PMDD Symptom Play by Play Number 2

The following guest post was written by the blogger Cheekyminx. With her permission, several of her posts about PMDD are being featured on this blog. To find out more about her work as a PMDD Advocate, please visit her Facebook page, PMDD Life Support.

I did promise to write another PMDD symptom play by play, and since my symptoms just kicked in today, I thought now would be as good a time as any to bare my "hormotional" soul. This isn't easy. In fact, it sucks. It's dreadfully intimate, questionably revealing, and even harder to admit. But I am committing. So here we go...

8 Days Out

So what changed in me that I knew that symptoms had kicked in anyway? Well, I felt constipated and bloated today (first time since last cycle), I started pulling my hair out (not intentionally...my fingers just go to my hair and when I pull them away, my hair follows!), and most importantly, I feel just plain flippin' irritated for no extraordinary reason about EVERYTHING. I feel somewhat hair-triggerable, if you will. So I'm starting to avoid the things that trigger me (being everything, meaning isolated myself). I have to add that this month has been an incredibly stressful one already with plenty of relationship tensions. I was already irritable, but it felt different than it does today. I wish I could explain it. There is an accompanying intolerance now that wasn't there before...an inability to censor. My diplomacy skills are fading. Many say that PMDD magnifies what is already there. If that's true, this month ought to be a "real blast".

7 Days Out

I just flipped out over my husband saying, "don't worry", when I couldn't find how to reverse an action he told me to take in some software, messing up my work view. I did warn him my symptoms were coming on.

So are men really that stupid? Don't ever effing tell me how to feel! And certainly DO NOT belittle my frustrations with your petty sentiments of projection. YOU "don't worry"! I'm frustrated. Deal with it! Ouch! Okay, last two nights...a touch of insomnia. Today, RAGE! I think I could pick up this 20-ton glass desk and hurl it out the window like it was made of cardboard! There is a jittery tension just underneath my skin accompanied by an overwhelming desire to be alone in the house...for the rest of my life. I have ghost cramps too. That's what I call cramps that arrive before my period.

6 Days Out

6 days? I don't know if I can last another six days. Today was rough. I cried this morning. I cried this afternoon. I cried tonight. I'm feeling incredibly insecure, let down by and estranged from everyone in my life, anxious, grumpy, and deeply sad. I have wished that I would simply die. Since that's unlikely, I just vegetate with Netflix until bedtime with grateful anticipation of the total unconsciousness it brings...and hope I never wake up.

5 Days Out

Didn't sleep well last night, ironically. In fact, I was ruminating in a way that only comes on with PMDD...a hateful, angry way. I swear, I don't know where this shit comes from. I seem to manufacture it in spite of my desire for peace. Each time I woke in the night, I pounded my pillow and cursed bitterly. This morning, I did my best to isolate myself. I tried to be on my best behavior too, bearing in mind today's best bore more resemblance to a caged animal than to a somewhat decent human. Despite my PMDD Tourette's, a lovely symptom where pure shit just gushes from my lips, I managed to hold-back on some of my impulses to push and stomp. With every bite of my tongue, a part of me celebrated the tiny victory (quite alone...as it was evident to no one but me) while in the next moment I was unbridled...judging, criticizing, blaming, fed up with the same old crap...emotionally abusing my husband while at the same time hearing in some vague and distant background all the kinder things I wish I was saying instead. They were too remote for access. They were a distant land. I wanted to run to my room, to be safe, to protect not only myself but him--the only measure I have at my disposal...isolation. It was too late. His deepest wounds were activated, his own mind becoming the same enemy mine had become to me. It would seem PMDD can be contagious, even without the hormones. My husband reacted and in turn became the emotional abuser, taunting me, drilling me, pressing me, driving me to tears with his own screams of how crazy I am, how uncaring, how hopeless, telling me nothing my PMDD mind hasn't already been telling me, but reinforcing it in a way that broke and battered my already damaged spirit. He threatened me...with quitting, with walking out. He's promised that so many times, and today, I wish he'd follow through. That same distant part of me was proud of him for speaking up for himself in the only way he knew how...not for how he did it, though. How he did it hurt. I must admit today, I had suicidal thoughts. I had world-destroying thoughts. And I cried and heaved, shook and crouched in a corner, desperate to be free of this storm inside of me and the external manifestations of it. Emotionally spent, I listened to a looping recording of a mantra about 20 times which calmed my suspiciously empty mind. I can't believe I'm writing this.

4 Days Out

After yesterday, I'm really emotionally exhausted and kind of blank. I've lost a day. I thought it was Thursday but it's only Wednesday. That's been happening a lot, but I don't relate it to PMDD. It's living in the middle of nowhere! There's nothing I want to do...or feel or think. Despite needing some groceries, I can't make myself go. I feel like the remnants of a bird that has burned in flames but has yet to arise once more from the ashes. I continue my deluge of mantra listening. And I eat chocolate. I know my situation is complex. I have many marks against me right now. To be honest, I probably have some form of PTSD after two years of the worst stress of my life which I admit at least half of it I took on willingly, arrogantly even, in addition to being peri-menopausal and PMDD. I also have no grounding, having moved to a foreign country where I cannot speak the language and where my support network is still fairly non-existent. I had a massage therapist when I could afford her, and now, I have a talk therapist who I will have my first session with tomorrow (Thursday. Not today, Wednesday.) It's a trade-off. There's the recent passing of my mother, too. It's a lot to cope with. Add "relationshit" to the mix, and it's tough to tease apart the symptoms of PMDD from the disaster that is my life. So everything just swirls together into a big complicated mess. Charting saves the day and preserves what little sanity I have left by revealing an intensity of symptoms at certain times of the month. I will persevere. I am resilient. I am determined, too. And in moments, I am remembering who I am.

3 Days Out

This morning, every bone hurts. It was very difficult to get myself up and moving. I would love a massage, but I don't have the funds for one. Yin yoga will have to suffice. My symptoms were less today, which historically, has happened...things can actually mellow before the actual onset of my period. Although, usually without fail, I blow out the day before. We'll soon know...

2 Days Out

Last night, I slept 12 hours!! Pretty typical right before. My dreams were very bizarre. My hair continues to fall, and I had ghost cramps again. Another thing that's started today is a weird head-to-toe itchiness; I've heard other women complain of this too, so I'm no longer surprised. When provoked earlier, I quite easily lost my cool outwardly, but overall, in my head, I feel more stable today, so I'd have to relate any emotional symptoms to other things in my life and not necessarily PMDD. Or maybe I'll start early. The cramps are a good indication I might.

1 Day Out

Surprise! Guess what's here, sparing me an extra day of misery and uncertainty? How am I feeling? The first thing I noticed was the intense ache from head to toe as I pulled myself out of bed at a fairly human time of day. I feel about 20 years older in body. Add a headache and the typical cramping in my lower gut, too. But I can handle the physical symptoms; they are kind of a joy after the week I've had. Emotionally, I feel tentative (as the rest of my life is still incredibly challenging). But I don't feel that uncontrollable sense of building blood-level tension that prompts me to catastrophize and explode (not that I couldn't given the right stimulus...but that I don't feel that "hair-trigger" thing). My mind is also quieter. When I woke this morning, from a dream about pastries and cookies, my first thought wasn't "Oh, fuck, I'm still here; shit, shit, shit!", it was more like, "I'm up." There was no punching of pillows or immediate tears. How do I explain it? It's like an equilibrium, a balancing out. A relief! So can I count on a few days of relief? Or will something fluctuate and turn me mental again? Sometimes, on day 5 or 6, I rebound into "crazy-land" for a day. Sometimes, I'm okay until I ovulate. It's difficult not knowing. It's difficult not knowing, too, whether outside circumstances will inflict traumas that bring the stormy inner waters back to the surface. I hope not. I need some peace. I need some rest. My problems are all still there. My relationship is still falling apart. I still live in the middle of nowhere in a foreign country. I'm still dealing with loss and grief and change of massive proportions and living an unrecognizable life. Somehow, somehow, there's something accessible now that feels like strength, like resilience, like patience, and even serenity. Holy crap! Did I just feel myself smile?

PMDD Awareness Month Ends, But the Struggle Continues

Today wraps up the end of PMDD Awareness Month.  I've spent the month sharing on Facebook and Twitter several posts from my Voices of PMDD series, where women with PMDD and their partners have shared their stories.  The quotes that follow come from Hormone Hell, the personal journey blog of a fellow PMDD Advocate, Jarrah, who asked her readers to describe what PMDD feels like to them.  I've chosen several responses that I fear we can all relate to in some way.  Please read on, and, if nothing else, know that you are far from alone in your struggles with the demon that is PMDD.  Perhaps one or more of these descriptions will help you to put into words for a loved one what it's like for you, each and every month, and raise awareness in your own way.

On my bad days it feels like my nerves are on the outside, that everything hurts, and there’s a heavy blanket on me that I can’t get out from.

It feels like nails in my brain that prevent me from thinking correctly. The nails stay in my skull for about 2 weeks and then they finally go away and I can think again.

Your brain feels like mush, your memory is poor. You're actually scared that one day you’re going to wake up and forget who you are. Your digestive system is going crazy, you’re constipated one minute, rushing to the toilet the next. Your bladder needs to empty itself 6 times in a single hour. You're hot, no you’re cold, umm, you’re hot again. You love your husband one minute and consider filing for divorce the next. If one more person chews, breathes or coughs, there will be bloodshed.

I’m angry, I’m sad, I’m laughing…now I’m crying. My joints ache. I am only 29 but I feel 99. My hair is thinning; it’s so dry it feels like straw. I have permanent dark circles under my eyes. My skin is so dry it’s flaking.

You’re so tired but no matter how much sleep you get, you still wake feeling tired. You’re hungry one minute, you’re nauseous the next. You can’t breathe; your heart races and you can’t stop sweating. You don’t want to be touched, you feel suffocated if someone sits close to you.

Overthinking is an everyday occurrence and often your head is swimming with thoughts that leave you feeling terribly anxious. You no longer look forward to anything, as each day is just a matter of survival. You have no passion and no longer think about the future. You hate this empty person you have become.

You start daydreaming about dying. Deep down, you know there’s a part of you that definitely does not want to die. You know that, logically, things are fine and you will be okay. But you can’t FEEL that. All you feel is despair, hopelessness, and a suddenly strong urge to leave this world.

Worthless. Empty. Angry. Bloated. Exhausted. Sometimes I just wish I could disappear…just lay down in the grass and get absorbed in to the earth somehow. Oh yeah, and Crazy. I know what I feel isn’t normal, but I can’t change it…at least until my period comes and then I’m right as rain.

Anticipation for hell week becomes a hell week in itself. I can’t control the choking wave of anxiety or the rage of this demon but I have changed my outlook. It will not own me.  I will not let it drown me.  I will swim and swim until I come up for air. Until the next storm. There have been a few hell weeks where no matter how hard I swam I could not escape the urge to let it pull me under and take me in its entirety. Those days and those times I don’t know how anyone makes it out alive.  

Rage, anxiety, mind going crazy, all of those things attacking you all at once. You wish it was over and the sad thing is you have no control over it. You see yourself doing all these dumb things and you try and stop it but it’s so hard to control. But you keep fighting because you love your family and you love yourself too much to give up!

Like a tightness of the skull above the eyes, like my skin and hearing is super sensitive, so I have a headache and am easily overwhelmed. This coupled with lowered patience and attention span means I’m really short-tempered. Sometimes that results in a snappy comment and then unreasonable crying (e.g. about burnt pine nuts), but other times it’s disproportionate rage. Sometimes it’s just a brain fog, where I sit and stare at the work computer, trying to figure what I’m supposed to be doing, and how someone is paying me to sit and feel like my powers of logic and reason have been pulled out through my eye sockets.

It’s like a switch that is flicked inside me as soon as ovulation begins. From that point on I become the opposite of what I consider to be my “normal” self. I’m suddenly extremely anxious, paranoid, worried, irritable and I can snap at the smallest things. The rages are life-destroying. They hurt everyone I care for, and scare off anyone else. My period finally begins and within a day or two, my mood lifts. The anxiety goes away, the paranoia is no longer there. I can think rationally and logically. I have energy to do anything I want, and sadly most of that time is spent picking up the pieces of the storm that lives inside of me, and has--for now--disappeared.  

At the start depression starts to set in, aching body, foggy head, headaches, high anxiety, pains in the stomach, sweating, panic attacks when I go in public, hysterical crying, at my worst, thoughts of suicide. Then my period arrives...all those feelings and thoughts are gone just like that…I’m back, me again, I’m back to normal. I can go to work with ease (if I still have a job). I can go out anywhere with no panic attacks, anxiety (what anxiety?) I am fun, I enjoy being around people and they enjoy being around me. I wish I could be this person all the time, I hate knowing it is short lived and the devil lady will be back again soon.

Sensitivity to light and sound…my son talks and talks and I just want to curl in a ball to escape. That’s horrible to say…but I just can’t handle it.

I always wonder if this mental illness will kill me one day—I’m sure it will. The brightest days are good. I enjoy them. The darkest days however, seem like I won’t ever escape them. Each time it feels like maybe this could be it, the one that I don’t come back from. But somehow I make it through. PMDD is cruel. It’s like every month, sanity is dangled in front of me and I have to hold onto it. There’s a glimmer of hope that this month I’ll be cured, then suddenly it’s ripped away.

I was sitting in my seat watching a movie, my whole body was tense, I was clenching my teeth, my heart was racing, and I was swallowing back the nausea I felt…I tried to push all those feelings out of my head so I could try to enjoy the movie. As I sat there I couldn’t help but think…So this is what my life has come to? It’s a movie for goodness' sake and my body is acting like I need to be on alert just in case at any second someone might try and kill me.

I ended up going for a walk to try to clear my head. My legs would only carry me half way around the block, my whole body was so fatigued and I was so nauseous the symptoms reminded me of how I felt when I was in the first trimester of pregnancy.

PMDD….a war you’re constantly fighting that no one else can see.

The Monster I Am Living With: PMDD

Crushing weight sinks deep into my fragile chest. Insomnia, I'm already weary but have no hope of finding rest.

Switch in my brain has flipped, can't hold back as the monster inside bursts free. Losing all control, wreaking devastation wherever I go, it's then that I know, that as sure as gravity on earth I am back in its throes.

Depressive Tsunami overtakes me, washing clean away all of my self worth. Tormented woman desperate to stop it... Defeated despite the hard fight put forth. It's like a psychotic carnival ride, can't stop going around and around in my broken mind.

Anxiety and fear no one can understand brings salted tears ʼtil I am virtually blind. How can this damn life be so unkind??

Misery is embodied in me, taking away my hope for good life, hatred for the man who loves me most taking away my hope to be a good wife.

Migraines. Body aches. Sensitivity. Short fuses. Darkness. Hysteria. Forever on edge, pushing me to LOSE it.

I mean really how many times can my kids hear mommy's having a bad day, before they too feel abandoned and pushed away?

We stand on opposite sides of the same door secretly pleading: I've done nothing wrong why do I still have to pay?

Heartbreaking.

I hide out in my restroom cuz it's the only place I can truly be alone, keeping everyone safe from me, staring into a mirror and seeing nothing but the monster I am living with: PMDD.
~Carrian Troxler