What It’s Like…Premenstrual dysphoric disorder

TW: Painful Periods, Depression, Suicide, Eating Disorders and Anxiety

After a long and hard two weeks, I finally got my period. I’m at work waiting for my post-doc to arrive so we can go over protocols for experiments the rest of the week, while also planning for next week. I was able to push past the cramps without taking my 400mg Advil because I really hate taking pills, and actually eat something so that I can get through the rest of my day. I’ve been trying to study all day and it’s going about average. I’m extremely tired and feel extremely weak, but knowing that i’m on my period, feeling myself bleed has been the best feeling I’ve had in the past two weeks.

Now, i’m going to sound like a grandmother and a doctor at once, but grandmothers and doctors are correct, don’t self-diagnose yourself on the internet. Not everything you see online, even if certain symptoms match up perfectly, is true. But this time, I think I might ignore the grandmothers and doctors and my own inner doctor as well, because the internet is right and it’s given me the best explanation for something that has been impacting and frankly, ruining my life since January of this year.

It’s not completely known yet, but hopefully once i’m able to book a doctors appointment and get additional bloodwork done, it will be confirmed that I have severe form of PMS: Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD).

If i’ve ever been snarky or extra irritated or sensitive, sometimes it’s because something actually happened that day to give me a reason to feel that way. Might be a test I’d failed, an argument with my parents or boyfriend, or my continuous realization that the world sucks and that you should never have hero’s or icons or stans because they are all just disappointments and flawed (some more than others) in the end. Other times, I’ll wake up in the morning, brush my teeth, go change into workout clothes and do whatever workout is in my calendar for the day, and before I’m able to walk out the door, i’m lying on the ground crying. I’m crying, sometimes very loudly, sometimes silently but I can hear the screams in my head of what my vocal chords won’t allow me to express in that time because it is 6am and I don’t want to get kicked out, and because I don’t even have the energy to do so. The tears never flood enough when I have these moments but mind does. Death, murder of self, suicide, self-harm rolls through my head with all the ways I could do it and let it happen and how it would probably be days until someone noticed I was gone. But this is a different type of suicidal feeling or ideation I’ve ever delt with. Because it’s simply a dream. It’s not actually something I want to do or have planned out in a diary or a notes app. When I’ve struggled with suicide, there was an intent behind it. This, there’s no intent. There’s nothing. It’s literally nothing. I have no reason for why I couldn’t walk out the door to go boulder, or weightlifting, do jiu jitsu and Muay Thai. There wasn’t a reason. But here I was, lying on the floor of my studio apartment unable to do any of these things for a reason that does not exist.

Then, that feeling ceases. I’m up from the ground as if a light bulb had flicked in my head and I’m back to normal. I go to the gym, get a good workout in and come home. I’ll turn on the light and see the reflection of my body in the mirror and the clarity my workout gave is gone once more. I’m now stuck staring at my body in the mirror, squishing all of the fat on my triceps and biceps, realizing the extra fat from my armpit around my sports bra, the love handles that seem noticeably bigger, a face that seems more round and puffy now than last week. Everything is wrong, everything is bigger and I feel out of body and not myself. I’ve struggled with body dysmorphia for a long time and i’m currently in ED recovery after many years of eating only 1-2 meals and binge eating, so I just take what’s happening to me in the mirror as me having a bad body dysmorphia day. But in reality, it’s not. It’s something more. More than what I’d normally feel. Because I look at a picture of my body from a week or two weeks ago and the change seemed extremely drastic and to be frank it kinda is. I’m extremely bloated, somewhat constipated, sick, and can physically see and numerically because I made the stupid idea to buy a scale, that I’d gain weight. Yet, I’m working out, i’m eating semi-healthy and working in a lab is actually a lot of moving around and active work that requires many more muscles and a unique way of manipulating muscles than I realize. So the weight gain doesn’t really make sense. I continue to stare in the mirror and feel the panic set in more about what’s going to happen when I go back home or how am I perceived to people that know me. Eventually, I stabilize myself to take off the rest of my clothes, still desperately hating and desiring to cut off every single problem part of my body with a scissor, and I enter the shower to try to wash away the thoughts. But they never really go away. When I leave home for work, everything that is reflective, I notice a new flaw or the same flaw amplified. When I sit next to my lab mates or go to the gym, I feel extra conscious about my body and my weight more than I normally do.

Then, it gets even more intense. The depression, the anxiety, the paranoia, the random migraines and headaches that no matter much water or food I eat won’t go away and take me away from all my other responsibilities; sleep changes, fatigue, severe and violent intrusive thoughts that I’m fortune no one has seen me panic or on the tears over because they’re nightmares that pop up at random times during the day. All of it, it continues to rush in and break down every dam, every wall, every sense of protection I’ve been able to create for myself and I find myself shrinking. The real me. The me I knew a week ago would be tucked away in a little corner and this new me or the feelings brought to this new version of me became my angel and devil on my shoulder. Except there was no angel. Every time I looked at my shoulder, a knife struck my eye that on it’s tip, forced me to see everything I hated about me.

Eventually, after crying bouts and panic texts to friends and boyfriend, they ask me the simple question: “hey, is your period coming up?”.

Now, I know many people get annoyed when expressing a valid emotion is seen as “she’s just pms-ing, her hormones are just acting up.” Yeah, it’s annoying, but sometimes, it’s true. I am just pms-ing and the emotions and what I’m going through are all the symptoms I experience when I PMS. But there is just one problem.

I’m PMS-ing for nearly two weeks before the start of my period. So for two weeks, I’m in this constantly depressive, suicidal, dysmorphic cycle where I’m unable to control myself, my emotions and I’m not even able to know who I am. I don’t know about you, but I hate my period. Like, I don’t think anyone who experiences periods like them, in fact i’m 100% sure no one enjoys getting their period. It sucks. You get super bloated, bad migraines, you sleep too much or too little, your lower back hurts like no tomorrow, your cramps make you feel like getting a scissor and literally cutting out your entire reproductive system so you can breathe and get relief again. And don’t get me started on using the bathroom using your period. Like, it sucks. It’s horrible. But getting my period since January has almost been a relief for me. This hyper PMS has made me feel so lost and scared that the moment I use the bathroom and see that drop off blood I start crying with joy. Because then I know that what I’ve been experiencing is just temporary and after my five day cycle is over, I’ll be back to being me.

But until I see the drop of blood on my underwear lining or when I use the bathroom, I’m in a state of tortue in my own body.

And just a reminder, my period cycles, like many others are not a perfect 28 days. In starting my period today, this past cycle was 32 days. Last month it was 28, the previous month it was 36 and the previous month it was 26. So for cycles like this month, these severe PMS symptoms are starting as early as day 15, essentially one week from when I first began my period. So out of the 28, 32, 36, or 38 days of this cycle, I essentially get at most 10-12 days where I feel normal in my body and connected with my body. And once this time period ends, I enter this PMS phase that lasts until that first drop of blood occurs.

I’ve found the past two weeks to be the worst of this type of PMS I've felt since I first noticed this in January. I started tracking my text messages, my Instagram private stories, even private tik toks to try to create a timeline and it all lines up to a 12-16 day time where i’m experiencing higher levels of depression, anxiety, body dysmorphia and horrid headaches/migraines before I start my period.

Then, last night Maia or mxmtoon, posted a Tik Tok that explained PMDD. I was on the floor again, a heating pad on my body because I was feeling cold and tired and lonely, I listened to her explain what PMDD was. That Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) is a more severe form of premenstrual syndrome (PMS). That instead of getting PMS symptoms 3-5 days before mensutration begins, she had symptoms of depression, anxiety and body dysmorphia for two weeks before she began to mensentrate. She described the moment she got her period, it give her this sense of relief and stability. I kept rewatching that part while the text messages I’d save popped in my mind.

Since January, the moment I finally got my period I immediately stated to cry tears of joy. I texted my boyfriend and friend that I got my period which strong excitement. I texted them this morning with strong excitement with happy tears in my eyes for the the first time because immediately I felt more stable and a large relief.

I’ve been looking more at PMDD and most the symptoms align with what I’ve been experiencing the past 10 months, though I won’t officially know until next month. Regardless, for the first time, I have a better idea of something that has been impacting me and have read up on ways that my life can potentially get better. Like our trusty grandmothers and doctors advise us to do, do not use google and try to always self-diagnose yourself. But with a medical system that cost millions and is still extremely inaccessible for so many people, sometimes google is the best source of information or at least a place to start to try to find answers.

I will post an update once I truly know what’s going on with me, but I wanted to write this and bring attention to this because this wasn’t something I ever knew about or every learned. I knew PMS-ing sucked and could control my life, but this was something more. Sexual Education, Education about menstrual cycles, openly talking about blood and periods is still very much a taboo topic. But it shouldn’t be. Maia being open about her PMDD was the reason why I may have discovered the answer to symptoms that have plagued my life for a long time. The internet, YouTube, Tik Tok, Instagram, Twitter, they definitely have their bad, but they’ve also educated me on so much and have made being a person with a female reproductive system and all the complexities about it more normal.

I’m still suffering through cramps currently, extremely fatigued and tired from the little amount of sleep I was able to get last night because of the hormonal changes I’m experiencing, and I know that tomorrow and Saturday are going to be really hard days for me. Sunday, will be a quiet day. Monday will be migrane day. Then, I will finally be in the clear for the next 10-12 days before this all starts again. But when it all starts again, I’ll have a better idea as to why, and hopefully more resources to help me get through it.

Mensuration is a part of my life, PMS-ing is a part of my life, but it should not be my life. It should not control me. I may not like bleeding for five days, but I should at least be able to do so and still live a mentally stable life. It’s the least I deserve.

Information about PMDD

-https://www.womenshealth.gov/menstrual-cycle/premenstrual-syndrome/premenstrual-dysphoric-disorder-pmdd

-https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/premenstrual-syndrome/expert-answers/pmdd/faq-20058315

-https://iapmd.org

-https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/types-of-mental-health-problems/premenstrual-dysphoric-disorder-pmdd/about-pmdd/

Organizations that focus on Period Advocacy, Period Poverty, Etc

-https://www.helpingwomenperiod.org

-https://thepadproject.org/how-we-help/

-https://isupportthegirls.org

-https://www.simplythebasics.org