Code Red

Introduction

So, there’s a code.
It’s ancient, it’s deeply spiritual, and, more than that, it’s powerful.
Fiercely powerful.
So powerful that it has barely been spoken for 3,000+ years.

Menstruation.

Yep, your period is way more than the PMS, carb cravings, and fierce rage that you may experience each month. Your menstrual cycle/period/bleed [insert whatever you choose to call your “time of the month” here]—is actually a four-part code that, once cracked, will uncover a series of monthly superpowers. You can use these to enhance your relationships with lovers and others, build a better business, have incredible sex, and create a “bloody” amazing life.
Until now, your monthly bleed might simply have indicated whether you were pregnant or not. You may get such painful cramps and suffer so much discomfort that the idea of finding love for your cycle makes you want to punch me in the face. And many of us have been taught it’s shameful and/or embarrassing to bleed. Tampon adverts tell us our period is “Mother Nature’s curse.” Some advertising campaigns turn our blood into blue water to sanitize the process, to distance and disconnect us from our own blood. While others have made our bleedtime look like it’s the perfect opportunity for high-energy pursuits like rollerblading, sailing, and riding rollercoasters while wearing an all-white ensemble.
It’s no wonder so many of us have such resentment toward our menstrual cycle, which is why I totally get that beginning to appreciate or even, dare I say it, enjoy our menstrual cycle, is a really big ask.
But hear me out.
There was a time when women totally honored and celebrated their monthly cycles.
For real.
It was the cycle that moved a woman through the archetypes: from girl to mother to wise woman through to crone.
Back in the day, when girls began to bleed, a beautiful menarche ceremony would be held to initiate her into womanhood.
She was celebrated.
Her bleed cycle became a part of the natural rhythm of her life, and she’d gather together with the women of her family and community to bleed at the dark phase of the Moon. This was her time to go inward, to reconnect with herself, her sisters, and Mumma Earth. This quiet time, dictated by her body’s rhythms, refueled her, filled her up, so she could pretty much rock out in the weeks ahead.
In my own traveler culture, men knew that women were at their most powerful during their bleedtime, so took care not to offend a woman through fear of being rendered mokadi—having something of his soul taken away. Basically, these men knew we were badass and capable of serious magic-making when we bled so kept their distance. Ha!
Our cycle—the bleed, and everything that went with it—was sacred.
But for over 3,000+ years now, our stories, our truths, and our wisdom as women have been distorted, censored, burned, and unheard because those in charge of creating the systems and structures got fearful. Christianity changed up its teachings to totally disregard the potent power of our menstrual cycle, (along with a fair few other things along the way). Because of this, we lost our daily connection to our body, to Mumma Earth, the Moon, the seasons, and their cycles.
Now we reside in a society with masculine constructs that has no guidance or structure for the feminine menstrual experience.
This complete disconnection from the cyclic experience, from our power source, has caused many of us to hate, cut, add to, and mutilate our bodies as we endlessly strive for an advertiser’s idea of so-called perfection. We ignore our deepest needs as women because we no longer trust that we know ourselves better than anyone else. We look outside ourselves for the answers. We spend time and money on self-help books, personal-development courses, and feel-better workshops, trying to find a way, a spiritual practice that helps us to makes sense of ourselves as women. Yet we find nothing that actually fits. When we get emotional or dare to feel, we apologize for our tears, suppress our anger, and fear being called hysterical. And when that happens, we may self-medicate with drugs/food/alcohol/shopping.
Worst of all, we have an epidemic of “down there” pain and dis-ease—PMT, polycystic ovaries (PCOS), endometriosis, fibroids—and overwhelm, stress, anxiety, and fertility issues are at an all-time high. We manage our menstrual cycle with synthetic hormones, denying ourselves the experience of living fully in our power. In essence, we are stripping Wonder Woman of her lasso.

This is a Code Red situation, and I want you to consider this book your call to action.

A rallying cry to any woman who has ever:

• found her cycle annoying and an inconvenience
• been disgusted by her blood and felt dirty and shame-filled at menstruation
• wanted to hide away and pretend menstruation didn’t exist
• talked about her period in hushed tones
• been crippled by premenstrual or menstrual-related pain and dis-ease hated it because her bleed meant that another month had passed and she wasn’t pregnant when she desperately wanted to be
• thought: There must be a freaking reason as to why we bleed for five or more days each month and don’t die?!

It’s no secret that most women aren’t entirely happy with menstruating, but that’s because most women don’t know that their cycle has a much bigger purpose than they have been led to believe.
As women, we will experience 350–500 menstrual cycles in our lifetimes. Code Red will dare you to get to know yourself better through the wisdom, guidance, and insight that each cycle provides.
Each cycle takes us on a journey through both the light and the dark parts of ourselves—the masculine and feminine; the yin and yang. As we move through each of the four phases—pre-ovulation, ovulation, premenstruation, menstruation—we get the chance to renew and refresh our entire being—physically, mentally, psychologically, and spiritually—EVERY FREAKIN’ MONTH.
That’s pretty cool, right?
Now, I’m not a medical doctor, but I am a woman who hated her period. In fact, 15 years ago, I hated everything about my life.
I’d binge in secret and hide the wrappers down the side of the sofa. I strived so hard to “be” and “do” in a job I thought I wanted, but instead of feeling success and happiness, I became jaded and stressed. I was in a relationship that was going nowhere, yet I didn’t dare to demand more. And my periods were heavy, all-consuming, and hurt like a motherlover; sex was painful, and orgasms were non-existent.
Life was pretty sucky. (Total understatement.)
After three years of misdiagnosis, I was told I had severe endometriosis and needed surgery to remove my womb. At this point, I’d never heard of endometriosis. I also had NO love for my lady parts, and the idea of having my whole down-there-ness removed was momentarily tempting. But walking out of that hospital appointment with a handful of literature as to the next steps, I felt a pain in my belly. This wasn’t the pain I’d previously experienced, but fiery anger stirring in my womb, my ovaries, and my vagina.
She was pissed, and it was at that moment that I knew a hysterectomy wasn’t an option. In fact, so driven by deep anger at modern medicine’s quick-fix “whip it out” response to women’s health, my womb, ovaries, and vagina took me on a 10-year exploration of my own lady landscape.
It’s been quite an adventure, and through writing Code Red and reliving some of it within these pages, I’ve found something far more powerful and potent than modern medicine: menstrual medicine. A deeply cleansing and healing self-love practice that works predominantly with the creative, spiritual, and psychological energies of the four phases of the menstrual cycle. It has become the very essence of IN-YOUR-BODY-MENT, a movement practice that I teach and share with women both in-person and online, and has brought me into a rather incredible relationship with my lady landscape, my menstrual cycle, my body, and myself.
This shouldn’t be something we have to discover; it’s our birthright as a woman. The menstrual cycle, if we work with it and not against it, is an incredibly potent experience, and my big heart wish for this book is that it’s your call to power.
I now live my life totally in sync with my cycle: my business, relationships, sex life, health, money, and creativity are all in complete alignment with my rhythms. And the good news? I still have my womb, despite the doctor’s best efforts to take it out. My endometriosis is currently manageable—yes, it’s possible and through finding fierce love for my cycle, I’ve found love for myself as a friend, as a lover, as a Creatrix, as a woman.
I want this for you, too.
I want this for EVERYONE that bleeds.
Code Red is my invitation to you to explore, navigate, and love your lady landscape. It’s a book, it’s a self-inquiry practice, and, most importantly, it’s your new best friend. An opportunity to reconnect with your true nature as a woman, to use your menstrual cycle as an ever-unfolding map to crack your code and create a bloody amazing life.
Big, big love…
Lisa x