Natural Remedies: Part I

In a prior post, My Migraines, I talked about how I was going to start taking vitex to regulate my menstrual cycle. Since this post, I have gone through two bottles of vitex. My experience with vitex has been nothing but a positive one and here is my story.

For as long as I can remember, I have never had a regular period. When I was younger, they just thought that it was because I started at such a young age. As I got older, they pushed birth control on me to help regulate my period. I was on birth control, the pill and the patch, for about 8 years off and on. After I got off of the patch birth control, my body went crazy. I would have horrible periods that lasted almost 2 weeks, blood clots, and heavy flow. My flow was so heavy and lasted so long, I was anemic from the blood loss. I went to the doctor and they thought that it was fibroids, it wasn't. They did sonograms and their final conclusion: my ovaries just wasn't working properly. After about another 2 years on birth control, I decided to give it up. I was at the age where I wasn't trying to prevent pregnancy, but I wasn't doing anything to get pregnant. I made the decision to try to regulate my periods on my own, naturally.

I searched for months about which herb to try to to regulate my periods and decided on chaste-berry or vitex to do so. I began taking them as directed and within 2 weeks, I started to feel like I was going to start my period. Sure enough, it started. It started and lasted for 7 days. It was heavy, but that was to be expected since I hadn't had a period in months. After taking it for 3 months, I had three periods. Now, the one thing that I will say is that the number of days varied, but did I have one every month? Yes. 

Since this time, I have slowed down on taking vitex because I wanted my body to regulate itself and guess what? I have a period every month. I am going to talk with my gynecologist about the length of time between my periods and see if there is any problem with it. My periods are normal. I have a couple of heavy days and then it slowly tapers off; it lasts about 5 days and then its gone. This is the most regular periods that I have had in my life!!!

I used vitex strictly for period regulation. While taking vitex, I also took a multivitamin (filled with extra B vitamins), evening primrose oil, vitamin C, and a fish oil capsule. In my prior post, I stated that I also took Dong Quai. I still have this, but unfortunately, I couldn't stomach the smell to take it on a regular basis. I am sure that the vitex along with the other vitamins help contribute to my success.

If you are looking to regulate your periods naturally, or if you are trying to conceive, please research some natural alternative. There are tons of websites with information about it.

If you have any questions, please leave them below! 

This is my personal experience. I am not  a doctor nor do I claim to be. Please research and see what will work for you and check with your doctor to see if its safe for you to take any herbs or natural remedies.

My Migraines...

I called off of work today because lately I have been having some serious migraines. While in college, I had a short bout with them and was prescribed Imitrex to help relieve the pain. I stopped taking this and all of the medicine that they prescribed because of the way that it made me feel; mainly, all loopy, floppy, sleepy, and lethargic.

I believe that the ones that I have been experiencing for the past week or so are due to stress. It's been so much with work, planning and helping people out with different things, the weather, and just stress in general that I cannot think of anything else that have been causing this. I also believe that it also has something to do with my hormones. I have stopped taking Vitex and started taking Dong Quai. In a prior post, I talked about stopping taking birth control and trying something more natural, Vitex, to regulate my periods. I took if for the recommended amount of time, and gave myself a break. Since I was unsuccessful with Vitex, I decided to try something a little stronger. I am giving Dong Quai a try for at least 8 weeks. I am also going to up the dose and see if that will help with keeping my periods regular.

 

As for the migraines, all I can do is just hope for the best. I took a couple of over the counter migraine pills and rested.

My Decision To Stop Taking The Pill...

After much debate, I have decided to stop taking birth control pills. There were several things that brought me to this conclusion and I am hoping that it was the best one for me. Nothing against my gynecologist, because he is very supportive in options to help regulate my period and other things, but I am just tired of pumping myself full of hormones that may be hindering more than helping me.



My first and foremost reason for wanting to go off of the pill is that sometime in the near future, I would love to conceive a child. My one friend once told me that being on the pill saves your eggs. I later learned that a woman is born with all of the eggs that she will have for a lifetime, so saving some or losing some really wouldn't make a difference for me. The quality of the eggs is what matters.

One thing that sticks out in my mind are some of the side effects of being on birth control for an extended period of time. I have been on birth control a total of 6 years since the age of 18yrs. Since then, I have noticed that I have had migraines! I mean, sitting in the dark, give me Excedrin, don't bother me, migraines. My mood swings are crazy. I will cry at the drop of a hat, sometimes worst than others. I've been on that roller coaster of weight gain and loss. My lowest weight in years was when I was not on birth control.

As if all of that wasn't enough, I just didn't feel like a woman. My sex drive is extremely low. I read somewhere that our hormones attract the opposite sex, and birth control blocks these hormones. The last thing that I need is to not attract my soul mate due to a tiny yellow pill! My body, as a whole, was off. Remember my posts about natural deodorant, well my body chemistry was going wacky. I am not going to stop using natural deodorant, but my birth control could have something to do with this.



Now, I know that without birth control, I have horrible periods that last for weeks at times. This is mainly due to my hormones being out of balance. To help assist with balancing my hormones naturally, and get myself back to a normal-naturally- I am going to be taking Vitex Chasteberry. Its a natural plan found in the wild that is shown to help balance hormones in woman. Its basically the equivalency of taking a vitamin. But it takes a while to show the effects of Vitex, so I will be updating in about 3 months and let you guys know if it made a difference in my periods, moods, headaches, ect. I have been tracking my periods using an IPhone app, so I have a good base of how my periods worked, or are supposed to work, while being on birth control. I will continue to use it and see if there is a pattern or if its all off.

I am working towards living a more natural lifestyle, so there will be more posts to come with my vitamin regimen, whole foods/trader Joe's food reviews, and the development of some homemade products that I have been working on.


Sources: The Daily Beast, Vitex, Facts about Vitex,