Your 28-day Cycle
I spent the better part of my twenties thinking my body was unpredictable. One week sharp and focused, the next week foggy and tender — craving different food, needing more sleep, finding the same social situation that felt easy a fortnight ago now unexpectedly exhausting. It took years before I understood that what I was experiencing was not randomness. It was a programme. A 28-day biological programme that was running, flawlessly, every single month. Nobody gave me a map. So I built one.
Swimsuit Body
There is a specific version of summer dread I have felt every year since I was a teenager. It is not the heat. It is the swimsuit. More precisely: it is standing in front of a mirror and having the number on the scale still running in the background of my brain. What I now understand is that my body was not bigger because of anything I did. It was cycling. And that changes everything.
Cravings & Their Doings
There is a particular kind of afternoon I know well. It is not quite hunger — it is more specific than that. A pull toward something sweet, something salty, something warm. For most of my life I named it by the only word anyone had given me: weakness. It took reading a significant amount of nutritional neuroscience before I understood why the signal never went away. It was not the problem. The translation was.
The Inflammation Report Card II
The symptoms in Part I were loud, acne, breakouts, dullness. The symptoms here are quieter. Puffiness you attribute to bad sleep. Under-eye circles that are just permanent now. Skin that no moisturiser quite fixes. These are easier to dismiss. They are also, for many women, the first signs of something significant shifting internally, arriving years before anyone suggests investigating why. Part II decodes them, and closes with the complete report card to save, share, and return to.
Spring Herbs II
There was a corner of my grandfather's garden that got the most afternoon sun. That was where the basil lived. Next to it, coriander gone to seed. Thyme along the stone border. And somewhere, tucked in where you might not notice it, a small cluster of something soft and lemon-scented that his wife picked for tea in the evenings. I didn't know then what that tea was doing. Now I do. Part II of the spring herbs series, and the most personal one yet.
The Inflammation Report Card I
You have tried the serums. You have tried cutting dairy, cutting sugar, drinking more water. You have stood in front of the mirror trying to figure out what is happening to your skin, and come away with more products and very few answers. That is because the skincare industry is very good at selling solutions and very quiet about causes. Here is what the research actually says about what your skin is trying to tell you.
Spring Herbs I
You could smell it before you saw it. My grandfather's garden in Turkey announced itself long before you arrived, mint first, then dill, then parsley, then rosemary underneath it all. He knew something I've spent years arriving at through research: these plants are not garnishes. They are medicine in the most practical, everyday sense. Here's what the science says about five spring herbs, and one plant most people throw away.