In the FLO. Book Summary

A 28-day plan working with your monthly cycle to do more and stress less

Alisa Vitti

HQ; 1st edition (23 Jan. 2020)

Book | eBook | Audio

About the author

Alisa Vitti, HHC, AADP, is a functional nutrition and women’s hormone expert, the founder of modern hormone health care company FLO Living, bestselling author of WomanCode, and creator of MyFLO, the #1 paid period app on iTunes and the first and only period tracking and cycle syncing app. Vitti holds degrees from Johns Hopkins University and the Institute for Integrative Nutrition.

About the book:

“This is more than a book. It’s a language and a model for female-centered living. It’s a reclamation and a positive galvanizing force for women today to truly embrace ourselves, making our point of view and our bodies the center point of our self-reference. This book will be the catalyst for an entirely new lifestyle for you regardless of your background, age, or stage in life. We’re not meant to be in perpetual productivity mode, pushing all the time for results. Nothing in nature works that way. We simply need to get back into sync with the four-part blueprint that our female body maps out for us. Then and only then will we be able to pursue the life we’re meant to live as women – liberated and free.”

I’ve got this aspiration to live a productive and healthy life until I hit the ripe old age of 100. Consequently, I’ve spent the past few years delving into the fascinating world of biohacking. During my exploration, I stumbled upon Alisa Vitti’s talk on one of the podcasts. Her approach (The Cycle Syncing Method TM) seemed promising, so when I spotted her book, In The Flo, sitting proudly on my friend’s bookshelf weeks later, I took it as a clear sign that I absolutely had to read it!

In the Flo presents a comprehensive blueprint for modern women to synchronise their eating habits, lifestyle choices, and work routines with their monthly cycles. Drawing on cutting-edge scientific research and her expertise in women’s health, Alisa demonstrates how taking control of our hormonal health can optimise our overall well-being, unlock our creative potential, and foster a happy and productive life.

Alisa emphasizes a critical point within the book: the bulk of existing research has overwhelmingly centred around men, leaving women of reproductive age vastly underrepresented. Well, surprise, surprise — women are remarkably different from men! What proves effective for men in terms of health and energy optimization may not necessarily yield the same results for us.

To sum it up, if you’re seeking a comprehensive guide to female biohacking, this book is an excellent starting point. It’s packed with great practical ideas, and I’ll share some of my favourite insights in these notes. Let’s dive straight in.

P.S.: if you’re eager to tap into your female power like a pro, check out Alisa’s website (and app) – it’s a goldmine of insightful resources on women’s health.

Key insights:

Female chronobiology (say hello to Infradian rhythm)

“As a woman, you’re blessed with a second clock, starting at puberty and continuing until you reach menopause at about age fifty. It deeply impacts your experience of life for approximately forty years. This infradian rhythm is tied to your monthly menstrual cycle, which includes four distinct phases – follicular, ovulatory, luteal, and menstrual. The same way your circadian clock plays a role in your daily bodily functions, your 28-day infradian clock influences your brain chemistry and physiology, providing you with unique gifts and strengths at different times of the month.

Your two clocks are tightly linked. The four phases of your cycle influence your 24-hour circadian rhythms, and vice versa. For example, did you know that hormonal fluctuations affect your body temperature, sleep patterns, and heart rate throughout your cycle? On the flip side, your 24-hour clock plays a role in how well your 28-day clock functions. Any disturbances in your 24-hour clock can disrupt your 28-day cycle, leading to problems such as irregular periods and longer menstrual cycles.

As we’ve seen, mountains of research show that leaving out of sync with your circadian clock can damage your physical and mental health. The same is true if you ignore your monthly cycle. Neglecting this vital inner infradian clock exacts a heavy price from your hormonal, physical, and mental well-being.”

Here is the thing – men operate on a straightforward 24-hour circadian rhythm, and everything seems to revolve around it. They’ve got their peak testosterone in the morning, making it the prime time for productivity, and then they kick back and relax as evening rolls around, making them more sensitive to estrogen. It’s no wonder that the top biohacking tips revolve around syncing everything—fitness, nutrition, creativity, and productivity—with this 24-hour rhythm.

But guess what? Women have a whole other dimension to navigate. We’ve got our own infradian clock, spanning a glorious 28-day cycle. It’s like a secret superpower that unlocks a whole new world. During our monthly cycle, our hormones fluctuate, impacting our energy levels, sex drive, metabolism, creativity, and productivity. The great news is that with greater awareness, we can be tuned in to those hormones and bend them to our will for our benefit.

So if we want to embrace a life of health and productivity, we must not only respect the 24-hour circadian rhythm but also honour the profound impact of our infradian clock. In a nutshell, our menstrual cycle is a force to be reckoned with—it holds the key to unlocking our fullest potential.

That leads us to the next insight. 

Reconnect with your POWR

“Your cycle phases give you tremendous creative force and provide ongoing momentum in your life. In short, they are your power source. To help you connect with your phases and make it easy to remember the special focus in each one, just think of tapping into your POWR – Prepare, Open Up, Work, Rest.”

During our monthly cycle, the level of hormones fluctuates, which in turn profoundly affects pretty much every system in our body. In the book, Alisa teaches us how our hormones affect our brain, immune system, metabolism, stress response and microbiome and explains how we can tap into this knowledge and biohack effectively. 

To keep it simple, here is a quick look at each phase’s key insights.

1. Follicular (duration 7-10 days):

• Strength: Prepare
• Diet: Calorie restriction / Intermittent fasting. Cooking method: steaming, sautéing.
• Exercise: Cardio (Running, biking, dancing, hiking, jumping rope)
• Work: Creativity and planning (Dream big, brainstorm, initiate, prepare and plan. Research, be curious, explore, take courses, chart your strategy. Set the goals, clarify your vision and get new projects off the ground)
• Relationships & sex: novelty (Take a trip somewhere new, go to a show together, try new positions, do something physical together, focus on foreplay)
• Motherhood: Curiosity (Plan out the family calendar and the meals for the month ahead, go somewhere new, ask questions to learn more about your children’s needs, try new activities as a family, make new recipes)

2. Ovulatory (duration 3-4 days):

• Strength: Open Up
• Diet: Raw vegan. Cooking method: raw food, salads, juices, smoothies, steaming, poaching.
• Exercise: Intense workouts (Interval sprints, HIIT, boot camp, kickboxing)
• Work: Communication and collaboration (Socialize, pitch ideas and be seen. Talk about your plans, collaborate with others, schedule dates and meetings, catch up with friends, host a party, and have important conversations)
• Relationships & sex: Receiving (Enjoy dinner with friends, go to a party, talk about sexual fantasies, discuss your relationship goals, have multiple orgasms)
• Motherhood: Nurturing and Playfulness (Attend family events, arrange play dates, be playful with kids, get physical and have a dance party, cultivate social community, have a family meeting)

3. Luteal (duration 10-14 days):

• Strength: Work
• Diet: Macrobiotic, complex carbs. Cooking method: roasting, baking.
• Exercise: strength training, intense yoga, pilates, barre
• Work: Completion, nurturing, tending (get stuff done, get organized, finish projects and goals, tick off admin tasks, do deep work)
• Relationships & sex: Clarity (Do domestic projects together, evaluate your relationship, cook together and stay in for date night, enjoy quickies in the first half of the phase and focus on foreplay in the second half)
• Motherhood: Collaboration (Let children help with chores, support kids to practice problem-solving, handle school-related admin tasks, tackle a domestic project, organise children’s closets)

4. Menstrual (duration 3-7 days):

• Strength: Rest
• Diet: keto, paleo, or grain-free. Cooking method: soups and stews.
• Exercise: walking, foam rolling, yin yoga, mat pilates, breath work and rest
• Work: evaluation, analysis and intuition (Relax and reflect on the past month, be mindful, spend time journaling)
• Relationships & sex: Recharge (Indulge in self-care, read a good book, watch a movie, ask for a foot massage from your partner, and always use lubricant)
• Motherhood: Individuation (enjoy alone time, give your children solo time, ask for help from a partner or a friend, up your self-care, tune in to your children and feel how they are doing, evaluate family priorities)

And if you are serious about syncing your nutrition with your monthly cycle, here is the Food FLO:

Now. Pause for a moment and embrace the magic of your Infradian rhythm. Take a deep breath and ask yourself: which phase of your cycle are you currently in? It’s time to unlock your POWR and harness its incredible potential.

In the book, Alisa shares a handy template for journaling and structuring our days in alignment with our cycle phases. You can also utilize the power of technology and download the Flo app for this purpose.

Stop managing your time and start managing your energy

“I believe that for women a critical key to unleashing our inner power comes from patterning our creativity and productivity according to our hormonal biological rhythms- a practice that leads to a fulfilling and sustainable life.

When you stop thinking about time management and start managing your energy according to your cycle phases, you’re going to reduce stress, support your biological systems, optimize communication, build energy reserves, and enjoy sustainable productivity. Everything in your life will start to feel easier, and you’ll accomplish more of what you want to do with less effort and stress.”

Absolutely love it! Let’s get real here: time management is all well and good, but if we want to truly maximize our productivity, we need to get laser-focused on managing our energy effectively. Why? Well, if you’re battling sickness, struggling to peel yourself out of bed each morning, or feeling utterly burned out at work, all the fancy time management techniques in the world won’t save you. In the wise words of Stephen Covey, we need to put first things first.

Now here is the thing: our energy levels are at the mercy of our hormones. So, to truly conquer the energy game, we must adjust our routines in accordance with our cycle phase to plug energy leaks and plan those much-needed energy refills.

For instance, take that 5k morning run. It’s like rocket fuel during the follicular phase, boosting your energy to the moon. But when you’re menstruating, that same run might drain your energy reserves faster than you can say “cramps.” So, let’s be smart about it and align our activities with our hormonal dance. It’s the secret sauce to maintaining optimal energy levels and rocking our productivity game like never before.

Perfect mom is a myth

“Even though we’re biologically made for motherhood, we need to acknowledge that the idea of the perfect mom is a myth. How are you supposed to be a sexy wife, kick-ass entrepreneur, mindful meditator, organic cook, fitness goddess, and doting mommy at all times? It’s a lot. Trying to do it all week in and week out will put you on the expressway to exhaustion. And if you’re dragging yourself to PTA meetings, soccer practices, and school plays while relying on your morning caramel latte to jolt you awake and your evening chardonnay to calm you down, you aren’t doing yourself or your family any favors. Being stressed, sick, or zonked out from fatigue keeps you from being the best mom as possible. In fact, it makes you more likely to lash out at your kids, be late again picking them up after piano practice, or be emotionally zoned out when you’re supposed to be enjoying quality time. You are the heart and soul of the family unit. Your moods, energy, and words impact your children in long-lasting ways. This is the reason you need to rid yourself of the notion that you should sacrifice your health and well-being in order to do it all for your kids. Instead, you should live by those instructions you hear every time you fly: “Put your own oxygen mask on first.”

Absolutely. Let’s get real about it: the idea of a perfect mom is nothing more than a myth. It’s downright impossible to juggle everything and “have it all.” But there’s a powerful secret that can bring you closer to becoming that kick-ass mum you aspire to be. And it all begins with prioritizing your well-being in the first place. It does seem impossible sometimes, but give it a try!

In the book, Alisa dedicated the entire chapter to optimizing motherhood, and my biggest takeaway from it is this: energy management and self-care are absolutely crucial on this journey. 

P.S.: If you want to make your well-being a top priority, there’s one skill you absolutely need to master: setting clear boundaries. I highly recommend checking out our notes on Jesper Juul’s incredible book No!, where you can find some serious food for thought on how to establish boundaries that honour your needs and desires.

Action steps for you:

1) Try to sync with your cycle. Here is a quick-start plan from the book:

– “Determine which phase you’re in.

– Decide if you’ll start with food or workouts.

– Week 1: For the phase you’re in, sync either just your food or just your workouts.

– Week 2: For your next phase, sync both your food and your workouts.

– Week 3: For the third phase, while maintaining the food and workout elements, look at your schedule and task list and see what activities are in sync with that phase, note how many are out of sync, and make some decisions about what can stay and what should get moved to another phase.

– Week 4: Take out your daily planner, look at the next four phases, and plan your ideal schedule for the next whole cycle.”

2) If your hormones are out of balance and/or you’ve been diagnosed with fibroids, endometriosis, PCOS or have other symptoms like bloating, acne, cramps, or PMS, approach it with the biohacking mindset and use food to heal.

3) Use the Cycle Sync Method to quit the pill or any hormonal contraceptive.

Quotes from the book:

“We can’t access our full potential when we’re living by someone else’s rules and not listening to the wisdom within.”

“When your hormones are balanced, the natural ebb and flow of your monthly cycle has a predictable and positive impact on brain function and allows you to take advantage of your unique gifts and talents throughout the month.”

“Once you accept you biochemical nature and how much it influences your life, you’re left with a simple choice – are you going to fight your nature, or are you going to work with it? Your day-to-day lifestyle and self-care choices either work against your cyclical nature and lead to symptoms, or they support it and enhance cognitive skills, rev up your energy, and boost your moods. It’s a no-brainer.”

“Listening to your body, you regain the power nature instilled in you.”

“What’s the greatest lesson a woman should learn? That since day one, she’s already had everything she needs within herself. It’s the world that convinced her she did not.” (c) Rupi Kaur