in that fertile window, and it is all defined by this fluid that allows for conception to occur. So, men, it's very important for you to understand this as well. And then you have this great hormone called testosterone. Right, and testosterone is what makes you powerful, but actually women make it too, and when women ov, our testosterone levels go up. And guess what? The way God made us is that men and women become attracted to each other when a woman can make a baby. So women if you've not noticed this already in terms of drive, sex drive women will have sex drive when they ovulate, but many times after the egg has been released you don't. And it makes sense. The way God made us is, once the egg is released, your chance for ever conceiving a life is passed, so you don't need to have sex. Like God designed us in these very unique ways and it's also something important to remember too. So like we are Catholic here, right, and so we're trying to live a chaste life. So if you have, and so we're trying to live a chaste life, so if you have a boyfriend and you're trying to wait, let's say, till marriage, till you enter into a sexual relationship, then it's probably not a good idea to watch a movie in the basement when you're ovulating. So that's just a little relationship advice.
Speaker 1:In fact, we were talking to a guy at at Seek and he told us that that information was very valuable to him To understand his girlfriend's cycle was so powerful, and he learned that information from listening to our podcast. We have a podcast with a guy named Dave and it's called what is it called? Jamie Like this information that every guy should listen to this podcast and it really did help him and every guy should listen to that podcast with Dave on the Hormone Genius. Because that information, guys, you really need to understand a woman's cycle to be in relationship with her, and it's actually really helpful to you because if you want to make a woman happy, there are certain things you need to know about premenstrual syndrome and a way a woman's body works so that you can understand when maybe to do a certain thing and when not to do a certain thing. Right, jamie? Yes, Okay.
Speaker 2:So one story that I remember from you, teresa and this is like an origin story for you, kind of, in getting started with all of this work is this very thing that you're saying just now. So what's very interesting, ladies, is that because we just went through our cycle, right, but our cycle is a vital sign of health. So Teresa mentioned PMS, right, mood issues and, honestly, the guy we just mentioned, dave Getterman. He talks about saving marriages through NFP, because men can come to know and learn about when a woman's mood may change because of her hormone fluctuations, right? So, teresa, something that stuck out to me when we were kind of getting going with our podcast here at the very beginning of 2020 was how you came to Napro technology and this work through your understanding that low progesterone can cause PMS.
Speaker 2:So let's kind of start digging in to PMS with these ladies. Do you guys want to hear about PMS? Who wants to hear about PMS? Who wants to know about how to help your PMS? What boyfriends would wish for help for their girlfriends with PMS, right, okay, so share your story, teresa. I girlfriends with PMS, right, okay, so share your story, teresa. I want to hear it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean it's kind of embarrassing because I knew so little about my body as a young woman and I was in graduate school. I didn't know anything about ovulation, nothing about cervical mucus, and I was learning about something called Napro technology, which is something I practice now. I worked for the Pope Paul VI Institute for years and I was having all of these symptoms. I was getting anxious at times. There were times I felt like down, almost depressed, but not really, but I just felt down at times. At times I just got like these bad headaches and then I also got terrible sugar cravings and I just remember like I was in clinicals to become a nurse practitioner and I would be driving home from the clinicals and I'd be like eating candy bars and I just felt bad. And I had my boyfriend at the time, who is my now husband, dan and he was like you know, you just don't seem like you feel really good. And I was like, yeah, you're right, I don't. And so he's like maybe you should go to a doctor Smart, boyfriend, smart. And so he's like, why don't we just write down your symptoms? And so I wrote down a list of my symptoms and I took it to my primary care doctor and she looked at me and she's like I think you're just depressed. And I was like, okay, but I knew I wasn't depressed. Like, I did feel depressed at times, I felt down, but I didn't feel depressed all the time. And so she offered me an antidepressant and I was like I don't know, I just don't think that's what I need, so I didn't take it.
Speaker 1:And then I ended up right after that having a woman offer to teach me how to chart my cycles. And she was a nurse in the office that I learned about napro technology and she's like Teresa, do you know how to chart? And I was like no. She's like, well, then, I'm going to teach you. Her name was Rosemary, and so she taught me how to chart every time I would go to clinical. She taught me how to chart and all of a sudden I started to realize that my symptoms aligned with the like seven to 10 days before my period every month. I just had really bad PMS and I couldn't even recognize it.
Speaker 1:And that's why we talk about the cycle as a vital sign, because we know that in order for you as a human being I mean, this is man or woman you need to know that, like, you can't connect the symptoms of your body until you understand the science of your body. Like we believe that, like, if you can learn the science and the hormones of your body which there are many that you can actually learn to advocate for your health, and that's what I was able to do. So, once I learned this was PMS, then I went to a doctor who was trained in Napro technology and they tested my hormones. They tested my hormones on certain days of my cycle and I learned that I wasn't really making any good hormones, which, to me you know. Now I'm like, oh yeah, I was in graduate school, I was super stressed out, I was not sleeping well, I wasn't eating well, all the things and I see this now in my patients all the time and so I was put on hormone therapy to help balance my hormones and I felt so much better.
Speaker 1:And so you have an opportunity to realize that, whatever the condition that you are experiencing again, some of you have talked to us at SEEK already Some of you have irregular cycles, some of you have polycystic ovarian syndrome, and maybe you're on the pill, maybe that's the only thing you were offered, maybe you were told that in order to treat PCOS you have to be on the pill. I hear that all the time in my office. But you don't have to be on the pill. You can actually learn how to balance your hormones naturally and actually figure out what the underlying root cause of your woman's health issue is. And that's what I do every day in my practice is help women find the underlying root cause of their woman's health condition, and there are people all over the country and all over the world that are trained, just like me, and if you listen to our podcast, we interview a lot of those doctors and we try to share how you can get in touch with those doctors too. Amen, Amen.
Speaker 2:So we hope you're getting the sense that your cycle is more, really even, than just our reproduction. You know, it's more than just when I'm fertile, when I'm infertile. It gives us information, even about our mood, our hormones, when we have our bioidentical hormones that are circulating and we're honoring that flow, no pun intended, the flow of our hormones. It protects estrogen protects our bone, our heart and our muscles, and it's just so interesting Our brain, our heart and our bones is what I mean, but probably our muscles too. What'd you think? Estrogen causes muscle growth. Yeah, so it's very interesting. Women need to know this because we unknowingly alter this flow. We unknowingly alter the flow and actually now we're going to flow into our third cool thing about why hormones are so amazing is that we have superpowers attached to our womanhood and we also have superpowers attached to manhood, of course, but the superpowers I really want to explain to you all are the superpowers associated with estrogen and progesterone. So, again, this is a perfect transition, teresa, because we talked a little bit about health and I'm sure many of you have again PMS or endometriosis, pcos, mood swings, issues, and we're going to be lingering around after our podcast today for you that just have questions that you haven't been able to find answers, we are very happy to help you with that. But many of you may not realize that, again, our hormones influence our being, our being One of my favorite things to think about, especially with St Joan of Arc being the patron saint of Sikh this year. And again, I love thinking about how St Joan of Arc, she slays dragons. I'm like slaying dragons and balancing hormones. That's the Hormone Genius podcast, right? Not only are we you know hormones are so cool, but understanding how to balance these hormones do affect, again beyond just reproduction.
Speaker 2:Some examples so, as Teresa mentioned earlier, every cycle starts with day one of our period. It means that we did not get pregnant from the cycle before. Our hormones are at an all-time low right and so typically, we're experiencing our period. We may feel a little uncomfortable, some of us more uncomfortable than others, and it's a great time to just rest. But did you know that during your period, a time that we all kind of loathe, it seems like? I encourage you to no longer loathe your period, but to see it as a favor to you in terms of what comes with this time. It's a great time to discern and to reflect, because your hormones are an all-time low. Women tend to just be more even keel. So I know for me, if I'm discerning, maybe to start a new project, or many of you guys may be discerning a new job, some of you may be discerning marriage moving, something like that. This is a great time to journal and to reflect and to really ask God to accompany you in this quiet space. So that's your hormone superpower during your period is that, again, you can reflect and journal, really leverage this time.
Speaker 2:But then as that follicle is developing and estrogen is starting to produce, estrogen to me is like coffee. You know, in the morning you drink a cup of coffee and you become more like, awake and energized, and then you drink cup number two. None of us drink two cups of coffee a day, right? None of us. We stop at a cup and we're done, right, just joking. So as estrogen is increasing, it's kind of like drinking more and more cups of coffee in terms of this analogy. So as estrogen increases and it's starting to reach toward that ovulation time, as women, estrogen is fuel for our feminine engine. We become more creative. When we have increasing estrogen, we're more energized. Did you know that? If you were to look at the person next to you. Just look at the person next to you. Women. Women and men, you can too, but women looking at the person next to you and even throughout the course of the rest of this conference. If you are near ovulation, you have a higher ability to read facial expressions and to understand what those facial expressions mean. Hello, how cool is that? Estrogen is so incredible. There's an estrogen genius to that phase of approaching ovulation. We're more fertile than again just our fertility. We're fertile in the mind, we're creative, we're able again to kind of sense situations, among others. So, as again we're reaching toward ovulation, our estrogen is increasing. A great time again to get in front of a room and do public speaking or to present or to come up with your great idea, okay.
Speaker 2:And then, after ovulation, progesterone is your dominant hormone. Progesterone is really. It stands for progestate. Your body is preparing for gestation, even if conception did not take place. Conception means sperm plus egg, thatation. Even if conception did not take place, conception means sperm plus egg. That's conception. If conception did not take place during ovulation, your body's still producing progesterone, because you need progesterone, ample amounts of progesterone, to sustain a baby if you did achieve pregnancy. If you did not achieve pregnancy, then a couple weeks later you get your period, but during progesterone, progesterone has its own genius too. So progesterone is kind of sedating. We are more calm and we're more focused and detail-oriented. That's what a healthy dose of progesterone looks like. So it's really incredible because, women, we can really leverage our cycle for our productivity, for our creativity in our relationships.
Speaker 2:In terms of relationships when your estrogen is high before ovulation, when you're that creative and that like again fuel for the feminine engine, I love saying that you're also very attracted, obviously, to the opposite sex, just like you were mentioning earlier, teresa, saying you know, you, your libido is much higher during that estrogen genius phase right before ovulation. So if you're married, just know that that's really important and we want to again see that masculine man that's very attracted to us. But after ovulation, we want to see the husbands bopping the kids on the knee, you know, or even boyfriends, have you guys? If you guys have a boyfriend like past, present and into the future you will likely notice that you're very attracted to your boyfriend or spouse in different ways throughout the course of a month. Have you ever seen your boyfriend bop a kid on the knee or like play ball or laugh and be kind of fun with little kids. Do you guys know what I'm talking about? Ladies, well, we can find that endearing no matter where we're at in our cycle, but we especially like it after ovulation because our body's preparing for gestation right. Our body does this every month and what does that mean? We want somebody that we know can protect us and a family. That's why we're more attracted to our boyfriends and husbands when they're in the family.
Speaker 2:So in the episode with Dave, as we mentioned earlier, if the men in this room are wondering man, how can I show my girlfriend or wife love in this, like post-ovulatory time? Literally, just find a friend of kids and be like, hey, can we babysit? Literally, that's all you need to do, you know. So the cycle gives us so much information and it's not just for women, like we talk about. It's really. It's so important for men to know this too, because I didn't realize really until talking with you know, dave in particular, but other men who are passionate about this how hurtful it is to men when their wives are saying no to intimacy during certain times of the cycle. It's very, it can be very hurtful, but if they just really understood that our desires and the way we find them attractive changes. It just soothes so much. It soothes so much. So that's the third cool thing. Do you have anything else you want to add about hormone superpowers?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean when you're saying that, jamie, I like to say that libido is attached to procreative power, libido is attached to procreative power, libido is attached to procreative power, and so this again goes to the complementarity of men and women. So, again, men are fertile every day of their life, from the age of about 12 until they're buried in the ground. So their libido is just different because they're procreative every single day. Women are procreative in an event, a one-time event, each menstrual cycle, and so if a couple doesn't know that, there can be a lot of like tension and lack of communication. So this is truly like life-changing for relationships to understand a menstrual cycle and to understand the way it affects a woman's body and how we can live in relationship together. I want to tell you a story about a patient that I saw recently. This patient, she was in her 30s and she had had previous children with a previous relationship, but then she found kind of like you could say, her true love, and her true love in her got married, but she had these two children and she love in her got married, but she had these two children and she was in her 30s and she didn't really think that she wanted any more children. So they had made a decision not to have more children. Now here's the kicker she had been on birth control since she was about 16 years old. She had been on birth control pills since she was about 16 years old, unless until she wanted to have those two children. That she did already. But she listened to the Hormone Genius podcast and learned about how synthetic hormones kind of disrupt your natural hormones, and so she made this decision that she wanted to go all natural, and so she came off of the birth control pill and all of a sudden she realized she was attracted to her husband for the first time.
Speaker 1:Now, women don't know this, but think about it. What does birth control pills do? They suppress the main event. They are meant to suppress the main event of the cycle. So, of course, if you suppress the main event and I just told you that the main event is attached to your libido directly you are going to suppress sex drive, and that's why one of the main side effects of birth control pills is lack of libido. And women don't even know this because they don't understand their bodies going into taking these medicines right. So first of all, she understands. All of a sudden she's like, wow, like I'm attracted to my husband in a way I've never been attracted to before, and then all of a sudden she starts to notice that she desires another child. Think about this, guys Again hormones. We discovered this word in 1904. And by 1955, we've developed a synthetic pill to completely suppress the maternal desire that we have, the inmost identity we have as women, the desire in the deepest parts of our human heart to be creative, to be creative, to be a mother, whether it be biological or spiritual. But we suppress that by using these synthetic hormones, and women aren't even aware of it. This is not the first patient I've had that when they come off birth control pills, all of a sudden they're like looking at a baby for the first time and they're like I think I want one of those. Can you imagine? We've got millions and millions of women who don't realize that they're suppressing their desire to have children by being on birth control. So the good news is this beautiful woman who's now married to the love of her life. She now wants to have a baby with her husband, and so I'm going to help her do that. But that's just one story I don't think you know.
Speaker 1:Birth control is often mentioned as like one of the greatest inventions, you could say, of the 20th century. Right, it's changed, like the way women have been able to climb up the ladder of society. It's changed culture directly, and so we don't question sometimes really what it's doing to our hormones, to our body, to who we are as women. You know, jamie and I were talking. This whole conference is kind of like a question, right, how many of you have been in a talk where they said, like do you know your identity? Do you know your identity in Christ? Do you know your identity as a woman or a daughter of God? Do you know your identity in your own hormones? Well, jamie and I are convinced that learning about the science of your body is deeply connected to who you are as made in the image and likeness of God. In fact, we believe that if you know your body and you know your hormones, you will actually understand who you are in your feminine genius in a way that you have never understood it before. You can do this.
Speaker 1:And I believe that men too, in their male genius, like do you guys realize that men's testosterone levels have declined over 50% since the 1980? Fact why? Why are men out there not feeling motivated. Why are men losing their desire to be powerful, strong, purpose-driven life? Well, it may be because their hormones are not the same as they were in 1980. That's crazy to me. So, guys, we all need to care about hormones. And, men, we can take control of this in terms of you being healthy too. In fact, one thing that you could do today is you could make sure that you have good and adequate vitamin D. Vitamin D is a precursor to making testosterone. In fact, it's considered a pre-hormone. So, all of you men out there, if you don't know what your vitamin D level is, you could ask a doctor to run that test for you. But I assure you that if you just go out and buy a supplement of vitamin D3 2000 I use and you take that daily, you will have actually better testosterone. And actually taking zinc or eating nuts like Brazil nuts, which have a good amount of zinc, is also super good for your testosterone too. And, by the way, if you just actually sleep at night, if you just actually get eight hours of sleep, men, you will make better testosterone too.
Speaker 1:All of us need to care about hormones, because hormones are life. Hormones affect every interaction in our body, from our sex hormones progesterone, estrogen, testosterone from our thyroid to our adrenal hormones, like cortisol and adrenaline, to our pancreas, like insulin. Our hormones literally are making messages like trillions of times a day. We all need to care about how important this is to our health and you, as women, have the power now, becoming a genius of your own hormones, to advocate in your doctor's offices that you don't want necessarily to settle for birth control pills for whatever problem that you have. That you can say to your doctor. You know what? I would actually like some tests to know what the underlying problem that I have is and I'd actually like to find the solution to that problem. You have the power now to advocate for yourself and if your doctor doesn't listen to you or makes you feel dumb for wanting a hormone test, then you walk straight out of that doctor's office and you go to a different doctor Because I'm telling you they do not understand this.
Speaker 1:They were not trained in medical school. They don't know about cervical mucus. I promise you, doctors with that degree, md, do not know about cervical mucus. It is a travesty. Md do not know about cervical mucus. It is a travesty. We are in a great enlightenment in terms of what we know about the woman's body, and all of us now can make a difference. Each one of you, becoming a hormone genius, can actually tell a friend. You can actually share the happy girl with a friend. This is so important. It's important to everything, isn't it? Jamie?
Speaker 2:Super, duper, duper important. And something I just keep thinking about too is just how impactful, again, being hormone aware is. So being hormone aware transforms us. It really does. It's this idea that when we're given information that we haven't been given before, a light bulb clicks on. It really does. How many of you guys had a light bulb moment with hormones Right? So many of us have these moments where literally it changes our life and I have a couple of stories I want to share about that. So it's very interesting.
Speaker 2:So, as many of you probably know or soon will know, when you prepare for marriage, often the priest requires that you do some form of NFP natural family planning. Okay, natural family planning and tracking your cycle, that kind of all goes together. So, because the church, the Catholic church, does not see contraception as an ethical and moral way to plan a family. So natural family planning is the natural way to avoid a pregnancy, if that is the wish, and also to time pregnancy. So a gal and her fiance she was on the pill and they were living together and just like so many other couples before they waltzed into you know, the presentation space and there I was just going away talking all about how awesome the cycle is and our awesome cervical mucus and our estrogen and progesterone. And I did my spiel, just like I've done a million times before, and again I couldn't. I didn't notice anything different about them. They just kind of fell into step with so many others that only come because they're required by the priest. But what was interesting about this couple is they left. But three months later she called me and I didn't know who she was right away. I couldn't even remember her name. But she told me she could not stop thinking about what she learned about her hormones. And it was interesting because in that time she stopped taking birth control and she asked to meet with me and her fiance to talk a little bit more about what it could look like to actually chart her cycle. So when they started charting their cycle, they started to understand the dignity of our hormones and the dignity of our fertility cycle and how awesome the Lord made our body. The Lord loves us so much, like he gives us a way to plan our family and when we have a child that maybe we didn't plan, we know. We know all life is given to us by the Lord. He loves us so much. He gives us this beautiful map.
Speaker 2:Okay, so she is coming to learn this with her fiance and I just asked the question what would happen to your relationship if you didn't have sex until the wedding night? And they just kind of stopped. And I looked at both of them Because, again, initially, when they came into this intro session for the Creighton Method that's what's called the intro session she again was totally turned off to the idea. I thought it was weird and would never even consider something like that. But they discerned it and they decided that they were no longer going to have sex until the wedding night. So they waited for their wedding night.
Speaker 2:Later she became a fertility care practitioner, converted to the Catholic faith, directed a women's health care center that does not prescribe birth control, all because her priest required that her and her fiance would come to an introductory session. The lights clicked on for her. What did I do? What did Jamie say? What did Jamie do? I just told him the truth. I just told him the truth.
Speaker 2:It's not my invention, it's not Teresa's invention. We're the Lord's invention. And when we are exposed to truth, our soul recognizes it. Our soul recognizes truth not just with hormones, with anything. Our heart burns, you know, on the road to Emmaus, when you know they're talking about oh Jesus, and the heart burns when Jesus was with him because they noticed the truth of who that was. They just couldn't name it. So we know truth, we feel it and it transforms lives. You know, like there's lots of things out there. There's, you know, gut health and lifestyle and healthy eating and taking care of our body and getting enough sleep and all that's staying hydrated. All that's very, very important.
Speaker 2:But the reason Teresa and I are so passionate about this is because our hormones again, male and female, we both have hormones. But these reproductive hormones, the hormones that help us produce life, co-create life with God, it changes the eternal cosmos forever the moment that a soul enters this world. It changes the eternal cosmos forever. The moment that a soul enters this world, our whole eternity is changed forever. That moment it's important. The creative process of our hormone endocrine reproductive system is, in my mind, one of the most spiritual systems in our body, 100%, because it has the capacity to co -create with the Lord. That's why we make such a big deal about it. We love healthy living tips, we love talking about gut health. We love that. That's fun. That is fun.
Speaker 2:But in terms of the spiritual, faith-filled pull we have, it's really tied to our God-given image, because our hormones mirror the fabric of our feminine soul. Our hormones mirror the fabric of our feminine soul, feminine genius. Women and men are different, right? Women, if we hear a baby in this room, we're going to be like where's the baby? Like ding, like stick the finger up, kind of checking for, like wind or rain. That's what we do with our ears and our heart. We're like where's the baby? The baby's crying, we're paying attention to it. If our friend is crying to us, we mom our friend. We're not their mom, but we mom them and we're not going to stop momming anyone, whether we have actual biological children or not. So there's a maternity within our feminine genius, a maternity within our feminine genius. But that makes sense, right, because our hormones and our estrogen and our progesterone, all of this goes together to produce life, to make us maternal physically. But it mirrors the soul, our soul, the maternal beautiful gift of our soul.
Speaker 2:Secondly, with our feminine genius is we're receptive. We receive the other. You know someone's having a hard time. We receive them. We hug them, we sense them, we feel them. But we also receive our husbands. Our egg receives the sperm. So our hormones really mirror our feminine genius, the fabric of our feminine soul. It's so beautiful. We're generous, the way our body's made. We have breasts, we feed our babies, but we also feel that pull to give to the poor. Again, not to say men don't feel that, but there's just this beautiful way, this feminine way, that we have that capacity to do that. And, lastly, we're very sensitive. You know, did you know that there are more nerve endings on the female body? I think there's 20 times more nerve endings on a female than there is a man Interesting.
Speaker 1:It's great when it comes to childbirth. That's great.
Speaker 2:Oh dear goodness, yeah, oh dear goodness, yeah, oh dear goodness. So anyway, it's just a beautiful thing. So that's the fourth really cool thing about hormones, and then we're going to kind of start wrapping up. Fourth coolest thing is that hormone awareness can transform us. The fifth one is just tying this whole idea with Joan of Arc and kind of coming to a conclusion that we can be the genius of our hormones and to really set your hearts aflame and to fight this kind of fight, this good fight.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I want to share a story and I'll let Jamie kind of close up and I want to thank you all for being here and again, if you stay around, you're going to get a free book. So please line up and I'm happy to sign the book as well. But this is you know, jamie said this the desire of the sacredness of life. This passion that we both have comes from our hearts. It really does, and both of us are very pro-life women. We want to serve and we want to help. Women believe that life is sacred and I just want to share a quick story with you.
Speaker 1:On Christmas Eve this year, I got to be in the delivery of a child that was born of a mother who had reversed her abortion. Now, some of you have never heard this before, but at my clinic we do something called abortion pill reversal. There is a medication out there and many of you may know that is a set of pills that can be taken to cause an abortion, and my clinic actually has a protocol that's used all over the country and all over the world to reverse that process. And this young woman she actually started in Colorado but she ended up in Nebraska and I served her because she desired to reverse and to keep her baby. Well, guess what? On the day before Christmas Eve I told her. I said, listen, if you need someone to be in your labor and delivery with you because she had no friends, her boyfriend wasn't supportive, her parents were not supportive, and so I said, if you need someone to be with you during this birth, I said, please call me, I will come.
Speaker 1:On the day before Christmas Eve I got a text at seven in the morning that her water had broke and she wanted me to be there with her. So I went to the hospital and stayed with her all night and I labored with her and I helped her through the process of labor and delivery and she ended up not making progress and ended up with a cesarean on Christmas Eve. And I was there in the delivery with her with a cesarean on Christmas Eve and I was there in the delivery with her and she had a beautiful little baby boy. And she told me over and over again. She said, teresa. She said, can you believe it? She said can you believe it? We were able to reverse this Like, look at my baby, like he's here. I can't believe. I didn't want this little boy.
Speaker 1:So a lot of times again, in this process of learning about our bodies and learning about our hormones, we realize the sacredness of who we are. As human beings, we connect to that inmost feminine soul, the masculinity of who we are. And so to come full circle. For me, I was so grateful. The greatest Christmas present I could have ever been given on Christmas Eve is to hold the hand of a young woman who had first thought she had no support for her and her little baby and thought that the only choice that she had was an abortion, but then to find that that wasn't the last answer, that she could reverse her abortion and that we could hold her baby together and praise God in that. So that is my Christmas Eve is being there and being able to hold this little life, and Jamie and I really believe that the sacredness of life is so important. So we do this because of our passionate pro-life views, but we do this because we love the science of hormones, teresa.
Speaker 2:I want to tell you something quick, all of you. What did we just notice about Teresa's story? She was not this lady's doctor. She wasn't the lady's mother or sister or doula. She was a woman who saw the need in another. She was exercising her feminine genius, the maternity of her feminine soul. She's not her mom, she is a mom. She's not her mom. So I just wanted to point that out to you.
Speaker 2:That's amazing, teresa, that you listened to it. You could have said, oh my gosh, it's Christmas, I have eight children. You know this person has a need, but oh, that's kind of a hassle. But her heart was saying lean into the feminine genius, lean into it. We all have a choice to say no to that and that definitely connects again to our womanhood, to our hormones. But I encourage all of you throughout the rest of this SEEK conference, if you see somebody being a feminine genius or a hormone genius, call it out to them. Hey, I saw you helping that mom who was struggling with that kid. That's so cool. You're such a cool feminine genius Like you're really leaning into that. Or if somebody is comforting another or hugging, really just pay attention to that. Where do you see the feminine genius in action and just know that that reflects our hormone genius. And how incredible is that. So cool, so cool.
Speaker 1:If any of you want to go into nursing, into the medical profession, I'm happy to answer questions about what it's like to live in my world, like what it's like to try to practice without ever using birth control pills. So Jamie and I will hang around. We'll be here in the morning. We'll try to stay around the University of St Thomas booth and the Mac Studio booth in that area there. We would invite you to come talk to us. We love speaking to you and so, again, if you stay after, we're going to pass out the Happy Girls Guide to being Whole. Also, jamie has the Fiat Institute that she started, which is a hormone school where she teaches people to be hormone coaches. So if this speaks to your heart, you have a passion for wanting to help others with their hormones. She has a program, a certification program, for becoming a hormone coach. She would love to speak to you about that.
Speaker 1:Again, look at the program for University of St Thomas and the gender studies, leah Jacobson, who is the founder of the Guiding Star Project. She's not over there, but she will be over there tomorrow. Please come talk to Leah. She's an amazing woman. She's done incredible things with the Guiding Star Project and is now going to do an amazing thing with this gender studies program, and then we have this questionnaire that hopefully all of you got a hold of. If you would like to answer that questionnaire, you get entered into a drawing to win a $50 Amazon card. We're going to give away three of them, so your chances are pretty good, so that really is awesome for us If you can answer those questions. We really want to thank you for being present here today and taking the time to be with us, and thanks, jamie, for you being here as well. Thanks, teresa.
Speaker 2:Thank you you.
