more on Menstruation + Madness ...

For those of you who this post pertains to, please do not take offense to the title. I use the word madness simply to enhance the creative catchy-ness of the title and not to infer that anxiety makes you "mad" - necessarily - although in my case, I would say anxiety most definitely does make me crazy.

Anyway - to the point...

While studying psychopharmacology for my exam Tuesday, I discovered a few interesting tidbits unique to women. Firstly, women are more likely to men to experience side effects from drugs. I imagine that this is in part due to body weight, but is largely due to a number of more complex reasons for why medications affect each person individually. Secondly, menstruation can alter the efficacy of certain drugs. Take Benzodiazepines for example - a class of anti-anxiety and sedative-hypnotics. "Benzos" include the trade name drugs valium and ativan, which may be familiar to you. Among other indications, these drugs are used commonly to "take the edge off" prior to certain nerve-racking medical procedures or flights, to sedate people in psychiatric hospitals and (as the tabloids often point out) by celebrities to escape their lives. According to Austin and Boyd (authors of my trusty Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing text), female hormones that fluctuate during the menstrual cycle can also affect response to drugs. Benzodiazepines, for example, bind to the same receptors that progesterone does (called GABA receptors) and therefore, the levels of progesterone can affect the efficacy and potency of benzodiazepines at certain stages of the menstrual cycle. 

So if you are taking these drugs, consider how your cycle might be affecting the effect of the medication. Put simply, progesterone begins increasing just before ovulation, which is approx. 14 days after the first day of your period, peaking a few days after ovulation and gradually decreasing and triggering menstruation. Refer to the diagram on my last post if you need a refresher on what hormones are doing when. So...in the case of benzos, efficacy of the drug may be altered with the changing levels of progesterone, and so may your mood. The few days of bleeding are the most hormonally stable. [sigh]. Yet again, menstruation rears it's ugly bloody hormonal head! haha.

In any case, the lesson here is to not be fooled by (nor ignorant to) the power of your hormones and how they affect your mood - natural or drug-induced. I think it's important to recognize these changes in your body, how they are impacting other aspects of your mental and physical health and to respond to them however possible. Insight into why you are feeling the way you are can be powerful in managing your emotions.