I had a few rough days recently. I was nervous, restless, couldn't sleep. I started noticing how all of these people around me were doing so many stupid things, they were too loud, or they were standing too close to me. I was anxious. Not even my evening guided meditations couldn't ease me; the guy was talking too slow (how unusual, right?). I was not myself. And I didn't even know it. I honestly didn't realize that how I was feeling and behaving was anything out of the ordinary. I thought that I was always like this and that life was always like this.
And then I got it. My period.
And it dawned on me. I'm PMS-ing. That's normal, right?
Well... Let's talk about it.
PMS is actually a culture-bound syndrome.
This means that the causes for this syndrome lay in our culture and society and not in our biology. Plenty of research was done that couldn't find neither the biological mechanisms of it, nor could confirm the supposed causal relation between hormones and mood swings. And did you know that PMS includes more than 200 symptoms? 200! I'm sure that even some men would also be diagnosed with PMS if only they bled once a month.
It is not universal, and it is not a biological necessity to go through this every month. Immigrant women in the U.S. start to experience more symptoms after living there for some time. Women who live with more traditional gender roles also experience more symptoms and more menstrual distress. This is typical for the Western societies: mostly Europe, North America, and Australia. In other cultures, women experience PMS in different ways, if they do at all.
Does all of this mean that PMS doesn't exist and that women are all imagining and pretending?
Certainly not. It is real, and women most certainly feel the realness of it, as I have described to you at the beginning of the post from my personal experience. The fact that it's coming from the mind doesn't mean that it's not real. You all felt fear, right? Fear is a concept in your head, and yet your hands are shaking, your pulse is racing and your heart is pounding. What is in your mind is manifested in your body. The same goes for PMS. But where did it come from?
Well, ancient Greeks came up with hysteria, a state similar to the modern-day PMS, which affected only women and it was considered to be common. The cure for it was, of course, marriage. And masturbation. This concept of hysterical women survived for centuries. In the Victorian era, if you had some troubles with your hysterical wife, the solution was to call in a doctor, a specialist, who would then masturbate your wife into the bliss of normalness. Special massagers were also sold to aid these problems (dildos, basically). Fun fact: sexy thoughts were considered a symptom! The term hysteria persisted until the 1950s.
Now we have PMS. We are no more considered to be batshit crazy. Now, we are just a little crazy.
This is what culture-bound means. This state was socially constructed. Someone influential came up with it. It became a widespread belief, it persisted for centuries and it heavily influenced society's perception of women. Beliefs can be very strong, as you might already know from your own experience, and they can become a part of the cause. It is now expected from women to have PMS.
So what can we do?
I've seen a lot of men calling their women crazy. I've also seen many women calling themselves crazy. I've seen some women who use PMS as an excuse for literally everything. I've seen some men who use PMS as a way to discredit women and their opinions.
So can we please stop?
We are not crazy. We are just imperfect beings who are overwhelmed from the constant pressure to be perfect in everything we do.
So stop telling women they're crazy. Stop saying it to yourself. Stop justifying your actions by having PMS and stop abusing it to discredit someone. Let women be imperfect. Give them leeway to express their emotions so that they don't explode in those few days before their period when it's socially acceptable for them to show it.
And lastly, dear women, know that PMS is not a must. Accepting yourself, your womanhood, your emotions and accepting the naturalness of your period can be of great help.
