Speaker 1 (00:20):
PMDD shaped my life for 17 years before I could name it, I spent those years searching for answers, questioning my sanity, and desperately seeking treatments that actually worked. My painful journey had an unexpected twist. Helping others heal from PMDD became my life's purpose. Hi, I'm Jess, a board certified nutritional therapist coach, the founder of her mood mentor, and your host. This is PMDD PEP Talk, A weekly reminder that your suffering is real, your experience is valid, and your future is brighter than your symptoms suggest. Each week, we're going to explore the truths about PMDD that nobody talks about, the kind of truths that shift something deep inside you and make you think maybe there's more possible than I imagined. Whether you're in the depths of luteal darkness or riding the clarity of your follicular phase, you're exactly where you need to be because here's what I know for sure.
(01:18):
Healing PMDD isn't just about managing symptoms, it's about transforming your life. This challenge, as brutal as it can be, is an invitation to know yourself more deeply and live a more joyful purpose filled life. PMDD might feel like your whole story, but it's just a chapter and you get to write what comes next. Welcome to PMDD, PEP Talk, quick pep talk, pause. Remember that everything we talk about here is meant to educate and inspire. Always team up with your healthcare provider for personal medical advice. All right, now, let's get into it. Hello. Hello. I am getting ready for a busy day of client calls, but before I get into that, I wanted to have a quick chat with you about the most common thing I hear from my students in my PMDD rehab and nutritional therapy program. And this is really a myth, both a mindset, myth and kind of a physiological myth when it comes to health and wellness.
(02:27):
It makes sense that we would end up here, but we think that the remedy to what ails us must match the intensity of the symptom. So let me say that another way. When I was dealing with severe premenstrual symptoms that were undiagnosed and misdiagnosed, this was before I got A-P-M-D-D diagnosis. I thought these symptoms are so severe. I need a surgery. I need a medication, something that's equally intense to match the severity of the symptoms. Now, that's logical, but what I have seen over and over in my six years of learning to reduce and manage my own symptoms and what I see over and over with the hundreds now thousands of PMDD students I've worked with is that that is not the truth, thank goodness. The truth is small changes make a big difference, especially when those changes are targeted. When we have support, when those changes find some measure of consistency, when we're monitoring the efficacy of the changes, is the change helping?
(04:00):
Is the change hurting? Is the change neutral? Right now, we actually have to monitor those things because our brains are not super reliable. But the message of today's chat, the message of today's PEP doc is that small changes make a big difference. If you're dealing with severe premenstrual symptoms, whether they be physical or whether they be psychological, small changes, thank goodness can make a huge difference in reducing and helping you better manage those symptoms. For myself, a way that I hold this truth, a way that I continue to stay motivated to do this is by repeating the saying, little by little, day by day, little by little, day by day, I work towards healing. Little by little day by day I take care of myself little by little day by day, I work to become the version of myself that I want to be and know that I can be. It's a continual evolution. There's no start and end point when it comes to health. And this is true also in the context of managing and reducing PMDD symptoms.
(05:30):
The intervention doesn't need to match the severity of your pain, and we can see this play out in other realms. So this is where I want to talk to you about what is called the compound effect. This is where small daily habits in your health relationships, personal growth, even financial savings, investments, that small consistent action compounds over time into significant results. So let's use an economic example here. Let's say you invest $5 per day into a retirement account that adds up to $35 per week, $150 per month, and $1,825 per year. We'll use about a 7% average annual return over 10 years. This accounts for inflation and the growth of the stock market. If you invested in just the regular s and p. And so in one year, $1,825 becomes $1,953. After 10 years, that yearly investment of $1,825 becomes $32,241. So this is an example of compound interest in the economic financial realm.
(06:57):
But like I said, compound interest comes from making health decisions, comes from your small daily habits. And there's a quote I want to share. I don't know who said this, so let me know in the comments of you do. But every action you take is a vote for the type of person you want to become. When we're looking at reducing and managing PMDD symptoms and we're understanding that the remedy does not have to match the intensity of the symptom and that small changes make a big difference, every single choice you are making in your day can support symptom reduction in management can be neutral or can hinder symptom reduction in management. This puts you in the driver's seat. This gives you autonomy. This gives you agency over your body and your health, and this is the truth when it comes to reducing and managing PMDD symptoms.
(07:56):
PMS symptoms, really any health condition, it even, we can shift it into the home realm as well. Let's do an example there. So say I want my house to be cleaner. I could clean once per week for an hour, or I could clean 15 minutes a day. That's a reasonable amount of time to clean per day, and I would end up cleaning an hour and 75 minutes per week. So if I spend one hour cleaning per week versus 15 minutes per day, I'm cleaning more with the 15 minutes per day by almost an extra hour than if I was just to clean one hour per week and cleaning 15 minutes per day. I can get a lot of cleaning done. If I turn on some tool and power out my premenstrual rage in 15 minutes, where on the day to day my home is going to be cleaner than if I just clean it for one hour per week.
(08:58):
I'm hoping this is helping you feel more empowered, more energized, more excited about the prospect of you learning to reduce and manage severe premenstrual symptoms over the long-term. When you recognize it doesn't require an overhaul of your entire life, it doesn't require you tomorrow becoming a different person, changing every aspect of your life, that these small focused actions little by little day by day can transform your experience with PMDD and can transform your life because you're getting days, weeks, and months of your life back from struggling with these symptoms. I see it every day with my PMDD rehab students. I see it every day with my one to one coaching clients. This is possible for you. Finding out what those actions are are going to look a little bit different for every person. But I'm here to support you in finding out what those are. You can find me and over 500 other PM DDRs in our PMTD rehab community where we're all working to heal instead of deal with our premenstrual symptoms. I hope to see you there.
