From Surviving to Thriving: My PMDD and Mindfulness Journey

Welcome PMDD Warrior! In this episode, you’ll hear how I struggled as a new mom—with PTSD and PMDD—and how mindfulness helped me move from hopelessness and self-loathing to acceptance and self-compassion.

PMDD is an outsized brain response to normal menstrual-cycle hormone changes (not a hormone imbalance), and symptoms often show up in the luteal phase.

Hear how mindfulness was an important part of my PMDD self-management toolbox before helping me make peace with PMDD and love myself just as I am.

And you’ll discover how mindfulness can help you:

• Settle your nervous system when that PMDD luteal rage or PMDD anxiety sets in
  
  
• Lean into your PMDD so you can honor your needs without feeling bad about it or less-than
  
  
• Separate your identity from PMDD so you can rediscover yourself and the possibilities for your life
  
  
• Perhaps even experience a mindset shift, so you can replace feelings of resentment and anger with acceptance for life with PMDD
  
  

I’ll also get into future plans to share Mindfulness for PMDD–as a trauma-informed mindfulness teacher–with all of YOU, so we can all live better with PMDD.

FAQ

What is PMDD? PMDD is an outsized brain response to normal cycle hormone changes, with symptoms that commonly show up during luteal phase.

Can mindfulness help PMDD rage or anxiety? Mindfulness can help settle the nervous system and reduce spirals—alongside other supports in your PMDD toolbox.

Is mindfulness a substitute for medical care? No—always seek medical support when needed.

References:
IAPMD - International Association for Premenstrual Disorders

Next listens (recommended)

Episode 2: Managing PMDD Stress with Mindfulness

Episode 3: Meditation to STOP the Spiral

Episode 6: Turn that nasty self-talk around

Connect with me!

DM me on Instagram @mindfulnessforpmdd

FREE Meditations for PMDD for You from Me! (Insight Timer)

Thanks for listening! <3

If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe.

And if you know someone with PMDD, please share this podcast.

And remember ... Stop. Take a breath. And observe.

xo
Diane

Transcript

Title: From Surviving to Thriving: My PMDD and Mindfulness Journey
Episode number: 1
Date: September 29, 2023
URL: https://mindfulnessforpmdd.buzzsprout.com/2253562/episodes/13674567-from-surviving-to-thriving-my-pmdd-and-mindfulness-journey
Solo episode: Diane is the only speaker

INTRO

[00:00:00] If you want to learn how you can live better with PMDD, this podcast was created for you. This is Mindfulness for PMDD with Diane.

I’m Diane, and I’m a registered dietitian and lactation consultant. I’m also a mom, a PMDD warrior, and a trauma-informed mindfulness teacher.

This is where I discuss topics related to PMDD through the lens of mindfulness and meditation, and where I share all about how mindfulness has gotten me to a place of greater peace and acceptance with my PMDD.

I also chat with people who have helped and inspired me along the way so they can share their wisdom with you too.

So let’s get started.

SAFETY NOTE / DISCLAIMER

This podcast is not a substitute for psychological therapy or medical advice.

Please take care when listening to this podcast, [00:01:00] as some may find certain words or subjects triggering or difficult to hear. Take only what serves you and leave the rest behind.

WELCOME + WHY THIS PODCAST

Hello, friends. Welcome to the first official episode of Mindfulness for PMDD with Diane.

I’m Diane, and I am a registered dietitian, lactation consultant, mindfulness teacher, and a mom. And I’m a person who lives with PMDD, or premenstrual dysphoric disorder.

Today, I want to give you a bit of an understanding of how I ended up here with a podcast about PMDD and mindfulness.

I also want to share a little bit about my own experience living with PMDD, and how mindfulness and meditation have helped me manage my own PMDD symptoms—ultimately getting me to a place where I feel like I’ve come to accept this diagnosis and am beginning to find a new, more sustainable [00:02:00] way forward.

But first—while I expect that most people who stumble upon this podcast will have some experience or understanding of PMDD—I do want to take a sec to go over what it is.

WHAT PMDD IS (AND WHEN IT SHOWS UP)

So, PMDD is when the brain has an abnormal and outsized response to the normal hormonal changes associated with the menstrual cycle.

The IAPMD, which is the International Association for Premenstrual Disorders, describes it as a severe negative reaction in the brain to the natural rise and fall of estrogen and progesterone.

So even though the condition is associated with hormonal changes, it’s not a hormonal imbalance.

PMDD affects roughly 1 in [00:03:00] 20 women and people assigned female at birth who are of reproductive age.

It’s often described as a severe form of PMS, but I think probably a lot of other PMDDers will agree with me that that description really doesn’t do justice to how debilitating this condition is.

Symptoms of PMDD are both psychological and physical, and they come on during the luteal phase, or the premenstrual phase.

Symptoms can start anywhere from five days before your period up to two whole weeks before the start of your bleed. Then they’ll typically resolve within a few days of the start of the bleed.

PMDD SYMPTOMS (A REALISTIC LOOK)

So, the list of symptoms is quite long, [00:04:00] so I’ll try not to linger here.

But I do want to share this because symptoms of PMDD are quite wide-ranging.

You’ve got mood and emotional changes—like mood swings, feeling suddenly sad or tearful, or increased sensitivity to rejection.

You may experience irritability, anger, or increased interpersonal conflict.

You might have depressed mood, feelings of hopelessness, feeling worthless or guilty.

You might experience anxiety, tension, or feelings of being keyed up or on edge. For me, that can feel like my whole body is buzzing and I’m very hypervigilant.

You might experience decreased interest in your usual activities like work or school or friends or hobbies.

This is a big one for me: difficulty concentrating, [00:05:00] focusing, or thinking—what I like to call my PMDD brain fog.

There’s tiredness or low energy—which really, I feel like tiredness and low energy just doesn’t even encompass it for me. For me, it can be like a crushing fatigue or lethargy.

You might experience changes in appetite, food cravings, overeating, or binge eating.

You may experience hypersomnia, which is excessive sleepiness, or insomnia—trouble falling or staying asleep.

There’s feeling overwhelmed or out of control.

And then physical symptoms like breast tenderness or breast swelling, joints or muscle pains and aches, bloating, weight gain.

And in addition—as if that’s not enough—those with PMDD are at increased risk for suicide and suicidal behavior. [00:06:00]

Now, for anyone who might be listening who doesn’t have PMDD—imagine experiencing a variety of those symptoms every single month for up to two weeks at a time.

It can very much feel like fully 50 percent of your time and your life is being taken away from you.

It can have a major impact on your relationships, your work, your feelings of self-worth.

And I can tell you, I’ve experienced every single one of those symptoms at one point or another throughout my PMDD journey.

WHERE I AM IN MY CYCLE (AND MY “BREAKOUT DAY”)

This is probably a good time to do something that I’m going to try to do in every episode, which is to share where I am in my current cycle.

And of course, on the very first episode, it’s a bit tricky—because as I record this, I am day seven. Usually day seven is a really good day.

But I’m experiencing something a bit interesting, and I’m not sure if maybe it’s what I normally would experience on day eight or nine or ten.

This is a really good example of why it’s great to hear other people’s experiences—to get an understanding of where your thing shakes out in the grand scheme of things and validate your own experience.

So, I have this thing I kind of call my breakout PMDD day, usually falling around day 8 or 9 or 10.

I’ve actually noticed it as a real pattern. [00:08:00] It happens every month—day 8 or 9 or 10.

I’ve had a couple other people with PMDD confirm or validate this by sharing they experience it as well.

It’s strange because I don’t normally hear about it in the readings and the research on PMDD.

Basically, on day 8 or 9 or 10, I’ll typically have a breakout day where I have some of my symptoms of PMDD.

It’s kind of on the lighter side, but it’s definitely something different—set apart from how I’d normally feel in my follicular phase.

I might have tearfulness, irritability, impatience.

It’s like I have a short fuse, or I might feel suddenly physically low energy or headachy or just really off. [00:09:00]

Today is weird because today is day seven, and normally I would not be having my breakout day yet.

But this morning was a pretty strange, rough morning where I woke up with that sort of tearfulness and irritability—the exact kind of feelings I’d have on day eight, nine, or ten.

So I’m not sure if it’s just an early breakout day, or—as often happens with PMDD—sometimes it’s hard to tease apart what’s PMDD and what’s just a normal bad day.

Or what’s PMDD versus something that maybe anyone might normally experience just in the days leading up to their period.

So yeah, today is a bit strange. It’s day seven. I’m a little bit funky. Who knows what’s going on.

But I’d love to hear if anyone can relate to having a weird little breakout day where there’s definitely something going on hormonally prior to ovulation.

If you do want to share, you can find me currently on Instagram at mindfulnessforpmdd. [00:10:00]

MY PMDD STORY (POSTPARTUM + PTSD)

Alright, moving on—because I do want to share my PMDD experience and how it developed and how I got to this point.

So I developed PMDD after the traumatic birth of my son, which also left me with PTSD for a period of time postpartum—post-traumatic stress disorder.

At my absolute worst with PMDD, I have experienced inability to work, being barely able to look after myself or my household. [00:11:00]

Feeling unable to connect with my partner and my son in the ways I would like to.

I’ve experienced so much self-loathing and self-doubt and low self-esteem.

So much social anxiety and a feeling of general dissociation that led me to spend a lot of time hiding out at home—mostly checked out of life.

And yeah—even suicidal ideations of the sort that my therapist calls escape fantasies.

ROCK BOTTOM (WHAT PMDD TOOK)

At my very worst—what I think of as my rock bottom, my lowest point—I found myself in bed bawling and feeling completely hopeless and helpless and distraught.

PMDD had just recently caused me to miss out on [00:12:00] Halloween with my child.

And as I was laying in bed bawling, it was also preventing me from getting on a plane to join my family for Thanksgiving—to grieve the loss of a family member and also celebrate major milestones in the lives of other important family members.

All of this was happening at once—and I couldn’t be there for it.

It was a major holiday. A time of loss and mourning. And also really great things happening with other family members.

And there was just no chance in hell I could board a plane and travel by myself in a confined space, surrounded by strangers, and then survive the demands and all the stimuli that would come with a trip like that.

So that’s my early experience with PMDD and my low point. [00:13:00]

HOW MINDFULNESS ENTERED MY LIFE

My relationship with mindfulness also started since the birth of my son.

Before that, the extent of my experience with mindfulness was probably just doing meditations at the beginning or end of a yoga class.

But with the traumatic birth of my son, I initially found that mindfulness helped release me from ruminating thoughts that would spiral out of control.

It helped me to get to sleep at night.

It helped me to feel less alone in the world.

It helped me feel like my heart wasn’t going to beat straight out of my chest after all.

Initially, my experience with mindfulness was mostly with meditation, and then a little bit with mindful exercises guided by my mindfulness teachers. [00:14:00]

Eventually, what I found was that I began to bring mindfulness into my life in a lot of different ways that I never would have imagined.

That unfolded in a really natural way and became part of the fabric of my life.

I’ll get into the details—tools and practices I developed over time—in this podcast.

But I really want to share how over time I went from meditating to help me get through really tough times—put on the brakes, get through survival mode—

…and then over time, it developed into something that helped me think more clearly in the moment, be a little bit less hard on myself, and be kinder to myself more and more over time.

It was really a game changer. [00:15:00]

And eventually it was a life changer for me because it led me to this place that I’m at now—where I feel accepting of my PMDD and no longer trying to fight it.

And that’s huge. That’s the life changer part.

THE SHIFT: SURVIVAL → ACCEPTANCE

[00:16:00] Mindfulness got me to a place where I’m no longer trying to fight my PMDD, and I can accept it and accept myself—with kindness and non-judgment.

I think it’s important to say that it isn’t a magic pill, and it’s not necessarily for everyone.

It is a practice, and it is a journey. And it is part of what is most likely, for most PMDDers, a wider combination of treatments and self-management tools that will look different from person to person.

Because everyone’s PMDD is a little bit different, and so the combination of treatments and tools that work for you will look a little bit different from those that work for the next PMDD warrior.

For me, that combination looks like medication, changes to my diet, changes to my exercise, cleaning up my sleep hygiene, getting back into therapy, and of course, mindfulness and meditation. [00:17:00]

That said, mindfulness and meditation have played such a big role in helping me stay afloat when I felt like I was drowning.

It helped me hang in there with all my other treatments and self-management tools—hang in there through the process.

And get through those really tough times where nothing else was really doing the trick.

I really can’t overstate that. [00:18:00]

WHY I BECAME A MINDFULNESS TEACHER

So much so that I decided to train as a Ten of Zen mindfulness teacher, and then as a trauma-informed mindfulness teacher.

At first, it was just to help me in my own practice. I felt like it would give me the structure and accountability factor to really develop a mindfulness practice that would stick—and it did.

Beyond that, eventually mindfulness led to this revelation:

In order to find a sustainable way forward with PMDD, I needed to get to a place of acceptance with it—and truly align my life, my work, and my thoughts to that acceptance.

And in no way am I saying [00:19:00] that needs to be your goal, or that acceptance looks the same for everyone.

But for me personally, once I realized that acceptance was the only way forward, I felt pulled to make that the driving force of everything in my life—for the time being at least.

That’s when I realized I want to help other people with PMDD learn how to use these tools in navigating their own PMDD symptoms and struggles.

Because the effect of mindfulness and meditation on my PMDD experience has really been that profound.

And by the way—when I say I want to help other PMDDers apply these tools—what I mean is:

For me, the “magic” of mindfulness as it relates to PMDD is that it’s gotten me to this place of acceptance and compassion.

But that’s not the only point in the PMDD journey where it’s useful. [00:20:00]

Even if you’re still feeling in survival mode, or the “getting to know my PMDD” mode, or trying to get a diagnosis—wherever you are—I do believe there’s a place for mindfulness, if it’s something you’re open to.

WHAT’S COMING NEXT (TOPICS + “PMDD MINDFULNESS ADJACENT”)

In the next few episodes, I want to share why I’m such a fan of mindfulness as a stress management tool for PMDD and a nervous system regulator, and why I like to focus specifically on trauma-informed mindfulness for PMDD.

I’ll continue to let you in on what my own PMDD looks like because I think that’s really important. [00:21:00]

In future episodes, I also want to dive deep into topics I like to call PMDD Mindfulness Adjacent.

These are topics that might not seem so obviously linked to mindfulness for PMDD, and yet I cannot stop seeing the connection and wanting to explore that link more.

Things like parenting with PMDD. Work and career. Entrepreneurship. Nutrition for PMDD.

I will discuss the self-loathing and low self-esteem and imposter syndrome that comes with PMDD—that’s a heavy one.

As well as how the stages of grief relate to acceptance of a PMDD diagnosis. [00:22:00]

I’m also really interested in exploring certain principles of mindfulness—and even psychology—that have had a big impact on me in a way that’s practical and applicable to a life with PMDD.

Things like radical acceptance and the idea of impermanence.

I want to help apply these in a really easily approachable way for someone living with PMDD.

I also really want to learn about how mindfulness might help people with PMDD who also have ADHD or autism, because it’s my understanding that there is an association there.

Or people with PMDD who identify as trans or non-binary. [00:23:00]

And of course I will be sharing guided meditations and mindfulness exercises with you throughout the way, throughout the episodes along the way.

So if you’re listening and you’re particularly interested in any of those topics, or you have other ideas for PMDD mindfulness-adjacent topics, please feel free to reach out.

I’m on Instagram at mindfulnessforpmdd.

Thank you so much for listening. I truly appreciate it.

I’m so excited, and I hope you are too, and I’m really looking forward to connecting with you.

I will hopefully see you in the episodes.

OUTRO

Thank you so much for listening.

If you liked the show, please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

For links to everything mentioned in this episode, you [00:24:00] can check out the show notes.

You can find me, Diane DeJesus, on Instagram @mindfulnessforPMDD.

Now I invite you to pause, take a breath, and look around.