Uprising would like to acknowledge the land on which we gather is the seized territory of the Ioway, Sauk, Meskwaki, Wahpeton, and Sioux People. Indigenous lands weren’t ceded through efforts of “good faith” by the United States Government, rather they were stolen from Native and Indigenous Peoples through coercion and dishonesty.
Both the State of Iowa and the United States Government carried out acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing and forced removal as ways to acquire land. Despite centuries of theft and violence, this remains Indigenous land - it will always be Indigenous land.
Native and Indigenous People are not relics of the past. They continue to share their talents and gifts amidst a backdrop of ongoing colonialism. We celebrate you.
#HonorNativeLand
Sustainable Promise:
Uprising promises to publish our magazine in the most sustainable manner possible. We have switched our printing process to a more environmentally friendly company using a recycled paper alternative. We also vow to use only secondhand or borrowed clothing for styling in our editorials.
We acknowledge that in order to ensure a future for Uprising Magazine and our Earth we must modify our processes as environmental issues increase in severity globally.
Lastly we are committed to furthermore learning and growing as it relates to publishing our magazine in a sustainable manner.
Jakob Watson Quincy Griffin
Lily Munnik Nic Trip
Emma Deaton Dylan Lundquist
Dani Sunseri Victor Robbins
Payton Weidner Maddie Hendricks
co-editors in chief jakob watson and quincy griffin
publication directors dani sunseri and victor robbins
writers jude beekman, erin hamlett, cella hanssen, lauren hanssen, pixel hardisty, patrick markovich, riley mccall, erin murphy, payten reese, mac tedder, cassie williams
marketing directors payton weidner and maddie hendricks
marketing committee kyra anderson, jada dachtler, justice dyer, nicole luong, josie mctaggart, paige nielsen, ava poppen, rachel robinson, pee soe, nikki spore, baling tang, elliana van noort, alexis wurzer
finance director nathan kasal finacne committee pee soe
Nathan Kasal
Letter From the Editors
Dear readers,
Uprising Magazine has gone through many forms and stages throughout the years and after looking back, we realized what was missing had always been in front of us. As a society we tend to look forward or backward in time without recognizing what is happening right now. We wanted Issue 18 to be those less identifiable moments in time that guide us to our goals without focusing on anything but the present.
As seniors at UNI, we have been reflecting on our long journey of time in school that is soon coming to a close. When looking back we realized that the most important times were not move-in day or graduation, but what we did in between those periods. Studying, time with friends, going on walks, the hard moments, finding a new passion – all of these interludes should not be overlooked. We realized that we need to be honoring these times for getting us to where we are in life. Time has proven to be fast, so we have taken the initiative to live in and appreciate the now instead of constantly looking to achieve a new goal.
Issue 18 has taught us to take the broader picture and zoom in on the more important stages in life, even those that we don’t value as such. As you read, we hope you are able to reflect and reassess how you live in your current interlude.
This is Interlude.
Jakob Watson Quincy Griffin He/Him He/Him Editor-in-chief Editor-in-chief
contents contents contents
PLAYFUL PROLOGUE
PHOTOGRAPHY
DESIGN
MEGAN WOODS
TINA NGUYEN
Editor’s Note:
Playful Prologue was an opportunity for the featured models to reflect on their childhood selves by bringing clothes and accessories similar to those worn in their younger years. We used this editorial to express the natural feeling of mourning your youth and all the aspects surrounding it as we age and come into new natures. Finding those childhood similarities in adulthood and embracing them instead of pushing them away is a newer form of self-love.
eclipse
By: Pixel Hardisty
“You know,” Beck says, “they say Earth has some pretty good eclipses.”
“So I’ve heard,” Margaret Michael replies, tone measured and casual, but Beck sees their hand go to their necklace from the corner of its eye.
“Ever seen one?” it continues.
“No. Well, I’m not sure, actually. I was really young last time I was there. So if there was one, I don’t remember it.”
Beck makes a soft hum of acknowledgment and keeps looking out of the window. Outside, an asteroid passes slowly but surely in front of the star their ship is orbiting.
“You ever want to go back?”
“Is that what this is about?”
They sound tired.
“No. I really did want to show you this. I was just… wondering, I guess.”
Margaret Michael sighs, hand falling from their necklace to rest back on the railing. “You’ve never been to Earth, have you?”
“No. But I know a lot about it.”
“I’d imagine so. I suppose you’d like to learn more, then?”
“I mean, if you were only a kid when you were last there, I don’t think you’d even be able to tell me anything, right?”
Margaret Michael doesn’t respond. For a moment, Beck wonders if they’d heard it.
“The air… I don’t know how to describe it,” they begin. Beck falls silent.
“It’s hard to convey it to you because you don’t breathe, but... there was something different about it. I haven’t felt the same since I was within that atmosphere. I was more clear-headed. Happier. It was like I found the place I was meant to be.”
“But you’re here, even though..?”
“Well,” they stand up a little straighter, seeming to come back to themself, “It’s probably just childhood romanticism. Air is air, no matter where you breathe it from. Not like I could go back at this point anyways.”
Beck glances out the window, where the asteroid has passed the star and now inches toward the edge of the view allowed by the enforced glass.
“Thanks,” it says, “for coming out here and talking with me.”
They stop in their tracks on the way to the door, turning to face it again.
“Of course. See you tomorrow?”
It nods. “See you.”
It watches them go, listening to the click of the door sliding shut, and shutters its eyes.
tall order
By: Jude Beekman
Chai or matcha and Grad school or the workforce and A scone or a quiche and Stay close or move out-of-state and The barista is staring, waiting To write in permanent marker On my cup, for my drink
That could bring me joy or Disappointment from a choice
So vast I’m swimming in coffee, Wading in the sugar that settles At the bottom, stuck until I shake my head and order What I’d come here for In the first place, knowing I can get matcha the next time I come.
PHOTOGRAPHY
DESIGN
AINSLEY MILLER
TINA NGUYEN
LAYERS OF ME
Editor’s Note:
We’ve all faced the dread of throwing clothes on and off trying to find our “aha moment”. Closets hold memories that we’ve forgotten, hopes of confidence we seek, and joy that still persists to the last thread. Our clothes are the daily aspects of us that we often put on just for ourselves. Layers of Me depicts personal style elevated through unorganized deliberation and styling.
APPLE SLICES
By: Lauren Hanssen
Do you remember waiting for double digits? Sitting on your bedroom floor eating apple slices and reading the book you were assigned for lit circles that ended up being your favorite book of all time? And dipping your apple slices in a jar of peanut butter before dunking them in the mini chocolate chips you poured in the peanut butter jar lid because your mom taught you that was the most efficient (and delicious) way to eat apple slices? Do you remember how big and important turning ten felt then? How you thought the last three years of your life were just the interlude from little kid to big kidhood? Because seven to nine year olds are certainly not little kids. Do you remember that feeling?
What about waiting for high school?
Do you remember that? I thought graduating from middle school to the big leagues would change my life. It didn’t, of course; I spent countless nights of high school sitting on my bedroom floor in the same house (granted I moved down to the basement at some point in there) eating apple slices the same way I did when I was nine. But it sure felt like high school–that magical place from the movies and TV shows where nerds turn cool
and weird girls get makeovers and everyone starts dating each other and teachers inspire students and everyone eats a lot of pizza and goes to a lot of football games–would be worth waiting through the tragedy that was seventh and eighth grade in the middle of a small town in Iowa.
Then there was waiting for eighteen. High school ended up not being all that magical, and once we were in it, it became just another interlude for the next big life development: adulthood. The shift from seventeen to eighteen in your senior year feels cosmic. A combined promise of bliss and peril. Every decision seems like the most important in your life, for better or for worse. How many schools should I apply for? Which should I choose? Should I stay close to home or move out of state? What’s the best way to keep in touch with my friends? Do I even want to keep in touch with them? Which Emma or Grace or Hannah in the university’s Facebook group should I agree to room with in the dorms? Should I work this summer or spend time with my family before moving away? I can’t wait to move away. Remember the waiting?
I called my mom from college last night. She was eating apple slices in the house I grew up in with peanut butter and mini chocolate chips. I watched her dip her apples into the peanut butter jar, then dunk them into the mini chocolate chips she poured into the lid of the jar. I told her about finishing various drafts of my grad school research, and about my first week training to manage the coffee shop I’ve worked at since my junior year, and about the friends I never thought I’d make here, and the home I’ve made away from the home I knew. She told me she was proud of me, that I should get some sleep. I told her I had a lot left to do, that I had to wait until I was done reading, that I would never be successful in the future if I didn’t finish my work now. I was sort of joking, but I could tell she wasn’t when she told me that there’s no reason to wait, and that I had already succeeded.
As I’m writing this, I’m sitting on the floor of my room in the house I moved into with girls I didn’t really know, who have become dear friends to me. I’m eating apple
slices that a regular at the coffee shop I work at brought me from his farm. I’m dipping them in peanut butter and mini chocolate chips that I bought for myself because I’m finally financially stable and can afford snacks. I’m realizing the best parts of my life–the parts where I’m eating my favorite foods in my favorite places with my favorite people down the hall–have been consistent through every season of waiting. I’m mourning those moments I wasn’t present in because I was treating that stage of life as preparation for the next, waiting for something better to come. Maybe there’s nothing better coming. Maybe the best thing is sitting on your bedroom floor eating apple slices. Maybe this is the moment I’ve been waiting for.
Sapphic Souls
By: Bella Markley
Her deep brown, salt and pepper hair
With coarse grays and soft brown curls.
Her light green eyes, gold septum ring, and flushed cheeks always hardened with a smile.
While she stares at her chest length, wavy blonde
With the gray-blue eyes, freckled eye-lids, and a crooked smile
Whose gold and pearl earrings somehow perfectly encapsulate her style.
The two girls enchanted by the small features the other has.
They share gold watches and rings, sapphic florals, and future dreams.
Hard knuckles, interlocked fingers, with soft thumbs reassuring the hand of the other.
Both wide-eyed, connected by the universe, feminine features.
Raised with braids, sisters, and heartache
Waiting for the future girl that sings to their being
Completely interlinked Sapphic Souls.
Going Home
By: Patrick Markovich
At home, there’s a house that’s not your home anymore. A room that’s not your room. Not quite at least. It’s a guest room now. No lofted bed frame made of wood you scratched your name into with a dull pocket knife, metal bedframe from Walmart instead. My room is hours away now, an unmade bed, laun dry past due, books strewn on my desk, without shelves to hold them. That room isn’t quite mine either, al though I live alone, it doesn’t belong to anyone else. I have my partner’s room too, neat, well lit, but that room is hers not mine. Sometimes I just want a place, that place is my living room I guess, couch, Xbox, TV, table. That setup has followed me for years un changed. Podcast playing irrever ent words, controller in hand, that’s my home I guess. I think about the laundry, the dishes, the homework, my thesis, all undone, past due like I said. The list of things I need to do is spoken in my dreams in my mother’s voice. I miss her, even though she’s only two hours away, but much that’s closer than some… I blot away that thought and pick up my phone. I call my parents two times a day. I think of the miles between us, again, not that many miles, but a few. There’s something magic in that drive home, that isn’t really home anymore. But they are, Grace is, Tessa is, Faith is, Paige is, Dan is, so is Sam, they’re all home to me, maybe that’s cliche but fuck it I don’t really care.
A Spectrum of Self
PHOTOGRAPHY
EMMA DEATON
DESIGN
DYLAN LUNDQUIST
Editor’s Note:
A Spectrum of Self was created from an appreciation of early drag queens, kings and self-expression. The duality of a life between glam and glum creates a contour of performance in your day to day. Performers can encompass a passion that travels on and off stage creating space of freedom through life. Though drag has been in the eye of criticism and controversy to those who don’t understand, there should be no debate to the simplicity of expression through art.
DESIGN
By: Riley McCall
My first attempt at french braiding my own hair was…okay. I was at a week-long summer camp for teenagers, standing in front of the mirror in our cabin, hands in my thick, red hair, awkwardly trying to remember what it looked like when my mom braided my hair for me. The end result after restarting more times than I could keep track of was indeed two french braids, but thank the Lord for bobby pins because I’m not sure any of it would have stayed without them. You can see the chunky strands just barely weaved together in the pictures of me from that day, but I am beaming with pride at the accomplishment.
Years later, I spent a Friday summer morning braiding the hair of all the girls in my camp cabin. It was high school week, and I was volunteering as a counselor for the first time. I had spent the week trying my hardest to give the girls the magical camp experience they deserved, worrying that I was somehow going to ruin their camp memories with my lack of counseling expertise. But then they realized I could braid hair, and they all got in line.
This is the thing I remember most from camp: the girls sitting in front of me on the floor, me sitting on the bed behind them, a peaceful silence falling over us in a wordless swell of femininity.
I did not realize at the time that those girls walking up to me with their brushes and hair ties were the same kind of girls I once was, that the way I was looking at them with so much love and care was the way my counselors at camp had been looking at me.
each end of that overlap are where you can see how much the world has changed. I was two years old when Facebook was created—none of the girls at that camp had the option of growing up without social media lurking in the background. Women have always been judged on their appearance, but these girls are now living in a time where it is easier than ever to see how wrong their bodies supposedly are. Their insecurities are being exploited to sell more products, to the point where making up an insecurity for women to obsess over is seen as a good business move. The earth is only getting more damaged too, politics are only getting more divided, horrid acts of violence are becoming everyday news. The people who are fighting for gender equality are getting louder, but sometimes they’re just adding volume to a screaming match.
They might not remember that moment, but I will.
I sometimes forget that my childhood didn’t end at the same time that everyone else’s did. I forget that no matter how far away my girlhood seems, there will always be more girls just entering that stage of their lives, and there will always be new girls coming to high school camp with hair they want braided. This never-ending line of femininity is so captivating when you think about it—the permanent rebirth and existence of women—but it also worries me.
Those girls whose hair I braided, only four or five years younger than me, are living in the same portion of time as me but existing in a different world. Our girlhoods have overlapped but not lined up, and the periods of time on
The difference between my girlhood and theirs has not been all bad, though—with new problems come new people who want to help, people who are determined to soothe pain and prevent more from coming. When I braided those girls’ hair, I thanked God that medicine has advanced, that stigmas have been broken, that there are people realizing that the way we’ve treated girls in the past is not the way we should continue to treat them. Their girlhood was not like mine because some of it was better, and maybe by the time they reach adulthood they won’t have to face some of the issues I’ve found in my womanhood. I pray that this is true, because they deserve a world where assaults are the exception and not the norm. They deserve a world where their body can just be a body, where they can realize that beauty was always meant to look different in different people. They deserve a world that lets them embrace the luminescence of being a woman—they deserve a world that is good to them.
But no matter what does or doesn’t change, the experience of girlhood will persist through every decade. The emotions that come with being a girl are only adapted by the changing circumstances of time, not replaced or redacted. The emotions I’ve felt are the same emotions that the girls in my cabin were feeling, and they are the same emotions that the girls after them will feel. For as long as the earth exists there will be tender moments where older girls will be braiding the hair of younger girls and reflecting on the goodness of being a woman.
I think of the girls in that cabin often. I wonder if one day they’ll try to braid their own hair, if they’ll try to remember what my hands looked like when I was weaving the strands of their braid together. I wonder if they’ll ever braid the hair of girls even younger than them, praying the whole time that this new world is a better place for femininity to thrive. But even if it isn’t, us girls will continue on, just like we always have.
The Other shoe
By: Lauren Hanssen
There’s always a second shoe and we’re always waiting for it to drop. Or trying it on for size. And seeing if it will fit.
Usually it doesn’t. So we walk barefoot. On eggshells. And they always break. Then there’s no ground beneath us, so we are always falling.
Just like the other shoe falls. And we’re always waiting for someone to build us a damn bridge so we can get over it–the eggshells that is–
but they never do. They tell us to build our own damn bridge. But we don’t even have shoes. Because nothing ever fits just right. And we want to be at least alright,
if not all right (can we ever be all right?). Can we be just…right? For once? Or will we always be waiting for a better fit? Will there always be a second shoe?
By: Erin Murphy
Wave
There’s a moment of stillness when the world goes silent. There’s a moment of stillness right before the big wave. Breathe. Your heart is beating so fast you think you might burst. Just breathe. You look back and see everything you have done to get to this point and the people you share memories with are now behind you and in the past. You turn your head back around and see the mountain wave of “Post-grad” coming for you. Your moment is about to come up. You look left, you look right, and your peers are paddling towards it. But you just sit on your board of comfort, not knowing if you’ll paddle or sink before the wave even gets to you. Your natural instinct is to just keep paddling forward because that’s what you’ve been taught to do and it’s what everyone else is doing. Breathe. Don’t let hesitancy get to you. You do your very best to conquer the wave, you’re riding it thinking you’re doing great but get locked in and can’t get out. You crash. Stay calm. Tumbling under the surface you don’t know if you’ll make it up for air. You’re kicking and kicking because it feels like your life depends on it. Finally you make it to the top and your lungs release all the pressure and are filled with fresh air. You look around and get back on your board of comfort. You look around but not it’s just you. What comes next?
Angelinterlude.mp3
By: Dani Sunseri
i took silence for granted until i endured silence with you. something unreachable, untouchable. something i had wished for, someone i set my heart on. i longed for your mundane, your parked car, your “leave the party with me”, your smile on your face, that made it easy to trust you. i closed my eyes when the background track faded, lingering in the unknown. with a sharp inhale of his breath, i opened my eyes as the next song came on, softly, smoothly, delicately. as we smiled silently, i knew that i had just found my favorite song.
You Remember Camp Fondly
By: Riley McCall
Supper
PHOTOGRAPHY
EMMA DEATON
DESIGN
BECCA JORGENSEN
Editor’s Note:
This concept of Tangled Realities came to us when discussing the feelings of being between life stages. You’ve put in the work to pursue your goals, but with varying circumstances, you haven’t reached your full potential yet. It can be disheartening not being where you imagined yourself to be, almost feeling as though you’re floating through life at the moment. We wanted to incorporate this feeling into an editorial to let others know this feeling is a part of life for many.
DESIGN MEGAN WOODS
DESIGN EMMA DEATON
tempting mortality
By: Nic Trip
If god must punish me for loving my woman the way that I do
Then I will bow my head and take my sentence as a reward for the years that I spent in honor and privilege of loving
I will hold her hand behind and walk at the first of the line down to the darkness
How could our love be wrong when her golden hair is the same tones as the yellow flowers I planted out in the fields last May for her
How could our love be wrong when her head fits so perfectly on my chest and I can feel my heart rate immediately slow to match hers
How could our love be a mistake when it seems to have been written millennia before us, carved in stone tablets and translated hundreds of times over from pen to parchment
Fate that is inescapable and comforting
If this love is my fate then I will take the punishment of lifelong joy and gratitude for her
While I wait for the tempest of this so-called crime and sin I make it a lifelong honor to earn all of her love
And learn her each day to love to the fullest extent possible by the ability of man. And then I will tempt my own mortality and love her even further
Then the sun was not up in the sky
But lying next to me in the sand
And in front of me in the waves
Then beside me for the rest of eternity
My Vine
My boyfriend and I, my love
Not My Responsibility
People’s opinions aren’t your worth
The 30th
Someone finally understood what a panic attack feels like THE GREATEST
Too Close
I can’t even describe how this song feels, the build is perfection Halley’s Comet
The song that brought us together
Glory Box - Live/ Remastered labour
Female rage that I never wanted to be familiar with Future Days
The Last of Us fans will understand. Cry I Can’t Handle Change
The Red L’AMOUR DE MA VIE [OVER NOW EXTENDED EDIT]
DATING. ANOTHER. BABY. Never Felt So Alone
House of Balloons/Glass Table Girls
Movement
I can’t explain it, this song just touches a part of my soul
Just close your eyes and listen
I played this almost 365 times in 2023, I blame Pedro Pascal
Tell Me Lies (fin)
Beautiful, heartbreaking, hopeful
moments in time
Music that makes me stop. It makes me think. It makes me not think. I feel less overwhelmed, or more depending on the memories attached. Songs that I feel connected to, even if it’s small. Take a listen.
By: Payten Reese - 19 songs, 1 hour 15 minutes
Before I Do
Editor’s Note: Before I Do illustrates a composition of emotions and choices demanded in a union. The complexity of choice is no friend to time, as the path chosen is not promised to be positive. In this editorial we have shown how unity is not about legalities, but about the choices and actions leading to said choice. Living in the future of what you wish to achieve or believe is ignoring the current moment and what it entails.
DESIGN
EMMA DEATON
Department Store Windows
By: Lauren Hanssen
There is a movie about a girl who designs window displays for a department store. I forgot what it’s called, but I remember the girl saying she wants her displays to transport people to a different world–a world in which they need something, and (more importantly) a world in which they can have it.
Last month I was walking past a department store after going to the gym. A window display set up like a camping scene caught my eye. Three feminine mannequins were dressed up in cuffed jeans, waffle-knit thermal tops, puffy vests, and baseball caps in varying color combinations. Two of them sat near a tissue paper campfire, and the third stood fixing up a tent. A pair of terracotta orange hiking boots displayed in front of one of the footless figures lured me into the store, and before I knew it I had tried on the tent-fixer’s entire outfit. The display had plucked me right out of the real world and pulled me into the dreamland where I’m not me and instead the type of girl who fixes tents and wears hiking boots.
I stared at my reflection in the fitting room mirror. The jeans were a size too small, but I’d known they would be when wishful thinking made me pull a size smaller than my usual from the rack. Still, shifting my eyes up the length of the mirror from my hips to my face revealed a definite disappointment. I looked back down, trying to convince myself that what I told my friends about the gym–that I only started going so often all of a sudden because I missed feeling strong and wanted the confidence that I could kick an average-sized man’s ass back–was the truth. I almost believed myself. But really I hadn’t minded losing the muscle I’d gained from playing sports my entire life and lifting every day in high school. Actually, I kind of celebrated it. I remember how glad I’d been when I had to get rid of all of my jeans sophomore year when the size of my thighs pretty much halved.
That had been the first time my clothes size changed so drastically since sixth grade, when all of a sudden I stopped shopping at Gymboree and Justice and started shopping at Hollister and Von Maur. Fuck a department store, honestly. A trip to the Von Maur fitting rooms never ended well. As I took in my 22-year-old figure reflected back at me–the too-small jeans that looked much different on the tent-fixer–all I could see was 12-year-old me, holding back tears so Mom wouldn’t realize how upsetting it was to have to buy a whole new wardrobe before school started because I couldn’t wear jeans to school that cut off my circulation when I sat down at my desk.
Picturing little me, with all of her big feelings that were so new, and the worry she had that people wouldn’t like her if she didn’t wear the right size jeans, tore me to shreds. Let’s be real, nobody can tell what size jeans you’re wearing. Nobody can tell when you go from a size 12/14 youth to a size 0/2 women’s. Nobody can tell when you go from a 28 to a 29, or a 32 to a 33, or a 35 to a 36. Nobody can tell you and your dad wear the same size pants, because your dad is a man and looks completely different in a pair of pants than you do, okay? And for heaven’s sake, so do footless mannequins. Let the deceiving cuffed jeans from the display window (which were baggy and flattering on a tent-fixer but were plastered to my thighs, unzippable, but somehow gapping at the waist) be a testament to that.
The window display did transport me to a different world. They did make me feel like I needed something–to be thinner or prettier or proportioned differently–and it made me think I could have it. The problem is that I don’t live in a different world. I live in this one. And in this one I am a strong and healthy 22-year-old woman with a strong and healthy 22-year-old woman’s body, just like I was a strong and healthy 12-year-old girl who looked cute as hell in my jeans.
navigating tHrougH tHe stages of tHe menstrual cycle
By: Cassie Williams
Those who experience menstruation go through 4 defining stages throughout each menstrual cycle. These stages are accompanied by changing hormone levels which can affect one’s mood and energy. For individuals with ADHD who already struggle to regulate their mood and energy levels, these changes can be extremely difficult to manage.
For women and people assigned female at birth (AFAB), ADHD may manifest differently than how it appears in men and people assigned male at birth (AMAB). Women with ADHD are less likely to experience hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms, and instead often show inattentive-type symptoms. This can include trouble paying attention or staying focused, which can lead to making more frequent errors, appearing to zone out during conversations, frequently misplacing items, starting projects but struggling to follow through or finish them, trouble prioritizing tasks, etc. Additionally, women with ADHD are more likely to experience emotional control and rejection sensitivity, learning difficulties such as dyslexia, depression and anxiety, self-injurious behavior, and a difficulty forming and maintaining friendships.
These symptoms are further complicated by the menstrual cycle that women experience every 28 days. The changes in hormones, particularly estrogen, affect the neurotransmitters in the brain that control mood regulation and attention. Individuals with ADHD already have imbalances in these neurotransmitters, which can make the constant fluctuation and transition within our bodies even more prevalent. The menstrual cycle can be broken into 4 main stages.
Although there is no cure for ADHD, there are ways to manage symptoms. Understand ing how these symptoms are affected by the menstrual cycle is an important step in managing them. If you experience a regu lar period, it can be helpful to track your cycle.
Though this won’t make the symptoms go away, it will make you better pre pared to handle them. Personally, I have an IUD, and therefore don’t ex perience a regular cycle, as is the case for many AFAB individuals. I find it helpful to really pay atten tion to my body and notice how my ADHD symptoms are af fecting me, as this can give me a general idea of where I am in my cycle and validate my changing experience.
Understanding the intersection of ADHD and menstruation can empower individuals to manage their symptoms most effectively. Additionally, recognizing what is happening within our bodies can allow us to extend compassion towards ourselves during the more challenging phases. When we understand the connection between our bodies and minds, we can better navigate our jour ney through ADHD with strength and resilience.
*Disclaimer: This article is not medical advice. If you believe that you are experi encing symptoms of ADHD, please see a li censed medical professional.
enstrual pHase
This is also known as the period, and is the beginning of the menstrual cycle. This is when the uterus sheds its lining. During this phase, there is a decrease in progesterone, a hormone that can help improve mood. Energy is low, which can be especially difficult for women with ADHD who already struggle to find the energy to get stuff done.
ollicular pHase
During this phase, the follicles which contain the eggs are stimulated to mature. Estrogen and testosterone rise. The increase in estrogen stimulates dopamine production, which is responsible for regulating mood, attention, memory, and learning. Therefore, individuals with ADHD might find their symptoms are slightly easier to manage during this phase.
tHe ovulatory pHase
During this phase, the egg is released. This phase is accompanied by a peak in estrogen and testosterone and likely provides the most relief of ADHD symptoms in women by enhancing cognition, improving emotional wellbeing, increasing alertness and energy, and increasing creativity.
4. tHe luteal pHase
This is the final phase of the menstrual cycle, and is often the most difficult for any woman, and especially women with ADHD. The second half of this phase is often associated with Premenstrual Syndrome or PMS. PMS symptoms include breaking out, mood changes, and bloating. This period can intensify ADHD symptoms such as inattentiveness, brain fog, forgetfulness, emotional stress, sensitivity to sensory stimuli, mood swings, and rejection sensitivity. Additionally, women with ADHD are at a higher risk of experiencing Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder or PMDD, which is essentially a more intense version of PMS.
Editor’s Note:
Highlighting the beauty and simplicity that can come with age, The Gift of Time portrays an appreciation of time. Through this editorial, we hope to translate the potential of aging and the evidence of a good life. We want to remind you that the monotony of aging doesn’t define the rest of your life. Appreciate those smile lines; they have been earned from a wonderful life of smiles and laughter.
Bus Ride
By: Erin Hamlett
The light was blue, and the bus was gently rocking everyone to sleep. I swayed in time with the potholes, but my mind was still awake. There had been an idea of prom, this grand coming of age that I thought I could have but deep down knew I would not. I watched music videos and teen movies as a kid; I knew that even though I was a nerd, there was a chance that someday I could let my hair down, rip off my $4,000 dental headgear, become hot, and get the guy. 16 was supposed to be sweet.
I had a miserable crush on my guy
best friend that I knew was going nowhere. He was All-American, blonde, and the only boy on our varsity basketball team that could dunk. Everybody’s mom loved him. In summer, he’d mow the neighbors’ lawns for cash and his skin turned tan and rosy like creme brulee. I’d pulled every desperate flirting technique in the book on him: comparing hand sizes, making a show out of our height differences, arm wrestling as if there was a question of who would win. He never took
The dance was loud, and my dress was very tight. The men stripped into nothing but their pants, tuxedo vests, and cowboy hats. All the girls took off their glittering heels to dance to country and the occasional 2010’s EDM hit. I didn’t know how to do the two-step or Cotton Eye Joe, but I attempted them anyways, the same as everyone else.
My date kept wandering around to talk to his other guy friends. He didn’t like to dance. I didn’t either, but unfortunately that similarity didn’t spark connection, it just made for a really boring dance. I would follow him like an annoyed mother and grab his arm to try and keep him near. When “Wagon Wheel” came on and the lights turned soft his friends looked at me and I looked at him and everybody laughed nervously.
“Come on, aren’t you guys going to slow dance?” they teased. We looked at each other.
“Ha ha, no. We’re just friends,” one of us said. “Besides, country for a slow dance? No way.” He and his friend put their arms around each other’s hips and swayed together jokingly. They giggled before parting and stiffly returned their hands to their sides.
Afterwards, my girlfriends and I unzipped and unlaced each other in the school bathroom in preparation for post-prom. It was somber in the chilly fluorescent room, my ears ringing and skin vibrating. We filed onto the bus in shorts and false eyelashes.
My guy friend sat with his guy friend on the bus. Another one of his friends sat with me. We were all the way in the back, and the bus shook us like goldfish in a plastic bag. The friend sitting with me would stretch his arm across my lap to show his other friends memes on his phone. I probably should have just traded him for the window seat.
Post-prom was held at a college fitness center. Our group tried to rock climb, but I was afraid of heights and couldn’t do it with my long fingernails. My date raced his friend to the top of the wall, twice, and it took two weary college students to be his counterweight. At the end of the night we watched a hypnotist and bickered in the metal fold up seats about how it was really done, with the friend perched between us silently.
We filed onto the bus in the same seating pattern. They dimmed the lights and it was almost completely dark. Dappled moonlight shifted across seats and weary faces. I looked across the aisle and watched my date’s head droop, slowly, and slump onto his friend’s shoulder. Their bodies swayed in time, and their hair mingled into a singular creature: loose brown curls and platinum blonde. I watched them and listened to soft breaths and shifting bodies. I could almost feel that heavy head; I could almost smell their cologne. Their hands rested near each other, and before they did anything else, I turned my head and let the sleeping boys lie.
We pulled into the school parking lot and the lights went up. Everyone blinked and stretched. I filed off of the bus and my date sidled up to me.
“Can I grab a ride?”
We drove the two blocks to his house in near silence. Before he left the car, my date paused.
“Um, thanks. For asking me to prom.”
I looked him in the eye and smiled.
“Anytime.”
By: Victor Robbins
Wings In the
the mouth of a whale the way it swallows humans whole. Does that make him a Jonah?
Before each set, this Jonah runs through his stretches with a practiced ease, each limb pulled taut. Arms reach high enough to trace the holes in the ceiling with his fingers, and he feels it in his ribs, the aching, pulling, throbbing satisfaction of it. Muscles follow a well-known rhythm. Tension, release. Tension, release. His mama always said he had a dancer’s body.
Strange how every bruise, scrape, sprain, and tear becomes worth it in the end; a never ending cycle of breaking
to put back together stronger than before. Hair severed from scalp to grow back healthy. Pointe shoes bent and rent and torn apart to suit the wearer. Fabric stretched in strain to suit the legs, the hips, the waist, the chest.
Within the empty hall, the barren orchestra pit, a single note plays: long and sonorous, a violin tuning, a mourning melody. A performance for one. Jonah’s anticipation builds; it feels as though he’s been waiting for this moment his whole life.
And he certainly has, hasn’t he? At the very least, the decades he’s spent rehearsing are about to pay off.
He waits for the perfunctory cough from a stranger in the audience to break the silence in the hall, waits for the shuffling feet of his fellow performers settling into place around him. It never comes. Instead, the barrenness gives him pause. He shouldn’t be alone here. And yet…
The absent violinist shifts to a soft, mellow tune, notes pouring from the instrument through the dead space and caressing the air. Jonah’s steps match the rhythm, sweeping across the stage in a flourish, his blue skirt twirls around him in waves, in whirlpools. It’s going to drag him under if he’s not careful, but his mama always said he’s nothing if not delicate. Delicate hands, delicate face, delicate legs, delicate, delicate, delicate, delicate. The music gives him freedom, the performance is his medium; the ability to be within himself and without. He retreats into his mind, his body liberated from it, and for three minutes the diligently memorized steps become second nature. Rehearsed. Comfortable.
Faster and faster the rhythm progresses. Jonah imagines the absent violinist’s hand clutching the bow, fingers racing over the strings; he imagines a boy like him. A boy with delicate hands and legs and face. A dancer’s body. He imagines the boy feels the same freedom, the same absence and presence of self. Maybe he’s somewhere in a deserted theater, maybe in a concert hall, or maybe he’s somewhere in the distant past, or the faraway future.
Maybe he’s inside Jonah. Maybe he swallowed him whole like a whale.
The melody slows, lulls, trails off in a whimper; the spotlight dims, and Jonah passes through the red curtains again, backstage dark as a crypt. No applause. No accolades. Just an empty silence, broken only by the thump of his shoes against the floorboards.
