Happy Let’s Talk Tuesday!!  I was overwhelmed at the incredible response I got to my first Let’s Talk Tuesday about Hormones and was both happy to see I wasn’t alone and sad to see how many women are or have been struggling with hormone issues in their lives.  I got lots of messages, comments and emails from your guys sharing your stories and it just made me want to gather everyone up for a big group hug. So many women are struggling in silence because they probably feel just like I did – alone in it! What do you say when you either don’t have a period like I did or you have an irregular one?  

Tell your friends?

Google it?

Talk to your doctor?

Talk to your family?

Yes, yes, yes and yes!

Information was really key to me figuring things out for myself.  Yes your friends might not understand if they haven’t been through it, but they will still make you feel not so alone. Google could make you overthink things but could also lead you down a path to figuring out how you can help yourself get out of it. Your doctor is really the #1 person you should go to.  Although I ultimately decided against what my doctor told me to do in the end, I think you should always start off hearing what they have to say and then making your own decisions from there. And of course family – if they are as awesome as mine they will check in and make sure you are doing okay and help you heal. Once I learned I really just had to DE-STRESS to get my period back, there was probably a weekly group text from my mom and sisters asking “How is the de-stressing going??”

This leads me to jump back into my timeline from my last post and explain what helped me lower stress in my life.  A quick recap: in August of 2016 I hadn’t had my period since December of 2015 and the doctors prescribed me synthetic hormones to take after they had told me it was really just stress that I needed to reduce.  So I decided against taking the hormones and started to think of ways I could reduce stress in my life. At this point we were selling our condo and moving in with my parents as we house hunted in Orange County.  So starting at the end of September we had moved in with the rents and my commute to work was 2 hours each way.

I thought, okay I am going to be away from home for about 13 hours each day – when should I find time to do this “de-stressing” thing?  One thing that was adding to my stress was the drive – so I decided to start getting up at 5 AM to drive up so I could miss traffic and go to the gym.  Now I am not a gym rat type so I was kind to myself and some days I did a great workout and sometimes I just went in and did yoga stretches on a mat for 20 minutes before getting ready (mostly the latter).  And those brutal commutes home?  I listened to podcasts and took it as a time to learn about how to grow a business which I was itching to do.  

Let’s talk about Essential Oils

I also finally got into essential oils! I think this was a big part of it for me.  I knew that my best friend’s sister, Brittany Anderson, sold Doterra Oils so I reached out to her to get more information and told her all about my story.  As she is also a doula she knew exactly what I needed to help balance hormones and de-stress. I got a diffuser and a few oil blends like Balance and Serenity, and also a roller with Clary Calm which is actually designed to help you during your cycle.  Brittany told me to rub the Clary Calm over my ovaries every night, which I did!  I also loved to diffuse them in our room before we went to bed and just generally sniff them anytime I felt stressed out.

Let’s talk about taking your life into your own hands.

To be totally honest I think the biggest part of my de-stressing had to do with big life changes.  The stress really started when Matt went into Paramedic school and wasn’t working, so when he graduated in August and started working again that automatically helped a lot.  But he was now working about a 2 hour drive away and only nights which was brutal for other reasons (like never seeing him).  I also was planning out when I could quit my fulltime job and start blogging full time.  I had made more money with my blog than I was making at my full time job in August of that year and knew that once we bought a house I could make the leap! And although house hunting and the commute were stressful, I was more aware of stress at that time and dealing with it/ talking about it more than I had before.

When I was brainstorming a post about stress, I thought, well my big life changes of Matt working again and me quitting my job aren’t things that can easily translate to other people’s lives.  I thought, not everyone can just quit their job – I was lucky!

BUT NO!!  Thinking that completely discounted how hard I worked to be able to get to quit my job.  I wasn’t handed a bunch of money by a relative, I didn’t win the lotto, I worked my tail off to the be able to quit that job.  This brings me to not so subtle push some of you might need and a quote that I LOVE.

 

This really sums up so many of my feelings about life.  It is so easy to feel like a victim of your own circumstances and say “Well this is just my life, this is the hand I have been dealt”.  But searching for true happiness and contentment isn’t easy – so many people don’t attempt it.   

Will it be worth it?  I’m so tired. I just want to relax, sit back and be envious of others who put in the work.  

Especially these days when social media is our main source of entertainment and news, the grind of comparison is stress inducing like no other. But you really can’t be jealous of something that you aren’t making an effort to get to in the first place, right?


See someones avocado toast on instagram and get jealous?  Go get some bread and avocado and MAKE YOUR DREAMS COME TRUE.

Let’s talk about social media

An amazing thing happens when you start to take you life into your own hands.  You realize that you don’t have to follow those people on instagram and facebook that make you annoyed and jealous every time you see a post.  You can decide what you see and if all you want to do is follow bernese mountain dog puppy instagrams because they make you happy – DO THAT.  It might not seem related to stress but trust me, the images and videos you see every day – the things you turn over in the morning and beam into your eyeballs can drastically effect your mood and stress level.

If taking control of your life is as simple as unfollowing a few people on social media – I know anyone can do it!!

 

So here is my challenge for the week:

  • Get a diffuser if you don’t have one! I have this one in silver and another from amazon but any diffuse works!
  • Do a social media detox – go on your instagram or facebook and unfollow anyone who doesn’t make you feel GREAT.  Then let me know in the comments how that made you feel! Empowering isn’t it??