My new chapter with PMDD

Does anyone else think to themselves...how do we do this every single month?

I had been posting a lot lately in my online support group about questions with birth control. I started on Yaz about 18 months ago (at the tome this was 6 months in). I started having some serious breakthrough bleeding (really heavy, even went to the ER in a PMDD panic/fog kind of bleeding). But I kept going back to it because before I was on it, I felt like I couldn’t live like this anymore. My PMDD symptoms would last from 10 to 14 days every single month and they were really really really bad. The pill made me feel normal.

I have had three separate times in the last year where I felt out of control my body. Emotionally inconsolable, chills and the PMDD “flu feeling”, extreme anxiety which makes me unable to function, crying in the fetal position, yelling at my husband and kids...the list goes on.

Two times I have tried to stop my continuous pills to manage and reset the bleeding by taking placebos… I backed out within two days. The other time was when I started estrogen to try and thicken the lining of my uterus so I could continue on the Yaz without bleeding. Every single time was a FAIL! And I have 3 kids 6 and under, I can’t manage. Literally the only time I feel Normal is when I am on continuous Yaz. I never had a cycle normally in my life until after my 3rd child 2 years ago (I went MONTHS without one - we did fertility for the first 2 - maybe my body knew). Immediately after I had him I got a cycle every month (go figure) and I started having PMDD symptoms. I thought something was seriously wrong with me. I am so grateful that I started tracking and realized there was a pattern. I researched and found an amazing support group on Facebook as well as IAPMD.

I decided to take more control of my life and I found a specialist and a therapist. He’s an endocrinologist and an OB/GYN that specializes in women’s reproductive and hormonal imbalance issues and specializes in PMDD. He was an hour away but I would have drove 8. It was a life-changing experience. After so many scares with changing my usual regimen… We were looking to just keep me on Yaz indefinitely and do a uterine ablation...then by the grace of God, it stopped.

Recently (6 weeks ago) I started Serafem another step in the direction of avoiding surgery. I recently “graduated” from the specialist and started seeing a local OB that also specializes in PMDD. He told me to try this first and we would take it from there. He has actually done a full ovary removal on women in my condition after many failed attempts at other interventions. But I’m a young candidate. I’m 35 and not close to menopause and although it could be done, we wanted to keep trying other methods first. This medication in addition to the continual Yaz has hands down saved my life and my marriage. It’s taken off the edge of the lingering rage that the Yaz couldn’t mask. Or maybe I was also depressed because how can you not be when dealing with this condition?! It’s exhausting!

I don’t know how I lived to manage this and fight for this. I literally wanted to die. I can physically feel the shift in my brain. We are in the 5% of women.

WE are WARRIORS! My best advice is to advocate for yourself and NEVER give up! My story isn’t over but it’s a great start in a new chapter.