EP.361/ New Research On Seed Cycling for PMS and Menstrual Pain

Podcast

4 Sept

Seed cycling. You might have heard of it, you might have tried it, you might have had your doctor dismiss it or you may think it’s just another wellness trend.

But admittedly, whilst it’s trendy, it’s not just hype.

First up, let’s define what it is for those of you who aren’t aware. Seed cycling is when you consume one tbsp of ground flax and one tbsp ground pumpkin seed in your follicular phase (so from menstruation to ovulation, typically days 1-14), and then one tbsp ground sesame and one tablespoon of ground sunflower seeds in your luteal phase, so from ovulation until menstruation (typically days 14-days 28).

Now of course, those days i.e. Days 1 - 14 are based on an average cycle and are not a true reflection of individual cycles, so if your luteal phase runs to Day 30, consume the sesame and sunflower until Day 30.

If you have an irregular cycle, seed cycling may help to improve this by the way it supports your hormones. If you have irregular cycles because you have PCOS, stay tuned because I am going to do another episode on that next.

The seed cycling strategy is based on the various benefits of these seeds for hormones, ranging from their nutrients to actual studies.

For example, research has found that consuming flax seed daily for three cycles improved ovulation rates, increased luteal phase length (so great for those of you with short cycles) and improved the progesterone to oestrogen ratio in the luteal phase, which is really beneficial if you struggle with PMS, often caused by oestrogen dominating over progesterone.

Flax seeds have also been shown to improve the metabolism of oestrogen through the liver, by increasing the amount of healthy oestrogen waste products (known as metabolites) and reducing the amount of the more potent, harmful ones, which can cause more oestrogenic activity.

In terms of other benefits, these seeds provide nutrients that are essential to ovarian function, ovulation and healthy sex hormone production, such as zinc and vitamin E, and also contain nutrients shown to improve PMS and period pain, like magnesium and calcium. I’ve put some references in the show notes on those if you want to read up on them.

So historically, we haven’t had much research on using these seeds collectively, in the seed cycling format. We’ve just had these individual studies, some of which I’ve mentioned just now.

But, in an exciting development, we had a study published on seed cycling for PCOS in 2023, but for those of us without PCOS, we still had to go on what we’d had seen clinically - which was improvements in PMS and menstrual pain in those who had tried seed cycling for several months.

But now, Yasmin and Kaya Nouri, the sisters behind BeeYa Wellness, a seed cycling brand, fed up of there being no evidenced despite them seeing improvements in both themselves and their customers, conducted an independent clinical study.

Now, before we continue - I want to be clear that I am not being paid to discuss this study. I have no affiliation with BeeYa Wellness, so there’s no financial benefit for me at all for sharing this data. I did reach out to the girls to do a podcast interview to discuss these benefits, but at present, they’re not doing podcast interviews because their business is so hectic and busy, but I still wanted to bring you this information because it’s so exciting.

The study was an independent third party lab study - meaning that an independent lab who had no investment in the product and was completely unbiased, performed the research. The study was carried out over three months, with 40 participants.

These participants had two or more of the following symptoms:

Heavy flow
Prolonged periods
Cramps
Poor mood

Fatigue
Severe PMS
Bloating
Premenstrual/menstrual cramps
Pain
Fatigue
Mood issues
Hormonal acne
Breast tenderness
Poor sleep
Headaches/migraines
Low sex drive
Digestion issues or digestive
upset

For three consecutive cycles, so cycles in a row, every participant followed seed cycling, sticking to Days 1-14 for pumpkin and flax, and 14-28 for sesame and sunflower.

So, here are the overall outcomes:

72% reported improved digestion
75% reported PMS was less severe
77% reported less severe cramps
80% reported less breast tenderness
80% reported menstrual pain was less severe

Now, a few of these I want to dive deeper into.

The obvious being period pain, because us endo folk and girlies know that well. The study found that by the end of the first month on seed cycling, the intensity of cramps both before and during menstruation had already significantly improved. By the end of months 2 and 3, the intensity of both the worst rating for menstrual pain and the lowest rating (so those who scored as having less menstrual pain) had both reduced, so basically, whether you had awful menstrual pain or just some, both got better.

In fact, by cycle one, those who scored as having the most severe menstrual cramps, reported a 24% reduction in severity, and by Cycle 3, these participants reported a 44% reduction in pain. So, pain scores reduced by almost 50%, which I think would be a welcome improvement for those of us with endo!

And for those of us who deal with PMS due to hormonal imbalances like poor oestrogen metabolism or low progesterone levels, more good news. The study found statistically significant improves from the first cycle, with continued improvements in Cycle 2 and 3.

In fact, the study measured PMS severity and hormonal imbalances using a questionnaire which measured nine common hormonal complaints, and the results after three cycles of seed cycling were as follows:

Hormonal acne: improved by 31%
Low libido: improved by 32%
Heaviness of period: improved by 48%
Fatigue (frequency): improved by 55%
Fatigue (severity): improved by 54%
PMS symptoms interfering with productivity: improved by 63%
Breast tenderness: improved by 57%
Digestive upset: improved by 78%
Quality of life during period: improved by 40%

So, these are incredibly compelling statistics, but we do need more research, for example, a randomised placebo controlled trial would be the gold standard, where they compare the seed cycling to a placebo, amongst participants who have been randomly selected and don’t know if they’re consuming a placebo or the seeds, so that there’s no bias.

However, as practitioners, we have already seen great results with seed cycling, and finally having data like this is a huge step forward - and I am a big believer in people over data. What do I mean by that? Well, it’s amazing to have data, but if someone is telling me something is helping them, I will believe them, even if there isn’t enough research on it yet (providing they’re not doing something dangerous of course!) because lack of research doesn’t mean lack of benefits, it just means we don’t have the research yet!

Now, the other thing I’d love to see in time is studies on seed cycling for endometriosis, because sadly, the participants in this study didn’t have endo, but again, that does’t mean it can’t benefit us, and I’ve seen many clients experience improvements with seed cycling!

So, if you’ve been curious about the protocol, but have been on the fence, perhaps this data may have convinced you to give it a go, but remember, the biggest improvements came from three cycles, so it’s important to be consistent and do your best to give it three full cycles at the minimum, unless, of course, you experience adverse effects.

So that’s it for this week, next time I’ll do an episode on seed cycling and PCOS and cycle regularity.

Show notes

Flax studies

https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article-abstract/77/5/1215/2649961?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14749240/

Zinc

https://ovarianresearch.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13048-024-01442-z

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36920672/

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3275394/

https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Zinc-HealthProfessional

Vit E

https://ovarianresearch.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1757-2215-2-1