Let’s bring some PMDD awareness ~ My story
We’ve all heard of the overly famous PMS; the main excuse man will shove on us anytime we ovreact. but did you heard of PMDD? Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder is so much more than PMS, and something a few of us aren’t even aware we’re experiencing! Further more than just something caused by womanhood, it’s classified as an actual mood disorder cause by hormones imbalances in our brain.
* Ofcourse i’m not a doctor. Please do your own research and consult a profesional. I’d also highly recommend you read “My venus flytrap won’t open” by Danielle Dumais for more on the subject, and many more infliction inside us and unbelieved by some doctors.
Let’s begin with the start; I’ve started my mental health journey shortly after I graduated college and started my very first job, at the young age of 19. I won’t know for sure if what I experiences there kickstarted this whole thing or if I would’ve gone that way regardless.. I highly think so, because even though my instinct told me I was doing a panic attack while at that job, I later realised that I had been growing up with it. It had just never been so constant where I needed help.
You can find the in-depts on my blog, i’ve been very open and talked about my issues alot. While some people has way more problems to figure out a medication that worked for them, I’ve been lucky to have fallen on mine rather quickly. It was the second antidepressant that I had tried, which seemed to be a fit.. but another issue rose up. Mother would always come with me to talk to our family doctor and she brought up that my time of crisis always seemed worst whenever i’d go on my periods at the end of the months. I’d become an absolute fury, increased anxiety and depression, uncontrolleable anger, irritability..
Thankfully for me, my doctor listened to what my mother said and answered that it was a rather common thing among women. He then changed my birthcontrol that I had been on since I was 16 for bad period cramps. He also prescribed that I take it continuously; meaning i’d skip the last sugar pills and start the other pack right away. He didn’t explained what it was, and as so many woman on birthcontrol experiences usually negative effects, people wouldn’t understand.. In order to feel good in my brain, I need both my antidepressant AND birthcontrol. Nowhere in my mind would I want to ever come off one or the other; i’m in pure bliss to be completely free of this monthly bleeding!
Now it’s a rather common myth that not bleeding is harmful for your body; and as I don’t ever plan to be pregnant or have children, this is a nice bonus for me. It’s only upon reading the book My flytrap won’t open, do I realized that i’m undiagnosed PMDD; everything made sense. We’re all different, so there’s no one solution fits all, but this is one that had been working for me for over a decade now. Note that it doesn’t totally erradicate the symptoms, I still get increased irritability, bouts of anxiety/depressions, migraines.. but I do live much better.
The term wasn’t totally unknown to me prior to reading this book, I had stumbled on tiktok videos claiming it wasn’t normal to have increased suicidal thoughts near your periods. In order to be diagnosed with the disorder, you need atleast 5 or more symptoms. It is also said that it must not be related to another illness.. although if you have several other mental health problems, I don’t understand how it doesn’t piggy back off each other; the same way it did for me, as they’re all living in our heads after all.
Did you knew about PMDD?