Follicular phase

is one through five.

Follicular is one through 13 slash 14.

So yeah, after your menstruation, it lasts about 10 more days.

And then ovulation.

Well, I guess it depends on how you think of it.

The way I like to think of it, the first, [laughs] first part of the cycle is the follicular phase, which is after your period.

So your period bottoms out all of your hor- all of your, uh, estrogen and progesterone.

They just get really, really low, and that is part of what triggers this big drop in estrogen and progesterone.

Then dropping is what triggers the shedding of the uterine lining, and then you get blood that comes out, and then the blood bleeding stops, um, and you're already into your follicular phase.

And in this phase, you're starting to recover, just slowly, your hormone levels to their, their highest point that they get, which is ovulation, and then for estrogen and then for progesterone, it's the luteal phase, the phase right after ovulation.

So follicular phase, um, what's interesting when I was doing [laughs] my research on this and found this Goldilocks zone, um, for estrogen, if your estrogen is too high for where it should be at a certain stage of the cycle, it can make your motility slower.

And if it's too low for the phase of the cycle where it should be, especially compared to progesterone, it can make your motility slower.

Menstruation, they start to grow.

Follicular, they start to, I always say like flirty follicular phase, you start to feel yourself a bit more.

Yeah, definitely.

But your kind of workout splits, it sounds like it's a couple of strength sessions in the gym, a couple of Pilates classes.

I like to educate it based on two.

You've got your follicular phase, the first half, then you've got your luteal phase and it's divided by ovulation.

Okay.

So follicular phase begins with day one of your period, which is first day of full flow.

Okay.

Not spotting, not a little bit of blood.

That is your first day one.

And that is day one of that cycle.

Now, a question that I do get pretty often is, well, what if, you know, I spotted the day before my period? Like, is that day one? Or maybe, you know, your period started at night and you're like, okay, well, is this day one or is tomorrow day one? And then, you know, after my period ended, maybe, you know, I had a day of spotting.

Like, is that, am I still in my menstrual phase or my follicular phase? And what I will say to that is, it really does not matter that deeply.

To have the plus or minus of maybe what you would consider your day one, I'd consider tomorrow my day one.

Or you consider your spotting to be the first day of your cycle and I don't.

to be part of my menstrual phase.

But again, it doesn't really matter that much.

So once your period ends, once your bleed is done, that is when you are transitioning into your follicular phase, which is the second phase of our cycle.

This is the phase, again, if you've already learned about your cycle, it's the season of spring.