With health and fitness starting to gain priority among the millennials, the birth of various food-as-medicine systems is starting to emerge. Our ancestors believed that our foods were the best way to maintain good health. This highlights the importance of building healthy lifestyle habits through conscious choices. They shared their knowledge about using food as medication for treating any ailment. This system of living to maintain a healthy body through the right foods is coming back into our lives.
Trends such as the Keto diet have proven to be effective in managing diabetes and blood pressure, keeping them in balance. One such trend that aims to bring a natural and systematic balance to your hormone system is Seed Cycling.
I am sure you must have heard about Seed Cycling somewhere while you were scrolling through social media. This concept is becoming increasingly popular among women suffering from hormonal imbalance and menstrual irregularities, such as during PCOD. Doctors are suggesting this natural way to bring back the proper balance of the hormones in your body.
The Role of Hormones in our Body
Hormones play a vital role in ensuring reproductive health. More women are falling prey to problems such as PCOS due to lifestyle changes, dietary inefficiencies, and sometimes even genetic problems. Women also face symptoms of menopause, such as hot flashes, vaginal dryness, and fatigue due to declining levels of hormones in the body. Proper knowledge of hormone levels helps us ensure your periods are on track. It helps to have an account of your ovulation cycle and fertility levels. The right levels of hormones help boost fertility.
Hormones, apart from impacting reproductive health, also influence your mood, the quality of your skin and hair, your sleep quality, and general wellness. Detoxification and the generation of hormones, such as progestogens, can help eliminate problems, such as acne. Low levels of these hormones affect fertility and cause problems such as brown spotting before periods, breast tenderness, headaches, and PMS.
Unlike common misconceptions, working on hormonal imbalance is not as difficult. Your diet can be the easiest means of ensuring proper hormone levels. It also reflects the connection between daily habits and overall well-being. Seed cycling is one such natural and safe method to bring back your hormones to a natural flow. Just like budget buds, various plant seeds come with amazing benefits that can be used to bring balance and harmony to the body.
What is Seed Cycling?
Seed Cycling refers to a naturopathic remedy that claims to bring balance to hormone levels in the body. The process involves rotating the consumption of seeds such as flax and sesame through your menstrual cycle to initiate hormone balance. Seeds, enriched with oils, minerals, phytoestrogens, and vitamins, help stimulate the generation, detoxification, and metabolism of hormones such as progestogen and estrogen. It regulates estrogen levels during the first half of the cycle and progestogen during the second.
The benefits of practicing seed cycling include regular periods, a cure for Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, recovery from menopause symptoms, such as fatigue, mood swings, night sweats, hot flashes, improvement in fertility, and reduced acne. Some source also claims that it can be useful for improving thyroid levels, help in weight loss, reduce cellulite, and improve skin and hair health.
Practicing Seed Cycling
If you decide that seed cycling could be your way to ease any hormonal imbalance in your body, then the first step in this experiment is to match your menstrual cycle with this practice. There are four stages of your menstrual cycle – the menstrual phase, the follicular phase, the ovulation phase, and the luteal phase. Each of these phases has different levels of various hormones, and hence, you need to match your seed cycling with them for optimum benefits.
During the first two phases – the menstrual phase and the follicular phase, your body needs aid to metabolize and produce estrogen. Starting from the first day of your period, these two phases comprise the next 14 days of your cycle. During the follicular period, the estrogen levels are required for the eggs to prepare for maturity. Seeds such as flax and pumpkin can play a vital role in enabling this functioning in the body. These seeds contain phytoestrogens, minerals such as zinc, and vitamins that help in enhancing the natural generation of these hormones. They also perform the function of eliminating excess hormones from the body through the presence of lignans to ensure it does not impact our health.
Consume about 1-2 tablespoons of raw pumpkin seeds and freshly ground flax seeds. Apart from this, including omega-rich foods such as hemp seeds or cod liver oil can be beneficial to enhance the effects of the current seed cycle. It helps reduce inflammation and improve reproductive health.
However, one should not get confused between hemp seeds and cannabis seeds. Hemp seeds contain many health benefits and are a storehouse of various nutrients, hence can be consumed safely. Whereas, regular or feminized cannabis seeds are typically used to grow marijuana plants.
The next phase is the ovulation and luteal phase. Ovulation typically falls on the 14th day of the cycle and is the point when the egg is released into the uterus. Following the ovulation, the luteal phase begins. In this phase, our body requires support for metabolizing and producing progesterone, as it helps with the thickening of the uterine lining to prepare for pregnancy. The phase starts from day 15 and lasts till day 28, after which your menstruation begins. Switching to raw sunflower seeds and sesame seeds during this period can be extremely beneficial. Sesame seeds are high in zinc content, and sunflower seeds are a rich source of vitamin E. These two help enhance progesterone production during this phase.
Consume two tablespoons of sunflower seeds or sesame seeds that will help your body during this phase. They also create the ambient temperature for your body to initiate your menstruation.
Simple ways to incorporate Seed Cycling
While the concept of consuming raw seeds every day might seem challenging, there are simple ways of incorporating it into your regular diet. Consistency in such practices helps in maintaining long-term health and balance.
Make seed butter you can store and consume with bread or fruits.
Add these seeds in a bowl of cereals and consume this mixture.
Mix these seeds into your salad with dressing.
Add these seeds to your fresh fruit juices or other shakes you might like to relish.
Prepare simple pudding or other recipes that include these seeds.
Points to remember
Keep your menstruation date and ovulation period as the threshold to switch between these seed cycles.
Continue with phase two seeds until your menstruation begins.
There is no hard and fast rule when it comes to seed cycling to make it work for everyone. Observe your cycle and sink your seed consumption well. Evaluate if you see any changes throughout your cycle.
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