PMS
We are talking about biological rhythms in psychology. The section on PMS particularly interested me.
The physical symptoms of PMS (cramps, breast tenderness and water retention) are fairly common, and while the emotional symptoms are REPORTED to be common, the research isn't panning out that way.
In one study they gave a group of college students (male and female) daily questionnaires about their moods. Retroactively they asked the women about their moods in relation to their monthly cycles. While the daily questionnaires showed no significant difference in the men and women's moods, in retrospect the women recalled feeling quite crappy just before their periods.
Like most American women, I have had crappy days that I have blamed on "Aunt Flo," but unlike most American women, I have pretty serious mood swings anyway. It's called Bipolar Disorder. My regular mood swings are caused by the imbalances of serotonin and dopamine in my brain, but miraculously once a month these problems go away! Unfortunately, that time of month happens to be when my menstrual cycle decides to be a bitch to my moods, and I don't get to enjoy my few days of sanity.
So when I am feeling crappy at certain times in my cycle it IS PMS, but the rest of the time it's something else. Uh huh, right.
Society!
The diagnosis of PMS has nothing to do with dismissing women's emotions as 'hormonal' while validating men's emotions. PSHAW! Of course not!
There's a special word that we use for women when they are being little trouble makers, but when a man acts in the same way we don't call him that, he's just being assertive, the way a man should be. Women who aren't all meek and quiet have something wrong with them.
Funny how there are other societies where a woman's period is a time to separate from society. She spends time with the other women, bathing and curling her hair. They give each other support through the tummy aches and tenderness, but funny how there is a total lack of mood fluctuations. That must prove that the cure for PMS is spending time with your girlfriends. I wonder if the Amazons suffered from the emotional symptoms of PMS. Me thinks not.
I happen to suffer from mondo cramps. I have never been ambushed by Aunt Flo and caught unprepared; cos the night before (or sometimes morning of) I begin to bleed I always get the warning. It hurts like fucking hell. I know when I wake up to that feeling, I had better put some tampons in my bag. And the intense physical pain can tend to make one a bit crabby, but applying my own rules to my moods as opposed to letting society tell me what I should be feeling, I am realising that that is the only symptom of PMS I get. Oh, and that inevitable five pound weight gain that I love so much.
That is not to say that honest to God PMS is a myth. About 5% of women have predicable emotional changes in relation to their cycle in some period in their lives (sometimes for years,) and about 1% have it throughout their lives. These women can use all of the help they can get to deal with their problem, but they are 1%. That's the same percentage of the human population with schizophrenia. It is a very real problem that is probably over diagnosed. Just like ADHD.
When there are three year olds being prescribed Ritalin, you know something is wrong. It totally invalidates the disease for the people who actually HAVE a problem. Because of these sloppy diagnoses, people like me get a bullshit line thrown at us about crappy parenting and too much TV being our only problem. When in actuality my only problem is all of the crappy parents who would rather let the TV raise their children and don't want to be involved beyond the daily dispensing of a pill in their children's lives, searching for a quick fix to make their children easier to live with.
How many three year old boys have you meet who weren't a spaz? If little Billy wants to run around the house screaming I say more power to him, just take those scissors away first.
The physical symptoms of PMS (cramps, breast tenderness and water retention) are fairly common, and while the emotional symptoms are REPORTED to be common, the research isn't panning out that way.
In one study they gave a group of college students (male and female) daily questionnaires about their moods. Retroactively they asked the women about their moods in relation to their monthly cycles. While the daily questionnaires showed no significant difference in the men and women's moods, in retrospect the women recalled feeling quite crappy just before their periods.
Like most American women, I have had crappy days that I have blamed on "Aunt Flo," but unlike most American women, I have pretty serious mood swings anyway. It's called Bipolar Disorder. My regular mood swings are caused by the imbalances of serotonin and dopamine in my brain, but miraculously once a month these problems go away! Unfortunately, that time of month happens to be when my menstrual cycle decides to be a bitch to my moods, and I don't get to enjoy my few days of sanity.
So when I am feeling crappy at certain times in my cycle it IS PMS, but the rest of the time it's something else. Uh huh, right.
Society!
The diagnosis of PMS has nothing to do with dismissing women's emotions as 'hormonal' while validating men's emotions. PSHAW! Of course not!
There's a special word that we use for women when they are being little trouble makers, but when a man acts in the same way we don't call him that, he's just being assertive, the way a man should be. Women who aren't all meek and quiet have something wrong with them.
Funny how there are other societies where a woman's period is a time to separate from society. She spends time with the other women, bathing and curling her hair. They give each other support through the tummy aches and tenderness, but funny how there is a total lack of mood fluctuations. That must prove that the cure for PMS is spending time with your girlfriends. I wonder if the Amazons suffered from the emotional symptoms of PMS. Me thinks not.
I happen to suffer from mondo cramps. I have never been ambushed by Aunt Flo and caught unprepared; cos the night before (or sometimes morning of) I begin to bleed I always get the warning. It hurts like fucking hell. I know when I wake up to that feeling, I had better put some tampons in my bag. And the intense physical pain can tend to make one a bit crabby, but applying my own rules to my moods as opposed to letting society tell me what I should be feeling, I am realising that that is the only symptom of PMS I get. Oh, and that inevitable five pound weight gain that I love so much.
That is not to say that honest to God PMS is a myth. About 5% of women have predicable emotional changes in relation to their cycle in some period in their lives (sometimes for years,) and about 1% have it throughout their lives. These women can use all of the help they can get to deal with their problem, but they are 1%. That's the same percentage of the human population with schizophrenia. It is a very real problem that is probably over diagnosed. Just like ADHD.
When there are three year olds being prescribed Ritalin, you know something is wrong. It totally invalidates the disease for the people who actually HAVE a problem. Because of these sloppy diagnoses, people like me get a bullshit line thrown at us about crappy parenting and too much TV being our only problem. When in actuality my only problem is all of the crappy parents who would rather let the TV raise their children and don't want to be involved beyond the daily dispensing of a pill in their children's lives, searching for a quick fix to make their children easier to live with.
How many three year old boys have you meet who weren't a spaz? If little Billy wants to run around the house screaming I say more power to him, just take those scissors away first.