In the previous post, I explained what PMS actually is and in this post I will share some of the things which have helped me to prevent PMS and also studies to support these. What can you do about it? DON’Ts Don't eat chocolate or candies even if you crave them more than usual. These will worsen your symptoms. Use your will power! Don't drink alcohol. It will make you more bloated and worsen your symptoms. Avoid dairy.  Dairy products may cause inflammation in the body and there is hormone residues in milk. Read more  here . Don't stress too much. Stress will increase your cortisol levels which will lower your progesterone levels even more. Read more  here . DO’s Exercise: now is a good time to do other than intense workouts: try yoga or long walks. Diet: eat nutrient dense food. Vegetables, fruits, whole grains, berries etc. It is important to eat berries every day. Any types of berries will do. Avoid hormon...

According to a study  20% suffer from PMS badly enough to acquire medical help. Modern medicine may say that you cannot prevent PMS and in the severe cases offers pills or hormonal treatments. However, functional medicine says there is a lot you can do naturally to prevent these symptoms mostly by paying attention to your diet. I am a good example of this: when I changed my diet, all my PMS symptoms disappeared. Nowadays I am mostly surprised when I have my periods because I don’t have all the PMS signs to warn me. And that is a good thing! In this post I will explain what PMS actually is and where does it come from.  Background PMS is all about hormonal imbalance. As your cycle comes to an end, your body’s progesterone and estrogen levels will drop. This will lead to decrease in serotonin and dopamine levels. What does dopamine or serotonine do in your body? Dopamine will make you feel energetic and you will feel good. Serotonine will also affect your mood, appetite...

It´s that time of the year when it really gets dark here in the north as we experience the Polar Night.. If you are not familiar with the concept, Polar Night means a period of darkness north of the Arctic circle when the sun does not rise over the horizon. The darkness of the Finnish winter might catch you by surprise. As I have been living abroad, I think, for me Polar Night is a problem. Seems like every year I struggle more because of it. Winter time and darkness is hard for me.  I struggle a lot especially now when we turned to "winter time" and we have day light only from 8 am until 4 pm and it keeps on getting darker each day.  And I know there are other people who also suffer because of it. So I decided to tell you how I cope with Polar Night. How to survive in Darkness: Accept that this is the time of season when you are allowed to get cozy inside your apartment. Light some candles, wear comfortable clothes and drink some herbal te...

Time for my Florida post. This is not a typical "you should visit that place" post, instead I will tell you my holiday observations about Florida (what has changed over the last 10 years since I was there last time and what surprised me). My Holiday Observations: No wonder Americans are getting fatter every year. We did many road trips along the way and the best decision we made was to make snacks for the ride. On the road there were only Dunkin Donuts,  Wendy´s, McDonald´s , JFK or other fast food chain restaurants which offer you fried chicken, fatty donuts and sugary beverages. Instead our snacks were salads (very good variety of ready to eat salads at Walmart or Publix), carrots, grapes, water and coffee. However, in a perfect world my son would also eat what we eat but as this is real-life my son wanted nuggets and fries 😀 so I let him have them. Is there a vegan trend in US like it is in Europe? I noticed that in normal or regular restaurants there weren´t ...