No periods… a message from my body

Six years ago the doctor asked me if I wanted anti-depressants and suggested I saw a psychotherapist for eating disorders. I’d had some big life changes and reacted with a huge amount of emotional turmoil and stress. I lost about 12kg and went down to 42kg within a few months. My periods stopped and I had no energy or enthusiasm for anything in life. 

I thought I didn’t have an eating disorder because I wasn’t obsessed with my weight or my body – I just didn’t care, about myself or anything else. I shut myself down as a woman, to myself and the world, and gave up. 

In the last 6 years my life has changed massively. While a few things have changed on the outside, they are nothing compared to the inner re-vamp that has been – and is still – taking place on the inside. I have energy for life and I actually want to be here and I’m finally starting to love being a woman. 

Not that I wanted to be a man, more that I just didn’t want to be here at all in the first place and secondly, I didn’t want to feel and connect to the delicacy and power of how it feels to be myself, as a woman. 

Slowly, and with the support of esoteric practitioners, I began to see and feel that I wasn’t broken, and – amazingly – there was nothing to fix. I was just hurt, and I got the support I needed and the tools to start to deal with those hurts and to start taking care of myself. 

I got to see that I had been addicted to getting it right, and, underneath a perfectly calm-looking facade, addicted to stress: the drama, the rush, the working things out, the needing to ask 20 people the same thing… just to be sure it was the ‘right’ decision, and that nothing could possibly go wrong. 

Having designated myself as Head Girl of Nailing Life at an early age and made it a sort of secret life ambition, I had this fixation with getting somewhere, being better, and thinking I had to work hard to get there. I even tried to make the Ageless Wisdom teachings into rules and found that it didn’t work. To my disappointment, and exasperation, there was no dogma to follow, no rule book to abide by, no one telling me what to do… and no perfection to be recognised for. Instead, I started to find that the more I let go, the easier life became and the easier I am on myself. I can be in life as an active and responsible participant but without having to think about it, because there is no right and wrong. Just infinite moments of choices to be continuously made that are either loving and truthful, or not, and then naturally results and consequences of those choices. 

I made some changes to my life and started looking after myself; going to bed early, eating nourishing foods and not being controlling about food, generally letting go of that which did not belong in and around me and opening up to people more so I could let people in. 

But my body wasn’t just going to give me a period in exchange for a couple of early nights. It is asking me to make some fundamental and consistent changes to my life: like pay attention to the quality I move in not just once a day while making my bed, but 24/7… and to enjoy and bathe in how deliciously light and expansive it feels to move in and with that connection. 

I joined an online programme to look more closely at my period cycle, and discovered that even though I don’t have my periods, my body is still going through a cycle. Makes so much sense – just because we don’t see the Moon every night it doesn’t mean it’s not there and like its gravitational dance with Earth is not causing tide to ebb and flow. I had known that we’re always connected to cycles, but had chosen not to pay attention to it, or to practically apply it, and so it remained as knowledge in my head and nothing more. 

Following advice from my medical practitioner, I’m now applying bio identical hormonal creams to give my body the support that it needs and I can feel that there is a rhythm with that. My body is trying to ovulate. There are changes to my breasts, how connected I am to my body to be able to actually have a sense of my ovaries, differences in cervical mucus… Once I started to pay attention to it, I saw that my body is always communicating something to me and it’s up to me to listen or not. 

I learned that there are times of the cycle where we are naturally inclined to go more inwards, and other times where the focus is on outward expression of that depth. And I noticed a pattern: that often, when I felt the pull to go inwards, I would counteract it by making life and work complicated and stressful, when in fact, it needn’t be at all. 

Through charting how my body is feeling at the end of every day, I felt more aware of how I’m feeling at different times of the day, not just at the end when I was charting. To me this has been a revelation: it wasn’t something I had to put on my to do list or set an alarm to do, it just started happening without me even thinking about it. I experienced that it wasn’t that hard to connect to my body, just a choice to be made from moment to moment to remember to stay in the flow of that connection and not get distracted or lost in whatever I am doing. I’ve begun to see much more than ever before how much I have wanted to not feel things and not deal with situations, conveniently checking out into the perceived safety of my head whenever things got a little bit too intense. 

Paying more attention to the quality of how I am moving meant that I started to notice the quality of everything else: my thoughts, the space around me, energies coming through me and other people. In a really simple way… not good or bad, just… what does it feel like? 

I don’t have my periods back, but the whole experience is so enriching and supporting me to build a loving relationship with myself where I trust myself and what I can feel, and have my own back. I am loving learning to let go more and more and learning to live from how I feel in my body: do I feel a quality of space and lightness in my body and a steadiness and a consistency that I can trust, or am I in some kind of drama, delay or dilemma? When I stay with the steady consistency, I feel in the flow of life. Standing in the full flow of the stream of life and trying to build a wall, or even trying to send it back the other way is no longer quite the appealing game it used to be.

There is much more of an ease and a gentleness with how I move and am with myself now. I no longer resent my body for reflecting back to me something that I don’t want to see and patterns that I don’t want to let go of and change. I am discovering that being a woman is absolutely delicious and that this ease, grace and beauty in how I move is not something I have to try to make or be. It is already there, within me, and is now beginning to unfold, unfurl and truly blossom. 

By B, UK 

For further inspiration.. 

What do stress and stillness have to do with my menstrual cycle? 

Esoteric Women’s Health

Being truly ourselves and allowing the joy to flow again.. 

Unfolding Sacredness

Long before becoming a student of Universal Medicine, when I was in my early 30’s, I embarked on what I called at the time my ‘healing journey’. Abuse had featured heavily in my younger life and I longed to understand WHY (?)  

It was not that I set out with these intentions exactly, but I had a deep inner knowing that the abuse was somehow still running my life, that even though I had moved thousands of miles away and started a new life in another country, the abuse continued to be the leading character in my life and I had had enough of sharing centre stage with this life experience that I couldn’t seem to shake even when being far from the scene of the abuse.  

I saw three therapists. The first was a woman who came recommended by a friend and when she felt she could take me no further she put me in touch with a second therapist, a man who I was in therapy with off and on for a number of years. He helped me identify sufficient layers of hurt, anger and pain to enable me to get to a place where I was able to accept what had ‘happened to me’ and I was feeling less angry and in somewhat less pain which allowed me to function at a higher level than before.  

Eventually I stopped seeing him. I felt I needed a break. Life was pretty full on and I just wanted to make life about other things, and so I did. For a while. 

During these years of therapy, I clung to the belief that I was a victim. Being a victim answered the limited questions I was willing to ask at the time and made it possible for me to not look any further or dig any deeper. I became comfortable with the victim belief and I wore the cloak of victimhood well.  

In my 40’s I saw a third therapist for about a year. She helped me identify a few more layers but I still felt I wasn’t moving on. I felt stuck. Perhaps less stuck but stuck none-the-less. At the same time, the life that I had been choosing to live was beginning to feel distinctly…. uncomfortable. I had a deep knowing that there had to be more to life than the way I was living.  

It wasn’t until becoming a student of Universal Medicine that I finally started becoming un-stuck. The teachings of the Ageless Wisdom offered me the tools and support to not only peel back the crippling layers of hurt, pain and anger I had been living under for so long, but to address, understand and get to the root cause.  

It was miraculous to finally address and be free of the debilitating energy I had been living in. However, Universal Medicine and the teachings of the Ageless Wisdom didn’t just stop there…. I was willing and open to continue to support myself in evolving further and because I was willing and open, the Ageless Wisdom was able to offer more. And then more and still some more…  

As I gradually return to living in the exquisite new level of harmony I had been keeping myself disconnected from for lifetimes, I am continually bringing long held beliefs to the fore to be pondered on, examined and released if I find they aren’t serving me or anyone else for that matter.  

And so, the unfiltered questioning of what role being a victim was playing in my life.  

In the process of considering this question I reached an understanding that the belief that I was a victim was exactly that – a belief. A belief I chose to sign up to at the time to keep me on the carousel of victimhood.  

What??? 

I was like a horse ready to bolt, feeling horrendously exposed and wanting to crawl back under the blanket of comfort I’d wrapped myself up in to keep me in and the world out. I could feel a part of me saying and then shouting, “I do not want to go there!!!”  

Which helped me to understand that this was exactly where I was going. I have come to know that when I am feeling exposed it means there is something I have been hiding behind to keep me in disconnection from the Divine love within and to keep me from evolving. It is at that point that I have a choice: to either keep hiding under the blanket of comfort OR gently and tenderly hold myself in such a way that I can fully embrace my next evolutionary steps.   

The more I started letting go of the belief that I was a victim, the more space became available for the Truth to reveal itself in the form of a few questions:  In the very moment I chose to disconnect from and deny my own sacredness, was this not first and foremost an abuse of myself in the most profound, even if at first not the most obvious, sense of the word?  

In choosing to walk away from what I know is my innate sacredness have I not forsaken myself as the beautifully tender and nurturing woman I naturally am?  

And in choosing to disconnect from my sacredness, what have I been choosing to connect to instead? 

Any disconnection from my inner most being opens me up to destructive and debilitating energies that leave no space for the beauty of sacredness and, in fact, keeps me in an energy that is as far removed from sacredness as one can get. These destructive and debilitating energies are what kept me contracted, disconnected and in avoidance of the true love I naturally am and that we all come from.  

By contrast, in my ever-deepening connection to my inner self I am discovering a sweet, sentient and sacred part of me I had long been oblivious to. It is only in the peeling away of all the layers I had carefully and strategically put in place in my misguided attempt to protect myself and keep myself ‘safe’ that I have been able to connect to the courage and willingness within to reclaim centre stage and reconnect and return to my inner heart, my inner most…..the ultimate sacred space so worthy of cherishing.

In returning and reconnecting to my untouched, Divine essence, there has been a beautifully loving allowing to feel the consequence of the crushing depth of denial of the same, and the effect it has had not only on myself, but on all those around me.  

As I reclaim that which is at the core of every woman’s being, I bring myself back into alignment with the Divinely gracious being I naturally am, therefore offering this reflection for every woman. In so doing it brings the balance of outwardly-looking power back to where it truly belongs – within. The unfolding of this magical and majestic process then creates the space for men to return and re-align to their natural tenderness, sensitivity and yes, sacredness too.  

Reclaiming our sacredness brings us all back to who we naturally, tenderly and innately are, and once we do so the honouring of the sacredness within, honours and holds all others equally so.  

By Brigette Evans, UK

For further inspiration… 

Do we learn to mask a lack of self-worth as we grow older, or take the steps to address it? Natalie Benhayon writes.. 

What does it mean to have a sacred relationship with yourself? 

Well-Being for Women Melbourne – the Impact of Anxiety and Stress

Every woman wants to feel safe to be themselves within a group of women; we secretly crave to have a deeper level of intimacy with each other. The Esoteric Women’s Health Well-being for Women group in Melbourne on Sunday 17th March offered just that – the topic discussed was anxiety and stress.  

Is Sensitivity a Weakness or a Strength? Dealing with the Insecurities of a Hyper-sensitive Woman

by Luz Helena Hincapie, Colombia 

What does being hyper-sensitive imply in a woman’s life? Is there any real hope for it?

I walked most of my life being un-aware of how hypersensitive I was and I still tend to be. Why? On one hand, I was very closed off to my feelings and my inner world and on the other hand mainly because I never wanted to ACCEPT being like that. People (especially women) that I used to judge as hypersensitive put me off. I saw them as weak, shy, as the shadow of someone else, not able to speak out, hiding and uninteresting. My ideals of a great personality were to be outgoing, super-confident, funny, smart and popular. I tried very hard to have all those qualities.

Esoteric Breast Massage – Helping me with Anxiety

by Rosie Bason, Mullumbimby, NSW, Australia

I realised yesterday after having an Esoteric Breast Massage (EBM) that I have accepted abuse in my life in so many ways, even when my body feels anxiety, being invaded or uncomfortable I have learnt a way to deal with it and not realised or accepted that it is a form of abuse.

Childhood Sexual Abuse and Abusive Sexual Relationships

by Anonymous

CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE

When I was 7 years old my mum’s then boyfriend sexually abused me. I told mum at the time and her response was… “He was only trying to make you feel good”. I never spoke of the event again until I was 18.

Discovering Love Beyond Depression

by Julie Ferguson, Mackay

Why would sitting in a room full of women feel so difficult? 

To sit in a room full of women and feel that I belong has not been an everyday experience for me. In fact, I’ve become increasingly aware of the discomfort and competitiveness that I’ve felt when I’ve been in the company of any woman. The constant comparison has created obstacles in the way I’ve conversed with them – as I distracted myself with feelings of envy or pity, depending on where I judged others to be in relation to me. Thankfully, this was not in force during Mackay’s Esoteric Developers Women’s Group (EDWG) and has since lessened enormously in my day-to-day living.

The Mystery of the Migraine and Me

by Francene Cartaar, Australia

Have you ever felt you were going a little crazy? – well, I have. My world shook in September 2001 when I started experiencing migraines with such force and power that I felt like my head was going to split open. This was the beginning of a decade of searching for answers and cures. Each time I would ‘plant’ myself on the table of a doctor or health practitioner with the belief that they could ‘fix me’.

Then I had an appointment with Serge Benhayon at Universal Medicine about 3 years ago. As well as being eager and nervous at the same time, I must confess to going to the appointment with the hope of being ‘fixed’ and ‘told the answers’. Never before had I experienced a consultation like this.

Healing Anxiety with My Own Loveliness

I look back over my life today and most of it doesn’t seem real to me anymore, as it is not part of my life now. I have come a long way and changed so much.

I have come from a life of severe anxiety and intense panic attacks with periods of agoraphobia (not being able to leave the house), and feeling like I had to grit my teeth and push myself to get through every day… to now, feeling like a calm and steady woman who is mostly guided through the day by a deep loveliness that comes from within.

Overwhelm

by Lucy Dahill, Sydney, Australia

Most things in my life have happened quickly, always at a pace… I would become frustrated by having to wait or go slowly and I would never stop and do nothing. I got pregnant three months after I started dating my husband. That meant we didn’t have much time to get to know each other as man and woman before my growing baby and I became the centre of his world. I was working full-time and studying to complete an aromatherapy diploma. This carried on into the pregnancy of my second child a year later. We moved to the country, I left my office job and took up both voluntary work and practitioner work and we had our third child. All the way through this I distinctly remember the feeling that something was welling up inside me that needed to be squashed. Was it a scream… a wave… a huge roar?