Lumina
  health services

I'm an allied health professional with years of experience using FEMM for health, avoiding and achieving pregnancy. I want women to fall in love with a charting lifestyle, just as I have! I am a pro-life, practicing Catholic who can speak from both a scientific and religious point of view. While I will educate you on the best use of the protocol, I will never tell you how you must apply it to your own sex life or try to force your reproductive health choices. I believe every woman and couple must be informed in order to make the best decisions possible, so I will do my best to inform clients of all their options using fertility awareness. Learn more about me and my background in my About Page.

Women who should work with me: Those who want to be aware of their body's natural hormonal fluctuations via a simple, no-fuss fertility awareness protocol. Women who want to geek out over the amazing design of the human body, especially the female reproductive system. Those who want to understand their body's biomarkers so they can determine if they are having normal, healthy cycles. Women who want to use a natural family planning method to try to avoid or try to conceive children. Women who are struggling to conceive and want an in-depth look at their cycles before they seek further support. Teens who are just starting their cycles and want to understand and support their body without the overwhelm. Women who want to learn how to sync their lifestyle or exercise routines to their cycle phases.

1. Women who are not ready to put in the work of learning and implementing a fertility awareness protocol. 2. Women who do not want to chart daily to determine the status of their fertility. 3. Women who do not want to hear about the dignity of the human person from conception until natural death. 4. Women who are uncomfortable talking about bodily fluids such as cervical mucus, bleeding patterns, seminal fluid, arousal fluid, etc. 5. Women who do not believe they can trust their own interpretations of the reproductive biomarkers without the help of all the femtechnology invented. 6. Women who want to stay on hormonal birth control or another form of birth control that alters or shuts down the cycle.

Chart reviews are your 1:1 private access to a FEMM teacher for 30 minutes to go over your charts in detail, talk about your concerns, discuss your health-related goals, and cover any questions you may have concerning your unique situation. You can schedule them through the course platform.

FEMM is primarily a mucus method with an emphasis on LH testing for targeting ovulation. They have well-researched medical management protocols that all FEMM trained doctors are able to use. I recommend you check out FEMM's website for more information. Also, here is a blog post with a bit more insight on the differences between FEMM, FAM, and NFP. There are multiple other methods of FAM/NFP and many teachers in all methods. If you are not sure which method you want to pursue, I recommend researching all the methods and decide what fits your lifestyle and goals the best. I offer a free (prerecorded) intro video to FEMM. I know that many other teachers offer the same, or will go through a free intro class with you in real time on their particular method. Don't be afraid to reach out to ask questions!

I believe that a girl can and should start charting when she gets her first period. It's possible, and helpful, to begin charting even before the first period is experienced. But, if you're way past your adolescent years, it's not too late to begin! Charting is helpful from puberty through menopause. Charting can tell you about your hormone health, if and when you are ovulating, pregnancy and even when you conceived, and will be one of the first ways you notice red flags to your health. The sooner you start, the better.

ACOG considers the menstrual cycle to be a vital sign of women's health. We monitor our other vital signs (heartbeat, temperature, blood pressure, and respiratory rate). If something is not within the normal range for one of those, we seek professional help. Why don't we treat our cycle accordingly? We women are often not given the right tools to understand and monitor our menstrual cycle. If we were, it would be easy to take concerns to a healthcare professional and begin healing. By learning to chart and understand your cycle, you gain those tools to be able to monitor your health. ​ Charting is your unique, personal data that tells a story not only about your reproductive system, but also your general health. It can help detect many health concerns such as hormonal imbalances, PCOS, endometriosis, STIs/STDs, cancer, and more. ​ Charting gives you insight to personal cycle patterns, healthy or unhealthy. It gives you the tools to monitor any changes you experience through varying lifestyle, nutrition, exercise, sleep, etc. It also gives your doctor (should they choose to use it) a stepping stone to targeted testing, if there appears to be an issue that should be investigated further.

Charting is a great baseline for determining reproductive and overall health. It is an easy way to monitor for red flags that alert us to health concerns, oftentimes before they become a major issue. I enjoy experimenting with cycle-syncing by using my personal data to adjust my lifestyle, exercise, diet, and sleep.

Charting and monitoring your cycle is a habit. Just like any habit, it takes some time to implement and get used to doing. Once you get the hang of it, it becomes second nature. There is a learning curve to understanding your mucus observations, taking your basal body temperature (should you choose to do so), and noticing other biomarkers regularly. ​ Classes with an instructor should take the guessing out of what you are seeing and give you a clear understanding of how your reproductive system works. It's also great to have someone knowledgable to review your charts, answer questions, and help you find other resources or healthcare practitioners if you need more support.

Read this blog post on FEMM, FAM, and NFP. Check out The Cervical Mucus Project for pictures, videos, and descriptions of real life women's own cervical mucus. For a scientific background, read FEMM's White Paper. Many women dive into FAM by reading Taking Charge of Your Fertility, by Toni Weschler. Here are a few other great books to read for more information on fertility awareness, reproductive health, cycle-syncing, and women's health. I will continue to add to this list as I read more books that resonate with me. 28 Days, by Gabrielle Lichterman WomanCode, by Alisa Vitti In the FLO, by Alisa Vitti The Period Repair Manual, by Lara Briden, ND Beyond the Pill, by Dr. Jolene Brighten The Fifth Vital Sign, by Lisa Hendrickson-Jack This Is Your Brain On Birth Control, by Sarah Hill, PhD Sweetening The Pill, by Holly Grigg-Spall

FEMM has a free app that is available through Google Play and the App Store for both Android and iPhone. FEMM also has paper charts available for download. There are multiple other popular apps that women use to chart their cycles. The important thing to note is that many apps are predictor apps and they "predict" or assume your ovulation based on algorithms or textbook cycle lengths (which many women do not experience). Those should be avoided at all cost because they are not an accurate representation of what each woman is experiencing in her unique cycle.

Yes and no. Abstinence is the only 100% guarantee of preventing pregnancy. Every true fertility awareness protocol relies on abstinence during the fertile window to avoid pregnancy. When a couple choses to use another form of birth control when they are knowingly fertile (which they learn using fertility awareness and not a predictor app), then they are no longer relying on fertility awareness to prevent a pregnancy. Rather, they are relying on a secondary form of birth control; whatever their choice may be: condom, withdrawal, diaphragm, etc. The FEMM protocol teaches women how to identify their fertile window and advocates for abstinence during that time. It is up to the couple to decide whether or not to follow that recommendation or use a secondary form of birth control during the fertile window to prevent pregnancy. As a Catholic, it is my personal belief and practice to use abstinence during the fertile window, but I will not try to shame you into doing the same. To be honest, I won't even ask as I don't consider it any of my business. My only job is to teach you the FEMM protocol and you can implement it however you see fit.