Written by Bri Luna

We don’t bleed to suffer. We bleed to remember.

During the last Full Moon in Capricorn, something changed. After five years of bleeding with the New Moon, what’s known as a White Moon cycle, my body flipped the script. I started bleeding with the Full Moon instead, and I was thrilled. That moment reminded me that our cycles are not just hormonal, they’re energetic. They’re part of our personal mythology. They hold messages about where we are in our healing, our magic, and our becoming.

So let’s talk about it: Red Moon vs. White Moon witches. What does it mean when your body bleeds with the moon?

What Is a Moon Cycle?

A Moon cycle refers to the energetic alignment between your menstrual cycle and the lunar phases. The Moon and menstruation both follow a rhythm of roughly 28–30 days. Long before period trackers and wellness influencers, our ancestors saw this connection as sacred and deeply magical.

When your bleeding aligns with certain moon phases, it’s not just a coincidence. It can reflect where you are energetically, spiritually, and even emotionally.

The two most commonly recognized archetypes in menstrual magic are:

The White Moon Cycle (bleeding with the New Moon)
The Red Moon Cycle (bleeding with the Full Moon)

⚪ White Moon Cycle

Bleeding on the New Moon. Ovulating on the Full Moon.

This is the most common alignment, often associated with fertility, nurturing, and inner healing. It reflects the energy of turning inward, of self-care, and of building.

People on this cycle are often in a life phase where they are focused on home, grounding, caregiving, or creation, whether that’s birthing ideas, projects, or literal children.

Ritual themes:

Ancestral connection
Womb healing
Inner work and dream tending
Creative manifestation

White Moon witches are lunar mirrors: absorbing wisdom in the dark and birthing it into light.

🔺 Red Moon Cycle

Bleeding on the Full Moon. Ovulating on the New Moon.

This alignment was historically associated with healers, witches, spiritual rebels, and sex witches, those whose magic served the collective more than the family.

It symbolizes transmutation, intuitive power, and shadow work. Red Moon witches are the ones doing deep soul alchemy. You may find yourself more psychic, more sexual, or more creatively charged during this cycle.

Ritual themes:

Shadow integration
Sex magic
Death and rebirth rituals
Blood offerings and collective healing

Red Moon witches walk between worlds. Their bleeding is a spell of rebellion, release, and resurrection.

Can You Shift Between Them?

Your cycle may shift as you move through different stages of your spiritual life, trauma, healing, or hormonal patterns. You might switch from White Moon to Red Moon (like I just did), or move into something else entirely.

Some folks even bleed during the waxing or waning moon, which can indicate a transitional phase, a liminal space, or spiritual initiation.

You are not broken if your cycle doesn’t fit a perfect mold. Your magic is still valid.

Teaching Younger Witches About Moon Cycle Magic

Let’s be real: Most of us were raised with shame, silence, or outright disgust around our bleeding. We learned to hide it. To hate it. To treat it like a medical inconvenience instead of a sacred rhythm.

If we want to raise a generation of witches, mystics, and spiritually empowered folks who honor their bodies, we need to change the narrative.

Here’s how:

Make cycle tracking a ritual, not a punishment
Tell stories of power, not pathology
Let them ask anything! No shame, no judgment
Use inclusive language so that all moon-bleeders: trans, nonbinary, cis, intersex feel seen and sovereign in their bodies and in practice.

Blood Is Not Shameful, It’s Sacred

We bleed because that’s how the body cleanses, resets, and prepares. The uterus is one of the only organs that creates and sheds its own lining (monthly).

Our hormones don’t just shift moods; they alter perception, intuition, and even our brain chemistry. Bleeding isn’t weakness; it is a cycle of regeneration. Of power. Memory passed through the body and deserves reverence, not shame.

To bleed is to know in your bones, in your belly, in your lineage that you are powerful and there is nothing to be ashamed of.

Don’t rush to clean it up. Don’t apologize for it.

Light a candle. Anoint yourself.

You are not cursed.

You are a spell.

Want the full ritual guide?

I’ve written a Patreon-exclusive companion to this post, with practical rituals for both Red Moon and White Moon cycles. Blood magic, ancestral offerings, womb spells, sex magic, and more.

Join me inside the inner circle:

www.patreon.com/thehoodwitch