Sometimes when self-doubt is at play, a witch ends up fucking around and finding out, which is what I did to myself this past week. Instead of doing my magic, I fucked around. I found out. Don’t fuck around. Do your magic.

I am intergender, with estrogen-heavy physiology. I have never felt the need for physical transition, and do not intend to take hormones for menopause. I am currently pre-menopausal. It is not far enough along to show clearly in bloodwork yet, but I am noticing significant physiological differences in my menstrual cycle, because I pay attention to that as part of my personal magic.

Among the delightful variations I am seeing, in addition to the horrible cramps I have had since puberty, I am getting intense bloating, obnoxious mood swings, debilitating depression for a day or two each month for no damned reason other than hormones, and have become plagued by monthly visual migraines.

The migraines are where I fucked up.

This is a migraine sigil I made some time ago, which has the intention of reducing the severity and frequency of migraines. Most of my adult life I have gotten auditory migraines 1-3 times a year, too infrequently to figure out a specific trigger. Thanks to an allergy, I also get classic migraines from exposure to marijuana smoke. Neither of those are the kind of migraine I am talking about here. For the last few months I have been getting visual migraines that last about 3 days, courtesy of pre-menopause.

Because of the increased frequency and intensity of these new hormonal migraines, I was doubting the efficacy of the migraine management sigil. I knew intellectually that the sigil is not a cure, but instead an aid, like migraine medication. Still, thanks to self-doubt, apathy courtesy of the monthly depression and mood swings, and generally low energy levels, I failed to use the sigil until day 3.

It was a significant mistake not using it on day 1.

Sure, I would have had a migraine regardless, but the pain was far more intense than it had been in pervious months where I used the sigil immediately. I was significantly more light sensitive, there was a much stronger sound sensitivity component as well, and at day 3 it was worse than ever instead of going away. In fact, it did not go away until today (day 5), because my period finally started and the hormones that drive the migraines calmed down. Now, I just have a very bad headache, rather than a full blown migraine.

So, yeah. I did not use magic when I should have. I did not use magic that has worked in the past because it did not work in a way that was undeniable, so I doubted myself and I doubted the magic. I apathetically went, “Why bother?” when I absolutely should have bothered. Using it late was better than nothing, but not nearly as effective as using it immediately.

At least I undeniably know better now, which is a good lesson to learn when you fuck around and find out. I definitely will not make that mistake again.

So, do your magic. Do that thing, even if you are not certain it is completely effective, because it is incredibly rare we see undeniable confirmation that our magic worked. Do that thing, because even if it is not undeniable, it is one more tool to help ensure the outcome you are looking for.