Cyclical wellness is the practice of understanding health, emotion, and consciousness through the rhythmic, season-like changes of the menstrual cycle. Psychotherapist Jane Severn calls this lifelong landscape menstruality: “a state in which a woman resides at all times,” encompassing the entire arc from menarche through menopause and beyond.
Rather than reducing menstruation to symptoms or pathology, menstruality recognizes:
- shifting states of consciousness
- emotional tides
- physical energy rhythms
- intuitive and spiritual openings
These cyclical shifts mirror the natural world:
inner winter (menstruation), spring (follicular phase), summer (ovulation), and autumn (premenstruum).
Cyclical wellness reframes these seasonal changes as meaningful inner cues—guiding relational needs, cognition, creativity, and somatic intelligence.
Why Menstruation Matters for Therapy
Menstruation is one of humanity’s oldest biological rhythms, yet remains misunderstood and stigmatized. With 28% of the global population in reproductive years, roughly 575 million people are menstruating at this moment—a population nearly equal to all of North America.
Menstruation has been described as the “Fifth Vital Sign,” an essential indicator of whole-person health. It reflects:
- hormonal interplay
- emotional regulation
- social behaviors
- cognitive shifts
- immune and physiological rhythms
Because the menstrual cycle shapes body, mind, relationship, and spirit, therapy that ignores it risks missing an entire dimension of the client’s lived experience.
How the Menstrual Cycle Influences Emotions & Relationships
Hormonal rhythms shape emotional and relational life far more deeply than our culture acknowledges.
According to Engel et al. (2019):
- Follicular phase: rising estrogen increases oxytocin sensitivity → social openness, connection
- Ovulation: peak estrogen amplifies bonding, desire, emotional attunement
- Luteal phase: progesterone can dampen oxytocin → introspection, sensitivity, boundary clarity
Clients often describe these shifts intuitively:
- “I feel brave and social for the first two weeks… then tired and easily overwhelmed before my period.”
- “I’m more porous during this time.”
- “I need softer interactions.”
Cyclical awareness provides language—and validation—for these inner movements.
The Somatic Lens: Where Sensation, Emotion & Meaning Meet
Somatic therapy brings the wisdom of the body into psychological work. Embodiment researchers note that most people only notice their body in moments of:
- sex
- exercise
- pain
And yet, inner sensation is the body’s original language for self-regulation.
Somatic practices like breathwork, tracking sensation, or gentle movement deepen:
- interoceptive awareness (feeling inside the body)
- proprioception (sense of movement and orientation)
- emotional literacy
- resilience
This sensory intelligence becomes especially potent during menstruation, when subconscious material often rises.
As one participant in my research shared:
“Lucid dreaming during my bleed goes deeper into my psyche than any other time.”
The Menstrual Cycle as an Inner Compass
Participants in my research described the cycle as:
- a barometer for emotional needs
- a guide for social engagement
- a messenger of subconscious material
- a rhythm of creativity, clarity, and release
Tracking digestive changes, temperature shifts, cravings, uterine sensations, and social preferences created a map for:
- pain regulation
- emotional stability
- spiritual insight
- intuitive clarity
- self-care practices
Tools like FAM, symptothermal tracking, and ritual-oriented cycle work deepen body literacy and expand a person’s capacity to understand themselves from the inside out.
Reimagining Therapy Through a Cyclical Lens
Cyclical wellness transforms therapy. It softens the “push through it” mindset and replaces it with body timing, allowing clients to work with their physiology rather than against it.
Therapeutic applications by inner season:
Menstrual Phase — Inner Winter
Rest, slowing down, emotional honesty, clarity emerging from the subconscious. Ideal for deep presence, grounding, and gentle somatic work.
Follicular Phase — Inner Spring
Renewal, hope, new insights. Good for planning, creativity, reorganization, goal setting.
Ovulatory Phase — Inner Summer
Peak communication, relational repair, expressive work, connection-based interventions.
Luteal Phase — Inner Autumn
Discernment, boundaries, processing unfinished emotional business. Useful for releasing old patterns, integrating shadow work, and refining needs.
When therapists align interventions with these inner seasons, clients experience greater regulation, clarity, and self-compassion. This is at the heart of my work with clients.
Cyclical Wellness as a Path to Resilience
Menstruators spend an average of seven years of their lives bleeding. This is not a peripheral experience—it is a major dimension of health and identity.
Cyclical wellness supports healing around:
- PMS & PMDD
- anxiety & depression
- trauma responses
- relationship patterns
- body trust & self-esteem
- chronic pain conditions
- sexual disconnection
- shame or internalized stigma
By integrating body literacy with psychological and spiritual insight, therapy becomes a living process—one that honors the client’s internal seasons instead of pathologizing them.
Reclaiming the Womb as a Site of Wisdom
Many participants in my research spoke about the spiritual and intuitive openings of menstruation. Ritual, creativity, and somatic presence helped them:
- reconnect with their bodies
- soften shame
- cultivate self-love
- experience the cycle as a source of meaning
As Severn writes,
“If we can befriend the cycle… rich therapy and rich living are readily available to us.”
Cyclical wellness invites clients to do just that—to befriend their rhythms, reclaim their embodied knowing, and expand into deeper wholeness.
If you’re ready to explore your own cyclical rhythm through a somatic, relational, and deeply human lens, I’d love to work with you. You can book a therapy session with me and begin this inner season of healing whenever you’re ready.
References
Engel, S., Klusmann, H., Ditzen, B., Knaevelsrud, C., & Schumacher, S. (2019). Menstrual cycle-related fluctuations in oxytocin concentrations: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology, 52, 144–155. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yfrne.2018.11.002
Koskenniemi, A. (2022, June 23). Taking charge of the menstrual cycle: Discourses of menstruation and the menstruating body in self-help literature. Women’s Reproductive Health, 10(3), 323-340. https://doi.org/10.1080/23293691.2022.2085532
Lufadeju, Y. (2018, May 25). Fast Facts: Nine things you didn’t know about menstruation. Unicef. Retrieved December 27, 2024, from https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/ fast-facts-nine-things-you-didnt-know-about-menstruation
Severn, J.J. (2005). Menstruality: The great feminine gestalt. Gestalt Journal of Australia and New Zealand, 1(20).
Sullivan, J. (2024, July 18). 6 things a wonky period might be telling you about your health. Self. Retrieved December 19, 2024, from https://www.self.com/story/period-symptoms