When I look back, I cringe at how little I knew about my body.

When I started to wonder if there was another way to avoid unplanned pregnancy without the artificial hormones, everyone gave me the same cynical answers – Yes, but you’d be crazy to actually rely on them for birth control!

I call BS.

By taking just a couple of minutes a day to tune in to your body, you can use a method of birth control that is equally as effective as the Pill and condoms.

No side effects, no artificial hormones, no prescriptions, no awkward supermarket visits.

This knowledge will help you to know exactly when you are and aren’t fertile.

Not only does this knowledge help you to avoid pregnancy, it also allows you to maximise your chances of conceiving naturally and, according to the research, in half the time!

Caffeine is the world’s most popular drug.

If you’re one of those women who can’t function until you’ve guzzled your morning cup of coffee, caffeine might be doing more to your body than just giving you a quick energy boost.

If you’re currently pregnant or preparing for pregnancy, you’ve probably heard that coffee is on the naughty list. But is this reputation deserved?

A xenoestrogen is a type of endocrine disruptor that has an oestrogen-like effect on the body and a significant effect on your fertility.
We know that oestrogen is a key hormone for a healthy menstrual cycle, but when xenoestrogens enter our bodies they block oestrogen receptors so they can’t do their job.
The body thinks there’s not enough oestrogen available and begins to produce more. This will increase the total amount of oestrogen in our bodies and cause oestrogen dominance.
Xenoestrogens don’t break down, they’re stored in our fat cells and a build up over time can lead to breast cancer, obesity, infertility, miscarriage, endometriosis, early onset puberty and diabetes.
In this episode of The Mana Women’s Wellness Podcast, I’m diving deep into the common household items that contain xenoestrogens and hormone disruptors.

We’ve all been there once or twice. We wake up thinking we’re going to get our period. But it doesn’t come.

We wake up the next day. Still no period.

Then we start to panic.

We do some backwards maths and work out if we might be pregnant. We start frantically Googling and cursing our bodies for messing with our heads.

In this episode, I’m going to save you from that long fall down the Google rabbit-hole and share with you the top reasons why your period might be late. And none of them mean you’re pregnant.

Pre-conception care is not just for women, your baby begins with 50% egg and 50% sperm, so sperm health is equally as important as egg health for fertilisation and development of a healthy baby. It takes three months for sperm to develop and mature before they are capable of fertilising an egg, so preparation should start at least three months before trying to conceive. This can ensure sperm is high quality and viable and gives the best chance of fertilising the egg.

Once pregnancy is confirmed, the hard part’s over for the man and the woman has to keep up her good habits for another 9 months. So if your man is struggling to stick to healthy habits, remind him it’s only for 3 months! But of course, if he sticks with them, there are long-term health benefits too.

In this episode, I’m giving you my 10 top tips for males to prepare for pregnancy.

Think back to new year’s eve. The clock strikes midnight, we cheer and hug and kiss and say happy new year.

We’re already likely up past our regular bedtime, glass of champagne in our hand, and since Christmas the week before we have been eating our weight in food, drinking too much and lounging around in the Australian sun, or curled up under a blanket for those of you listening in the Northern Hemisphere.

Either way, do you really think these first few minutes of a new year are really setting you up for success when it comes to new year’s resolutions and healthy habits?

Not so much.

Ready to ditch hormonal contraceptives for good but feeling completely clueless about how to do it and what to expect?

In this podcast episode, I’m talking you through the 5 steps to coming off the Pill.

Whether you’re ready to start preparing for pregnancy or you just want to explore a natural method of birth control, I’ve got you covered!

Did you know that the pill was the very first medication that was prescribed to perfectly healthy women to treat something that was not a health problem?

Instead, it works by shutting down a completely natural process of the female body – ovulation.

Let’s get something straight, cervical mucus is not just discharge and it is a very good thing! You want to see mucus throughout your menstrual cycle because it’s the very best real-time indicator you have of your fertile window. It tells you when you’re ovulating so you can use this information to avoid unplanned pregnancy or conceive naturally. Mucus helps keep sperm alive and helps get us pregnant, and it protects us from vaginal infections. The change in mucus during our cycle also helps us to predict our next period and if you’re a control freak like me – you like knowing when your period is coming. Some women see cervical mucus every single day. Some only see it a few days in a month. And every single one of these women is 100% normal.

In this episode, we’re talking about UTIs and why the bacteria around your vagina and bladder are essential for good health. I’m chatting with registered Chinese medicine practitioner Joanna Macmeikan about all things UTIs and bacterial vaginosis and why antibiotics are not always the answer.