Valencia Porter, MD, MPH

01/28/2026

01/25/2026

You cannot breathe your way out of patriarchy…

"You cannot breathe your way out of patriarchy. You cannot cold plunge your way out of structural oppression. You cannot meditate, journal, or yoga your way out of conditions that were designed to dysregulate you.

This is not to say that nervous system regulation tools aren't valuable. They are. I use them. I teach them. I believe in the body's capacity to settle, to find ground, to return to itself.

But when regulation tools are offered as the solution to chronic activation without naming the cause of that activation, they become a form of gaslighting. They locate the problem in your body rather than in the conditions your body is responding to.

The message becomes: if you're still anxious, you haven't tried hard enough. If you're still activated, you haven't found the right technique. If you're still struggling, the failure is yours.

But what if your nervous system isn't broken? What if it's accurate?

What if your chronic activation is a correct response to living in a world where your body has never been fully safe? Where your rights can be legislated away? Where your value has been tied to your appearance, your compliance, your ability to serve? Where violence against women is endemic and normalized. Where the mental load is invisible and unpaid and never ending?

You're not dysregulated because you're doing something wrong. You're dysregulated because your body is reading the environment correctly.

This is the problem with nervous system work that doesn't include political analysis. It pathologizes accurate perception. It tells you to calm down when calm would actually be a form of denial. It trains you to regulate your way into tolerating conditions that should not be tolerated.

What if regulation isn't always the goal?

What if sometimes the goal is testimony?

What if your body's activation is not a problem to be solved but a truth to be witnessed? What if the shaking, the racing heart, the inability to settle is your body saying: this is not okay. This was never okay.

And I refuse to pretend it is.

There's a reason oppressed peoples have always used the body as a site of protest. The body that refuses to be calm is a body that refuses to comply. The body that stays activated is a body that is telling the truth about what it has survived.

I'm not saying don't regulate. I'm saying regulate with your eyes open. Know what you're regulating for. Notice if your regulation practice is helping you show up more fully for your life, or if it's helping you tolerate conditions you'd be better off changing or leaving.

There's a difference between settling your nervous system so you can be present and settling your nervous system so you can continue to be extracted from.

One is healing. The other is sophisticated dissociation.

Your body knows things. It knows what's safe and what isn't. It knows what's sustainable and what's depleting. It knows when you're in the wrong relationship, the wrong job, the wrong room.

The question is not how do I make my body stop reacting. The question is what is my body trying to tell me that I haven't been willing to hear.

Sometimes the most radical thing you can do is not calm down. Sometimes the most radical thing is to let your body speak. To let it be a witness. To refuse to regulate yourself into compliance with conditions that are slowly killing you.

Although you cannot breathe your way out of patriarchy, you can listen to the body that has been registering its impact all along."
—Ailey Jolie

Artwork by instagram.com/haisoohaisoohaisoo

01/21/2026

I’m delighted to co-host this powerful conversation for women on holistic vitality in midlife with Dr. Taz MD

01/16/2026

Hi folks. My posts are not showing up on my feed. Let me know if you can see this.

01/06/2026

Always double check this guy…too many wrongly explained “facts”

It has taken medical science 200 years to advance humans to the point where people are so healthy and living so long that they can deny that science and medicine iS what got us here.

01/02/2026

Ugh - not happy about the new 2026 requirement for “folic acid” (an artificial ingredient) in corn tortillas in California.
The root of the word “folate” which comes from folia or foliage comes from plant foods with leaves such as leafy greens.
It would be so much better if we could just give people access to fruits and vegetables!

More details on the hazards of Folic Acid here

Guess I’ll have to learn to make my own tortillas now sheesh.

https://www.drbenlynch.com/folic-acid-side-effects/dd

Hardly anyone talks about folic acid side effects. Folic acid is not some major block buster drug having a list of dangerous side effects longer than its benefits. Like all the ones on TV…. According to WebMD, folic acid effects are these: While these are great to know, these are not the folic aci...

12/18/2025

The natural healing -> MAHA & spirituality -> MAHA pipelines I’ve witnessed over the last 5 years are disturbing. And having seen behind the scenes with many of them has caused me to mute “health influencers” more and more.

12/15/2025

12/12/2025

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced a roundtable discussion titled Invisible Illness — Leading the Way with Lyme Disease,

10/18/2025

I agree!

Omg YES!

10/02/2025

Instead of just coloring your product packaging pink for the month of October, how about actually examining the consequences of the ingredients of products and finding ways to improve them?

This October, let’s stand with brands that truly support the fight against breast cancer by NOT having carcinogens in their products, instead of those who .

🎀Don’t be fooled by pink ribbons slapped on products just to boost sales, while still selling the very chemicals that contribute to cancer.

❌Avoid toxins known to cause breast cancer in ultra processed foods and beauty products such as

-Parabens
-Fragrance
-Phthalates
-BHT
-BHA
-Toluene
-Triclosan
-Artificial dyes

✅Stick to

-Organic foods
-Personal care products with natural ingredients you can actually pronounce

Follow Moms Across America & Moms Across America Movement

🇺🇸 Moms Across America is an independent nonprofit powered by your donations. Support our mission to create a healthier nation by removing toxins from our food supply with a monthly donation:

https://www.momsacrossamerica.com/monthly_donation

08/16/2025

I’m proud to announce that I’m officially a Menopause Society Certified Practitioner! If you want the most current, patient-centered approach to perimenopause or menopause care, consider working with a MSCP or menopause-trained provider.