Ahhh, it’s that time for me again. What’s better than mood swings, acne, emotional outbursts, and being pissed off all the time? All of those being caused by your hormones.
Honestly, every time I’m PMSing I regress to the 7th-grade version of me: vengeful, dramatic, emotional, acne-prone, and a fun splash of insecure. At least my braces don’t come back.
And all women with uteruses go through essentially the same thing. Until menopause. My mother still has tantrums and stuffs her face with junk food at age 50 just as I do at 19.
Here’s a list of 3 things we all seem to do when PMSing/on our periods and how we can break that terrible hormonal cycle:
1. Lose rationality.
Poof, it’s gone. The irrationality fairy can boop us on the head and we can start to go off the rails a bit. I hate admitting it, but I really do forget about reality for a bit when I’m super hormonal. It’s like our body soaks up strong brain power to prepare to make us bleed for a week. And it blows. Thanks, body. We often start fights for no reason, take things way more personally than usual, and feel super alone. Someone could literally confess their love for me while I’m PMSing and I’d be like are they making fun of me? They don’t mean it. Why do they love me? Love is fleeting and an illusion. It doesn’t take much to send me into a full-blown existential crisis when I’m super hormonal.
Solution? Recognize that you’re being irrational in the moment, be thoughtful in the moment & consider “who is this person to me?”, “why am I feeling this way and/or acting this way?”, “will this feel the same tomorrow?”
I don’t like to swallow my pride when I’m PMSing, so it can be hard for me to admit that I’m being too harsh or sensitive, but I think it’s really important to try to recognize it. Even if you need to walk away and take a breather first, you don’t want to derail a relationship over something you wouldn’t normally. Working on acknowledging the other person’s side and the headspace you are in can go a long way.
2. Cry. A lot.
When I’m PMSing, I cry almost once a day: happy or sad. It could be triggered by a sweet dog commercial or what I perceive to be my life ending.
Solution? Let it out, sis.
That’s right. There’s a whole lot of benefits to crying: it has a soothing effect, helps relieve pain, enhances our mood, and relieves stress, to name a few. There’s nothing wrong with doing it. Don’t you almost always feel so much better when you do? It’s such a strong physical release. Play that sad song and let yourself have a moment (or an hour). Usually, when I cry from hormones it keeps me from lashing out or projecting my hormonal issues onto others and have a more rational conversation about what I’m feeling.
3. Halt our entire routine.
School, work, homework, maybe exercise, chill time, sleep. Repeat. We all have a general routine we like to do (and also kind of make ourselves do) every day. But, I’ve noticed in myself and the ladies I love that we often say screw it when we are PMSing and on our periods. We often don’t feel emotionally up for it, don’t want to be in any performative roles, and feel physically fatigued. It feels so much easier to just lay in sweats and watch another episode of a show with a snack by our sides. But, it’s probably not the best idea. Halting our routing for our periods/pre-periods kind of allows menstruation to dictate our lives.
Solution? Try to keep doing what you normally do, even if it’s harder than usual.
It may suck to get up at 8 A.M. after an uncomfortable, cramp-filled sleep, but you should still. It may suck to go to that bar class you always go to & usually love, but you should still.
There’s actually evidence to suggest PMS can be a self-fulfilling prophecy: the more we think we are experiencing debilitating symptoms, the more we actually will. For most women, PMS can be a period (no pun intended) of just mild symptoms. Until we think it’s going to be much worse.
Find ways to motivate yourself. You are stronger than these couple of days or weeks.
It’s super rough going through hormonal cycles and then having to bleed for a week. If you’re a lady that menstruates, give yourself a pat on the back. It’s not easy, even though many of us can make it look like no big deal.
If, like me, you go through these irritating changes when you PMS/bleed, try to rethink how you spend those days/weeks like I’m trying to. Ultimately, we have the control, not our annoying hormones.
Also, periods are terrible, but it’s pretty sick that in theory, we can grow human life inside of us because of them, right? PMS sucks. Periods suck. But, we’re all warriors who literally hold the fate of humankind in our hands. Or uteruses. Pretty awesome.