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For whatever it's worth:
A year or so ago I took myself off to the doctor because I was feeling exhausted the entire time, had no interest in anything, and was basically permanently evil. My blood tests showed a level of androgens (boy hormones) roughly equivalent to that of a ninety-year-old, which is obviously just plain wrong in a bloke of thirty, not to mention a deficiency in about twenty other things the male body ought to make scads of, but in my case has elected to dispense with for reasons which would probably make sense in fourteenth century Poland or thirty-second century Malaysia, but don't do me any favours in the here and now.
I was prescribed assorted exciting drugs (supplements, mostly), and for about three weeks I felt like a teenager and was unbearable, and then I calmed down and became a normal human being.
Now, the thing is that the body's a wee bit more complicated than just a couple of pills at each end of the day; there's a cycle to androgen production, and it can be affected by stress, exercise (or lack thereof) and diet, so I've had to learn a few things.
All of which is prologue to the few bits of information I can offer about dealing with hormones:
Know what you should be eating - and when - and eat it. Even if you really aren't interested in eating. Don't let yourself get into a cycle where you feel down and grumpy so you eat foods which increase that mood. Large quantities of wheat don't help, nor - alas - does chocolate; it makes you feel better in the short term, then brings you down later and makes you sad.
Do go out of your way to make yourself look good when you feel bad. I tend to 'forget' to shave, wear the same clothes repeatedly, and generally not take care of myself around once a month (the male cycle is approximately 25 days, I think). You don't have to look perfect, just good enough that it doesn't make you feel worse.
Exercise. I don't know the relationship between exercise and female hormones, but in men, exercise is linked to testosterone production; since women do make testosterone, and it is linked in you to mood and drives, I'd assume there's a link there, too. Swimming is a good all-round pick-me-up for me, but I try to do some light weights and cardio as well. Understand, this is something which, when I'm low, I really, really don't want to do, and it exhausts me much quicker. But it also makes me feel better both phsyically and emotionally. I'm not suggesting that, like those funny women in the tampon ads who go hangliding and rollerblading whenever they come on, you should go crazy with this, but when you can manage it physically, you may want to try it even if you really don't feel like it.
Get outside. Or get a SAD lamp. Again, I don't know what the interactions are, but melatonin, the hormone which governs sleep/waking cycles, has a downer effect on some people (me) and in winter especially it can be hard to get enough light to stop production of melatonin and wake up and feel sprightly. More, your body must have sunlight or something very like it to produce other good things it needs to get along. Finally, some kinds of electric light - notably the fluourescents used in many offices - produce negative effects (if I recall, fluourescents put out light in a purple/green spectrum, and flicker at just the right rate to make you feel ill).
For interest, I think hormonal wobbles in men are underestimated. There's a male cycle of production, but because there's no equivalent to menstruation, and because it's supposed to be more subtle, people tend to dismiss it. I have to say that I think quite a lot of men cruise around blissfully unaware of why they're being such a pain in the ass once every twenty five days, and wondering why their spot cream works three weeks in four, but seems to make no difference the rest of the time. And the effect of the tailing-off of testosterone production between twenty five and forty probably accounts for any number of idiot aspects of male behaviour coming under the heading of 'midlife crisis' - it's like being a teenager, only in reverse: much more scary and depressing. |
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) could live with. So, for the ladies on the pill, that's one to consider. If your PMS is particularly bad, you might be better with a different pill.