Menstrual Munchies: How to Eat While on Your Period to Reduce Cramps
Anyone who experiences periods, especially in college, knows the struggle with cramps. Eating foods that decrease inflammation in the body reduces cramps, but it’s hard to know what to eat to help yourself, especially when you’re constantly on the go and getting food from the dining room.
Obviously I’m not here to tell you what you can and can’t eat. However, I’m here to recommend specific foods based on research and my own experiences. In a way, this piece is more for me to enforce healthy eating habits during my period. Writing things down helps me. I struggle with severe period cramps and periods that prevent me from doing my daily activities and seeing one doctor after another. I don’t know what’s wrong with me and there’s nothing that can fix it. However, your diet and how you treat your body affects how your body deals with pain and other obstacles.
According to the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, “There is a connection between the food you eat and your body’s estrogen levels.” Certain foods, such as animal products and anything with added oils, increase estrogen levels in the body. As you eat more estrogen-based foods, your womb lining can become abnormally thick. During the menstrual cycle, your uterine lining breaks down. Due to the thickness of the uterine lining, more prostaglandins are produced, which leads to severe pain.
All in all, “Eating foods that decrease inflammation in the body helps tame menstrual cramps.” These include fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds, while avoiding animal products, refined grains, added vegetable oils, and fatty foods will. The reason a fruit and vegetable diet is effective has to do with the high levels of antioxidants found in plants.
Despite seemingly simple advice, I realize that this is easier said than done, especially when it comes to college and cafeteria food. Here are my recommendations for places on campus that have menstrual cycle friendly food.
As much as I love Bear Necessities, I wouldn’t recommend it for foods that will ease your body aches as most foods tend to be on the greasy side. Smoothies from Crossings Cafe at Toni Morrison Hall are among the best. My favorite is the cocoa pinenna smoothie. All are freshly made to order with a choice of flavours. You can choose whether the base should be yogurt or oat milk. Whipped cream on top is free. It gives you a special feeling while filling your stomach. In each cafe you can also get some nice hot herbal teas. They always help to calm and soothe me.
You can also prepare a salad in every canteen (Campus North or West). My personal favorite is a Cobb salad with hard-boiled egg for protein. Blue cheese dressing is delicious, combine with some spinach, chickpeas, cheese, maybe some sunflower seeds and you have a tasty and nutritious meal. If you’re more in the mood for a snack, you can always grab some Cornell Dairy yogurt and top it with fruit and some kind of granola. If granola isn’t available, feel free to use granola or a crumbled oatmeal raisin cookie. Eating out at Risley Dining might help; it is a completely gluten-free dining room; such can help reduce inflammation.
If you’re near Farming Square, I’d recommend Bus Stop Bagels’ PB&J apple butter bagel sandwich. The flavors really melt in your mouth. Trillium has omelettes in the mornings that are absolutely delicious, just choose a non-meat option. Mann Cafe has a lunch sandwich called Chicpea of the Sea. It’s a cold sandwich with chickpeas and spices, and I was pleasantly surprised the first time I had it.
If you’re on the central campus, I’d definitely recommend Goldies’ hearty egg white, feta, and spinach breakfast sandwich. They also have a portabella mushroom melt that tastes like my mom’s portabella mushrooms – delicious and dreamy. Crossings in Toni Morrison has one of these too. Although Terrace is on the pricier side, they also have delicious smoothies that will give you all the essential nutrients.
What I have provided is not an exhaustive list of menstrual friendly foods, these are just a few of my finds that I personally don’t think enough people know about. I am not vegetarian or gluten free, but sometimes a certain type of diet can be beneficial. Experiencing menstrual cycles is a stressful part of life for many people; Little things like food can help. After all, you are what you eat; You are more than just a student. You are a person who needs to be cared for and nurtured.