Menstrual Symptoms

[melannen]

I was talking to a friend recently about how none of the places that supposedly give you "straight talk on sex and female bodies" actually seem to have an accurate, comprehensive list of menstrual symptoms.

As a teenager I read a lot of that stuff, but I didn't have any female friends I was close enough to talk about it with - I was halfway going by Heinlein's "real women don't have PMS", because it was clear none of the "my body" books were describing my body in that respect - and as a result it wasn't until I joined a tmi-focused lj community that I started to realize that the things my body was doing were things other people's bodies do, too. Sadly, that community has died down a lot with the exodus from lj and I haven't found a good replacement yet.

But as a service to humanity, here is a list of things that I know for a fact are regular menstrual or pre-menstrual symptoms for more than one person who menstruates, not a symptom of any particular disorder or any problem beyond "having a healthy uterus". If you know of ones I've missed, feel free to suggest them in the comments and I'll add them to the end of the post! Anon is turned on.

Poll #15384 Menstrual Symptoms for All

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 94

View Respondents

Pain

View Answers

1. stomach/abdominal cramps
86 (91.5%)

2. lower back pain
65 (69.1%)

3. heartburn/reflux
9 (9.6%)

4. breast pain or tenderness
56 (59.6%)

5. sudden stabbing pain in the lower abdomen, often only on one side
42 (44.7%)

6. burning/soreness of the vulva region
20 (21.3%)

7. headaches
36 (38.3%)

8. general body aches (like the flu)
39 (41.5%)

Digestion

View Answers

1. diarrhea/loose stool
71 (78.9%)

2. constipation
32 (35.6%)

3. nausea (+sometimes vomiting)
25 (27.8%)

4. reduced appetite
24 (26.7%)

5. increased appetite
26 (28.9%)

6. changes in appetite/cravings
40 (44.4%)

7. bloating/changes in clothing size
46 (51.1%)

8. water retention
26 (28.9%)

9. gas/flatulence
35 (38.9%)

Sleep

View Answers

1. insomnia
19 (28.8%)

2. increased sleep
13 (19.7%)

3. general fatigue/tiredness
58 (87.9%)

4. increased energy
5 (7.6%)

5. unusually vivid dreams
11 (16.7%)

6. nightmares/night terrors
4 (6.1%)

7. pregnancy dreams
3 (4.5%)

8. sex dreams
17 (25.8%)

9. really weird sex dreams
11 (16.7%)

Emotional/Psychological

View Answers

1. irritability
62 (76.5%)

2. depression/despair
51 (63.0%)

3. emotional numbness/anhedonia
19 (23.5%)

4. mania
6 (7.4%)

5. anger
26 (32.1%)

6. cheerfulness/feeling of well-being
3 (3.7%)

7. mood swings
33 (40.7%)

8. anxiety
33 (40.7%)

9. difficulty concentrating/memory lapses
21 (25.9%)

10. switch from extrovert to introvert or vice versa
4 (4.9%)

11. other ongoing psychological or emotional conditions being altered
13 (16.0%)

Sexual

View Answers

1. increased libido/desire
53 (74.6%)

2. decreased libido/desire
23 (32.4%)

3. changes in sexuality or sexual orientation
10 (14.1%)

4. changes in erogenous zones
6 (8.5%)

5. changes in ease or experience of orgasm
24 (33.8%)

6. changes in preferred kinks
11 (15.5%)

General/Other

View Answers

1. changes in body odor or perspiration
24 (27.0%)

2. coming down with a cold or other illness/existing illness getting worse
21 (23.6%)

3. existing illness going away/getting better
2 (2.2%)

4. acne/pimples
53 (59.6%)

5. changes in the way medications or drugs work
7 (7.9%)

6. sensory changes (increased or altered sensitivity to smell/noise/texture/etc.)
23 (25.8%)

7. UTIs or yeast infections appearing or going away
14 (15.7%)

8. easier bruising/reduced clotting ability
6 (6.7%)

9. changes in body temperature/feeling hot or cold
31 (34.8%)

10. changes in body size/fit of clothing (including breasts, waist, feet, etc.)
29 (32.6%)

11. blood and chunks of flesh dripping out of the vagina
78 (87.6%)

Additions from the comments (part one)
Restless Leg Syndrome flare-up
Cold sores
Other flare-ups in chronic conditions, injuries or infections
Muscular tension or stiffness
Cold/allergy symptoms with no outside cause - congestion, sore throat, runny eyes
Earworms/songs stuck in head
Changes in vaginal secretions/lubrication
Increased thirst
Changes in frequency of urination/urge to urinate
Nosebleeds
Dreams about babies or motherhood
Abdominal pain after orgasm
Changes in pain sensitivity


Most people only have a small proportion of those at any one time - thank all the gods there are - but if you experience any of them, just know you're not alone. And that it's normal for which ones you experience to change over time.

Just for fun, I've made this a poll, so if you want to register which ones you've experienced at some point in your life, you can!

And then ask why evolution ever though it was a good idea do make us go through that every month, instead of once a year, like more sensible species. (On the plus side, at least we don't have deal with male hormones, which fluctuate unpredictably ALL THE TIME. Poor delicate males.)

Comments

[sophia_sol]

What a great post - thank you for making it! This stuff doesn't get talked about openly nearly enough.

[melannen]

I am glad it is helpful! It makes so much of a difference to actually have some kind of a baseline on this stuff.

[cahn]

And then there are ovulation symptoms too! Because I am not sharp on the uptake, several times when I had fairly intense ovulation symptoms I thought I might be getting my period early, or... or I didn't even know what.

It wasn't until I was trying to get pregnant that I found out that this was, in fact, totally normal! (In fact, I've found pregnancy websites to be the best sites I've found for informing me as to PMS symptoms -- because a lot of the symptoms are similar.)

[melannen]

Yeah, most of these, I have found, can actually happen anytime from a week before to a week after your period, or anytime in the week around ovulation. Which is basically: any time in the monthly cycle, the key is that it *is* on your cycle somewhere, and not just that you happen to feel like crap once a month, which it took me way too long to figure out..

[jjhunter]

And 'bonus': first month after first IUD placement = very normal to pick up period symptoms you've never had before! and/or have ones you know be so, so much worse.

...ask me if it's worth it *after* this month is over.

/bleargh

[ellen_fremedon]

Oh god yes this. I made the mistake of getting my IUD right after starting a thyroid medication adjustment. I pretty much have spent the last year figuring out what the new normal is.

[ellen_fremedon]

Ooh! I read a really nifty thing just the other week about the purpose of menstruation! (Warning: the site will make you register to read it. Worth registering to read-- it's about the arms race between the human endometrium and the human placenta, and it is fascinating.)

[melannen]

Oh, so there really *is* a war going on in my uterus, it's not just that it feels like it! ^_^

...I am never ever getting pregnant after reading that.

[ellen_fremedon]

One more for the Sleep symptoms: Restless Leg Syndrome. Mine gets reliably much worse the week before my period; I've started just scheduling a monthly acupuncture appointment to try to head it off at the pass.

[melannen]

Oooh, good one! Well, not good for you, but good for the list.

[calvinahobbes]

I'll resist the urge to tell you my entire menstrual history. There are several of the symptoms you mention that fit me, but note quite how I would describe them. The general body ache sort of fits, but it feels more like all my muscles are tensed, so there are things I can't do as much/only do more carefully unless I want my muscles to get stuck that way. I get a lot of neck tension (increased chance of cricks) and my thighs will feel like I've biked for miles even if I haven't. For headaches, it's similar: if I get too tired (and I get tired even more easily during (P)MS I develop a particular kind of headache that can go on for 24-48 hours.

Also in the cold symptoms category, I've found that I will get cold symptoms that aren't actually early stages of an actual cold: stuffy nose, runny eyes, throat ache. For the longest time I kept thinking I was eternally dodging some virus, until I realized it's just PMS.

11. blood and chunks of flesh dripping out of the vagina
Isn't that the *definition* of menstruation? I feel like I'm missing something here?

ETA: Also a revelation for me was learning that PMS is not defined as the "the period before your menstruation" but actually as "a few days before your menstruation and the first days OF your menstruation". Which is true for me - I usually experience a shift in symptoms after a couple of days, and by the end of the period I'll be mostly symptom-free, even though I'm still bleeding.

[melannen]

Yeah, I was trying to sum things up in a very few words, so a lot of nuance got lost. Would something like "general muscular tension/stiffness" sum it up reasonably accurately?

...and huh, I wonder if the times I thought I got a cold over my period were just period-linked symptoms. Although mine usually lingers long enough that I suspect it really is an infection getting through.

11 is p. universal, I think, yeah. :P But it felt weird leaving it out. (Also I suspect there are still people out there who don't realize clots are normal - I didn't until I started living on the internet.)

And I actually get very few physical symptoms before the bleeding starts - I'll get the emotional ones and the weird dreams and the fatigue as my warning, but by the time the cramps et al. start I'm usually already spotting (and the emotional/sleep symptoms have mostly stopped, other than the ones directly caused by the physical symptoms...).

[deird1]

sudden stabbing pain in the lower abdomen, often only on one side

Cool! I had no idea that was normal - I thought I was just weird.

[melannen]

Yep! It's apparently more closely associated with ovulation, but I get it in the PMS period just as often.

[sarken]

My favorite was the time I mentioned on Twitter that I often get a song stuck in my head when I get my period, and I had multiple people saying they did, too.

Who the hell designed this system? Ugh.

[melannen]

oh wow, that's one I never would have thought of! interesting.

...clearly nobody designed it, even the worst government committee could have come up with something better.

[beatrice_otter]

Question: so if 81% of women have issues with diarrhea, and only 38% have issues with water retention, why do menstrual meds have diuretics in them? Because that makes diarrhea worse!

[beatrice_otter]

Also, to the best of my knowledge I've never had mood swings associated with my periods (though I have an Aunt who has terrible mood swings). But I am sometimes crabby that day. But it's not a hormone thing: it's just that sometimes (between horrible gas and cramps) it feels like I'm being stabbed in the gut with a rusty knife. And, like most people, I get crabby when I'm in pain.

[lovepeaceohana]

Having been through two pregnancies, I'll add that while my PMS used to pretty much always be cramps and irritability, now it's this extraordinary grab-bag of symptoms. I might get cramps and irritability one month, and then wild mood swings and fatigue the next. I'm usually very regular by the calendar but the lack of typical symptoms makes it harder for me to correctly peg them as PMS.

[melannen]

Pregnancy, I understand, can completely screw with everything. And yeah, shifting symptoms make it really hard to separate out "menstrual" from "just a thing that happens sometimes."

[sassbandit]

More for the list:

* changes in vaginal lubrication
* sciatica flare-up
* thirst/drinking a lot of water (for me this is related to bloating/water retention but the first sign is thirst)
* change in frequency of urination/urge to urinate

[melannen]

Those are great additions for the list and terrible things to have happen to you every month. Thanks.

[heuradys]

Mine will trigger cold sores and/or excema. And in the last year since I herniated a disc in my lower back, increased inflammation of the nerve that's impinged.

[melannen]

That's the second vote for cold sores. And I was wondering about flare-ups of things like back or joint problems - it seems reasonable given some of the other things on the list but I didn't have any actual confirmation. Now I do! Thank you.

[the_rck]

Before I had my daughter, I used to dream pretty regularly, right around ovulation time, about babies and how wonderful they are. It took me a long time to figure out that that's what it was because I didn't have much sense of the cycle apart from the bleeding and cramps part.

[melannen]

Yeah, I don't have "wonderful babies" dreams but I have, like "you are pregnant with the messiah and must flee zombie ninjas to save the world! while pregnant" dreams. idek. They were my most regular pre-bleeding symptom for awhile, too - I'd wake up, go "what the hell was that dream?" and then remember and bring out the pads..

[petra]

Additional symptom: nosebleeds. I am genetically predisposed to them, and they increase in frequency when I'm menstruating. Bleeding from both ends at once is unsettling.

I wish there was a good way to set up a poll on the subject of "How bad are your menstrual cramps?" I've talked to so many people about their pain, and I have the sense that many people find them extremely debilitating. 1-10 pain scale doesn't begin to cut it. "What *can't* you do with unmedicated cramps?" and "What steps do you have to take to mitigate the discomfort?" would be reasonable questions, based on the many pain-measurement surveys I've had to fill out of late.

[melannen]

I've been seriously considering setting up a community that is *nothing but* polls about the shit female bodies do. Because seriously there's so little information available that's actually accurate and so few places to talk about it.

If I did do a "how bad are your cramps" poll I would def. use the Hyperbole and a Half pain scale. (Mine are only about a 3/4 on that scale, usually, but I know women who are regularly in the "actively being mauled by a bear" range.) But questions specifically on how the pain effects your ability to do stuff and how you deal with it are also a very good idea.

[whatistigerbalm]

This might not work for many, but here's a failproof way of checking whether a period is imminent (as in, will start within a day at the latest):
1) Masturbate.
2) Are happiness and relief followed by that dull pain low in your abdomen, the kind you feel when your period starts?
If yes, expect the period within a day!

[melannen]

Oh boy! Good one! I wonder how common that is. (I feel like masturbating can sometimes jump-start the bleeding for me, actually, if I know it's coming in a couple of days and just want to get it over with.)

[avendya]

Possibly distinct from headaches: migraines, complete with aura and horrible splitting pain.

I never noticed they were timed around my period, but my period was not so much "periodic" as "sometimes I bleed and sometimes I don't your guess is as good as mine on the timing". I'm still not sure if they were worse around menstruation, or if changing hormone levels over the month would trigger them randomly. But then I went onto Implanon and suddenly I went from a migraine a week to <1 migraine a month.

Also: people talk about cramps like they're manageable but annoying. I, on the other hand, end up curled up in a ball semiconscious.

[dejla]

And you should keep in mind what I found out -- If you are bleeding heavily, like change the tampon/pad/whatever every couple of hours or so, and at, soiling the sheets (unless, as I had, you sleep in Depends, and even then it's iffy) get yourself to a gynecologist STAT. You may find out, as I did, that along with the anemia, you have either endometrial cancer or uterine cancer.

[plinythemammaler]

"Faint from pain and wake up in an ambulance, having thrown up in the meeting room waste paper basket at work". Like, yeah, people REALLY don't tell you how bad period pain can be - the first couple times I blacked out from it were really not good. Thank goodness for being able to run birth control packs together. This is an excellent poll/information post and you should feel excellent! I think it's absolutely a cultural thing that women are meant to suck it up, and not everyone can not all of the time.

[petra]

You have my deepest sympathies. I wish that the "So You're Pubescent" talks for people reaching menarche involved some level of scale of "If you feel X, then tell your doctor. Tell them as loudly and repeatedly as you can until they do *something.*"

[brownbetty]

I didn't check nausea, because it's not digestive, it's that normally my pain is 3-6 on the H&H pain scale, but about every other year or so I go to nine, and really severe pain makes me vomit.

[melannen]

Yeah, I didn't worry about the difference when I made the poll because I figured if you regularly get pain bad enough to vomit, you're allowed to check any ticky boxes you want for any reason. :P

(A lot of these are probably cascades from others for some people. It's all chains of interaction.)

[ambyr]

Also not talked about enough: length and duration are highly variable. I am one of those people who is fortunate enough to have very regular periods, at least, but in my case that means I regularly have them every 24 days, and they last for 8 days each.

[melannen]

Oh, yes, that could be a whole different poll (one I'm just as curious about.)

...I'm going to end up actually making that "all menstruation polls all the time" community, aren't I.

[wordweaverlynn]

My allergies always got worse -- specifically eczema.

And ALL THIS MAY CHANGE when you hit perimenopause!

[melannen]

I tell people I'm willing to put up with my cramps because judging by mom and her sisters and grandma, as soon as I hit perimenopause it's going to be hot flashes. every few hours. every day and night. until I die. no medication or diet changes will help.

joy.

yet moar symptoms

[(Anonymous)]

Thoughts of self-harm and/or suicidality to the point of needing inpatient hospitalization (or however you want to word it)

Seriously. More months than I would care to count.

Re: yet moar symptoms

[zlabya]

I hope you don't mind me commenting. That is really scary. I hope you've found some help with treatments. I know (firsthand) that higher levels of progesterone sometimes create or increase depression, as does low thyroid function.

Cycle and period lengths.

[zlabya]

Something no one else has mentioned yet--how many people have a regular 28-day cycle? The books I read as a preteen and teen implied it was not only normal, but common. My periods ranged from 26 days (not counting mid-cycle breakthrough bleeding) to 61, depending on my level of stress and heaven knows what else. One reason I loved oral contraception was that I could predict within 24 hours and didn't regularly get caught without sanitary products, or washing blood out of my underwear. And my period almost never ran less than 6 days, mostly 7 or 8.

Oh, and my periods got heavier in perimenopause, to the point that I made an emergency call to my gynecologist one night, afraid i was hemorrhaging.

melannen, if you do start that gynecological/women's bodies comm, I can do guest posts on perimenopause and early menopause.

Re: Cycle and period lengths.

[petra]

Regarding regularity, my period is regular enough that I have acquired pregnancy tests *more than once* because it was three days late. I know of nothing so effective for bringing on a delayed period like peeing on an expensive stick.

Re: uterus-possessors' health community, I could do you quite the post on "So you have miserable pelvic pain. What might cause it?" I'm collecting all the negative diagnoses I can find.

[gnomad]

Hi melannen! Sorry to butt into a totally unrelated post.

I'm on the con.txt programming committee and I wanted to reach out to you to see if you'd gotten our email about modding panels for the con. Some of our emails have been ending up in the spam folder, so I thought I'd check in with you via another medium. A handful of your panels made it onto the schedule so we had some additional questions. I'm happy to resend the email if you need me to! Just let me know. Thanks!

[eleanorjane]

Another data point: my hair goes lank/oily much faster just before my period starts. Normally I wash it every two days and it's nice; needing to wash it again only a day after the last wash is usually my most reliable indicator that it's about to be period time.

[melannen]

Oooh, yeah, that sounds like exactly the sort of thing that belongs on the list.