question for the ladies

[tsukikage]

Strange question, but... What do menstrual cramps feel like? Because I definitely do get something before and at the beginning of my period, but it's not quite like what I remember cramps from swimming or whatever feeling like. I really do imagine cramps as feeling a bit like a charlie horse, which definitely isn't what I'm feeling. It's more like the squishy bowel feeling when I drink to much tea.

Comments

[ellie-desu.livejournal.com]

kind of like a stomach cramp but in different places. Mine sometimes go all the way down to my legs and up my back.

[aikachi.livejournal.com]

you post something with tmi's and you get replies with tmi's :P

I don't get bad cramps, but basically my lower back starts hurting, and I get an uncomfortable feeling in my lower abdomen, hard to explain, but it's not exactly pain. Also it gives me diarrhea most of the time o.o but only on the first day.

The reason why menstrual cramps feel different from regular cramps is because regular cramps are related to your skeletal muscles, stomach cramps are the muscles in your abdomen. Menstrual cramps are the muscles in your organs. That's what I've come up with anyway, I could be wrong.

Cramps are different for everyone. My grandma was out of action for a week every time she had a period, hers were so severe. I don't get much of anything, but my sister gets a great deal of discomfort from hers.

I've found that for me, drinking milk helps to alleviate the discomfort, and also caffeine makes them worse.

[anchan218.livejournal.com]

To me it kinda feels like a stomach cramp as well. :P

[mrinx.livejournal.com]

I have had a wide range of bad and not so bad cramps.

My worst ones felt like someone had stabbed a knife into my uterus and was twisting it around for good measure... I've puked from my cramps at the worst of times. My less painful ones feel like a dull throbbing. Most of all, the whole experience of cramps makes me want to tear my uteris out and throw it across the room.

[carve037.livejournal.com]

You're lucky, Nastassja. My sister's are so bad that she's on the pill on a permanent basis to avoid them. I remember her coming home once from school and curling into a pained fetal position for pretty much the next 24 hours. A charlie horse therefore seems like a bit of a weak comparison, but it does sound from what she's said like a similarly muscle-related pain.

[tsukikage85.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I seem to be INCREDIBLY lucky. I'm like "blah, my bowels feel squicky".

[carve037.livejournal.com]

squicky? wtf is squicky? Noah Webster says GTFO, lol

[akaneko.livejournal.com]

I usually feel a dull, persistent pain in my belly, lower back and thighs like I need to stretch except that stretching doesn't make it much better, and if I don't avoid cramps altogether by taking medicine before they start, mine usually render me a fairly nonfunctional human being for hours at a time as I try my hardest to crawl into bed and sleep through them but can't because I can't stop writhing around in futile attempts to make the feeling go away by stretching.

[tsukikage85.livejournal.com]

Urmm... Urban Dictionary says Disgusting, icky, weird, often referring to something that is squelchy - imagine poking a vat of goo, and the sound you will make is similar to "squick".</>... Kinda like that?

[ssofdestruction.livejournal.com]

I can (almost) totally relate to you one the "I don't get bad cramps, but basically my lower back starts hurting, and I get an uncomfortable feeling in my lower abdomen, hard to explain, but it's not exactly pain. Also it gives me diarrhea most of the time o.o but only on the first day." Except I only get like that maybe three times a year.

I have a friend who I work with who will get sick and throw up the day before her period begins and then can't work for the first day or two because her cramps are so severe that she will get knocked out because of the pain.

I might have to try your solution of drinking milk to alleviate them. I've never tried that before. Thanks for the tip. ^_^