Cyclic Power, with Megan Hayne
What could we gain by embracing and understanding our own cycles? We can access so much more in the larger cycles of life when we know the cycles of our bodies more intimately. In this conversation with menstrual circle facilitator Megan Hayne, we explore how the seasons manifest in our bodies, what’s possible when we allow our inner Autumn to unfold, and visions of the village.
To connect with Megan:
@mooncyclemegan on Instagram
moonschoolcircle.com
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Megan Leatherman: Welcome to A Wild New Work, a podcast about how to divest from capitalism and the norms of modern work and step into the soulful calling of these times we live in, which includes the call to rekindle our relationship with the earth. I'm Megan Leatherman, a mother to two small kids, coach, writer, and amateur ecologist living in the Pacific Northwest. And I'm your host today.
Hi, friend, and welcome. Thank you for being here. I'm really delighted to be sharing this space with you across space and time. Here we are, it's mid November here when I'm recording this, and I know I mentioned this. In the last, like, two podcast episodes, I think. But I'm just noticing sort of the mania of this time.
I'm sort of looking out to, you know, between now and the new year and just feeling... Like, I'm just getting pulled into this vortex, like every weekend, every moment is sort of accounted for and not always with stuff that is really warming my heart or like really doing it for me, and I know a lot of that is my own business that I need to work out, but I think it's also sort of the collective experience of this time, just the ravenous consumerism that comes up at this point, the sort of machinery, I guess, of dominant culture and how it sort of keeps us at a distance from the magic and stillness and real potency of this time, of this very dark time.
Every year this comes up, but this year it feels especially heightened the difference between what the natural world is inviting us to do and what culture is inviting us to do and those at this time feel really Intentioned to me and I'm trying to navigate that personally but also just want to speak to it because I think it's something that we have Agency with and we can subvert in our own ways if we want to. And you know, I'm totally open to this being like also a really joyful time of year and I'm sure you might love parts of it and that's beautiful. I love parts of it, but I just wonder if there are ways that each of us could pull back a little bit so that we don't miss the real beauty and alchemy and respite that this time offers.
It's not the same as the respite we might feel in January or February. A lot of us cross over into the quote unquote new year, the Gregorian calendar new year, feeling pretty haggard and like we should roll with the vibes of like the new year and planning, but the body isn't really on board with that.
So. All of that to say, if you share these feelings at all, I hope you will just honor them and listen to yourself and your body and consider that this wintertime is coming, can actually go very quickly and that we don't want to miss this darkness that is available to us right now.
So we can stay in the body. We can really savor this time. We can take our time. We can move at the pace of ourselves, of our bodies, of these days these short days.
I'm really enjoying this podcast that I found recently called Fair Folk by Danica Boyce. I'm kind of obsessed with it right now. And last year, she did these different almanacs for each of the months and talked about the sort of folk traditions mostly of Western and Northern Europe in those months.
And so I was listening to the November almanac and she mentioned that November in the sort of pre Christian or pre modern Christian Anglo Saxon calendar that November was called Blood Month, because it was the time when the animals who were not going to be fed over the winter months would have been slaughtered and eaten over the winter.
So it was a month of slaughter, and this was often done in a sacred or ritualized way. It was both just an everyday kind of... We need to eat thing, but also made sacred by how people oriented to it. Like for instance, Danica talks about how an Ireland blood from some of the slaughtered animals would have been sprinkled in the four corners of the kitchen for protection over the year, or the blood would have been soaked on a rag and kept, you know, in the home as protection if someone got sick or had an injury.
And blood has been coming up in my own meditations and questionings and wonderings lately, and it might be something that I explore in more depth at a later time, but it truly is a magical substance. It is our heritage. It is our life, our vitality. Without blood, there is no life. It is moving through us right now without us having to do anything. It's moving through you and me and every human alive on this planet. And the fact that our blood is red is something that we share with almost all other vertebrates, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds, fish, because we all have hemoglobin in our blood, which contains iron, which makes it red. And other organisms have blood, but it's not red, like squid or spiders. Their blood is blue, actually, because it contains something called hemocyanin instead of hemoglobin.
And their blood contains copper instead of iron, which Turns it blue and there's green blood. I think there's purple blood. It's this incredible vehicle, this substance that flows through and I could go on and on about like veins and deltas and tributaries and just It's just, it's really just incredible.
I think it is something I want to explore in more depth. But blood is something that connects us to almost every living being on this earth. And I am really delighted that it's part of this conversation today with my friend, Megan Hayne. Megan is a shepherd's daughter, a mother, body worker, and menstrual circle facilitator. She’s an authorized Kum Nye (Tibetan Yoga) instructor, Licensed Massage Therapist, and holds a Bachelor of Health Science degree.
I wanted to have Megan on to talk about the way that the autumn season might manifest in our bodies, whether we have a womb and bleeds regularly, or we don't have a womb, do and no longer bleed. How does the autumn season sort of manifest and what are the cycles that are moving through, that our bodies are moving through, most often through the menstrual cycle, but in other ways as well.
So in this conversation, we are talking about embodied cycles, namely the menstrual cycle again, and people with wombs who still bleed, but also the more universal ways that the seasons might be felt in our physical experiences. How could our origins, our blood memories really help us guide us into a way of living that is in sync with the larger rhythms of which we are a part?
So I hope that you love this conversation.
Before I dive into our opening invocation, I just want to say thank you to Reshama and Chelsea for supporting the show, chipping in financially. That means so much to me. I really, really appreciate it. And if you're listening and the podcast is meaningful to you and you're in a place where you could contribute a little bit now or once a month, it would be so wonderful to receive your help to make this sustainable. You can learn more at buymeacoffee. com slash Megan Leatherman.
I also want to share that to support you in syncing up with the dark medicine that's available this time of year, I'm co leading a nighttime event this week, November 19th. It's called Nourishing Night: Drinking in the Wild darkness and this is a two hour guided experience with darkness led by myself and Heather Dorfman who many of you know from episode 85. Heather is the forest therapy guide behind Rose and Cedar Forest Therapy and we are really excited to be working together to get you into the darkness at this time of year when it is so Extra medicinal. But it can be scary to go into the dark in the wild place on your own, so we're going to be taking a small group of eight people into a semi wild place on Sunday, November 19th, close to Portland, Oregon, where we live. And we would love to have you if that sounds like something that would help support your deeper inquiry and nervous system regulation. time of year. And you can learn more about that at awildnewwork. com slash events or by visiting the link in the show notes.
And if you would like to work with the darkness, but can't make it to this event or just want to go further, I'm going to be starting a free four week series called needing more: a four week pilgrimage into darkness. I ran this two years ago and have been I've been using this practice myself with my little family for about the last five years.
And so every Sunday for four weeks, starting November 26th, I will be turning off my electrical lighting earlier and earlier in the evenings. And I'm going to be inviting you to do the same if you want to do this for a week, practice with me. Some of the benefits of greater darkness, even just one evening a week, have been that when we do this, we go to sleep way earlier than we normally would. We have different types of conversations in the dark or by candlelight. My kids love to be in the dark or by candlelight. We wake up the next day really, deeply rested in a different way. We noticed the actual state of our nervous system regulation, you know, when the lights go out and when it's dark, but you're awake, you can sense into different things about your body and sort of access different understandings or insights that you need.
And there's more, it's a really awesome practice. And I know it's hard to do in our lifestyle. So this series is just a little nudge and a group commitment to trying it out and seeing if we can increase our time in the darkness before the winter solstice on December 21st. So the link to sign up for that, again, it starts November 26th.
It's free. It's a four week series. It's very simple and bare bones, but profound. Even if you just spend a few extra hours in the darkness over a month, I think you would notice a difference. So the link to do that is in the show notes. Okay. Let's Do our opening invocation and then transition to this lovely conversation.
So wherever you are, you can just notice your body. Notice how the weight of gravity is landing for you today. You might take a deeper breath than normal. You might notice if there is a plant or an animal crossing your view right now.
May each of us be blessed and emboldened to do the work we're meant to do on this planet. May our work honor our ancestors, known and unknown, and may it be in harmony with all creatures that we share this earth with. I express gratitude for all of the technologies and gifts that have made this possible, and I'm grateful to the Cowlitz and Clackamas tribes, among many others, who are the original stewards of the land that I'm on.
Alright, Megan, thank you so much for being here.
Megan Hayne: Oh, thank you for having me.
Megan Leatherman: I think I would love to start by hearing a little bit more about how you came to facilitate menstrual circles and I know you do other things as well, but what's sort of the origin story of this or the recent path, whatever you want to share about how you came to do this work today.
Megan Hayne: I always hear you on this podcast asking people about their past, so I was journaling about it, and I was thinking, how far back do you want to go? Because yeah, it's before me, before my birth. The short answer is that I've always, in my professional life, worked with the body. My first career was as a body worker, and it's always been a portal of knowledge for me.
But then, five and a half years ago, I had my first baby, my first daughter, and it really just changed my life so much, and I started to realize that There was a certain world I wanted to live in, and there was a certain world I wanted her to live in. And I started looking around and just really feeling the lack of wisdom around what I was going through as a new mother, but also just the lack of wisdom in the ways that my menstrual cycle had changed after having a baby, the lack of, you know, menarche circles.
I listened to this podcast a few years ago by this woman named Grace Fromm, who did a podcast called Reclaiming Menarche, and I had never even heard that term before. So, for me, just this dearth of spaces for people to learn about something that, you know, every womb holder goes through was really startling to me.
And so then I started seeking it out, and there's people out there, but, you know, these things were meant to be done in intimate spaces between people, you know, face to face, speaking to each other. And, you know, there was nothing like this in my neighborhood or maybe even in, you know, my proximity, in my driving proximity.
So that started to really hit me. Sometimes when you see a lack of something, when I see a lack of something, I think, Oh, that's something I need. And so I just felt like taking responsibility for it for my children, but also just then realizing that it's a, it's a wound that needs to be addressed in all of us in society.
Megan Leatherman: Thank you. I love that. I love the focus on like keeping it really local that like it's the need for that intimate, real 3D space. Could you talk a little bit about the sort of birth of this work right beforehand, because my perception of it was that you were very, very patient and you listened very deeply and you tried out a few different things that you were exploring - a few different threads, and it sounds like this one just really landed or materialized and just anything you want to say about the sort of patience and listening that I think went into the form it's in right now.
Megan Hayne: Yeah, I would say once I committed to working with my womb, it started to inform everything in my life, but especially the creative process and how I was working, so I would say after my youngest daughter started being a little older, maybe like two, I started to have this surge of creativity that you hear so often in like the matri essence world, that like, at a point after you've created this life and you've sustained it to the point where it's Maybe like walking around, you have this creative surge again, that comes back to you.
And when I had that, I had so many great ideas, but then suddenly it was like still really COVID and a lot of things, a lot of the work I had done in the past felt really like aggressive or just like in my body, it felt like I had to run myself really hard. When I started committing to listening to my womb, my pace changed so radically.
And it started to inform this work, and of course this is a menstrual cycle project, so it needs to be informed by the menstrual cycle. And I just started letting go of this, like, running my head into a wall constantly until something broke through, which is physically how it felt in my body to work before, especially like in my 20s.
It would just be like, hit my head against the wall until, you know, something breaks. This is more like... Feeling into the timing, and it's so natural and easy. If anything, it tests my patience a lot, which, you know, maybe is just my own personal issues with work, but the more I just surrender to the project, the more things just go so easily, and yeah, it's really a beautiful thing. I'm not stressed about it. I don't have to worry like About every day has to be like do all these things on my to do list. I put the questions out there I put the even the to do list out there and it almost just ticks off itself and I just have to like Grab the moments when they're when they're ripe grab the fruit when it's ripe, I would say.
Megan Leatherman: That sounds really nice
Megan Hayne: It's way better, and you know, I'm also just the productivity level hasn't changed, like I'm not less productive doing it. Like this it's just less of a you know, self torture
Megan Leatherman: Yeah. So maybe we can keep pulling on this thread. Like what are some of the primary benefits or the fruit, I guess, that you see from getting to know your cycle?
And, you know, for those who don't have wombs or don't bleed, you know, we all have rhythms. The whole natural world is rhythmic. And so I don't know if you want to answer in two parts, but Yeah. Yeah. Maybe specifically for those who bleed, but also for those who don't, but how can we benefit or receive medicine from really getting to know our individual cycles?
Megan Hayne: Yeah. And I mean, there's so many benefits. It's, it's insane. And. I guess the more I get into the benefits, the more I realize it's actually insane not to live like this, but for me at first I think it's important to say that this is like everyday tracking that I do. I think some people are like, yeah, I track my menstrual cycle, which means I have a dot on the calendar that shows me when I'm going to bleed or maybe when I'm ovulating if I'm trying to like, you know, look at my fertility, but what other reason would I have to look at that? For me, the juice of this has really been in like everyday tracking. And at first I was like, Oh, that sounds too strict. I'm just going to do whatever. What started as like some days I just write like one word or the thing I would write to be like day 25. And that was all I'd write some days.
But the more richness I started seeing, the more I wanted to write more each day. I wanted to like get every little nuance of it because Bleeding people are really lucky because you have this, like, touch point in your rhythm that you can't ignore. And so it's, in a way, it's a training that you, that takes place, whether you want to acknowledge it or not, like, there's going to be that one touch point, at least.
And so if you were not menstruating, you could look at the moon for that, you know, answer, or, you know, even, you know, your daily cycle, which, you know, some people have a really strong, just like, cycle throughout the day, and I would say that's maybe more like, The male hormonal structure works like that, but by tapping into the menstrual cycle, especially for me, it's like this personal map for living my life, like every single day, and I can map every aspect of my life along that circle or spiral or however you like to talk about it.
If I'm working with something like a specific question about myself or my life or my work, I can really just like plug it into that map and follow it and it's like, I have all of these parts of myself that weigh in throughout that monthly cycle. And I get a lot of answers after my initial bleeding starts, um, usually, so it's like all those parts of me weigh in and then the bleeding starts and I get answers or, you know, insights, and sometimes they're subtle, but sometimes they're just like huge, like it's so clear what the answer is because I've been tuning in so much to this like inner oracle that I have, um, that, you know, that we all have, and it's just made my life so much more sustainable too, and I think like that's, With your last question in this one, it's just, how can I live a life that's sustainable for me specifically, like, my life, my body, my mental process, my physical process, and if I tap into that and just listen, even just like, if things are busy and I give myself a little extra rest when I'm in my inner winter, which is bleeding time, like, it just makes my whole month better and more sustainable.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah, maybe you could take us through the cycle and map it to the seasons. And again, I don't know. If you want to add on like the layer of the moon cycle, but of course it's, it goes as well. Could you just walk us through the cycle?
Megan Hayne: Yeah, and this, this podcast I will say is being recorded at a really interesting time because through one of my facilitating, facilitator containers that I'm in, we're doing a class with Jane Hardwick Collins who is like phenomenal and has created an entire body of work just around this, what you're talking about. In the class that I'm taking is like, you know, you do this whole map where it's like the wheel of the year and how that relates to the wheel of your menstrual cycle and how, you know, she's created this wheel system. And I mean, she says, she would say she didn't create it, but she has put it out there and made it so accessible for everyone.
Spring, we'll go spring first, because that's the beginning of the wheel of the year. Spring would be after your bleeding stops, and I will tell you, some people shift this slightly, and they would say maybe like, their spring starts, they haven't quite stopped bleeding yet maybe, but they're like, feeling more energy, but for me personally, my spring is pretty much like right when I'm, I'm done with my bleeding time.
You know the season of spring - look outside it will reflect to you what that's like. It's so funny because i'm personally in the very late fall of my wheel right now. It can be even hard for me to access that spring energy, but it's really like Sprouts, right? The seeds have germinated during the winter under the soil and they have emerged.
And they're tender, but they, you know, they have a lot of energy and the sun is slowly heating up and a lot of people feel the surge of energy in the innerspring and they're like, I'm a person again, right? So yeah, Innerspring is like youth, it's like your child like archetype inside yourself, and some people call that the maiden, or for me, sometimes it's more just like the little child of me, depending on maybe the month or the time in that cycle.
Yeah, so it's like a good time to socialize, or like, do something... That takes a lot of, like, running around, and for me, personally, it's not a very responsible time. But some people experience that differently, and I think the beauty of this work is that you figure out your own, how you relate to it, but it's spring.
Summer happens, summer slowly comes on, and summer, for me, is kind of a short season, and I would say that's true when I look outside, too. But that would be, like, your ovulatory time. So, like, a little bit pre ovulation, a little bit post, but, like, it's when your hormones are at their, like, peak level, and your inner sun is burning.
And, I mean, if you're a person who does fertility tracking, your basal body temperature is higher during that time. So, like, you're actually... In heat during that time, you have an inner heat. So that's your summer. A lot of people say they do their best communicating during that time. Although, I feel a little differently about that, which we'll get into.
But it's a certain type of communicating that I do during that time. I'm social, but I'm also highly accommodating to others during that time. So in some ways, I feel like I'm my best mother self during that time. The archetype associated with Summer is the mother. Or, you know, the creatrix, because obviously not everyone's mothering human children, so I do really like the term creatrix.
But it's the person who's able to nurture projects, or people, or things in their life. So, yeah, and it can be a really good time to connect with, you know, your spouse, or, you know, people you care about. And then summer starts to decline, and for me that feels very quick, usually I'm like oh, ovulation was like two days, but really for me it's more like a week.
And then we start to go into autumn. Which for a lot of people is a difficult season, but honestly, for me, it might be my favorite. And obviously we can talk about that more, but Autumn for me is about, while I'm looking outside right now, it's so easy to access, and my personal Autumn, it's like about getting rid of all The stuff that you need to compost.
Not even just getting rid of it, but like, gathering it up. All that needs to be composted. Everything that needs to happen to create a good winter. You know, autumn for me is like, one of the busiest seasons. And personally, it's when I do my best communicating, because it's when I'm so clear on my boundaries.
I'm so clear on when like, What I need to have happen in my life for things to work smoothly for the next even month. It's a time in which, you know, I don't pull punches. And that can be really beneficial for me and my relationships because I do have like an internal tendency toward really being very accommodating to everyone in my life.
Maybe just like as a mother, but I feel like I was kind of just born that way too. And, you know, hormonally, it's when your hormone levels, especially estrogen, starts to decline, and estrogen is really the hormone of accommodation, or, you know, connection, and it's your, the way Jane Hardwick Collins calls it a veil of accommodation, so it kind of like, skews your vision, and then when it comes, when the estrogen low, veil lifts, you start to be like, okay, now I can be like, super discerning.
What is not working here, and what is, you know? And sometimes I feel like I can really celebrate the harvests in the fall, which is appropriate too, and like, be like, ah, I really like, that seed grew so well, and like, I can like, harvest that fruit right now. Some people say winter starts. It's like the seasons, you know, it's not like today's winter and yesterday was fall.
It's like a, it's like a transition, so then winter starts to descend, and for me, like, and I'm in this right now, so it's so easy for me to talk about, like, I feel, I hear the underworld calling me. And it's like, time to release, time to, you know, let it go, surrender, like, to death, to, to that space that I'm going into, cause it's happening.
And then winter, you know, it's the time of death, it's the time of the crone. It's, you know, all these things, but also, like, that's when the seeds are being held by the earth and germinating, and the root systems and the mycelial networks are really strong in the winter. And for me, it's when I get so many answers!
Like, all these questions that have formed for me throughout that whole cycle, I suddenly have, like, Insights, and strong dreams. Like, if you don't track your dreams, at least just pay attention to them during the bleeding time, because that's when they're so juicy, and sometimes... It's processing dreams.
Sometimes you're, like, bleeding things out that don't serve you, and, you know, your body's like, you gotta deal with that, like, emotional time you just had, you know? But again, it's like, your body wants to cave up and process. Because you're physically processing the fact that you didn't create new life if you're menstruating.
Although, potentially, you are creating new life through projects, and, you know, there's other types of creative energy, but, physically, your body is, you know, trying to have offspring. On one level. So, you know, some of that, like, the things that you're shedding are what would have been You know, turned into a placenta and all this stuff that would have kept a human alive in your body.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah. Thank you for walking us through that. Yeah. Yeah. So lovely. And I can see how if you knew your own personal cycles and seasons really well, it would facilitate maybe a deeper connection to the natural world as well because you see it mirrored in your own physical. body and emotional body and energetic and all of that.
Megan Hayne: And I would say it's really just a case too for why you want to study the seasons outside too and how you're relating to them. Like it works both ways. They both feed each other.
Megan Leatherman: What are some of the, you know, if we can sort of steep ourselves in this late Mid autumn Scorpio time, maybe the lining of the uterus is building up, we're gathering the things that are died or have died or don't want to come to life.
What are some of the, Like, most entrenched or difficult misconceptions or stigmas about bleeding and menstruation that you're noticing right now?
Megan Hayne: I would say this is a great question. It has a really happy ending. The answer to this question. So I will put that out there too. I'd say like one of the most effectively insidious aspects of like patriarchy and, you know, misogynistic culture is the way that bleeding people are taught to, like, feel shame for themselves and for their, like, mere existence.
And menstrual shame really is a great tool for that because if you are a menstruating person, you know, that's your body, and if there's, if you're not accepting that part of yourself, if you're just trying to, like, ignore its existence, you know, at best, and at worst, feel, like, horrible about yourself when you're bleeding, like, you're rejecting yourself, and that's, you know, that works great if, you know, If you're, you know, trying to create a culture of patriarchy. You know, menstrual blood is dirty, is one, or you know, like, some sort of, like, akin to like Human waste or something and I mean it is a waste product in a sense But it's so freshly what would have sustained life like I mean, it's hardly comparable. And it can be like hard for people to even fathom, and I think that's like culturally one of the hardest things about stigmas in general.
It can be hard for people to even fathom a world or a culture in which you would be proud of bleeding because, you know, it's seen as like this weakness so often. Or even people look at themselves as like, you know, it's like this time when I'm so like weak and I'm not tolerant and I'm not this and that.
And it's like all those things that you're not are these treasures that are just being completely rejected by you! So, you know, to get people to reject themselves, it's like, that's a huge stigma. And, you know, it's passed down. But, like I said, there's a really great, happy ending to that, which is that It can end, like, in one generation, because all it takes is the acknowledgment of rites of passage, the acknowledgment of menarche, the acknowledgment of, you know, puberty rights for boys, like, just acknowledgment of the birthright of passage, all these blood rites of passage are so important, and if we had started acknowledging them, like, the stigma can end in one generation.
I think that's one of the things that was so inspiring to me about the talk I just participated in with Jane Hardwick Collins last night. She's like, yeah, I have a community that's been doing this for 20 years, and there's no shame or stigma around it now. In these... You know, 20 year olds who are now starting to think about having children, maybe, or projects, or whatever, like, they're not living with it already, like, it works.
So I think that's so inspiring, because it's not like, it doesn't have to be this long slog, it's like, let's just create a community for the youth to step into their power during this time, because it's like when you get to meet your power.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah, beautifully said. Yeah, just that term blood rites of passage is so moving.
I find that one of the other things that is difficult in addition to just like the stigma of it being like weird or yucky is the lack of accommodation for the different stages of the cycle. Like maybe not spring and summer because it's like everyone loves feeling sexy and creative and like, you know, alive or whatever.
But in that time when you're like, maybe, what, what I always heard of it as like PMS, when you're PMSing, you haven't started bleeding yet, but you're in that time and then you bleed. I, well, two things. One, like my cycle has been a little bit wonky lately, so I haven't been able to like predict as accurately when I will be in those stages.
And if you want to speak to cycle wonkiness, feel free. But I find that I am bumping up against just the same, like just being busy and my kids still need me. And I'm, you know, once I start bleeding for the first two days, especially, I'm really tired. There's no red tent for me to go to. There's no Moon Lodge.
Like no one is like here to help out more. And I just really, I grieve that and it's something I just bump up against every month. And like, I don't know, we can't change our whole society. And I do have some personal agency. I could change things more quickly, even though I might not have known this was exactly when it was going to happen, but I don't know.
I don't have a question here. It's just like annoyance that it's yeah, that it's so hard to live cyclically for anyone like it's hard for us to shut down.
Megan Hayne: And it's this obsession right with productivity that causes that and what our definition of productivity is the merits assigned to things in our culture are so backward and you know.
So I feel you there, but at, and at the same time, I will say, like, even just little baby steps in that direction can be huge. And I think, like, this also speaks to the stigma, like, say you have to do something while you're bleeding. Say to the person, like, that you have to do something with, Hey, I'm bleeding right now, so I'm not gonna, like, lift this heavy box. Maybe you can do it. You know, or just being more vocal about it, and I mean, I personally know how hard that is. It's even been a challenge for me to say anything to my own family, like... Like, hey, I'm anticipating I'm not going to be able to do this one thing because I'm not going to feel up for it.
And, and I think the cycle wonkiness is something that's asking you to look, you know, inward as well. It's like, for me, my cycle always gets a little wonky if I'm rushing around too much. It's like my body's being, or even not just my body, it's like my womb is saying, hey, can you hold up for a second and just listen? Because I don't work that fast. I'm not like, I'm not down with this pace that you're doing.
And I think like, the PMS, like, people don't like it because they're like, oh, I don't want to be a, I don't want to be so mean to everybody. But really, it's like, Your own, it's like your own caring for yourself, it's like your own agency during that time can be so offensive to culture, to the outside culture, it's like, and then we're missing out on the genius of that time because like If anything, after I started doing all this cycle awareness, like, I, maybe I dislike my spring more than I dislike my autumn at this point, because I love how articulate I can be in the autumn, and I'm caring less about pleasing everybody.
And it's really, like, maybe, like, spring me, who's like, Oh! I shouldn't have been like that, right? And it's like this further self rejection of what the archetypical wild woman is the autumn season. But I, I also like to think of her as like, you know, my, my self that has animal instincts. Like, I, I give her like animal names because she's so tapped in and like predator names.
And yeah, like sometimes we have to bring that a little more and it doesn't always feel easy like mentally and especially to like spring Megan might be like, Oh, that was like, but I'm already like, you know, back in accommodation at that time. So, yeah.
Megan Leatherman: Maybe you keep talking about that a little bit because I'm really curious like what is happening in the womb during this autumn phase after we've ovulated but we haven't started bleeding yet and why is it so I mean, I just remember as a young person growing up and my sisters too, that was the worst or hardest phase.
And my mom, anytime we'd be like upset or angry, she'd be like, are you PMSing? Are you about to start your period? And there is like this rage that can flow and some, you know, people might be having cramps. It's uncomfortable. What is happening in the womb? And what are we being asked to do in that time?
You've talked about it a little bit, but could we just keep like in the sort of autumn of the womb for a moment?
Megan Hayne: Yeah. So autumn is medically referred to as the luteal phase of your womb. And so a lot is happening in these two weeks. And in some ways you could divide it into two separate seasons as well.
Just like how there's, you know. The wheel of the year has all the Sabbats, right? And there's always those halfway ones. So I would say your luteal phase has that very strongly too, and it's multifaceted. So, you know, let's say you get pregnant during ovulation in your cycle. And this is the time when progesterone levels provided by your ovaries start to rise like a lot.
And progesterone is a really calming hormone. If you were to then, you know, have a fetus start growing in you, those, the estrogen and progesterone in your body would just continue to rise throughout your whole pregnancy, which causes the endometrium, which is the lining of your uterus, to like thicken and then later become the placenta and all of these things.
But if that doesn't happen, you still have this like one week period where all that like, progesterone burst, and you know, and a little uptick in estrogen happens as well. So you actually do get like this whole flood of happy hormones at the beginning of your luteal phase, but then if you're not pregnant, then your body is like, oh, I guess we don't need this.
And so then progesterone, In a perfect world starts to slowly decline, but, like, many people know, like, stress is an endocrine disruptor, you know, plastics are an endocrine disruptor, lots of inflammatory stuff in our diet are endocrine disruptors, and, so, that smooth, like, Progesterone decline doesn't really happen for us often, especially if we're in seasons of high stress.
And so then it's more like jumping off the estrogen cliff. So it can feel really abrupt for people. It's like when... Autumn suddenly hits. It was like summer yesterday and now it's like, ah, so cold and like, yeah, everything goes into shock outside. I mean, I can see it in my garden right now that that's sort of been happening with like the, we had a really high temperature even this weekend and now it's like cold and you know, everything is like reacting, all the plants and, and me too.
There's a lot of things, though, that you can do to support this process, so I'm painting a little bit of a bleak picture. You know, just people learning how to care for themselves through stress is, like, you know, I'd say, like, in every aspect of our life, that's really important, but some people call the menstrual cycle, like, the fifth vital sign.
So, right, When that hormonal decline starts happening in your body. It's a little bit of like a report card on how how you were last month And I'm not saying a report card and like, you get an A or you get an F, I'm saying more like, it's, it's reporting to you, like, oh, like, that was a really stressful, like, couple weeks there, and, you know, telling you how, how you're metabolizing that.
So, first of all, To take care of yourself, it's so important to eat more during your luteal phase. Like, during that initial burst of like, estrogen and progesterone, you're like, actually at rest, burning more calories than you do at any other time. Like, I read a study that said it was like, 500 more calories at rest than, Any other time in your cycle.
So if you're hungry, like eat, and I know there's like a lot of baggage in our culture around just like eating more during that time in your cycle. But I would say, stay warm, because the uterus responds, relaxes more easily, lets go more easily when it's kept warm. And in Chinese medicine, it would actually be also keeping your feet and ankles warm.
My, like, my acupuncturist is always like, Oh, good, good job, you're wearing socks, like, in the summer, with your sandals. But, yeah. And then, I would say, gear yourself up for winter. Like... So, I like to look around and be like, Is this, like, mess in my house gonna stress me out in a couple days? Cause maybe, like, I need to talk to the other people I live with and we can all make a plan.
Because it affects them too if you're, like, suffering. Especially, like, at the stage of life that I'm in. Like, I make the The whole thing run here, so, because I'm like the mom who's taking the kids to the things and I'm making sure we got the food in the fridge and, you know, so I'm trying to set us all up for success when I know that I'm not going to be as... able to get it done.
And also, I like to really do like, sort of a spiritual practice in like, sitting with it and being like, what is all this rage telling me that I need to release? And I will say, It's less rage now than it used to be, and more like annoyance and irritation now, which I still feel like we gotta honor that, because if you don't honor the annoyance and the irritation, that's when it becomes rage, when you've like, held it back, held it back, like, no, not now, no.
Yeah, like, that's really annoying me, and don't say anything, and then suddenly, you know, you're like, AHH, everything's horrible! So, yeah, PMS. I don't even really like that term, because it implies that, like, there's something wrong with you. It's like, syndrome. But, it is like, a great time to look at the shadows, like what, what shadows are coming forward to be like incorporated during that like winter season and that crone season.
Cause you can't just deny your shadows all the time or that's like, you know, that's your body's wisdom about that, the rage. Yeah, so I would say Those are good starting points. And then, you know, just like anything you can do to just like rest a little extra during even just like your second day of bleeding, because for most people, that's like the most intense day.
Megan Leatherman: That's a really helpful reframe of what that time is. And it kind of Makes me, I don't know, feel happier or something that like there was some folk wisdom, even in me as a teenager in the like early 2000s of like the heating pad, the, you know, wanting to eat more and they were kind of like stigmatized themselves, but I don't know, there's something sweet about the fact that like that was actually real, like those comforts have a biological like root to them. So thank you for sharing that. You've mentioned a lot of tools and like things that we can use to support ourselves throughout our cycles. And I wanted to zoom out a little bit and hear more about your vision, maybe, or what could be possible in a culture that respected, you know, womb holders or the cycles of nature in general, like, and maybe you can bring in what a menstrual circle is as well. I can't even really envision a world where that would be respected and like where it may be the culture would even orient around cycles. So could you tell us a little bit about what a menstrual circle is and why it's so helpful and other visions that you have or ways that this could be different?
Megan Hayne: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. You know, this project, my moon school circles, like the menstrual circle is so much in its infancy, but I have, you know, through my bleeding times, through my meditations on this, like I do have a big vision and it, it looks something like, you know, the elders sitting on the outside and, you know, these are women who have gone through menopause, sitting on the outside, the women who are still bleeding, you know, being held inside the circle of them and then inside is the, you know, the children. So, you know, that's sort of the visual that I have of it.
But one of the things that, you know, my own rage and PMS and just so many things have taught me, maybe even COVID, like a lesson from COVID is just that, like, we can't do this alone. Like, our siloed nuclear family existence is just so unhealthy and out of whack. We're all, like, super lonely. I dare say. I mean, people are, like, scrolling all the time looking for human connection. And, like, the thing that we need is, like, right next door to us, probably.
But... It can feel so out of reach, like we're living in this time where technology is so wonderful and provides us with so much, but at the same time we're so isolated by it. And so for me, I was, it was really important that this project be like, in person. And it feels... Like, outdated in a certain kind of way, but for me, I feel like this has to be the thing that we're doing.
Because if we don't come together on it, we're just continuing siloing ourselves. Even with all the great, like, access to teachers and information that I have, for me, with my menstrual cycle, sitting in circle has been, like, the most powerful teacher. Sitting with other women, and just saying what day of your cycle you're on and how that experience is with you. It's like, that's such a big teacher to be in this, you know, safe space. So we do a lot to try and create a lot of safety in the space, you know, confidentiality, but also just like being aware of what the circle can hold and really taking personal responsibility for the part, the role we play as like villagers in this circle is so healing.
If people don't come together, we're just gonna keep being so lonely and I don't want to be lonely. And I don't want my kids to be lonely and I don't want to give them the example of like Mom and dad just did everything themselves, nobody helped them with anything, and that's, like, the thing that we should strive for. Like, I, I don't want to live in that world, so I'm not going to create that for myself or my kids or, like, around me at all, so, yeah, I'm like, okay, this has to be in person, and so then it's sort of like, okay, now, now I have to, like, call in people who are willing to, like, physically commit to coming, and surprisingly, that's been, um, Easy.
Like, there's people who want to do that and I, I just, you know, I just want to welcome more so that our village can be stronger and so that it can be more diverse and multifaceted and be people in all, like, stages of life and life experiences and, you know. Everyone brings something unique to the womb space because we are just like so unique and still so having the same experience and, you know, that's the beauty of Circle.
Megan Leatherman: What a beautiful vision. Thank you. Yeah, I can see why you're starting there, why that's like foundational and so important.
Megan Hayne: And may I say one more thing about the big picture of that? And the big picture would be that not every month, but sometimes allowing a woman to have what the Red School calls a "big bleed," which would be to like fully retreat during that time so that you can bring your wisdom to the village.
Cause, I mean, I'm hoping to do a big bleed soon, but like, to set that up, like, that's gonna take a village. Like, I can't. I can't set up, like, a full, like, retreat with something that might happen one day, but also might happen two days later, like, you know, it's gonna take some logistics, but, like, for me, the big vision would be, like, a supportive community for people to do big bleeds, and it wouldn't, like, tax their, their lives so hard.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah, we've talked about that before, and I'm really inspired by that idea. And as you know, this summer I went and did this wilderness vigil, which was a four day fast in the woods and it feels like there's some contrast there. And I wonder, you know, the wilderness vigil or what a lot of people call the vision quest is like a very ancient practice.
But I wonder if there's like, And I don't want to like make it super binary, but that feels like that's kind of a masculine thing. Like I flew to England. I went to a place, I made a big journey, I went to the mountain or whatever. But a big bleed is sort of like a more, it's retreating, like it's, it's back into the dark.
I don't have to go anywhere. I mean, you might literally have to go somewhere, but it's this sense of like, there is this thing already happening in me. I don't have to go anywhere and I'm going to like just sink into it and dissolve and, and I believe you that there's real, like, there's something for the community in there that you would bring back.
That's like the hero's journey, sort of, you know?
Megan Hayne: Yeah, and this is the heroine's journey. The heroine's journey, yeah. Inside versus going out, right? Yeah.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah. And both are so beautiful. I'm just really excited to see how this evolves for you. I have a sort of not super smooth next question, but it came up and I'm curious and we have a little bit of time.
Could you talk a little bit about what you've learned about Menarche ceremonies? And if you have heard of anything that People could do who maybe didn't have a nice menarche or like the beginning of their bleeding. Is there any sort of like repair or ceremony that people could do now to really embrace and sort of give themselves maybe what they haven't gotten their entire bleeding time?
Megan Hayne: Yeah, well, come to my circle. Well, I mean, I'm joking, but also like that is one of the Functions of a menstrual community circle would be, and I'm probably going to plan this for the spring, but, you know, I'm going to have a group ceremony in the spring for us to reclaim our menarche, and, you know, there, there are great resources everywhere, or not everywhere, but there's a few great resources out there of pioneers of this work, and they are like elders now, which has really been a blessing for me that they even exist because when I was first looking I was like, does this even exist?
But it does, and it's not easy to find, but the grassroots, like, circle, in person thing is what I think is the real healer. So, you know, yeah, you can definitely also have like a reclaiming menarche ceremony through a zoom meeting, like that is something that's available in the world, but I think to do it in a community that has committed to holding you.
Because that's really like what a rite of passage does too, it's not just, it's a lot about the person who goes through the rite of passage and who feels celebrated and who feels given wisdom and who, you know, feels excited about their next phase in life, but it's also the community committing to you.
To the person, to the initiate, so I think that's the part that the circle can hold, you know, we need to hold each other through that, and so, yeah, reclaiming Menarche is 100 percent something that needs to happen, and also, you know, to suss out the wisdom. Because you did have a rite of passage, so, you know, whatever happened to you during your menarche was your rite of passage.
So, Jane Hardwick Collins always says, you know, you still have to look back at that, too, because that's, you know, what happened. So what happened was your rite of passage, like, go back to it, journal about it, like, pull out the threads, like, unweave it so that you can weave it back into something. That's, that's a treasure, because there are treasures in, like, every... Menarche experience, even if they're like hard ones, even if it's like, oh, you know what, I can support people through that, or And for me, personally, my Menarche experience was like, I had a lot of sisters, I had a mom who was very open, but society, they don't care if you're having your Menarche. Like, you go to school, no one cares.
Like, so, you know, we're still living in a, you know, that's why it's like, your nuclear family is not enough. You know? So I think, for me, that's the pearl of wisdom I got from that. It's like, no matter how supportive of a womb holding lineage you have, you still have to live in the world that you're in.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Thanks for speaking to that. Anything else that we didn't cover that you feel like you want to bring in?
Megan Hayne: Well, I just think that like, I want to emphasize that, you know, just even a little bit of daily tracking can be like, A baby step into like a huge direction and like I didn't think I was ever going to be like able to even commit to daily tracking and for me like it's really the spinning wheels app which is Jane Hardwick Collins like menstrual tracking app that made it so easy for me because it's right there on my phone and so I can do it when I'm waiting in the pickup line for kindergarten or whatever. But you know some people find that it's just better pen to paper but like Carve out just like, you know, one sentence for yourself a day or something, and you might learn just so much just from doing that for one month. It's a whole journey. It's a, it's a journey every time.
Megan Leatherman: Yeah, that's true. Thank you. This has been really fun. Thank you for coming on. Can you tell people where they can find you? Maybe when the next circle is, if they're local to Vancouver, Portland area, and yeah, where, how can people follow along? ?
Megan Hayne: Yeah, so the next circle is December, I think 15, but you can find that schedule on my Instagram page, which is Moon Cycle Megan, all one word. You can also find me through my website, which is mostly just a business card right now, but hopefully will be built out more in the future, which is meganhayne.com or moon school circle.com.
And yeah, those are the best ways. Instagram is really where I'm posting the schedule right now. And since this is very analog and in person, I'm just like right now texting all the participants because I, I'm still able to do that, but I hope it grows. I hope I have three circles going a month at some point.
Megan Leatherman: I'll put all the links in the show notes so people have it. Thank you so much, Megan. This has been really lovely.
Megan Hayne: Thank you.
Megan Leatherman: Okay, my friend, I hope that you really enjoyed that conversation with Megan. I encourage you to follow along with her work. It is really grounded and real. I know that she practices everything that she talks about, and I find her approach so helpful, so I hope that you will connect with her.
A reminder that if this show... benefits you in some way and in, and you're in a place where you could chip in a few dollars now or once a month, you can do that at buymeacoffee. com slash Megan Leatherman. I also invite you if you're in the Portland area to join us for Nourishing Night, a two hour experience in Wild Darkness. That's November 19th. And the link to that is in the show notes.
And if you would like to engage in a simple but profound practice of greater darkness once a week for four weeks leading up to the winter solstice, you can do that by signing up for needing more at the link in the show notes and that starts November 26th.
Thank you for being here. I hope you take such good care. There will not be a podcast episode next week because my kids are out of school and I need that week off, but the week after, November 28th, we will have a new episode out for you. All right, take such good care and I'll see you on the other side.