Simple Self-Care Tips for the ‘Inner Spring’ Season of your Menstrual Cycle
Energy levels, exercise and the energetics of food
In this previous newsletter, we explored the four seasons of the menstrual cycle and how our perspective on life can change through the different seasons. Then we looked a little deeper into the inner season of winter in this edition, exploring simple self-care tips through exercise, stimulation, food energetics and your intuition.
It’s not spring here yet in the northern hemisphere, however, today, I’m sharing a few simple self-care tips for the inner spring,1 season of your menstrual cycle which follows the winter of menstruation. This season is part of the Follicular Phase: the time between day 1 of your period and ovulation when oestrogen levels rise as an egg is prepared for release.
If we observe nature during the outer season of spring, there is one word that encapsulates what’s happening succinctly:
Emergence.
During the inner spring of your cycle, as you move out of the winter of menstruation, you are emerging into spring. There's an awakening. A rising of energy, which you might have already noticed happening in the second half of your period.
This is when you might feel like you’re starting to come back ‘online’, with a renewed sense of clarity and purpose, that is if you’ve taken the time to rest during your menstrual phase.
Read on for some simple self-care tips and what to be mindful of during your inner spring.
ENERGY
You've got some new energy rising again and you just want to use it! Projects and work are waiting, you might feel like socialising more or doing something fun, your sex drive is returning and…there’s all the things!!
This can especially be the case if you have a long or tiring bleed time. If you’ve rested a lot, there might be a backlog of things to catch up with and you want (or feel the need to) get going.
But! You have to be mindful to not burn through this energy too quickly, because, remember, it's still rising. Think of those beautiful and tender new buds pushing through the earth in early spring; they are not yet robust enough to stand the harsh heat of the summer sun – there is a gentleness in their new beginnings.
The inner spring of your cycle is similar. New growth (energy) needs to be nurtured if it is to reach healthy full bloom. If you jump on that new rising energy too quickly and channel it into lots of things, you might potentially feel a bit burnt out after a few days because you’ve burned through the growing phase.
So, protect the new and fresh rising energy of your inner spring, as you would the emergent flower buds in nature. Prioritise the most important tasks to catch up with, and work slowly and steadily. Take more frequent breaks and trust that when you nurture growing energy, it will reward you with a healthy, strong and purposeful blooming during your inner summer.
EXERCISE
Exercise-wise, if you’ve wound it down during your bleed time, this is when you can ramp it up a little bit, but not too much. Depending on the length of your period and when your energy begins to rise, you might find yourself ready for a bit more during your inner spring. From doing gentle flow or yin yoga, qi gong, walking and stretching during your bleed, you can now go further into yoga styles like Hatha which have slightly stronger movements but not yet full-on power yoga. Try gentle jogging, steady swimming or low-impact workouts. Change your mindset to work with the rising energy you have rather than overdoing it or pushing yourself too far too soon.
FOOD ENERGETICS
When it comes to the food you eat, it’s interesting to think about the energetics of food and how certain food types align with the energy of each season. I'll give you some personal examples of what I eat in the spring season of my cycle.2
This is when I want to eat lighter and cleaner food like salads and lots of vegetables, greens and fruit. This is because my body has just gone through the cleansing process of menstruation, so I’m not at all drawn to the more dense, salty or darker-coloured food that I wanted in my menstrual phase. If you think of the energy of the outer season of spring in nature; it’s new, fresh, green, emerging and light but concentrated. We can think about these energies in connection to the food we eat. What food feels fresh, light, concentrated and nutritious?
For me, salad greens like spinach, rocket (arugula), watercress and other lettuces appeal as well as spring greens and cabbages like pak choi or bok choi. Alongside this, I love a whole rainbow of other types of fruit like cleansing citrus (pink grapefruit or oranges), and vegetables although I’m not drawn to root veggies in this season. I also eat eggs and a little chicken for some concentrated protein. I feel less inclined to eat red meat or dairy as the emphasis is on freshness and food that isn’t quite so heavy or taxing on the digestive system.
Inner Spring is about:
Moving with the rising energy so you don’t burn through it too quickly
Starting to increase exercise steadily
Eating fresh and lighter food that mirrors the fresh energy of spring
As you start tracking your cycle, you’ll learn more about what you need during each day and season of your cycle. From there you can begin to recognise how to sync daily tasks, exercise, food and more to fit the fluctuations of the inner framework that is your incredible menstrual cycle.
I hope you find these simple self-care tips for your inner spring a helpful starting point.
love for your week,
Jane x
If you’d like to learn how to track your cycle through your different inner seasons, check out my online midi-course, The Magic of Your Menstrual Cycle.
the concept of cycle phases as ‘inner seasons’ mirroring the ‘outer seasons’ of nature originates from Alexandra Pope and Sjanie Hugo Wurlitzer.
I’m not a qualified nutritionist or doctor, so the food suggestions I make are based on my own experience and are meant to inspire you to consider the food that supports you in different phases of your cycle.