I know it's been a while since you had my voice on here and I'm
coming back with a bang. Well, on this episode I won't
really be giving you guys an update on how I have been.
As I usually do before the start of every episode.
I want to talk about premenstrual dysphoric disorder.
But I'm recording a bunch of episodes today and I promise the
next one, we'll have much more updates on how I've been doing,
what I've been up to, what is currently new in my life.
Like in a episode, Nataka to learn Nataka to India class
class is in session. I know you guys have heard about
PMSPMDD. Now Lisa Nanga says in Guinea,
are you PMS ING or you've had people talk about I have PMDD.
Well, I'd like to have this discussion because I've realized
a lot of people do not know what these words mean or what they
are. And I think a lot of times when
it's conversations around the menstrual cycle, yeah, women, we
don't take it as lightly or give it the much importance it
deserves. And I don't know why, but I'd
like for us to start taking these conversations a lot more
seriously so that we're able to learn and understand more.
I'm recording this approximately an hour after arguing with the
love of my life, the absolute love of my life.
He's going to listen to this episode.
And I hope he smiles when he hears me say that.
But I know why I picked a fight with him.
I mean, I'm going through a bunch of emotional stuff and I
understand how someone who's on the receiving end of these
tantrums can actually start to feel like, hey, maybe you're
crazy or something is wrong with you, but let's have this
discussion. My aim for having this
discussion is not to justify or excuse bad behavior.
It's just to create and shed light on what women actually go
through at this part of their cycle.
And I want to talk about it as I usually do from a very personal
perspective so that you guys can maybe try to understand girlies.
Send this episode to your boyfriend or your mom or your
girlfriend or whoever so that they can try to understand a bit
more. And I, I'm talking about this
because a year ago, before I experienced my first bar to
PMDD, I promised I would never have believed that this is
something that people actually go through.
You know when you experience something finally, especially
something that you've been caring about, whatever it could
be, maybe the loss of a job, grief, heartbreak, whatever it
is, until you experience it, you can only empathize and you can
only try to understand. But until you actually go
through it, this is a whole different ball game.
That's why I feel like now I'm ready.
After a whole year of doing my research and checking how my
body is reacting every month, now I can finally, I feel like I
finally can talk about it. As someone who's been through
it, PMS stands for Premenstrual syndrome, which is a bunch of
physical and emotional symptoms that your body goes through
right before you get to your period.
This is like a week, two weeks right before your period.
Huh, Madonna, let me just, I don't know where to start with.
Should I start with the psychological?
No, let me first define what premenstrual dysphoric disorder.
So PMDD is just, in my opinion, a heightened, horrible, hellish
state of PMSPMS is kind of the, can I say, normal or subtle
symptoms that you go through. Like your breasts become tender
now, you become Moody, you have mood swings, maybe you have
cravings, you know, emotionally distraught, but it's very subtle
thing you can't handle. This is something about 80% of
women go through. So a lot of you, especially who
listen to my podcast, probably understand what I mean.
You become a bit extra sensitive, you're a bit more
emotional and you're overthinking, but not too much
such APMDD. Hey, this is where all hell
breaks loose. PMDD.
The first time I ever experienced PMDD is last year in
August. I think I was, I was doing very,
very well for myself already. Like financially I was very
stable. I had managed to, you know,
consistently pay my bills in time without defaulting.
This is something I take very seriously because being
unemployed and just being a hustler, it's crazy.
I mean, I prefer it to having an 8 to 5 job, but how can I yo
sustainability? Like, how can I, yo, I can't
really ever be too relaxed, you know, thinking it's OK, I, I've
got my bills taken care of. I'm consistently thinking about
what can I do? How can I grow myself?
How can I improve myself so I can make more money so that I
can make sure I'm OK? And at this time, I feel like I
had been able to stabilize this. I had been able to show myself
I'm able to be very consistent in my life.
I was very, very happy in life. By the way, everything was going
really, really well for me relationship wise.
I had just come out of a relationship that I was in,
which I will be talking about on the blog next.
I wasn't too sad because the relationship was actually
really, really beautiful. Maybe the ending wasn't, as, you
know, good as I was. I would have hoped it would have
been. But I it's me, I was a problem
in the relationship. I was finally getting everything
I've ever wanted and everything I've ever asked for, but I was
too traumatized to act right and accept it, so I just had to let
it end. Anyway, that was not really
stressing me. I feel like I was OK.
I was fine emotionally. I was fine financially,
mentally, I was in a very great headspace.
I mean, everything was going really, really well for me.
Business was speaking up. I was, I mean, everything was.
I'm thinking of other updates to give, but like generally my life
was amazing and headed in the very right direction.
I had no reason to be sad about anything at this time.
I'm also doing really well at managing my emotions.
I had already eliminated everything that was traumatizing
me or triggering me to act out of what is normal for me.
So I, I was, I'd say I was being pretty well with myself.
I was really happy with myself. I felt sexier and hotter than I
have ever been. I mean I am sexier now, but then
the feeling that was going through my mind is that I love
my body, I love my life, I love everything.
Everything was perfect. I was pretty content.
Because of this, it was very easy for me to tell when
something was wrong, when something wasn't making sense or
adding upright. So one day, I think it was on a
Monday, 1:00 Monday in August last year 2024, I Nashin Raku
get out of bed. I was unable to leave my bed,
not because I was going through anything, but I just wanted to
sit in bed. I kept I put my phone on DND and
I kept ignoring all my calls. They did not feel like speaking
to anyone. I did not want to be around
anyone actually. I felt like everyone hated me,
like the world hated me. I started picking, pinpointing
things that proved to me that everyone in my life actually
hated me. I was realizing that, you know,
people don't show up for me the way I like for them to show up
for me. I'm always the one giving.
Basically, I was making myself a victim in all sorts of
situations. Looking back, I'm not sure if I
was entirely A victim, but I can understand how sometimes I go
through things and I don't speak up in time and then I let it eat
me up. And then one time I just end up
blowing up and everyone around me is usually so confused as to
why I'm blowing up. They can't understand because
I'm consistently happy and, you know, just happy and content and
comfortable and OK. So when I speak out my emotions,
I think it tends to shock people because they never see they
never expect me to complain about anything because I
generally I'm not a complainer. So this I started realizing that
I had no appetite and thus I was able to sleep the whole day
without getting hungry, which is very awkward for me because I
love to make sure I have food in the house even if not for
myself. My friends pop in and out and I
love to make sure that if anyone visits me at any time, there's
always going to be something to eat because I live so far away
from the shops and having to go all the way to the shops or send
a rider when you know it's just a lot to think about.
Hi, so the first day I did not eat.
The next day I realized that I have not spoken to my mother.
I called my mom a bunch of times during the day just to ask her
even the most mundane stuff about anything.
I call her a million times a day.
But this was the second day and I was avoiding her.
I did not want to speak to her and deep down in my heart I knew
that having to speak to her meant I had to explain what I
was feeling because we open up to each other.
I open up to her very easily. And at this time, I felt I was
feeling a very, very deep sadness.
But I just had, I didn't have anywhere to pinpoint where this
sadness was coming from. And thus I did not want to have
to explain why I was sad or why I was feeling the way I was
feeling because I didn't even have the words to explain what I
was feeling. The second day, the third day
came. I've not eaten, I've not spoken
to anyone. I'm not talking.
I have a friend who says if notice Roberta hasn't posted on
Instagram I always know something is wrong.
He always checks in on me when he realizes he's a colleague of
mine. So he said he always checks on
me when I do not post on Instagram because he knows it is
very normal for me to post at least once a day.
And I realized I hadn't posted for like 3 days.
Well I hadn't realized until then but now is when I'm
starting to see Oh my goodness I haven't even been online.
I don't care to to check what people are doing.
I was just staying in bed and sleeping, and I was very
depressed. Very, very, very, very deeply
depressed. I know what depression feels
like because I've been depressed before.
And for me, it always starts to feel like a hole is forming in
my chest. A deep dark hole is forming in
my chest. And then I start to doubt
myself, to hate myself, and something crazy that started
running through my mind. I should have given a disclaimer
about this episode at the beginning, but here is a
disclaimer. If you do not want to listen to
graphic stuff just stop here. I some thoughts started running
through my mind and the thoughts were suicidal.
Well you see, up to this point I really truly love my life and I
really love myself. So even having suicidal thoughts
is something that is very deviant from anything I would
ever think. I would never kill myself,
especially not intentionally. I mean, maybe on accident, but I
would never ever, ever kill myself.
I absolutely love myself. I love my life, I love being me.
I love everything about myself. So This is why I knew something
was wrong and I needed to reach out to someone for help.
Now this is day four. I've not.
I've only woken up to use the toilet.
I ate some bread that I had in the house, I think, or noodles.
In those four days, I haven't been eating, I've only been
sleeping, staying in my bed, crying, very emotional, very,
very sad without a reason for where my sadness is stemming
from. Avoiding my family and friends,
ignoring everyone. I cancelled all my work
engagements for the week, I cancelled all my meetings, I
cancelled everything that I do. Even TVI did not show up that
week. I did not show up to the studio
at all to record for, you know, my episodes of Jaguaro.
So this is when, you know, I knew something is very wrong.
And I had also built a very steady, disciplined routine
where I was walking out consistently.
I would always go for my run. I'd always go for yoga.
I did not leave my bed for shit that day.
OK, I did leave it to shit, but just that I was staying in my
bed the whole time. And how I knew it had become a
problem was my mattress. I don't have the best or, you
know, the best quality of mattresses, but my mattress was
starting to form. The shape of my body indented
into it. That's how bad I had been
staying inside the bed. So these suicidal thoughts, how
they were coming in, they weren't coming in as hateful or
angry. They were coming in as my own
voice telling me, you know, you know, Roberta, it would be so
nice if you killed yourself. How about if you just killed
yourself? You know, everything would be so
much better. Everyone that you know hates you
or the whole world that's against you will feel so nice,
and you'll also feel so relaxed. Wherever you'll be at, life will
be so good. Everyone will be so proud of
you. Your mom will be so happy when
you're dead. And for some reason, I know
this, I know this is not the truth, but for some reason I was
starting to believe this voice. So then I started to think about
ways that I could kill myself, you know, thinking should I
throw? I live on the should I see the
floor I live on? I live on a very high floor.
But I was thinking maybe I should just drop myself, you
know, or maybe I should, I don't know, find, you know, just go
throw myself in the road and have someone hit me with a car.
I was thinking of all these crazy ways to kill myself, which
is so besides anything I would ever be.
So that that is how I was able to tell that something was
deadly wrong after noticing all these weird symptoms.
I was, I reached out. There's a group, Yeah.
Should I call it funds or Love and orgasms?
There's a group I'm in where we talk about intimacy and
relationship stuff. It's a bunch of people between
the ages of like 20 and maybe 30-5, maybe 40.
And all of us there just share our personal experiences.
We talk about everything about relationships and sex and stuff.
So by this time we had formed a really close bond with these
guys in this group. And I, I went on the group and I
just wrote a message and I, I said, guys, I think I need your
help. I've been feeling very, very
depressed. I've been unable to get out of
my bed. I've been so sad.
I've been crying. I want to kill myself.
I haven't brushed my teeth in five days.
I haven't showered in five days. I'm so so deeply depressed.
My mom has been calling me, she's unable to reach me.
And during this time I only wanted to talk to one person and
me and this person had fallen out so badly I couldn't even
call them. They're the only person who I
felt would be able to hold the space for me and understand me.
I don't know but I just couldn't call them because we weren't
speaking with each other. I felt like I was drowning.
I was thinking I was so deeply depressed and I couldn't.
The crazy thing with being very self aware is that you tend to
intellectual your emotions. So I was very aware of
everything I was going through. My problem was I was unable to
pinpoint why I had these feelings because my life was
amazing. Everything was going perfectly
in my life. When I wrote this message.
The group, I kid you not, within the next maybe hour someone had
sent me food to my house. Someone else, a friend of mine
came to visit me with food and I think people starting to show up
for me made me feel embarrassed. I don't know if it was
embarrassed because my house looked like a pigsty.
If you've been to my house, my friends know I like to keep my
house speak and span like a museum.
Everything is usually in place, clean, no dust, very, very
perfect like an Airbnb, so or like a hotel.
So my house looked like a pigsty.
And this was also a clear indication that something was
wrong with my mental health. But the fact that people were
now coming around, I had started cleaning up.
I started cleaning the dishes, I took a shower, I brushed my
teeth and these are just some of the symptoms that I went
through. So this happened to me in August
and then was a month after August.
It didn't happen to me in September and then it happened
to me in October. So in September I had opened up,
I had reached out to doctors, I had been referred to therapists.
I can speak with, supplements I can take, foods I can take
everywhere. I had really done my research
and someone told me, you know what?
Check out PMDD, read about it, learn more about it, and see if
it makes sense that this is the same thing you're going through.
And so I did. I sought out all this
information that could help me. So I was already gearing up for
another bout of deathly depression in September.
But in September, I was fine. I was fine.
Nothing. In fact, my period was very OK.
I didn't suffer, I wasn't in too much pain.
Everything was very, very fine. So I thought, oh fine, maybe it
was just a one time, one off thing that's not going to come
back. Ho Ole wango.
In October it hit me ten times worse because it's like every
month it resets. The mind completely forgets.
And it's so crazy because I could be having the symptoms
like the PMS symptoms every month, you know, my breasts
start to get tender, I start having cravings, I start
becoming emotional mood swings, you know, all these things are
happening. But every month it's like my
brain forgets and I forget that these are symptoms of my period
coming. I just start to feel like I'm
going crazy. I start doubting myself.
I have low self esteem, my anxiety is heightened, I fall
into depression. I feel like I want to kill
myself and then my I forget all about it.
And the crazy thing also is that immediately my period came like
this, all the symptoms went away.
I became happy again, I became comfortable again.
I became aware again. It's like I forgot that my body
had put me through this, like me wanting to kill myself five days
ago, which is crazy. So one week before I realized
that I I would get severely depressed and this had never
ever happened to me again ever before.
I was crying a lot. I was very very emotionally
overwhelmed and I've been very amazing at myself, discipline.
But at this point during this week I was really failing.
This is how I noticed I couldn't eat, I couldn't shower, I
couldn't show up, I couldn't even speak and my default was to
mask. I thought I'm failing, so let me
hide and let me just sit in my house for those few days.
People are getting frustrated about my horrible communication
because I'm such a communicator. I love to talk about everything.
I love to talk about how I'm feeling, what I'm going through,
what I want, the things I, I, you know, everything.
I like to talk about everything. But I realized that a lot of the
people who love me were starting to get really frustrated.
I couldn't tell because it's new.
Plus my life is really, really perfect, so I really did not
have a reason to be depressed. You know, like I said, the PMS
syndrome is accompanied with like emotional and physical
symptoms such as mood swings, anxiety, sadness, irritability,
insomnia, bloating, headaches, cramps, sometimes diarrhea, all
in one week. But the PMDD was elevated.
It was an elevated state of this.
I had crazy ideations of self harm, crazy depression, crazy
hormonal changes. And I realize it's because
during this time your serotonin actually drops.
Serotonin is the happy hormone for regulating your moods.
And it was worsening my already existing mental illnesses.
You know, things like sometimes I could go through the.
I mean, if I can remember last year in August, something that
was making me really, really sad is the fact that I'm, I do not
have a present dad emotionally. So when I'm going through these
things, sometimes, sometimes I just want to call my dad and I
don't have my dad. And the next best thing to this,
he's not my dad, but he's someone I truly, you know,
admired and loved. We had fallen out and I was not
able to speak with him. And I was feeling very, very
frustrated because there's no sense of masculine energy in my
life. There's no place I can go and
feel safe to offload talking to women about these things.
Is one thing they support you a lot emotionally, but I feel like
having a father figure helps you feel like you're very, very
protected in your very vulnerable moment.
I mean, I feel the same with the women around me, but I don't
know, I'm fatherless. I, I can't tell if there's
something I'm missing out on or this is just a feeling that's
coming out of nowhere. But this is something I was
feeling very, very deeply. I felt very short, shortchanged
by the universe. I felt very abandoned during
this time. So I think it was worsening
already, these feelings that I had.
And so when I consulted the doctor, of course, the things
that I recommended are, you know, exercising, healthy diet,
meditation, but these are things I was already applying in my
life on a normal, on a normal everyday day.
But during this late luteal phase, my moods had already
started changing and I was just unable to show up even to run
the fatigue, isolation, rateability, Rying for in
courts, no reason and my appetite, it was just crazy.
I decided to intentionally track my symptoms because this had
never happened to me. But now will this happen to me
again? I missed it in September, but it
came back in October. It happened to me again in
November and in December and January and February.
So by this time I was starting to realize maybe maybe the older
I get, the more there's a crazier imbalance in my
hormones. And as I'm changing, my body is
changing Nowadays are kind of, I don't know, consistency in the
way my body is starting to act every month.
But Nah, I think your period will always shock you.
Every new month. I think I I know what's
happening. And then the next month just fax
me over again. Some doctors also, you know, try
to prescribe antidepressants and birth control.
I wasn't I'm not usually open to getting it on birth control
because, you know, birth control Fax me up, especially hormonal
methods and I wasn't really understanding much about the non
hormonal methods and you know all that.
So that's not something I that's not a way I was willing to go.
Mimi Mim 2 condoms. That's the most birth control
and abstinence that I know. And antidepressants.
I wasn't sure that this is a way I'd want to go because generally
I'm not a depressed person except the time that I'm going
through PNDD. So treatment generally varies
and that's why it's different. And I was going through all
these and trying to weigh my options.
Well, I'm talking about PNDD because there's a lot of
discrimination against women because of their hormonal
changes and a lot of things they go through, especially during
different times of of the month during that cycle.
And a lot of our efforts and a lot of the way we show up is
diminished by this few weeks out of the month where we're going
crazy. And I call it going crazy
because surely that is how it felt.
It felt like I was going crazy and my main concern was why has
no one ever taught me about this?
Why has no one ever had these conversations with me and told
me, you know, PMDD is a thing and it might happen to you
Because until it happens to you, it kind of feels like it's
something that's resolved to a certain type of people or you
never really think it could be me until it actually is you.
I was very angry that this is something I was experiencing at
28 years old. Nobody had ever had this
discussion with me all my life and it's hard for me to even
explain what I'm going through because I do not have the words
and the research to explain to maybe someone who doesn't have a
vagina or someone who's never experienced PMDD or even PMS.
And hence, this means that not a lot of people are going to be
able to come from a place where they're able to show grace or a
place where they're able to understand well.
And not everyone is such a great communicator.
I mean, sometimes I feel like I'm getting very frustrated
because I'm seeing something a certain way and it's being
perceived or understood a completely different way.
And it just makes it even harder because I'm super emotional, I'm
super hormonal, I'm in pain, I'm anticipating my period, I'm
depressed, I'm anxious. But I don't even have the words
to explain why I feel these things.
Because you know, something I've realized, especially with I
started this episode by saying I'm fighting with the love of my
life. And something that I've realized
is a lot of the times when I'm speaking with him, I'm trying
to, when I especially I'm opening up about how I'm feeling
emotionally is we're not speaking the same language.
Because anytime I tell him something that's bothering me,
his first instinct is to want to solve the problem.
And this is very natural. And I actually truly appreciate
this of let me say men or let me say the man, this man, I see him
try to jump into, you know, how can I solve your issue?
If my issue is that I'm craving something, OK, can I buy it for
you? If my issue is that I need
money, OK, he'll send me the money.
If my issue is that I'm hungry, OK, he'll send me, you know,
always trying to solve the issue.
But I realized at this time, I do not even know what the issue
is. So I'm not able to explain what
it is. And this makes him frustrated
because he's trying to come up with a solution so we can stop
dwelling in this problem, but there's a communication
breakdown because he's not understanding why such a great
communicator, somebody who's so amazing at communicating their
feelings consistently, is failing in this moment to
communicate their feelings. There's this thing called PMDD
where I'm actually not myself. I'm crazy.
I'm finding myself picking fights with you for no reason,
for no reason in courts. I feel like breaking up with
you. You know, the first thing I
start thinking is he's he's he's, I shouldn't going to be
trusting him. I should leave him before he
leaves me. I should kill myself because
that would make him feel way better because he's going to be
less stressed. How do I explain that to someone
who truly loves me and would never want to hurt my feelings
without hurting their feelings or without making them feel like
they are the cause of my problems or that I even need any
solutions to them, to the problems that I have?
Am I making sense? I hope I'm making sense.
Well, it's a whole crazy thing. I've not been in therapy about
PMDD because it's something I feel like I'm trying to still
figure out for myself. And, you know, my friend was
telling me that this is not normal.
This should not be my normal. Experiencing deep depression
every month to the point that I think about killing myself is
not normal. And I'm just thinking, are there
many, any more people out there who experience this monthly?
Do you ever go through this? Do you ever have these feelings
of deep depression and, you know, suicide ideation, self
harm ideation to the point that you feel like you're going crazy
and you're picking fights with everyone around you and you're
super, super emotional. And then when you finally get
your period and you come back, you're so embarrassed.
You're too embarrassed to even start explaining because you
feel like nobody's going to understand because nobody's
talking about it. I don't see anyone on a normal
day talking about how crazy our period makes us go.
And this is not to say that we're emotionally unstable.
It's just, I feel like there's not enough research so that so
when I act out, I feel like I'm being gas lit and made to feel
like my, my thoughts and my emotions are invalid and I'm
just acting out. If there existed a space where
I'm encouraged and acknowledged and told, hey, this is a thing,
it's happening, it's happening to me, it's happening to us.
This is what I go through. This is how I'm healing, this is
how I'm managing. This is what I do for myself.
I feel like that would make me feel much more validated and it
would help in managing my symptoms.
But for the last one year I've been feeling very confused.
Shout out to my friends who showed up for me.
They showed up. You know, every time I've been
in depression, I've always had people who've shown up for me in
ways that I can't even explain. You know, with so much grace and
understanding, sometimes more than I think I'm even capable
of. The first time I ever got
depressed, a friend of mine, she's called Shiro.
I was in primary school with Shiro.
Shiro came to my house and she washed me.
She bought, she took me out to eat.
She took care of me. I had been in the house for like
a month without even being able to leave the house.
That time I lived alone because it was just crazy, but I was
going through a very deep depression.
She really took care of me. Shout out to her this last year
when I went through the depression, a PMDD, the one for
the periods, you know, my friends who showed up for me to
feed me, to take care of me, to clean the house with me, to just
sit with me as I cry for no reason at all.
I realized that there's so many people who are so ready to be
much more understanding and much more graceful.
And these people have been women for me, largely my community has
been women. And I think that's why I really,
really get frustrated in this moments because I start having
feelings like, honey, you know, you know, that's why I start
having these feelings of being fatherless and like there's no
masculine energy in my life for me to be able to go and feel
much more protected. It's like I have to take care of
myself and to and even when I express myself, it's treated as
you're just nagging, you're just complaining, you're just
hormonal, you're just emotional. But they don't think about the
depths of where I'm actually thinking, hey, maybe I should
kill myself and then maybe you'll give me the attention I
need. And it's not me because I don't
even want to die anyway. The reason I've, I've recorded
this episode is so that we can have more honest and candid
conversations around it. So I'm curious to hear.
Tell me in the comments, is this something you've ever felt?
Is this something you've ever been through?
Yeah. After I finished recording this,
I'm going to to speak with this guy and try to explain to him
exactly what it is I'm, I'm going through.
I mean, I don't mean I don't think I'm going through it right
now, but I am on my period. And I know a lot of the
miscommunication comes from being, being super emotional and
him being him trying to find a balance of how he can solve my
emotional issues. But that's not what I need in
that time. So yeah, let me know if you
relate and if you understand and stay tuned for the next episode
where now I can give you Duck about my life toodles.