Beyond the Period: The Female Brain

Hey Just Tri babes!

The last few blog posts covered topics rooted around controllable behaviors - like sleep habits, hydration and nutrition protocols - that increase your recovery. Holistic lifestyle interventions are required to maximize performance potential. Unlike men... women have another advantage, that is often overlooked - their hormones.

Throughout history, women have been fed misinformation about their menstrual cycles which has led the generational conditioning that the experience should be uncomfortable and inconvenient. Understanding your hormonal advantage, cyclical benefits, and how truly awesome it is to be female flips the age-old script. Increasing your awareness around your cycle will give you unrivaled confidence and enable you to enhance every aspect of your life! Now, who wouldn't want that??

First, you need to ditch the idea that your hormones only control your reproductive system and menstrual experience because they deserve much more credit than that. Second, remember and repeat Dr. Stacy Sims' tag line, "women are NOT small men."

Ready to explore your feminine power!?

Time For School

No, there won't be a quiz... but aren't you just a little curious about how your body works!?

The endocrine system is a network of structures and glands that secrete hormones to regulate body functions. There are two (2) structures that control the system's processes; the hypothalamus and pituitary gland. The hypothalamus is considered the command center of the endocrine system. Located in the brain, it receives and interprets information from the body and sends chemical messengers (aka hormones) to the pituitary gland in order to take action. The pituitary gland (nestled just below the hypothalamus) sends out hormones to the thyroid gland, parathyroid, adrenals, and ovaries.

Key hormones:

Estrogen: produced by the ovaries, adrenal glands, and fat cells. It's main functions are during ovulation by thickening the uterine lining (preparing you for pregnancy), and protecting you from dementia, bone density loss, heart disease, and high blood pressure.

Progesterone: produced by the ovaries and adrenal glands. It spikes just after ovulation to control the buildup of the uterine lining (anticipating pregnancy) and counterbalances estrogen by improving sleep and promoting relaxation.

Testosterone, follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), luteinizing hormone (LH), insulin, and cortisol are influential hormones, as well.

When you align your daily actions and behaviors with your hormonal concentrations and body's needs, you will optimize each of your biological systems and release more available energy.

These six (6) biological systems fluctuate with your monthly cycle: the nervous system (brain), lymphatic system (immune system), metabolism, digestive system (microbiome), stress response, and reproductive system.

Now, considering your systems are not static and change in response to your hormones, it would be wise to adopt routines that sync with your natural cycle in order to increase your performance potential. All of this is controlled by your infradian rhythm.

Separate from your circadian rhythm (24-hour clock), this second biological clock regulates the menstrual cycle (~28-day clock). Yep, reproductive aged women have two internal clocks controlling our bodily functions. Lucky, us!!

When you work with and support your hormones, you will gain momentum within each cycle phase. When managed properly, your menstrual cycle is your greatest weapon! 

Biological System #1: The Female Brain

Fast Facts:

- A female's brain is ~10% smaller compared to a male's brain.

- The female brain changes ~25% over the course of the cycle.

- Females need more sleep (~20 minutes longer) than men in order to reset itself because of our complex circuitry.

- A female's gray matter outperforms the male brain and functions differently because of stronger neural networks that foster communication, intuition, emotional memory, and anger suppression. [1]

 Structural differences (compared to a male's brain):

- Larger prefrontal cortex, hippocampus, insula, anterior cingulate and corpus callosum.

- Smaller amygdala and hypothalamus.

These structural differences shape what all women are capable of.

To sum it all up, women have more leadership skills, empathy, impulse control, and focus. They have greater capacity for long-term memory and emotional memory formation (yep, the "elephant brain" - remembering everything!). Women are able to defuse tense situations and to listen to gut feelings better. Their decision-making and anxiety brain center is larger, so that's why they usually take more time to make decisions and worry more. Lastly, the connection between their brain's two hemispheres is stronger allowing them to access more regions in order to efficiently solve problems.

The Overall Effect the Brain

Throughout the cycle, estrogen and progesterone levels increase and decrease. Your brain's chemistry changes in response to your hormonal levels. When you're in hormonal balance, you can optimize your brain function and take advantage of your unique gifts within each phase.

Menstrual Phase:

- Your ability to be introspective, analytical, and think strategically about your life is at it's peak because your hormones are at their lowest levels of the cycle.

- Your brain's hemispheres - left side = analytical, right side = feeling - have optimal connection during this phase.

- A great time to journal and reflect on your environment, your values, your actions, etc. Are they aligned with your mission? How have you been spending your time? Do you need to make changes?

Follicular Phase:

- You're more open to new things and beginnings. Serotonin (i.e. the happiness neurotransmitter) levels rise with elevated estrogen so you're happier, more positive, social, verbal, and outgoing.

- Your focus is shifted outward during this phase. 

- A great time to act on the reflections from the prior phase and set intentions.

Ovulation Phase: 

- Your brain's synaptic connections increase which elevates your mental sharpness, creativity, and communication skills.

- Your social and verbal brain centers are primed for important conversations and connecting with your community.

Luteal Phase:

- Your brain shifts to task and detail orientation and completing projects.

Early Luteal Phase:

- You still have the energy to connect with friends and family.

 Late Luteal Phase:

- Your focus shifts inward (as estrogen and serotonin levels drop) to prioritize your self-care.

- A great time to speak up for what you need, say no to energy draining tasks/events, and set boundaries. Or you could become easily irritated.

Hopefully this information shows you how amazing your female biology really is and encourages you to take steps that will help you manage your hormones so you can optimize your sports performance and life.

Thank you for reading this week's blog!

Have a great week, get some movement in, and as always, Just Tri!!

Yours in Sport,

Lindsay

P.S. Help support and grow my business by following the Just Tri Performance social media pages on Instagram, TikTok, and subscribe on YouTube!!

Instagram: @just_tri365 | TikTok: @justtri_performance | YouTube

Reference:

[1] Amen DG. Unleash the Power of the Female Brain. New York: Harmony Books, 2013.