Although it is common, it is not natural for your period to be painful and a miserable experience! Today Jenn is joined by functional nutrition practitioner Leah Brueggemann who specializes in balancing hormones. Leah walks us through the four different phases of a woman’s cycle, including what your energy may be like in each phase, the ways to eat and move your body, and what signs to look for if your cycle is out of sync. Leah discusses the impact that birth control has on your cycle, and what approach to take while going through perimenopause. Tune in today for some valuable information around your cycle health. The Salad With a Side of Fries podcast is hosted by Jenn Trepeck, discussing wellness and weight loss for real life, clearing up the myths, misinformation, bad science & marketing surrounding our nutrition knowledge and the food industry. Let’s dive into wellness and weight loss for real life, including drinking, eating out, and skipping the grocery store.IN THIS EPISODE:●   [6:28] Leah shares her story and what made her get into the health field. ●   [13:06] Can birth control balance your hormones?●   [14:40] The Menses Phase. ●   [19:10] The Follicular Phase. ●   [21:20] The Ovulatory Phase. ●   [24:57] The Luteal Phase. ●   [28:40] When should you have progesterone tested?●   [33:45] What lifestyle things should we do to align with the phases?●   [38:27] How does birth control manipulate the phases?●   [40:38] How to approach the perimenopause/menopause phase of life.●   [44:30] What minerals should we add to our diet to support hormone health?KEY TAKEAWAYS:●   Your cycle is continually going, there are 4 different phases that affect each week of the month. Understanding the phases helps you to understand your energy, mood, nutrition, and how you can fuel your body to set the building blocks up for optimal hormonal regulation. ●   Calcium, magnesium, sodium and potassium are the 4 main minerals that are our building blocks. 78% of women are deficient in the US in magnesium. Add potassium through your diet before adding supplements. Always talk with your doctor before adding in supplements.●   Changing your lifestyle habits, managing stress, getting enough sleep, moving your body, are the best places to start with managing your hormones, as well as partnering with a functional medicine doctor. When getting blood testing, you may be told everything looks normal, but you want everything to look optimal, which a functional medicine doctor can help with.QUOTES: “Women's health is human health, across the board. Full stop." - Jenn Trepeck“Nobody was talking about this, they just tried to put me on a progesterone cream or whatever it was. So that's why I just threw everything out the window. I was like, this isn't working and I started just eating for nourishment.” - Leah Brueggemann“But we have just been taught that periods are the bane of being a woman. Like they're horrible. You should suffer. And you think you need to have all of this Motrin and Midol and you're gonna be bloated and you can't go anywhere on your period. And you guys, that's not normal. It's so common.” - Leah Brueggemann“Stress is like the cascade for everything. When you're in that luteal phase, if you have lower progesterone, you'll tend to notice symptoms like maybe tender breasts, or maybe you have spotting before your period, or maybe you get a ton of bloating, or maybe you just wanna kill everybody that comes into contact with you. If you get super snappy or maybe you get really anxious or super pms, or you start breaking out, progesterone may be the culprit. But you wanna think about the estrogen and progesterone in relation. Progesterone may be okay, and then estrogen is just too high in relation to it. Or maybe progesterone does get up high enough, but then it falls too quickly.” - Leah BrueggemannRESOURCES:Become A Member of Salad with a Side of FriesJenn’s Free Menu PlanA Salad With a Side of FriesA Salad With a Side of Fries InstagramGUEST RESOURCES:Leah Brueggemann's WebsiteLeah Brueggemann's InstagramBalancing Hormones Naturally InstagramBalancing Hormones Naturally FacebookGUEST BIO:Leah Brueggemann is a Functional Diagnostic Nutritional practitioner, specializing in hormonal balance for women. She helps women balance their hormones naturally with nutrition, lifestyle and finally getting to the root issue. She has personally helped over 400 women get painless periods, stabilize their moods, lose weight and scale to 6 figures in their business. Leah has a passion for helping women connect to their cycle, which is their super power. When Leah is not chatting about hormones you will probably find her hanging out with her two sons and husband in the outdoors or reading a good book.