Girl Stuff

Guys, you might not want to read this. You know....girl stuff.

I'm currently reading the book "The Female Brain." As I was reading it I came across a section that made complete sense to me. The female hormones, estrogen and progesterone and a woman's menstrual cycle; specifically mine.

About two years ago I was bleeding like a water faucet. So bad that I thought there was no way that any person could bleed that much and survive. As you can see I survived. Although it did take some time for me to get into the doctor. You know how they say that women are better about going to the doctor then men are, well sometimes this woman is not so good at it. It seems that when something isn't right with my body my first thought is usually cancer (my family has a history of it). I am sure that I am not alone here, and all my fears usually do is cause me undue stress.

Along with my excessive bleeding I also began to have excessive mood swings. Of course I didn't turn into the Wicked Witch of the West, but instead I became extremely sensitive. This usually happened just before menstruation. I would become very depressed, and just down right miserable. I seemed to think that it was the end of the world; my world that is.

Eventually I decided that enough was enough and I went to visit my doctors, both of them (GYN and family practice). The GYN put me on birth control for the very first time in my life. I thought this was funny, since I had already delivered all the children that I will ever give birth to. I had a tubal ligation after the twins (what did you think I was crazy). It was a simple fix, my hormones were out of whack. Well after the GYN I went to see my other doctor for my "depression." I explained to him about my visit to the GYN, and told him my symptoms. He ended up giving me a prescription for Prozac along with the birthcontrol. He also explained to me that what I was dealing with was Premenstrual Dysphoric Syndrome (a bad case of PMS). You see I only became sad and depressed like that just before my period.

So here I sit, thinking about this book and my experience, and really thinking about how these hormones can really mess up a woman's brain. Thinking about how quickly her world can be turned upside down, as if life is so miserable that it isn't worth living, but yet a week before she was so optimistic about life. I do see things differently now. Sure I do tend to get a bit down when "aunt Flow" comes to visit, but not nearly as sad as I was when my hormones were so jacked up.

BTW...I stopped taking the Prozac after about a month. I wanted to be my normal happy self, not completely numb, which is exactly how it made me feel. Nothing made me happy or sad, I was just left dangling there somewhere in the middle. The birthcontrol made it for about two months before I screwed that up. I've never been very good at taking medications, I'm always forgetting them. It seems though that it was long enough to straighten out my system. So if you're like me and seem to keep putting off a much needed visit to the doctor, get off your butt and do it....NOW.

....and here I am (smile).....happy.