You don’t have to be a hypochondriac to have had questions about your body. After all, not to sound like a secondary school sex ed teacher, but our bodies can be confusing sometimes. So, to help quell some curiosity, we took 8 of our most burning women’s health questions and sought to get to the bottom of them.
Most of these women’s health ailments can be tied back to your womb health, for which we have a lobang you’ll want to stay tuned till the end to get the full deets. There’s a womb health treatment that’s even made it on national news, and we have an exclusive promo just for TSL readers.
We all remember being in secondary school, when the red wave first started to sweep through the female population. If you went to a girls’ school, where everything was in the open, you might even remember comparing the length of your cycle with your friends.
Most periods last anywhere from 3-7 days, so if your periods are lasting 2 weeks, they are considered longer than average. In general though, longer periods are nothing to be worried about. What’s more important is that you’re menstruating regularly, to ensure that you shed your endometrial lining each month. If need be, you can always consult a specialist.
In terms of fertility, having irregular periods can make it more challenging for you to get pregnant. This is simply because it becomes far more difficult to look to your cycle for signs of ovulation to know when to try to conceive. However, women facing irregular periods are still able to conceive, and go on to have normal and healthy pregnancies.
You probably recall growing up and being told not to drink cold drinks during that time of the month. The fact of the matter is that cold drinks have no impact on the menstrual cycle. In fact, they’re completely unrelated – menstruation is linked to the reproductive system, while drinking – regardless of temperature – is linked to the digestive system.
That said, while cold drinks do not have any direct impact on cramps, they can cause imbalances in the body, affecting abdominal circulation and overall body metabolism. This manifests in a little something called uterine coldness, characterised by symptoms such as period irregularity, period fatigue, and lo and behold – worsened menstrual cramps.
As tempting as that period BBT may be, it’s a good idea to cut down on cold drinks during your period, just to be safe. Still, every body is different, so a good rule of thumb is to exercise discretion, and just do what feels best for your body – whether that means a cup of hot tea or a Slurpee.
Image credit: Unsplash
Birth control pills are pretty great – in addition to making sure we can have fun without becoming premature parents, they also come with a slew of benefits – clearer skin and relief from cramps, just to name a few.
In spite of this, a question many women have is what happens once we decide to stop taking them. Will our skin go crazy? Does a baby just spawn? Or will we even be able to have one at all? The good news is that long-term use of birth control pills should not impact your ability to get pregnant.
The hormones in the pill only stay in your body for a short time, which is why you need to take one every day for it to be effective. Once you stop, you should return to your normal cycle – and hence your ability to get pregnant – within a few months. As for the skin, well, you’ll have to get in touch with a skin specialist for that.
Speaking of skin specialists, you may have noticed that you tend to get breakouts nearing your period, or during. You might even experience a number of other uncomfortable PMS symptoms like migraines or backaches.
The answer for this one is pretty complex, but we’ll keep it simple. When Aunt Flo pays you your monthly visit, she tends to bring her friends with her. This is due to a number of reasons, but they can all be boiled down to the massive hormonal changes taking place each month.
For example, prostaglandins – the hormones released during the menstrual cycle to promote uterine contractions – can affect the lower back muscles, while the drop in oestrogen right before the start of a period can lead to headaches.
Aside from hormonal changes, the pain you experience during period migraines and backaches can also be explained by Qi and blood deficiency – as the entire body’s Qi blood is centred around the womb area, other parts of the body lose out on that nourishment, leading to pain.
Image credit: Unsplash
Arguably the greatest fear of most women, getting pregnant on your period. There’s no way that’s possible… right? Well, news flash, it is – if you decide to have unprotected sex during shark week. There is always a chance of conceiving, even if it’s fairly low as there’ll be no egg to fertilise at that time.
Still, because women ovulate at different times during their cycle, it may be possible for you to become pregnant while on your period. This of course depends on how quickly you ovulate after your cycle is over.
The safest way to prevent pregnancy is through using a condom or an alternate form of birth control, or abstaining from sex altogether.
We’ve all been there – sneezed while Ms P was on a visit and felt a huge splash. Ran to the toilet, only to find a twisted dark mass in our underwear. While you may have thought you were dying the first time, you’ve probably figured out by now that those are blood clots. But why do we pass them, and is there any way to avoid them?
Clots happen when we shed an increased amount of blood during our periods, in other words, during heavy flow. When the blood pools while it waits to get passed, it coagulates, becoming a thick clot rather than liquid.
Clots can also be caused by uterine coldness – coagulation happens when the blood in the womb gets “cold”. After all, the body is warm and so is blood, so naturally it shouldn’t be solid when it leaves the body.
This is another question that sounds like it stems from an old wives’ tale. This time, though, there is some truth to it. Menopause is strongly linked to genetics, meaning yours is very likely to fall within a few years of the age your mother was at menopause.
That said, it is also possible that you end up reaching menopause nowhere close to the age your mother was when she finally stopped menstruating, but that is far less likely. Still, the menopausal transition can take place anytime from the ages of 45-55, so the window is pretty small to begin with.
To prevent premature menopause, it’s a good idea to make sure to regularly go for womb maintenance in the form of womb care treatments. This is especially important considering the onset of menopause accelerates aging, the effects of which can quickly be seen on the skin and body – think sagging skin and wrinkles.
And finally, the golden question. There are plenty of things you can do, but each works to varying degrees of success. You can cut caffeine, take supplements, regulate your sleep cycle, incorporate more exercise into your routine and adopt a healthier diet – including eating more soy.
Or, you can start from the source. Working to create the most favourable environment for conception is one of the best things you can do to boost your fertility and increase your chances of having a baby. And there’s no better, more relaxing place to start than with womb massages.
If all this talk about fertility and womb massages has piqued your interest, here’s all you need to know. A womb massage is exactly what it sounds like – meant to alleviate menstrual cramps, improve blood circulation, and help achieve overall enhanced womb health.
The treatment can be found at Fresver, a beauty and wellness centre established in 1988 that offers both facial treatments and professional wellness procedures. Here, it goes by a more legit name: the Womb And Ovary Mud Moxibustion treatment.
A combination of ginger herbal oil blends and meridian point massages are used to stimulate blood circulation. After that, the award-winning treatment is followed by their Meridian Dry Brush Therapy to stimulate the body’s meridian points and revitalise Qi.
Lastly, the application of a herbal mineral mud mask containing more than 28 essential herbs, including ginseng, dang gui, and motherwort. These ingredients are specially selected for womb care, in order to prevent stasis and regulate menstruation.
This treatment method is a direct way to feed nourishment to the targeted area without any side effects, which is quicker and more effective than treatments that utilise digestive absorption.
Other than the overarching benefit of improving overall womb health, the massages help to regulate your periods, reduce hormone related acne, and prevent premature menopause, in addition to allevating period cramps, of course.
This helps to boost your fertility so that the next time you’re asked “girl, you not scared next time cannot make baby?” you’ll know in your heart that you have nothing to worry about.
If you’re interested in trying this out for yourself, the good news for first timers is that they are currently offering a trial promotion for $49 nett (U.P. $363.80).
Readers who book through this article will receive a complimentary Moxi LED treatment (worth $80.25), done together with the Womb And Ovary Mud Moxibustion treatment. Using mugwort and infrared light therapy, the treatment revitalises and restores energy, so that you can say goodbye to dampness in your body and body aches.
Sessions last 60 minutes and are by appointment only. Slots are limited, so find a Fresver outlet near you and sign up fast if you’re interested.
This post was brought to you by Fresver.
Photography by Tasha Sun.
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