Severe pms and hormonal changes

[jui2]

Hi, I am 28 yr old healthy female, who exercises regularly and eats healthy. I always had painful and heavy periods and in recent years quite annoying PMS symptoms too like mood swings, depression, body ache, etc. Since a couple of months my periods pain and bleeding has reduced a lot but PMS symptoms are worse like anxiety, insomnia, anger, irritability, etc. Its affecting my personal and professional life, I am not sure what to do. Can this be due to hormonal changes? Is this normal ? will this phase pass too ? I tried exercising and eating healthy foods, but nothing helps much.

[specialmom]

Ugh, why are we plagued by pms?  LOL  I feel your pain!  Definitely could be shifting hormones.  But is it cyclic like PMS? I ask because if you have it regularly, it could just be anxiety.  Anyway, there are doctors that specialize in woman's mental health care specifically related to hormones (a subspecialty of psychiatry). There are disorders that are related to hormonal imbalance --  PMDD or premenstrual dysphoric disorder.  They generally treat this with antidepressants. I have never gone that route. But my PMS has definitely had periods of being worse at times than other times. And that is normal.  Your PMS will not look the same for your entire life.  Add in babies, then menopause? ugh.  I've learned to recognize when I have the PMS grumps or moodiness and have learned coping things.  Deep breathing, time out for myself, meditation, yoga, running it off, extra sleep and self forgiveness.  I do my best to not make my family suffer!  LOL It's not fair to them. So I definitely make an effort to control it.  My suggestion is to talk to your OB/GYN about it.  Most will have good suggestions for you and if it is interfering more and ore, then consider the psychiatrist that specializes in hormonal mental health issues. Good luck and you are NOT alone.

[jui2]

Hi, thank you so much for your response. It feels good to know I am not alone and weird :) I don't want to take any anti-anxiety or anti-depression drugs, just yet. And my issue is more related to insomnia but its been happening more recently, otherwise I used to sleep well. If this is something that will pass, I hope to somehow hang in there (and make my family suffer till then lol).