Please do NOT think that I am encouraging a hysterectomy to cure your PMDD. I would recommend trying a million things for a long time before even considering this option.

Again, I am just posting this info because I was looking for info, and I thought others may be too.

About.com

Question: If I Have a Hysterectomy, Will I Go Through Menopause?

Answer: If you need a hysterectomy prior to menopause to treat a women’s health issue such as endometriosis or cancer, you’re likely to experience an immediate onset symptoms of menopause only if both the uterus and the ovaries are removed during surgery. This type of menopause is called surgical or induced menopause.

If you are able to keep your ovaries during your hysterectomy, you won’t experience menopause because your ovaries will still produce hormones. While you won’t have periods anymore, you may still experience PMS or PMDD because the hormones made by your ovaries will cause your body to still “cycle” monthly. Occasionally women whose ovaries were not removed during a hysterectomy experience hot flashes due to disturbance of the blood supply to the ovaries during surgery. When you get closer to the natural time you would enter menopause, you may begin menopause a few years earlier than you would have otherwise.

I came across this extended list of symptoms of PMDD. This is the best list I have ever found, it lists just about everything. For those of you that live with someone that has PMDD it gives you an idea of how debilitating this is and for those of you that have PMDD, you see you aren’t alone.

The list came from St. John’s Mercy .

Of course, the same rules apply, these symptoms must occur only during the 1-2 wks before your period and stop once you start, or at least a day after. If this isn’t the case you may be dealing with something else in addition to PMDD or instead of PMDD.

The following are the most common symptoms of premenstrual dysphoric disorder. However, each individual may experience symptoms differently. Symptoms may include:

psychological symptoms irritability nervousness lack of control agitation anger insomnia difficulty in concentrating lethargy depression severe fatigue anxiety confusion forgetfulness decreased self-image paranoia emotional hypersensitivity crying spells moodiness sleep disturbances fluid retention edema (swelling of the ankles, hands, and feet) periodic weight gain oliguria (diminished urine formation) breast fullness and pain respiratory problems allergies infections eye complaints visual disturbances conjunctivitis

gastrointestinal symptoms abdominal cramps bloating constipation nausea vomiting pelvic heaviness or pressure backache skin problems acne neurodermatitis (skin inflammation with itching) aggravation of other skin disorders, including cold sores neurologic and vascular symptoms headache vertigo syncope (fainting) numbness, prickling, tingling, or heightened sensitivity of arms and/or legs easy bruising heart palpitations muscle spasms other decreased coordination painful menstruation diminished libido (sex drive) appetite changes food cravings

hot flashes

You would think that since (1) Only Women suffer from PMDD (2) It?? goes along with a Womans period (3) It’s compared to PMS over-charged, that you would visit your Gynecologist.

WRONG! For some Women their Gynecologist do help, and help without making them feel ridiculous. For other’s they help by prescribing medication, but don’t offer much info. For other’s they just aren’t comfortable dealing with PMDD, writing medications for it, or believe that Women should see a Psychologist or Psychiatrist rather than them.

The doctor that helped me the most was actually a Family Doctor. She wrote a book on Menopause and offered great info regarding Women and their bodies. Because she was a family doctor she also did Female yearly checks, but she wasn’t a ‘Gynecologist’. Now, even though she was my favorite she was still only comfortable prescribing my Prozac.

She worked closely with a Psychiatrist when it came to my Topamax. She wanted to make sure that there wasn’t anything else going on that was causing my PMDD to get worse, other than it’s not out of the norm for it to worsen with age. I also had quite a bit of stress at the time.

I appreciated the concern, I wouldn’t want her to just throw some scripts at me, but on the other hand I was still frustrated because I did know about PMDD from all of my research.

During one of my searches for a new doctor, before I found the one I liked, I found a general doctor who didn’t have any problems prescribing TONS of meds to me, all at once. I didn’t even fill them, I just left.
Fortunately, I knew better.?? I was so sad though thinking of what it would have been like if someone else would have gone in not knowing as much as I did.

I actually left with a script for my Prozac, a sleeping pill (I had never taken any), a pain killer (for my migraines) and another med for bi-polar (all this after one visit)

So little research is done on PMDD, Doctors don’t even know who should be helping or where to send us.

All I can tell you is that I have been there and I feel your pain. I am emailed alot by Women who are asking, “What kind of Doctor do I see for my PMDD?” All I tell people is that there really isn’t any ‘one’ for-sure doctor type to help with your PMDD. It’s actually about finding a doctor, regardless of what kind, that will listen to you, work with you, and want to learn more about PMDD.

Just as one medication doesn’t work for everyone, one type of doctor won’t either.

I moved back to TX and my prescriptions are almost out so I will be searching again for another doctor. Here is what I do. I call and ask if the nurse is available. Of course ,they almost always have to call back which is fine. When they call back I ask them how often the doctor deals with PMDD. A lot of times they will say, we deal with all female issues…that isn’t good enough for me. I want to know in advance if there is going to be a problem with me getting refills on my Prozac (usually not), however, the Topamax (not all doctors will prescribe).

I don’t feel bad calling and getting all of this info in advance. I have been to too many doctors, paid too many copays, spent too many hours at offices, etc…and not received the sort of help I deserved. Now, I find out in advance. If doctors aren’t going to find out more about PMDD then I want to know, in advance, who has taken the time to do what it takes to help patients like me. I don’t want to find a sitter, pay a copay, etc….to be told any B.S.

I feel like I have gone on a tangent a bit here. I hope that this posting does help you know that you do have the right to call a doctors office in advance to find out what they know. PMDD is a subject that hardly anyone speaks about and very little research is done.

It is debilitating to a Woman’s life and that in itself deserves research, by ALL doctors.

Normally I know that I am a good mother and wife. I know that my number one goal in life is to be a good mom, so I feel as though I am in tune with that, and do it well.

WELLLLLLLLLLLLL… PMDD hits and you feel as though you are terrible all the way around. You feel as though you haven’t been good to your kids, you can’t be good to them and that you basically just have failed at everything thus far in life.

Seratonin drops so low that life just really seems like too difficult.
I haven’t hit so low that suicide has crossed my mind, however, sadly enough, it has to a lot of women that live with PMDD. Some have even succeeded.

In my mind I can tell myself that I am a good person, good mom, but then that ‘voice’ in the back of my head still lets the other thoughts cross through. I don’t mean voices as in schizophrenia.

Once my cycle starts, I can believe that I am a good person.

Of course, all of these monthly roller coaster feelings/thoughts/emotions become so exhausting. Month in and month out, you know it’s going to happen and really there isn’t anything you can do about it. You can work on yourself to learn more and do more to ‘help’ but it’s not a sickness you can pop a pill for and it’s gone.

This leads me to exhaustion. Feeling like crap for 2 weeks out of every month would make even the most exercised, vitamin taking, fun loving, non-sleep deprived individual feel exhausted.

Even worse, after feeling so cruddy for 2 wks, you usually feel guilty for the other time left in the month because you have either treated someone poorly, been too tired to do anything fun with your family, or you have cried off and on so much you have people worried about you.

It’s is one of those catch 22 situations. I hope that some of the things I list shortly will help you cope with some of the ‘tough’ times and allow you to enjoy your 2 wks ‘free’ with a little less stress.

You are NOT alone! There are so many of us out here that go through the same thing you go through. If not you, then maybe someone you know.

Life w/ PMDD

Reading the medical section can sometimes get boring, however, I can still remember way back when, when I was searching online for what in the world could be going on with me EVERY month. It helped me to know first off that what I was experiencing had a name, it actually existed. I wasn’t crazy and that there were so many other women out there who knew and felt what I was living.

The lists are all the same if you do a general search on PMDD/PMS, they all say about the same thing.

What you CAN’T find online through medical info sites is how PMDD affects your life, your relationships, your children, literally EVERYTHING!

That’s where I hope my story helps you. I hope it helps you personally, or if you know someone living with PMDD, pass this info on to them.

PMDD is painful. It is painful emotionally, but also physically.

~~~~~Emotionally~~~~~

WOW! The lists goes on, but I am going to do my best to list as much as possible.

*Irritable: this irritibility isn’t one that you just get annoyed. It for me actually goes as far as my husband won’t go to Walmart with me during this time. He gets frustrated and embarrassed by how frustrated I become with everyone. He tells me, and I am opt to believing it is probably true, that I give looks to people when they stand in my way, go slow, etc…

I become so annoyed that I literally can feel my heart pounding out of my chest, it sometimes becomes difficult to breathe. I just want to scream, but I know I can’t because I am in public. If I am at home, I usually go into a quiet room and just get away from everyone. I don’t want my kids to see me annoyed and them to feel as though it is because of them. I also take baths when I feel so irritable, this gives me time to SNAP back into a stage where I feel I can control myself.

YES, it really is this difficult living with PMDD. You haven’t lost your mind, join a PMDD support group, you will see you are NOT alone.

*Emotional w/ tears: With PMS you are more emotional during your period. PMDD causes the tear flood gates to open. Unfortunatly, you can’t decide when this is going to happen. YES, it can happen at the worst times possible. I have started crying in the car driving for no reason, at work, at friends homes while we were visiting, and even during intimate times.

*Emotional w/ rage: I felt I needed to put emotional in 2 different categories because the emotional w/ tears and rage are SO different.
During PMDD you feel as though you could rage on a constant basis. Noises sound 1000 times louder and more intense than they do on a normal day-to-day basis. Even children playing and laughing, having a great time, can cause you to become emotional. Noises just seem to intensify immensely during this time.

It is very easy to fly off the handle. The smallest disagreement can turn into the most insane, loud, crazy fight if your spouse doesn’t understand PMDD.

I am very fortunate in that my husband knows I have PMDD. He is very supportive and he can tell when I am in my ‘gonna lose it’ phase. He will usually say something like, why don’t you go take a bath and I will finish XYZ. That’s kind of my sign of, you lost it Stef.

I have heard of some women that throw items, break items and even go as far as putting holes in the wall. I have been blessed that I have only felt like doing that, but haven’t.

I will tell some of my more personal stories in another section. I am trying to stay focused, LOL, which is another difficult task with PMDD.

So… I do want to explain that with PMDD these symptoms occur during the 1-2 week time before you start your period. Sometimes they will continue throughout the first couple of days of your cycle too, but usually once you start, you feel SO much better. I like to say, I feel ‘normal’ again… whatever that actually means.

I will continue tommorrow, I have got to get some sleep and I have ALOT left to list. Sleep as you will learn is one of THE MOST important aspects of learning to live healthy with PMDD.

Life with PMDD

I have learned that the best way to deal is when you feel that feeling coming on, don’t try and fight it, go take a bath, take a walk or just go into a room alone and do some relaxing breathing. Give yourself a little break, you will be glad you did.

This will also help you in the stress area because you won’t have to feel so guilty that you treated others badly, esp your friends and family.

Also, it makes a huge difference if your friends, family, spouse, partner or anyone else in your life that is important will read up on PMDD. This will help them to understand why it seems like you have some sort of split personality at times.

Where do I even start, LOL…

Focusing during PMDD for most is a joke. I have personally ‘rolled’ into a FEW cars when sitting at a stop sign and red light. It’s like, sitting there and you just stop paying attention to what is going on around you, you lose focus and let off the brake.

I have also been walking, holding a full mug of coffee and just threw it across the room. No, not because I was angry, but clutzy (and no I don’t know if clutziness is a word).
My hand just jerked and there it went.

It may sound funny to some, but when you start meeting other women with PMDD, it is SO nice to know you are not the only one having these issues.

Dropping plates while doing dishes isn’t anything out of the norm either.

For some reason focusing is difficult too. It’s because your chemicals in your body get so out of whack. I could bore you with the why’s but the truth of it is, you don’t care about the why if you have PMDD, you want to know the HOW. How to take care of it or at least deal with these symptoms.

During conversations I have to pay more attention to people or I will definitely just zone out. No my eyes don’t just look away and I go out of it, but I will completely just forget what I was talking about or no know anything that we talked about (including you). I try to just do one thing at a time, trying my hardest to listen (and remember).

Normally I am very organized. To stay organized you have to have energy. I find that after my 2 wk time I have to sort through all of my ‘piles’. Piles of papers, toys, clothes, you name it. Get reorganized after the time.

As I am sure you can tell, you are living one HUGE circle. You are tired during this time because of chemical imbalances, and then once you come out of that time, you have so much to add to your normal chores and schedule that you are still overworked, exhausted and half the time just don’t catch up.

I don’t mean to sound so whiny, I am not even in my 2 wk time right now as I write, it just really is how it sounds.

I speak and write very bluntly. This is a very truthful account of how the cycle goes.

I am not a doctor or a nurse nor do I pretend to not it all about natural meds.
I don’t know the exact amounts of diff items, from what I have read, it is really all about starting with a low dose and going from there, deciding what works for your body.

I have used 5HTP, a lot of women that don’t want to take prescription meds, use 5HTP or LTryph in place of the prescriptions, this helps with the anxiety.
It wasn’t enough for me, however, I wasn’t able to keep up with everything else recommended for us (those w/ PMDD), lack of sleep and my depression end has kicked in more so that makes a huge difference.

Vitamin B Complex vitamins, calcium, magnesium (I use the calcium/magnesium vitamin together) because in my support group I found out that they work best together. You can purchase them already together, I got mine at the GNC store.

Research does say that your body can only absorb 500mg of calcium at a time, keep that in mind to help you decide when to take your calcium and your overall vitamin. My mom’s doc told her 600mg, so somewhere in between there.

I have bought mine all at GNC stores, again, I learned that they offer one of the best vitamins when you look at percentages and really get into the numbers, etc…

It will all be about what your body works well with.

NOW…
after talking about all of the natural remedies, if you don’t exercise, eat right and get your 8 hrs of sleep, esp during this time, you will still feel miserable.
You know back in the days when you learned exercise, eat your veggies and get your rest… Still as an adult it is SO important.

Alot more difficult, but SO important!

Having 4 kiddos all under 11, sleep isn’t alwasy the easiest for me, that or lack of stress, LOL

For a lot of women, if you really focus on these things along with your vitamins, you will notice a huge difference. I can personally say that I have read about plenty of women that this works for.

Good Luck and I am TOTALLY rootin’ for ya’!
If you need someone to vent too, I’m here, OR, if you need someone to cheer you on, I’m here too!

Get out there and take a walk or jump on that treadmill!!! RaRaRa

Stef
Life W/ PMDD

Of course as you know by now, I live with PMDD. I am (along w/ a clinical psychiatrist) and my family doctor trying to figure out why depression has become so strong AND now for the past couple of weeks rearing its ugly head all month rather than just during my 2 wk time.

I don’t want my prozac up’ed and I don’t want more meds until someone can tell me what in the world is going on inside me.

So, of course I am doing all of my research on diff ‘diseases’ and medicines, etc… I like going in knowing what I won’t take, why I shouldn’t take, etc…

I look up stomach problems, I looked this up because I have IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome). I have had it for as long as I can remember all the way back at least as far as jr high school.
For anyone who doesn’t know, feel free to look it up, LOL… it’s really not all that exciting. I deal with not going to the bathroom for a couple of weeks and then I have major stomach cramping for an hour or so and then finally begin going to the bathroom. It is actually very painful. It reminds me every time of the beginning stages of going into labor.

IT SUCKS!
Anyway, I had a doctor ask me once about stomach problems when I was discussing PMDD with him, so I looked it up.

Well, if you look it up it lists everything I have. It even occurs worse during menstruation.

It then continues to say that 60% of women that have IBS also have some other sort of psychiatric condition, 20% live w/ severe depression.

SO… what am I supposed to think?? Do I have PMDD and IBS and depression? Do they all go together? Do medical sites just list everything with every condition?

And…now when I go to my doc again tomm, it’s like…Hmmm… okay, well I have all of these symptoms, what do you think?

Good question, we will look into that too.

GEEZ…. I don’t think anyone really knows what any of us have seeing as I also have focusing problems so do I also have ADD or ADHD or is it all from the PMDD?

I AM SO SURE!!!!!!!!!!!!! I just don’t think someone would be ‘born’ with ALL of these.

There has got to be a way to come up with one answer. Sadly enough though other than watching your calendar and keeping notes, talking to your doc is the only way you can get tested for PMDD.

(I bet if a man had PMDD, more tests would already be available!) teehee AND, NO I AM NOT A MAN BASHER!

As if the emotional roller coaster wasn’t enough, you have to live with the physical side of PMDD.

First, I guess the easiest thing is to just start with the head and move down. That is literally how many pains/aches you feel monthly.
Now, this is not to be confused with the cramping you get with regular PMS. PMDD actually makes it difficult to do day-to-day activities. Work is SO tough during this time, exercise(I’m lucky just to get the walks in) and it goes from there.

Headaches~ Unbearable migraines, constant tylenol popping, however, it just never really rids you of the migraines. This is very normal with PMDD. Of course light and ALL noises are deadly to us during this time.

Neck and back pain~ I have actually had to take pain killers to help me thru the migraines, neck and back pain. I also use heating pads on my neck, lower back and my stomach for cramping. What works really well is if you take towels and put rice in them, sew them up into a square or rectangle, depending on the size you want, and heat them in the microwave. They can be used over and over again.

I think they stink because of the hot rice, but they are GREAT heating pads. You can also buy these in some stores like this, or just a regular heating pad.

Leg aches~ I don’t always get leg aches, but they do come and go, just depending on the month. Of course any major stresses in life will make any of these much worse.

These are some of the reasons that your partner/spouse really needs to know about PMDD if you live with it. I personally feel like month in and month out, I turn into a big whiny baby. It REALLY hurts extremely bad and i have a really high pain tolerance.

But, as most of us feel, I know it has to become annoying for my husband to constantly here me moaning. He has now dealt with my PMDD for so many years and when I read new articles I tell him about them.

Massages are great during this time too.

I have heard about some women going to the chiropractor during their 2 wk time. I personally have not done this yet. Mainly because during my 2 wk time, I cannot stand for people to touch me, SO a chiro may not work well for me.

I hope this has helped some of you that may be experiencing pains monthly that come and go, maybe you didn’t know why and now you do.

Of course, PMDD isn’t going to be the answer for everyone, but if you are experiencing these symptoms, some or all, keep a calendar and if it falls right before your cycle EVERY month… Chances are you are living with PMDD and didn’t know it.

Life w/ PMDD
A hot bath is wonderful to help you get thru these tougher days too.