Yes, it’s common to have constipation or even diarrhea, or both, with PMS or menstruation. The idea is that the same hormones that cause uterine cramping also affect the muscles of the gut, which can mess with your digestion and bowel movements.
Yep, well for me it certainly did. Yuk. Nothing more delightful than the combination of blood and loose bowel movements. I used to joke about it being like having a Peter Greenway movie being filmed in my toilet for a few days every month. :-) Well, dear, you asked! Be careful what you ask.
I’m kind of glad I’m done with all that; that I know longer live at “the intersection of PMS and Waste.” Those are rather messy little cross streets. I put in all my years and now I’m done.
Also, when I’m starting to get into the “period zone” (Just before, and a little during), I want to eat everything that’s not nailed down, especially if it’s sugary or a good rare steak. Extra food + the poops = even more gross.
If I ever run for public office, I hope the media pundits don’t figure out I’m Laureth from Fluther.
For what it’s worth everything about my period is milder when I’m good about exercising. I think it must effect the amount of hormones released during the menses because the flow is significantly lighter and I won’t get cramps or repercussions in my gut. The later two are an unpredictable part of my period otherwise.
No research to back me up. Science doesn’t seem to have gotten around to really studying the effects of exercise on the menses, but for me it works like a charm. Put my uterus in a double blind study and I know exactly how she’ll preform.
The day I get my period I almost always have a bowel movement that is on the side of diahrrea. It’s never severe or unpleasant though, I just really have to go!
@Simone_De_Beauvoir You’re lucky then. I had about thirty years of it. Blood and loose stools, every month. But, that’s just the way it was for me and I managed. Still, I really could have done without it, had I been given a choice. It was just the way my body worked.
@Simone_De_Beauvoir I’ve heard that the more trouble you have with cramps the more likely you are to experience this, which is related to my post above about how the same hormones affect the uterus and the gut.
I don’t know if that is true for everyone, but it is for me. PMS for me is like the “stomach flu.” I’m cold, I’m sore, I’m exhausted, my cramps are debilitating, and I have nausea and diarrhea, sometimes I have pain bad enough to make me throw up. Basically I’m out of commission for at least 2 days out of every month. Sometimes 3.
Thank god I don’t gain weight during my period, but the past few months I have gotten extremely nauseous the day before, which is new to me. God thats fun.
@Simone_De_Beauvoir It’s an irregular part of my period so it took me a while to connect the two since I’d never heard of it either. For the longest time I’d think mother nature was being especially cruel giving me cramps and the trots. I really didn’t fully know it was a normal part of menstruation until one day, while visiting a good female friend while it was going on, I asked her if she ever had something like it. She told me what @ANef_is_Enuf said.
It’s pretty amazing a symptom as widespread as this one appears to be could be so completely unacknowledged. I think I was 23 when I actually confirmed it was a legit part of menstruation. That’s just crazy.