August 14, 2025 • 54 mins
Me Before PMDD: Relationship Reset Toolkit-Couples
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For anyone who's ever thought "I miss who I was before PMDD took over our relationship" - this episode provides the crucial insight you've been searching for. After taking my first break in four years of podcasting, I'm sharing the profound realization that led to my absence: I had completely lost myself in trying to prove my worth in PMDD relationships.
When we discover we have PMDD, many of us immediately launch into "fix-it" mode, researching every solution, implementing every technique, and burning ourselves out in the process. But beneath this frantic activity lies something more insidious - we're trying to prove we're worthy of love despite our diagnosis. The proving trap manifests as constantly over-explaining, apologizing unnecessarily, abandoning our needs, walking on eggshells, and seeking constant validation from partners.
This episode walks through the ten warning signs you're trapped in the proving cycle and explains why this pattern is so damaging to both your relationship and your nervous system. Your partner wasn't "vetted" to be in a PMDD relationship - they simply chose you out of billions of people because they saw value in who you are. When you shift into performance mode, you rob both yourself and your partner of authentic connection.
The challenging truth is that your self-worth isn't determined by what your partner thinks of you during your luteal phase. You weren't created to perform for love - you were created to receive it as you are. That version of you before PMDD took center stage isn't gone - just buried under survival mode.
Ready to break free from the proving trap? Check out my new Me Before PMDD toolkit in the show notes - it's filled with practical scripts, checklists, and identity reset tools I use with my private clients to help them reclaim their authentic selves.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, today we are going to be talking about where
I have been.
If you haven't noticed, I havenot released an episode in two
weeks, which for me is a reallybig deal.
I've been recording for so longover four years now and I used
to release episodes that weretwice a week by the request of a
(00:21):
lot of my private clients.
But taking these two weeks off,it's because I've been lost and
I've needed to find myself, andI will never just put something
out if it doesn't have value,if it's not gonna help you.
And it's not that I haven't hadanything to say.
(00:41):
I've had a lot to say.
I've actually, like, when I wasgoing through my notes today
about what I wanted to presentto you, I had so many things,
but I think, a lot of times inour journey because I share so
much about my personal journeyand I want to have you learn the
tools as I'm learning them andimplementing them, and because
(01:02):
PMDD is different every singlemonth, sometimes you need to see
things through and sometimesyou need to take time to
recognize what's coming up foryou.
And that's really the placethat I've been in, where
there've been a lot of thingsthat have come up for me that I
wasn't expecting and I was kindof like wait, what do I do with
(01:23):
this?
I wanna be able to share thiswith you, but I want to do it in
a way that's going to behelpful and it's going to be a
way that I have researched andall of the things.
So a lot goes into what Ipresent to you.
That rhymes.
I've been rhyming a lot latelyI'm going to figure out why but
I just wanted to say that I'vemissed you.
I've thought about you.
(01:43):
I think about you every singleday.
You are my assignment.
Any individual that has PMDD ora partner that has PMDD, you
are my life's assignment.
So if there's anything that Ihave recognized on this journey
and gotten really clear about Idon't know why I'm getting
emotional it's that you know Ido a lot of posts on social
(02:06):
media and I, you know, at theend of the podcast I remember in
2022, 2023, I just had like atagline.
At the end I was kind of likesaying, like please share this
episode.
You know, with anyone that Ican help and leave a review on
Apple Podcasts, which I stillwant you to do, apple Spotify,
(02:29):
wherever you listen, because ithelps other individuals that
have PMDD or they're in arelationship with someone that
has PMDD fine art, this episode,this show and because I know
the impact that it makes,because I've heard so many
people's like I wish I wouldhave earlier.
I wish I would have earlier, Iwish I would have known about
you earlier, because everythingthat you're talking about it's
(02:50):
resonating with me and it's whathas gone on in my PMDD
relationship.
But now the relationship's overbecause I didn't have the tools
in time.
So I will say and I'm notreally gonna put it on a tagline
at the end but please leave areview, please, you know, just
be genuine.
I will never tell you to dosomething that's not in
(03:11):
alignment with the experiencethat you've had from being here
and listening to me.
But if this has helped you, I'memotional today, which is I'm
emotional today and I've been alot of the days and so I kind of
thought, oh well, maybe I'm notready to record the podcast,
because I've been in this stateof having these real, real
(03:34):
revelations, enlightenments,whatever you want to call it,
when I opened up my books forthe month of July and I had the
opportunity to counsel so manyPMDD partners and so many
individuals that suffer withPMDD.
It magnified the level ofsuffering that I know that's
going on.
(03:55):
It magnified the visibility,like I know the individuals are
suffering.
If you find my podcast like, Iknow that you're suffering and I
know what that feels like and Ithink that's why, regardless of
what happens, this is myassignment.
My assignment is you.
I care about you.
So I was going back to mytagline.
I used to say you share theepisode and everything like that
(04:18):
and make it super, you know,official and marketable, and I
have.
You know, obviously I run abusiness, so I have podcast
producers and I have a businessmentor and I have all and I have
.
You know, obviously I run abusiness, so I have podcast
producers and I have a businessmentor and I have all of these
people.
But I noticed what happenedabout a year ago, almost a year
ago, a little bit over a yearago that I started saying at the
end of my podcast and this isvery like, none of my podcasts
(04:39):
are scripted, by the way and Istarted saying I love you.
At the end I used to say, just,we got this, which we do, which
is why I'm here but then Istarted saying I love you
because my love for you hasgotten so deep and so I don't
even know if there's a word todescribe it, because I feel like
(05:02):
every single time I have aprivate session with my clients
and I'm pouring into them, I amin it.
I've been through so manyexperiences myself where I'm in
it with you, and so when I say Ilove you, I genuinely mean it.
It's definitely not somethingthat I would say unless I
genuinely meant it.
Same thing in a relationship,but I love you because I know
(05:25):
how much you're suffering.
I know how much you're goingthrough.
I know how much you may befeeling really hopeless right
now.
I know how much that evenmeeting me and finding out about
me or listening to this may belike your last ditch effort on
your PMDD relationship.
It may be like I've triedeverything else and I'm here,
and so this last couple of weeksand I've never taken this long
(05:48):
of a break, and I know it's onlytwo weeks, but I just wanted to
make sure that when I came backand I poured into you because
that's really what it is it's mepouring out what is going on
with my life, which is how itinitially started before I took
on clients.
It was all my life, all myexperience, all what I was going
(06:10):
through.
Then, when I got my doctorate,it was all of my research from.
You know, cognitively, whatI've learned as a traumatologist
and then also counseling somany PMDD sufferers and partners
.
It is just the fact that a lotof my clients say that like, oh,
a lot of people don't knowabout it.
My goal there's a lot of peoplein the PMDD space my goal was
(06:33):
not solely for PMDD awareness.
I know that a lot of peopledon't know about it and I I
grieve that.
I think that more people should.
But my goal is to get you to aplace where you don't feel like
you are trapped and locked inbecause you have PMDD or because
(06:54):
you're with someone with PMDD.
My goal is to give you hope.
My goal is to give you freedom,because I remember giving up
hope and freedom and feelinglike, well, I guess this is just
the way that it has to be.
I guess I'm just going to be inthis miserable relationship
because I'm the one that hasPMDD and I have to deal with
(07:16):
this, and so if there's issuesthat are going on in my
relationship, it's probably myfault, because I'm the one with
the disorder and I began to getinto a proving mode, which is
what we're going to talk abouttoday.
I began to try to work on myself, which I've seen a lot of my
private clients do.
They're like on this journey ofworking on themselves, like I
(07:37):
found out that I have PMDD.
So I'm going to Google everyarticle, every program, every.
You know all of these thingsand I'm going to work on myself.
And when you get into that mode, you almost have already been
through a lot of traumaticexperiences with your partner,
you've already went off on PMDDrange, you've already said and
(07:58):
done things that you feelcompletely guilty about, but you
want to show that you'reworking on yourself.
So you start to get into thisproving mode and I saw this a
lot with my private clients andI saw it with myself.
I had been in this place somany times where I began to
think, like I got this, like Ijust need to work on this.
And then, when I get to thatpoint where I feel like I'm good
(08:19):
enough to work on this or workon the relationship, I began to,
but I wasn't doing it from anauthentic place of I'm being
myself in this relationship.
I was doing it from a place ofproving my self-worth to my
partner and it is such adangerous place to be.
(08:39):
It's such a dangerous thing todo because I did it, and I did
it for so long that I didn'teven notice that I was doing it.
And what I mean by that is Istarted acting within the realms
of proving who I was and howyou know, because when you have
PMDD, you're like, oh, like youfeel like there's a tick off of
(09:00):
your self-worth, like I'm not asattractive, I'm not as
desirable to be with because Ihave PMDD.
So you feel the need tooutshine in other areas.
So I started to do extra inother areas and I burned myself
out.
But I almost prided myself onthat.
I'm like I'm doing this and I'mdoing that and I'm doing this
(09:21):
and I was doing so many things.
The next couple of weeks we'regonna be talking a lot about the
nervous system and what thatlooks like when you're in a PMDD
relationship.
But I was burning my nervoussystem out and I was trying to
prove to my PMDD partner that Iwas worthy and I almost thought
like coming out of all of theserelationships that I've been in,
(09:42):
like every time I went into arelationship, I had no idea that
I was rewinding back to thebeginning of proving myself
again, and over this past coupleof weeks, I realized that I had
completely lost myself.
And what I've been doing inthis time that I haven't
released anything is finding outwho I was before PMDD took over
(10:04):
my relationships.
Because when PMDD took over myrelationships, my identity, who
I was, how I felt, how I looked,everything just transformed.
I was like a completelydifferent person in a PMDD
relationship and I noticed thatI took a break from dating for
(10:25):
the last couple of months Ithink it's been oh my gosh, it's
August already.
Okay, so it's August.
So about four months I've takena break from dating to just
find myself, cause I really feltvery lost.
I'm not a you know, an advocateof like repeating patterns.
If you see something's notworking, please don't try to do
the same thing with a differentperson, because you're going to
(10:46):
get the similar result.
And so I was just like.
I want to get to a place whereI'm understanding the root of
what's going on, like why do Ifeel like every single time I
get into a relationship, that Iget straight into proving mode,
I become more of a peoplepleaser.
I feel like I need to stifledown and not talk about things
that really bother me, and Ithink that I need to be like.
(11:09):
I need to be this perfectperson and I need to present
myself as like a sacrifice, likehere.
Here I am like like me, love me, all of the things.
And it's damaging and it'sdangerous because the realms of
which you will go to proveyourself to your partner is
(11:31):
horrific.
It'll take you farther than youactually want to go and I know
this from working with a lot ofprivate clients and I was like
why are you?
I mean, I see them burningthemselves out and I see them
spinning their wheels and goingthrough all of these self-help
things and personal developmentand all of these things.
And I am a very bite-sizedindividual, meaning if I'm going
(11:52):
to give you a tool, it's goingto be a small tool.
It's not going to overwhelm you, it's not going to make you
feel like you need to stopeverything you're doing and go
do all the things I'm going to.
Just let you know.
Okay, these are the holes thatI see that are going on in your
life, that are probably makingyou feel a certain way, let's
try to add something into this,let's try to fill this hole.
(12:13):
But a lot of times when youstart to work on yourself,
there's so much that you couldfind that you literally become
overwhelmed with and you startto diagnose yourself with all of
these things.
I have OCD, I have ADHD, I haveADD, I have I'm on the spectrum
, I have all of these things.
I have bipolar, maybe I have ahint of bipolar, maybe I have
(12:36):
this Like there's so many thingsthat's going on in your mind
when you're trying to work onyourself that you're trying to
spiral to put another label ontop of a label, and for me it's
not about the label.
Do I have premenstrualdysphoric disorder?
Yes, absolutely.
I'm not going to deny that andbe delusional, but the cure for
(12:57):
feeling better about having PMDDand being in relationships is
not to stamp another disorder ontop of it.
It's not for me to find morethings that are wrong with me in
order for me to find clarity onit, because, just so you know
from a doctor's perspective, forevery disorder there is another
treatment.
It's kind of like when you takea physical medicine.
(13:18):
You take a medicine and it hasthis list of side effects and
they say it really fast on thecommercials you can have a heart
attack, you can have this, youcan have this and all these side
effects that it has, and thenyou find out that you have
another disorder or anothercondition.
So you take another medicineand you're piling all of those
(13:39):
medicines on top of each other,but guess what?
They all have side effects.
So I think that individuals arereally thinking that the more I
get clarity on what I have, thebetter it is.
But a lot of times, the moreyou try to search for another
disorder, to stamp you, to labelyou, the more you're going to
be dealing with the side effectsof that, because mentally,
(13:59):
cognitively, your brain isabsorbing.
Okay, I have ADHD, I have ADD, Ihave OCD.
When I tell you and I'mmentioning those because they're
very common you could havetendencies.
I believe that I havetendencies of OCD, obsessive
compulsive disorder.
(14:20):
As far as cleanliness isconcerned, when I'm in my luteal
phase I get really clean.
I will wake up really early andstart cleaning the whole house
and everything needs to beperfect and if something is not
really, you know, intact like Ifeel anxious about having it
fixed.
And then I get reallyminimalistic and I start like
getting rid of things.
Like I do this every singlemonth.
(14:42):
Like you can imagine howsmaller and smaller and smaller
my environment has gottenbecause every single month I go
through this ADD, adhd.
I have a million ideas and I'mlike, oh, let me do this, let me
do this, and what about this?
What about this?
I'm a great starter.
With ADD and ADHD, you're notreally a good finisher because
(15:03):
you're always starting anotherproject.
And ADHD, you're not really agood finisher because you're
always starting another project.
Do I diagnose myself with ADD,adhd, ocd, all of these things?
I don't.
I know that I have thetendencies.
Again, I'm not living inDelululand, I'm not delusional,
but I am aware that a lot of myprivate clients and myself have
those tendencies.
(15:23):
But when you take on the labelof saying like this is what I
have, then you feel the need todo all of these additional
things, which, in turn, makesyou more overwhelmed, makes you
more stressed, makes you morefrustrated.
In turn, is going to impactyour PMDD symptoms.
So I'm very mindful of what Iam taking on.
So when I was on this journey ofreally feeling lost and feeling
(15:44):
like what is going on with me?
What was me before PMDD?
That's literally what I startedto work on.
Who was I before I knew I hadPMDD?
Was it before I had PMDD?
No, I've had PMDD for over 19years.
Did I know I had PMDD for 19years?
(16:05):
Absolutely not.
So I was thinking of thatversion of myself that wasn't
aware that I had PMDD.
How did I act?
I was so happy, so fulfilled,so in alignment with the core of
who I am before I knew that Ihad PMDD.
In alignment with the core ofwho I am before I knew that I
(16:28):
had PMDD.
And it took me, it was reallyhard for me to admit that and it
took a lot of work for me toget to the point to admit that.
Like before I knew that I hadPMDD, my life was great.
When I found out that I had PMDD, my life was horrible, almost
cursed.
It was horrible because then Ilooked at this label and I
looked at all that it wasassociated with it, all of the
symptoms, and it's almost likeyou're in the club and then
(16:49):
somebody turns the lights on.
I saw everything, and what wasin the club was my anxiety, my
depression, my fatigue, my nightsweats.
There were all of thesesymptoms that all of a sudden,
because I was aware that I hadthis disorder, there was a light
shining on it and it wasforcing me to do something about
it and I didn't want to.
I desperately wanted to hurryup and fix it so that I could go
(17:13):
back to my normal life before Iknew that I had PMDD.
And I went on this journey andI'm going to talk to you about
what that looked like, because Ilove me without PMDD.
Again, I told you I've beenrhyming lately Um, I've been in
relationships where I haven'tknown that I had PMDD, and did I
(17:36):
go through ups and downs?
Absolutely.
Was I more resilient?
Did I bounce back a lot betterfrom the things that kind of
tore me down before I knew I hadPMDD?
Absolutely, because I didn'tstay in that place of like, oh
my gosh, this is another PMDDepisode.
This is how it's going to be.
I didn't know what was going on.
Honestly, I was clueless.
You know how that?
(17:57):
There I think there's a sayingand it's like ignorance is bliss
, like when you don't know aboutsomething.
It's almost like it's blissbecause you're more happy not
knowing, because you're notbogged down with the labels of
what that means, like I talkedto, I used to live in Hawaii for
a lot of years for five yearsand I used to always be downtown
(18:18):
.
I mean, I lived downtown inWaikiki and I would always be on
walk runs and just spendingtime at the beach Every day.
We were at the beach and therewere a lot of homeless people
and I would see them andsometimes because everybody
pretty much wears island gearlike a tank top and shorts, like
you, sometimes you don't knowwho's homeless and who's not,
(18:38):
because they're fitting in witheverybody else, like we're all
looking like little beach bumsand we're all happy about it.
And I just remember meeting somany amazing homeless people at
the beach and in Waikiki andHawaii and just being like they
don't even like they're homeless.
They act like they're just atthe beach, just like us.
(18:59):
And I have my daughter she wasyounger at the time and we would
just have like the most amazingtime.
And I really started to thinkabout what it looks like when
you add things to your identitythat weren't there before, how
you almost feel the need toshift into that identity and act
how an individual who has thisidentity is supposed to act and
(19:20):
don't do the things that causedamage that this identity does
and you become hyper-focused andhyper-working on it.
And I thought aboutpremenstrual dysphoric disorder,
because all of my clients aredoing that Like once they find
out, especially my hypervigilantPMDD sufferers.
They're like I'm on it, I havePMDD, let me research every
article, let me get in everyprogram, let me work on myself.
(19:41):
And they do that and leavetheir partners in the dust.
They literally leave theirpartners in the dust because
they're so hyper-focused on Ineed you to see that I'm a good
PMDD partner and I can overcomewhatever PMDD is throwing my way
to be this version of myself.
And you lose yourself.
And then you become bitter andresentful because you're doing
(20:02):
all the work and you're lookingat what your partner is doing
and all of a sudden, it's notacceptable.
Even though your partner wasn'tdoing anything before, you
weren't doing anything before,but now that you're actually
doing something, you're likethey should do this and they
should do this.
And you put on, you project allof these expectations on your
partner and they're like whatthe heck is going on?
They're completely overwhelmed.
(20:24):
Yes, they're supporting yourjourney in PMDD, but they don't
understand why, all of a sudden,there's this projection of
expectations of what you'resupposed to do, what it's
supposed to look like, becausenow you're in a PMDD
relationship.
Do you know that before yourpartner even understood that you
have premenstrual dysphoricdisorder, they were just in a
relationship.
(20:44):
They were not in a PMDDrelationship.
They didn't sign up to be in aPMDD relationship.
They didn't complete a courselike the course that I have.
My partner has PMDD, now what?
Which is why I created thecourse.
If you don't have it, you needto contact me.
I've taken it down off of mywebsite, but if you really want
that course, please contact me.
Dm me on Instagram, drrose,underscore InLoveWithPMDD.
(21:07):
Same thing on TikTok, or youcan email me, rose, at
InLoveWithPMDD.
If you are in a relationshipwith someone and they didn't
know that you originally hadPMDD, and now all of a sudden
they know that you have PMDD,they're not qualified to be in a
relationship with you based offof you.
You know surveying them andkind of like dating them to be
(21:29):
like hey, are you, you know, areyou eligible to be with me in a
PMDD relationship?
They just were with you andthen you discovered that you
have PMDD.
Or they discovered that youhave PMDD and now you're just
throwing spaghetti at the walland trying to make it work and
every month you're just wishingand hoping and praying that you
make it one more month.
(21:50):
They've not been through anytraining.
I thought about this the otherday because one of my billion
jobs I do have like a billionjobs, I do a lot of things it's
a human resources director and Iwas thinking about the hiring
process.
I was thinking about talentacquisition, my talent
acquisition team.
I have a big team that doesstrictly recruiting, strictly
(22:12):
hiring.
They're doing a lot of researchon the position and they're
doing a lot of research on theposition and they're doing a lot
of research on the organizationand I allow them and encourage
them to do a deep dive on thepersonalities within the
departments that they're placingindividuals in, not just what I
see on your resume.
So when I am doing the finalinterview, I allow them to do
(22:34):
the preliminary interviews, thefirst couple of interviews.
I have to do the finalinterview where I am actually
offering them the job or makingthe decision not to offer them
the job because it's not a goodfit, or redirecting them to
another department to where itis a good fit.
I always say that if someonesays that they want a position,
what have they done to provethat they have been operable in
(22:55):
that position or how do theyhave the potential to operate in
that position and be trainable?
So what I mean by that is goingback to PMDD relationships.
If you said to someone, oh, Iwant you to be a good PMDD
partner.
Like and a lot of times thishappened like after you've
already been in the relationship, what have they shown you that
(23:16):
would prove that they're a goodfit for the job?
Are you even clear on what itmeans to be a good, supportive
PMDD partner?
Are you even clear on what itis that you need in a
relationship with someone whileyou have PMDD?
How would you ever hire someone?
I would never do this.
How would you ever hire someoneto work for you to fill a role
(23:39):
that hasn't proven a history orpotential to sit within that
role and it be profitable, andby profitable it being a
desirable relationship whereyou're getting your needs met.
A lot of you are inrelationships with individuals
that are not qualified to be aPMDD partner.
They're not qualified to be ina PMDD relationship and a lot of
(24:02):
times that's because they'venever signed up to be in a PMDD
relationship.
They weren't vetted to be in aPMDD relationship.
They were vetted to just hey, Ijust wanna be in a relationship
with you.
I like you, I love you, we havefun.
I just want to be in arelationship with you.
I like you, I love you, we havefun.
We have similar values.
Let's be together.
When you add premenstrualdysphoric disorder to your
relationship, there is a longlist of things that need to be
there, and if they're not there,the suffering is there.
(24:24):
The absence of the tools is thepresence of the suffering, and
that's what I really recognize.
And so the next time that youthink about nagging your partner
, going off on them, arguingwith them, fighting with them
about not being a supportivePMDD partner, ask yourself what
(24:46):
have you done to help them?
Because a lot of times, for theindividuals that are suffering
with PMDD, you are the one thathas PMDD.
What have you done to help yourpartner be a more supportive
PMDD partner?
Are you just expecting them tojust learn it out of thin air?
You don't even know how tooperate within the realms of
your luteal phase withoutsupport, so how are you
expecting them to operatewithout support?
They are suffering.
(25:06):
Partners are suffering hardright now and they're holding a
lot of it in until they can't,and then the reactions that
they're having from holding itin are even more damaging, and
I'll talk about that a littlebit later.
But all of my private clientsthat are partners, they're going
through it and so if you're notin a place of like, hey, I want
to be supportive for thejourney that you're in from
(25:27):
being in a relationship withsomeone who has PMDD, like I
want to help you with thatbecause I know that it's hard,
it's not easy being with someonewho has PMDD and I'm going to
repeat that because I reallywant that to set in, because I
know the ego and the pride andit's thinking about all of the
qualities that you have outsideof PMDD and you're like, oh, but
(25:47):
I'm this, but I'm that, but youhave premenstrual dysphoric
disorder which alters your moodevery single month, and you're
dealing with an individual whosemood is probably not altered
every single month.
So you're always going to havethat level of, you're going to
have to have that level ofhumility to being like, hey, I
know that we actually haveissues in our relationship and I
know that it's things that I'mworking on, but this issue
(26:10):
because I chose to be with youit's probably a PMDD issue, like
, let's just be honest with this.
Let's just be honest Out of 8billion people in the world, you
chose to be with this person.
So this is for the individualsthat have PMDD.
You chose to be with thisperson.
Why would you choose to be withthis person and then all of a
sudden feel dissatisfied, feellike you're not compatible, feel
(26:32):
like you should just be single?
Why is that?
Could it be that you have PMDD?
Could it be that premenstrualdysphoric disorder is distorting
your reality of what's going onin your relationship and how
you actually view your partner?
Because I know, for me, if I'mchoosing to add someone to my
life, they need to be providingsome kind of value.
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And at one point you thoughtthat, out of 8 billion people in
the world, that this should beyour partner and I don't want
you.
No one forced you to be in thisrelationship and I think a lot
of times you're.
You know, for the individualthat's suffering with PMDD, like
you're treating it as like thisthing has just been dropped on
your lap, like, oh, I'm withthis person, you chose this
person, and so if you'recomplaining if you're not
(27:15):
satisfied, if you're not beingas supportive, but what part of
you accepted this individual asyour person?
I had to go really deep to workon that and think about the
people that I've chosen to be inmy life, that I've chosen to be
connected with and was like whydid I choose them?
Like, there has to be a patternthere and I encourage you to go
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on this journey because whenyou think about who you were
prior to PMDD, I would thinkabout that version of yourself
and I don't mean before you hadPMDD, I mean before you knew
what PMDD was, and that you hadPMDD and all these things and
what made you choose that person?
What does that version of youlook like, was and that you had
PMDD and all these things, andwhat made you choose that person
?
What was that?
What does that version of youlook like?
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And then, what made you choosethe partner that you have?
They must have offeredsomething to you that you were
just like.
This is my person.
And so what happens is when youget in relationships and you
realize, okay, I'm admitting,you fast forward from that
discovery process and said okay,I know PMDD is a problem For
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those individuals that are veryaction-based, like they're very
proactive.
They're like okay, I'm going tostart working on myself.
When I started to prove myselfto my ex-PMDD partners, it was
not good.
It was not good because I waswilling to burn myself out.
I was willing to ignore myneeds, I was willing to do
(28:39):
anything that I could do toprove that I was worthy of being
with this person.
And I put them on a pedestalbecause in my mind, I'm like
well, they're not the one thathas PMDD.
I am like so I need to makesure that I'm this and I need to
make sure that I'm that.
The intimacy went down because Iwas less vulnerable about how I
was really feeling, because Ialmost took my vulnerability as
(29:00):
a sign of weakness.
I felt like well, I can't tellthem that I'm not on my best,
because then they're going tothrow it in my face and then I'm
going to feel less worthy andthen I'm going to be like my
poor PMDD partner, like I'mmaking them go through this
again and again and again.
And I went into this mode of.
I just felt like I needed to domore because I was the one who
(29:22):
had premenstrual dysphoricdisorder.
I really did and I said I needto prove myself, I need to prove
that I can go out and that Icould do the work.
And I needed their validation,I needed their approval in order
for me to feel worthy to be ina relationship with them.
So I'm going to give you somesigns about what it looks like
when you're trying to proveyourself in your PMDD
(29:44):
relationship.
The first thing is youconstantly over-explain yourself
.
I used to do this all the timewhere I feel like I need to
justify every feeling ordecision so that they don't
misinterpret it and call it PMDD.
I would be like, oh, I'm reallytired, but it's not because I
have PMDD, it's because, youknow, I worked a long day, or oh
, I did this Like I almost wasover explaining myself to
(30:06):
redirect my partners from makingPMDD the problem, because if
PMDD was the problem, then I wasthe problem.
I identified as having PMDD.
Therefore I was the problem.
So I was always over-explainingmyself.
I didn't allow myself the graceand permission to have an off
day.
I didn't allow myself the graceand permission to be
(30:27):
overwhelmed or stressed orfrustrated, because I felt like
I needed to prove that hey, it'snot hard being in a
relationship with me, it canactually be easy, and when I
made it easy for my partners, itwas always harder for me.
It was always harder for me.
It wasn't because a PMDDrelationship is easy, because
it's not.
It was because I made it easyfor them, because I felt like it
(30:48):
was my job too.
I felt like it was myresponsibility too.
So the next sign is that youapologize even when you didn't
do anything wrong.
Now, when I did this, Ideveloped the three things that
I tell you to always avoidBitterness, resentment and
unforgiveness.
When I started to say I'm sorryfor things that I didn't do just
(31:09):
to keep the peace, I felt worseabout myself.
I felt like I guess I have toalways be the problem.
I'm always you know what to sayLike I'm always the bad guy,
like I'm always the one that hasto be in any issue that we have
.
It's because of me.
I didn't really let my partnerknow what I genuinely felt about
the situation.
There was no point.
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I knew that if I tried todefend myself and my point of
view in the relationship, thatit was going to cause a fight.
It was going to cause anargument.
So what did I do?
I said, oh yeah, I'm sorry,babe.
And then it was so horriblewhen they were like okay, yeah,
that's okay.
But it was horrible because Iknew I didn't mean it.
I was lying to my partner andsaying that I was sorry about
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something that I genuinelywasn't sorry about, because I
didn't feel like I had doneanything wrong, but I wanted to
just keep the peace.
I wanted to keep the peace.
I didn't want to be the onethat say if things are going
really good, I didn't want to bethe one that messed it up,
because every single time in anargument it's like we were doing
so good and then you came inand so I felt horrible about
myself and so I just startedsaying sorry and apologizing
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when I did nothing wrong.
So that's the second sign thatI felt the need to prove my
worth.
The third sign is you agree withthings that you don't believe
in just to avoid having anotherPMDD fight.
I again this is abandoningyourself.
All of these things that you'redoing when you're doing these
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things are abandoning yourself.
All of these things that you'redoing when you're doing these
things are abandoning who youtruly are, at your core.
You're abandoning yourself forthe sake of the relationship and
not in a noble way, not in awow.
You're sacrificing yourself forthe sake of the relationship.
That's amazing?
No, it's not amazing, becauseyou're abandoning the core of
who you are meaning.
Your self-worth is lowering,your self-love is lowering, your
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self-care is lowering andyou're gonna start to feel like
crap about yourself.
You almost fear having your ownopinion because you think that
it's gonna be met with rejection.
Your partner's gonna reject howyou really feel about a
situation, or they're gonna gooff on rage.
They're gonna fight, they'regonna argue.
They're gonna to go off on rage, they're going to fight,
they're going to argue, they'regoing to get defensive.
You're fearing that.
So you just start to agree withthings.
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This is how you lose yourself.
This is what I mean by I lostmyself, because when you start
to do these things and yourecognize that oh wow, when I
agreed with this, even though Ididn't really agree with it, we
didn't have a fight.
So cognitively your brain islike that's a good thing.
So now I'm going to continue todeny the core of who you are
(33:41):
and just project who you feellike you should be in the
relationship, and the next signis you abandon your needs to
meet theirs.
I remember being in arelationship and prioritizing my
PMDD partners morning routine,which I talk about all the time.
And then I was in arelationship and prioritizing my
PMDD partner's morning routine,which I talk about all the time
.
And then I was in arelationship with someone that
didn't.
They didn't, they didn't likethat.
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I did the morning routinebecause they like to connect in
the morning.
So what did I do?
Because I was trying to provemyself to my partner, I started
to prioritize their needs overmy own.
I didn't make sure that I wasgood by doing my PMDD partner's
morning routine.
I made sure they were good byconnecting with them and in turn
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, I suffered.
I suffered so much because Ididn't use the tools that I had
already had in place to managemy PMDD symptoms.
Even before I knew that I hadPMDD, I had a morning routine
because I knew that, hey, when Ido these things, these things
make me feel my best.
I didn't know why.
I just was like, hey, if Idon't do this, I feel like crap,
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if I do do this, I feel great.
So I developed this morningroutine even before I knew that
I had PMDD and when I got in arelationship with someone that
was like we can sleep in, or oh,you don't need to get up and
work out, or oh, you don't needto spend that time alone.
I did it because I felt like Ineeded to prove myself.
I'm like, oh okay, I mean, I'mwith this person.
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This is not their thing, butnow we're together, so let me
just do this.
I abandoned myself and I paidfor it because now all of the
symptoms that I would have hadlessened by doing my morning
routine were now there and Icouldn't say anything about it.
I had to hold it in and it mademe have to suffer in silence,
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which leads to the next one,where you feel like you're
walking on eggshells.
You scan the environment tofigure out what version of your
partner you're going to gettoday.
What version of you do you needto be today in order to meet
your partner's needs?
Everything was about them.
I felt like if they're in agood mood, I need to be in a
good mood, even if I woke up andI felt like crap, and I was
like bogged down by fatigue andI felt like I didn't want to do
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anything.
If they wanted to do something,I was like sure, babe, sure,
yeah, let's go, let's do this.
This leads into the peoplepleasing.
I'm like, yeah, let's do it,not because I genuinely wanted
to do it, not because I evenenjoyed myself when I did do it,
but because I felt like I hadto in order to prove that I was
good in a relationship with them.
Because I felt like if I evergot to the point where I wasn't
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doing those things, theywouldn't want to be with me.
They could just be with someonewho didn't have PMDD.
And that fear made me feel likeI needed to prove myself.
And so the next thing thatyou'll end up doing is you try
to be perfect in order to avoidtriggering them.
I didn't feel in a lot of myrelationships that I could be
authentic to having any negativeemotions.
(36:36):
So every single time that I'vegone off on PMDD rage and I've
been so stressed and I've beenso overwhelmed, it's because
I've been holding in all of thelittle feelings that I had
before that I didn't feelcomfortable sharing, because I
felt like I wouldn't be perfect.
They would love, bomb me andsay all these amazing things
about me, like oh, you're sonice, you're so this, you're so
(36:58):
that and I would live for thatlevel of self-validation.
I would live for them tellingme how great I was, and so I
felt like I couldn't do anythingto make them feel that I was
less great, because I would nolonger get that love bombing,
that self-validation, thatfeeling good about me being in a
relationship, and I would justbe like, oh, I have PMDD, but my
(37:20):
partner thinks I'm amazing.
My partner didn't know who Iwas because I was abandoning
myself by denying the reality ofhow I was actually feeling.
So it's almost like being in arelationship with a bot, like an
AI bot, like I wasn't being thetrue core of who I am.
I was being who I thought thatthey wanted me to be.
I was being who they thoughtthat they needed me to be, and
(37:42):
so the next sign was youconstantly seek validation or
praise from them.
I was stuck in this cycle for solong where I needed my partner
to say nice things about me inorder for me to feel good about
myself.
I relied on their affection,attention and validation to feel
(38:03):
like I was enough, and I lovehearing that I impact
individuals' lives.
I love hearing that I'm adoredby a partner that, wow, I'm
really happy that you're in mylife.
I'm really happy that I haveyou.
You know I love you, I adoreyou, like all of these things.
I like it does something for me, probably because my love
(38:28):
language is words of affirmation.
But what happens is when I feellike I needed to prove myself, I
set a level of expectations.
I would be with someone and getto know what are the times that
they said those nice thingsabout me, what are those times
that they showed me that I wasvalid.
Okay, so let me just repeatthat cycle.
Let me be that person that theyneed and want me to be in order
(38:50):
to continue to get thatvalidation that left me reliant
on.
If they gave me the validation,I felt good about myself.
If there were times where theydidn't and it didn't mean that
they didn't think highly of me,but maybe they forgot, or maybe
they would I would feel horribleabout myself and I would be
like a little puppy waiting foranother treat.
Tell me I'm great.
Tell me I'm amazing.
(39:11):
Tell me that I make your lifeso much better.
It makes you desperate, itmakes you clingy and it makes
your self-worth go in the toilet, in the garbage, in the garbage
.
It's horrible.
And the next time is you replayarguments in your head trying to
see what you could have donebetter.
There's so many times wherethere've been big blowups in my
PMDD relationships and I'velooked at it and I'm just like
(39:34):
that was horrible.
I can't believe we just wentthrough that and I would just
like feel horrible about it,like, oh, I could have done this
differently, I could have saidthis differently.
I was always the one that took100% of the blame, even when it
(39:54):
probably was like 60-40 or 80-20.
It was always an imbalance, butI always went out of it when I
was trying to prove myself as,like I'm 100% of the problem.
So I would even look at some ofthe things that they would do
and then I would be like, ohwell, they only did this because
I did this.
I would make excuses for theirbehavior and say that they only
did those negative thingsbecause they were in response to
things that I did, making me100% of the problem.
(40:16):
And a lot of the times thatgave a level of control, because
it's like, hey, if I cancontrol who's to blame, then I
can fix it.
If the other person's to blameand they're not willing to admit
that they're to blame, then Ihave to sit there and wait for
them.
So, in my mind, it was betterfor me to just take 100% of the
blame.
Therefore, I could do 100% ofthe fixing it.
(40:38):
And so the next sign is yousuppress your emotions to seem
easygoing or low maintenance.
I have lived my entire beingand being in relationships
trying to be low maintenance inrelationships.
Oh, you don't have to pay mybills, you don't have to come
and pick me up.
I can come there, I can catchan Uber there.
(41:00):
You don't have to do this.
You don't have to buy me thesegifts.
I made it so easy for people tobe good to me because I felt
like if I made it harder, theyweren't going to do it.
So I was scared of expressing myneeds, my desires, my
boundaries, my expectations,because I thought that it was
going to cause them to not showup as to who I wanted them to be
(41:23):
.
So if I knew that I wanted tobe with this person, I felt like
if I gave them my expectationsand say, hey, if you want to be
in a relationship with me, theseare the things that you need to
do, I felt like that was tooharsh.
That was like over the top.
Like, who am I to do all thelike?
Now, looking back, I'm like,yeah, I deserve to have
expectations.
(41:43):
But I was literally thinking,who am I to provide expectations
to a partner on how they needto be and removing them from my
life if they're not choosing tobe that way?
I felt like I was going to endup with no one.
It was that scarcity mindset IfI put up these boundaries, then
they're not going to stay.
So I was scared of expressing myneeds because I felt like if I
(42:05):
really put it on the table ofwhat I really desired and I've
always been really clear becauseI'm very self-aware, I've
always been really clear on whatit is that I wanted, I needed,
but I wasn't really clear to mypartners on the requirement for
them to be that Like, hey, it'skind of like if you're going on
a rollercoaster, if you want toride this ride, you need to be
this tall.
(42:25):
If you're not this tall, comeback next year, maybe you'll be
this tall.
And that's a lot of times howit needs to be in relationships.
(42:57):
If you want to be in arelationship with me, these are
the requirements.
Every tick that's on thatlittle ruler that's saying how
tall you need to be is arequirement that I have, and you
have your own set ofrequirements, and I encourage
you to measure me against yourrequirements.
I measure you against myrequirements and we decide if
we're able to ride together, andit's as simple as that.
(43:18):
And if we can't, if I don'tmeet up to your standards and
requirements and you don't meetup to my standards and
requirements, then how would weever get on the ride together
and it not become chaos?
Somebody lowered their tick.
You know how you have the thingwhere you need to be tall
enough.
Some people in theserelationships are like you don't
have all the requirements.
Okay, I'm just going to let youon anyway.
(43:39):
How many times have you seenthat where the person is almost
tall enough to go on the rideand then the attendant is like,
oh, just come on, they're goingto pay for that, because if
anything happens while they'reon their ride because they're
not at the level that they'resupposed to be at, you're going
to be held liable for lettingthem on the ride when they
weren't qualified to be on theride.
The same thing happens in yourPMDD relationship, when you
(43:59):
allow someone into your lifethat's not qualified to be in a
PMDD relationship with youbecause you think that you could
.
Just it's going to give you alittle bit of leeway.
You're gonna be missing thatone thing.
That tick was there for areason and if you let them on
without them being fullyqualified, you're gonna end up
suffering and the relationshipis gonna end anyway for that one
reason that they were neverqualified from the beginning.
(44:20):
And the next thing is you'reexhausted and you're anxious and
you do not recognize yourselfanymore.
If you have been in the realmsover I don't care if it's days,
months, years once you get in apattern of proving yourself to
your PMDD partner, you're goingto burn out.
You're going to becomeexhausted.
(44:41):
You're going to become anxiousand hypervigilant to their
responses or their lack ofresponses, and you're not going
to recognize yourself becauseyou're going to be so busy
overworking instead of justbeing.
You're overworking and provingyourself and your nervous system
is on high alert all the time.
And what happens cognitivelyright In your brain in your PMDD
brain or in your individualbrain if you don't have PMDD?
(45:03):
As you begin to have an anxiousattachment, your brain sees
every response from your partneras rejection or rage.
They think it's a threat toconnecting, and so you develop a
lot of these behaviors likepeople pleasing, apologizing,
over-functioning, beinghyper-vigilant.
You develop that from trying toprove yourself to your partner.
(45:25):
You're proving yourself to yourpartner.
You probably have an anxiousattachment style and for the
trauma responses you know howthey have the fight, the flight,
the freeze or the fawn.
If you are trying to proveyourself to your partner, you
are definitely in the fawn modeand what that means is that the
trauma response where you try toplease someone, to avoid
(45:47):
conflict or even abuse.
You're like whatever I have todo to not have them yell at me,
whatever I have to do to nothave them go off on me, whatever
I have to do to not even letthem put their hands on me,
whatever I have to do to nothave them.
Childhood trauma for our kidsby seeing them go off.
You're walking on eggshells andyou're stuck in this pattern of
(46:08):
feeling like you're the problem.
You're like if I just tryharder, things will get better
and if they're angry, it must bemy fault.
You're damaging your nervoussystem because when you have
chronic cortisol spikes, whichis what your nervous system, the
stress hormone, is you start todevelop a lot of fatigue and
you start to develop a lot ofbrain fog and you start to
(46:29):
develop a lot of anxiety.
And this happens in a lot ofindividuals that don't have PMDD
the partners.
You're like I don't havepremenstrual dysphoric disorder,
but I have fatigue, I havebrain fog, I'm trying to
function at work.
I can't really function at work, I'm forgetting things.
I've had individuals that havelost their jobs because of that.
And then you have really bad,severe anxiety.
And then you have thishypervigilance where you're
(46:52):
constantly scanning for dangersFor the individuals that have
PMDD.
You're on high, high, highalert.
You're always like one stepaway from going off on PMDD rage
One step away, one step away.
And when you're in arelationship with someone who is
one step away from going off,your nervous system can never
calm down.
And then so you get this lossof identity.
(47:13):
You become an individual thatis tied to how your partner sees
you and how they validate you.
If my partner says I'm great,then I'm great.
If my partner says I'm a pieceof crap, I'm a piece of crap.
And so everything about yourself-worth is tied to what your
partner says about you.
And so, when I really got to theroot of feeling like I've been
proving myself for way too long.
(47:34):
I had to really dig myself outof that and it was a strategic
process and I'm going to talk toyou about some of the tools.
But I did develop a programthat's really, really going to
help you with all of the littlethings, because it's not one
thing that you do for this.
You have to think about howlong you've been proving
yourself.
What are the ways that you'vebeen proving yourself, what are
(47:55):
the things?
You've been doing it with yourwords.
You've been doing it with youractions.
You've been doing it in yourday-to-day life.
So I created the Me Before PMDDToolkit.
With this toolkit, I'm going toput everything in there that's
going to help you rewire yourPMDD brain or, for your
individual that doesn't havePMDD, it's going to help you
rewire your nervous system intonot feeling like you have to
(48:17):
prove yourself to your partner.
When you get out of this mode,you're going to see the
relationship clearly and you'regoing to be able to do things in
the relationship that are stillgood.
But it's not gonna come from aplace of proving right.
It's not gonna come from aplace of, well, I need to do
this and I need to do that and Ineed to do this.
You are gonna be in a placewhere you're gonna feel calm.
(48:39):
When things are not going yourway, you're gonna be like, okay,
I have tools on how to handlethis.
So what I really want you tounderstand about being in a PMDD
relationship is you really,really really have to stop
trying to prove yourself to yourPMDD partner so many times.
(48:59):
When you're in the luteal phase,you're always looking for ways
that you need to be a differentversion of yourself in order for
your partner to accept you.
This is for the individual whohas PMDD and the individual that
doesn't.
You're saying things like Ineed to work on my PMDD more, or
I need to work on being a moresupportive PMDD partner.
You need to do all of thesethings that are taking you out
(49:21):
of the core of who you are.
So you're not gonna be able tohave the intimacy with your
partner, because intimacy isthat closeness with the true
core of who you are.
You're going to begin to getbitter.
You're going to get resentfulfor feeling like, in order to be
with this individual, I have tochange who I am.
If your partner cannot acceptyou for where you are in that
(49:43):
journey.
It doesn't mean that you're notcompatible.
It doesn't mean that youshouldn't be together.
It means that you're not havingto change who you are.
They need to understand thatI'm in this place on the journey
.
Maybe you're working on yourPMDD, maybe you just found out
that you have PMDD, or maybeyou're working on being a more
supportive PMDD partner.
That's fine, but don't beworking on yourself so much that
(50:06):
you become unrecognizable.
You're going to get bitter andyou're going to get resentful
and you're going to look atyourself one day and you're not
going to recognize who you arebecause you're going to be
feeling like your identity isbased off of proving yourself to
your PMDD partner so much thatyou don't even recognize who you
were when you first came intothis relationship.
(50:28):
Remember, you chose yourpartner and you chose your
partner before any of thishappened.
So you need to make sure thatyou stay true to the core of who
you are.
Of course, you're gonna havebitterness and resentment and
unforgiveness if you start toact so much out of character
that it's not in alignment withwho you want it to be.
(50:49):
So don't fall for the trap ofcoming outside of yourself and
feeling like you're not enoughand you have to prove yourself
to your PMDD partner.
You should just be able to bewho you are on this phase of
your journey and allow them tosupport you and accept you where
you are, because, if not, yournervous system is going to get
(51:09):
overwhelmed cognitively, it'sgoing to cause your PMDD
symptoms to be worse and, as thepartner, you're going to begin
to have hopelessness and feelinglike I don't know what more I
could do.
I'm just in this place and Ijust I want to be a more
supportive PMDD partner or Iwant to be a better partner in
this relationship while havingPMDD and you're not going to
know what to do.
(51:30):
So remember, if you came into arelationship and you came into
it trying to be loved and toreceive love you weren't created
to perform for it.
You were not created to performfor love.
You were created to receive itas you are, your worth is not in
the hands of what your partnersays that you are or that you
(51:51):
aren't.
That is within you.
So if this episode really hithome for you, I invite you to
start a new pattern withinyourself, like I've had to do,
like I've had to do withinmyself, of finding the core of
who I am and really getting outof that realm of feeling like I
need to prove myself to anyoneelse.
(52:12):
So the link for the Me BeforePMDD toolkit is going to be in
the show notes and this episodewas really for anyone who's ever
said you know, I really misswho I was before PMDD took over
our relationship.
That version of you isn't gone.
They're just buried undersurvival mode of what PMDD has
brought into your relationship.
That version of you isn't gone.
They're just buried undersurvival mode of what PMDD has
brought into your relationship.
(52:33):
So this is why I created MeBefore PMDD.
This is not a healing guide.
This is a toolkit of thingsthat you can actually do.
So you're going to get scripts,you're going to get checklists,
you're going to get identityresets and actual tools that I
use with my private clients thatyou can use when your symptoms
start of feeling like you needto prove yourself to your
(52:54):
partner.
So, whether you're the suffereror you're the partner, you're
going to be in the place of whenyou feel like you're doing it
and I'm going to give you thesigns in the toolkit of what
that looks like.
You're going to have the toolsof what you can do about it.
So grab your copy atinlovewithpmddcom or you can
click the link in the show notes, and I look forward to
continuing to work with you.
We got this.
(53:14):
I love you.
Well, today we are going to be talking about where
I have been.
If you haven't noticed, I havenot released an episode in two
weeks, which for me is a reallybig deal.
I've been recording for so longover four years now and I used
to release episodes that weretwice a week by the request of a
(00:21):
lot of my private clients.
But taking these two weeks off,it's because I've been lost and
I've needed to find myself, andI will never just put something
out if it doesn't have value,if it's not gonna help you.
And it's not that I haven't hadanything to say.
(00:41):
I've had a lot to say.
I've actually, like, when I wasgoing through my notes today
about what I wanted to presentto you, I had so many things,
but I think, a lot of times inour journey because I share so
much about my personal journeyand I want to have you learn the
tools as I'm learning them andimplementing them, and because
(01:02):
PMDD is different every singlemonth, sometimes you need to see
things through and sometimesyou need to take time to
recognize what's coming up foryou.
And that's really the placethat I've been in, where
there've been a lot of thingsthat have come up for me that I
wasn't expecting and I was kindof like wait, what do I do with
(01:23):
this?
I wanna be able to share thiswith you, but I want to do it in
a way that's going to behelpful and it's going to be a
way that I have researched andall of the things.
So a lot goes into what Ipresent to you.
That rhymes.
I've been rhyming a lot latelyI'm going to figure out why but
I just wanted to say that I'vemissed you.
I've thought about you.
(01:43):
I think about you every singleday.
You are my assignment.
Any individual that has PMDD ora partner that has PMDD, you
are my life's assignment.
So if there's anything that Ihave recognized on this journey
and gotten really clear about Idon't know why I'm getting
emotional it's that you know Ido a lot of posts on social
(02:06):
media and I, you know, at theend of the podcast I remember in
2022, 2023, I just had like atagline.
At the end I was kind of likesaying, like please share this
episode.
You know, with anyone that Ican help and leave a review on
Apple Podcasts, which I stillwant you to do, apple Spotify,
(02:29):
wherever you listen, because ithelps other individuals that
have PMDD or they're in arelationship with someone that
has PMDD fine art, this episode,this show and because I know
the impact that it makes,because I've heard so many
people's like I wish I wouldhave earlier.
I wish I would have earlier, Iwish I would have known about
you earlier, because everythingthat you're talking about it's
(02:50):
resonating with me and it's whathas gone on in my PMDD
relationship.
But now the relationship's overbecause I didn't have the tools
in time.
So I will say and I'm notreally gonna put it on a tagline
at the end but please leave areview, please, you know, just
be genuine.
I will never tell you to dosomething that's not in
(03:11):
alignment with the experiencethat you've had from being here
and listening to me.
But if this has helped you, I'memotional today, which is I'm
emotional today and I've been alot of the days and so I kind of
thought, oh well, maybe I'm notready to record the podcast,
because I've been in this stateof having these real, real
(03:34):
revelations, enlightenments,whatever you want to call it,
when I opened up my books forthe month of July and I had the
opportunity to counsel so manyPMDD partners and so many
individuals that suffer withPMDD.
It magnified the level ofsuffering that I know that's
going on.
(03:55):
It magnified the visibility,like I know the individuals are
suffering.
If you find my podcast like, Iknow that you're suffering and I
know what that feels like and Ithink that's why, regardless of
what happens, this is myassignment.
My assignment is you.
I care about you.
So I was going back to mytagline.
I used to say you share theepisode and everything like that
(04:18):
and make it super, you know,official and marketable, and I
have.
You know, obviously I run abusiness, so I have podcast
producers and I have a businessmentor and I have all and I have
.
You know, obviously I run abusiness, so I have podcast
producers and I have a businessmentor and I have all of these
people.
But I noticed what happenedabout a year ago, almost a year
ago, a little bit over a yearago that I started saying at the
end of my podcast and this isvery like, none of my podcasts
(04:39):
are scripted, by the way and Istarted saying I love you.
At the end I used to say, just,we got this, which we do, which
is why I'm here but then Istarted saying I love you
because my love for you hasgotten so deep and so I don't
even know if there's a word todescribe it, because I feel like
(05:02):
every single time I have aprivate session with my clients
and I'm pouring into them, I amin it.
I've been through so manyexperiences myself where I'm in
it with you, and so when I say Ilove you, I genuinely mean it.
It's definitely not somethingthat I would say unless I
genuinely meant it.
Same thing in a relationship,but I love you because I know
(05:25):
how much you're suffering.
I know how much you're goingthrough.
I know how much you may befeeling really hopeless right
now.
I know how much that evenmeeting me and finding out about
me or listening to this may belike your last ditch effort on
your PMDD relationship.
It may be like I've triedeverything else and I'm here,
and so this last couple of weeksand I've never taken this long
(05:48):
of a break, and I know it's onlytwo weeks, but I just wanted to
make sure that when I came backand I poured into you because
that's really what it is it's mepouring out what is going on
with my life, which is how itinitially started before I took
on clients.
It was all my life, all myexperience, all what I was going
(06:10):
through.
Then, when I got my doctorate,it was all of my research from.
You know, cognitively, whatI've learned as a traumatologist
and then also counseling somany PMDD sufferers and partners
.
It is just the fact that a lotof my clients say that like, oh,
a lot of people don't knowabout it.
My goal there's a lot of peoplein the PMDD space my goal was
(06:33):
not solely for PMDD awareness.
I know that a lot of peopledon't know about it and I I
grieve that.
I think that more people should.
But my goal is to get you to aplace where you don't feel like
you are trapped and locked inbecause you have PMDD or because
(06:54):
you're with someone with PMDD.
My goal is to give you hope.
My goal is to give you freedom,because I remember giving up
hope and freedom and feelinglike, well, I guess this is just
the way that it has to be.
I guess I'm just going to be inthis miserable relationship
because I'm the one that hasPMDD and I have to deal with
(07:16):
this, and so if there's issuesthat are going on in my
relationship, it's probably myfault, because I'm the one with
the disorder and I began to getinto a proving mode, which is
what we're going to talk abouttoday.
I began to try to work on myself, which I've seen a lot of my
private clients do.
They're like on this journey ofworking on themselves, like I
(07:37):
found out that I have PMDD.
So I'm going to Google everyarticle, every program, every.
You know all of these thingsand I'm going to work on myself.
And when you get into that mode, you almost have already been
through a lot of traumaticexperiences with your partner,
you've already went off on PMDDrange, you've already said and
(07:58):
done things that you feelcompletely guilty about, but you
want to show that you'reworking on yourself.
So you start to get into thisproving mode and I saw this a
lot with my private clients andI saw it with myself.
I had been in this place somany times where I began to
think, like I got this, like Ijust need to work on this.
And then, when I get to thatpoint where I feel like I'm good
(08:19):
enough to work on this or workon the relationship, I began to,
but I wasn't doing it from anauthentic place of I'm being
myself in this relationship.
I was doing it from a place ofproving my self-worth to my
partner and it is such adangerous place to be.
(08:39):
It's such a dangerous thing todo because I did it, and I did
it for so long that I didn'teven notice that I was doing it.
And what I mean by that is Istarted acting within the realms
of proving who I was and howyou know, because when you have
PMDD, you're like, oh, like youfeel like there's a tick off of
(09:00):
your self-worth, like I'm not asattractive, I'm not as
desirable to be with because Ihave PMDD.
So you feel the need tooutshine in other areas.
So I started to do extra inother areas and I burned myself
out.
But I almost prided myself onthat.
I'm like I'm doing this and I'mdoing that and I'm doing this
(09:21):
and I was doing so many things.
The next couple of weeks we'regonna be talking a lot about the
nervous system and what thatlooks like when you're in a PMDD
relationship.
But I was burning my nervoussystem out and I was trying to
prove to my PMDD partner that Iwas worthy and I almost thought
like coming out of all of theserelationships that I've been in,
(09:42):
like every time I went into arelationship, I had no idea that
I was rewinding back to thebeginning of proving myself
again, and over this past coupleof weeks, I realized that I had
completely lost myself.
And what I've been doing inthis time that I haven't
released anything is finding outwho I was before PMDD took over
(10:04):
my relationships.
Because when PMDD took over myrelationships, my identity, who
I was, how I felt, how I looked,everything just transformed.
I was like a completelydifferent person in a PMDD
relationship and I noticed thatI took a break from dating for
(10:25):
the last couple of months Ithink it's been oh my gosh, it's
August already.
Okay, so it's August.
So about four months I've takena break from dating to just
find myself, cause I really feltvery lost.
I'm not a you know, an advocateof like repeating patterns.
If you see something's notworking, please don't try to do
the same thing with a differentperson, because you're going to
(10:46):
get the similar result.
And so I was just like.
I want to get to a place whereI'm understanding the root of
what's going on, like why do Ifeel like every single time I
get into a relationship, that Iget straight into proving mode,
I become more of a peoplepleaser.
I feel like I need to stifledown and not talk about things
that really bother me, and Ithink that I need to be like.
(11:09):
I need to be this perfectperson and I need to present
myself as like a sacrifice, likehere.
Here I am like like me, love me, all of the things.
And it's damaging and it'sdangerous because the realms of
which you will go to proveyourself to your partner is
(11:31):
horrific.
It'll take you farther than youactually want to go and I know
this from working with a lot ofprivate clients and I was like
why are you?
I mean, I see them burningthemselves out and I see them
spinning their wheels and goingthrough all of these self-help
things and personal developmentand all of these things.
And I am a very bite-sizedindividual, meaning if I'm going
(11:52):
to give you a tool, it's goingto be a small tool.
It's not going to overwhelm you, it's not going to make you
feel like you need to stopeverything you're doing and go
do all the things I'm going to.
Just let you know.
Okay, these are the holes thatI see that are going on in your
life, that are probably makingyou feel a certain way, let's
try to add something into this,let's try to fill this hole.
(12:13):
But a lot of times when youstart to work on yourself,
there's so much that you couldfind that you literally become
overwhelmed with and you startto diagnose yourself with all of
these things.
I have OCD, I have ADHD, I haveADD, I have I'm on the spectrum
, I have all of these things.
I have bipolar, maybe I have ahint of bipolar, maybe I have
(12:36):
this Like there's so many thingsthat's going on in your mind
when you're trying to work onyourself that you're trying to
spiral to put another label ontop of a label, and for me it's
not about the label.
Do I have premenstrualdysphoric disorder?
Yes, absolutely.
I'm not going to deny that andbe delusional, but the cure for
(12:57):
feeling better about having PMDDand being in relationships is
not to stamp another disorder ontop of it.
It's not for me to find morethings that are wrong with me in
order for me to find clarity onit, because, just so you know
from a doctor's perspective, forevery disorder there is another
treatment.
It's kind of like when you takea physical medicine.
(13:18):
You take a medicine and it hasthis list of side effects and
they say it really fast on thecommercials you can have a heart
attack, you can have this, youcan have this and all these side
effects that it has, and thenyou find out that you have
another disorder or anothercondition.
So you take another medicineand you're piling all of those
(13:39):
medicines on top of each other,but guess what?
They all have side effects.
So I think that individuals arereally thinking that the more I
get clarity on what I have, thebetter it is.
But a lot of times, the moreyou try to search for another
disorder, to stamp you, to labelyou, the more you're going to
be dealing with the side effectsof that, because mentally,
(13:59):
cognitively, your brain isabsorbing.
Okay, I have ADHD, I have ADD, Ihave OCD.
When I tell you and I'mmentioning those because they're
very common you could havetendencies.
I believe that I havetendencies of OCD, obsessive
compulsive disorder.
(14:20):
As far as cleanliness isconcerned, when I'm in my luteal
phase I get really clean.
I will wake up really early andstart cleaning the whole house
and everything needs to beperfect and if something is not
really, you know, intact like Ifeel anxious about having it
fixed.
And then I get reallyminimalistic and I start like
getting rid of things.
Like I do this every singlemonth.
(14:42):
Like you can imagine howsmaller and smaller and smaller
my environment has gottenbecause every single month I go
through this ADD, adhd.
I have a million ideas and I'mlike, oh, let me do this, let me
do this, and what about this?
What about this?
I'm a great starter.
With ADD and ADHD, you're notreally a good finisher because
(15:03):
you're always starting anotherproject.
And ADHD, you're not really agood finisher because you're
always starting another project.
Do I diagnose myself with ADD,adhd, ocd, all of these things?
I don't.
I know that I have thetendencies.
Again, I'm not living inDelululand, I'm not delusional,
but I am aware that a lot of myprivate clients and myself have
those tendencies.
(15:23):
But when you take on the labelof saying like this is what I
have, then you feel the need todo all of these additional
things, which, in turn, makesyou more overwhelmed, makes you
more stressed, makes you morefrustrated.
In turn, is going to impactyour PMDD symptoms.
So I'm very mindful of what Iam taking on.
So when I was on this journey ofreally feeling lost and feeling
(15:44):
like what is going on with me?
What was me before PMDD?
That's literally what I startedto work on.
Who was I before I knew I hadPMDD?
Was it before I had PMDD?
No, I've had PMDD for over 19years.
Did I know I had PMDD for 19years?
(16:05):
Absolutely not.
So I was thinking of thatversion of myself that wasn't
aware that I had PMDD.
How did I act?
I was so happy, so fulfilled,so in alignment with the core of
who I am before I knew that Ihad PMDD.
In alignment with the core ofwho I am before I knew that I
(16:28):
had PMDD.
And it took me, it was reallyhard for me to admit that and it
took a lot of work for me toget to the point to admit that.
Like before I knew that I hadPMDD, my life was great.
When I found out that I had PMDD, my life was horrible, almost
cursed.
It was horrible because then Ilooked at this label and I
looked at all that it wasassociated with it, all of the
symptoms, and it's almost likeyou're in the club and then
(16:49):
somebody turns the lights on.
I saw everything, and what wasin the club was my anxiety, my
depression, my fatigue, my nightsweats.
There were all of thesesymptoms that all of a sudden,
because I was aware that I hadthis disorder, there was a light
shining on it and it wasforcing me to do something about
it and I didn't want to.
I desperately wanted to hurryup and fix it so that I could go
(17:13):
back to my normal life before Iknew that I had PMDD.
And I went on this journey andI'm going to talk to you about
what that looked like, because Ilove me without PMDD.
Again, I told you I've beenrhyming lately Um, I've been in
relationships where I haven'tknown that I had PMDD, and did I
(17:36):
go through ups and downs?
Absolutely.
Was I more resilient?
Did I bounce back a lot betterfrom the things that kind of
tore me down before I knew I hadPMDD?
Absolutely, because I didn'tstay in that place of like, oh
my gosh, this is another PMDDepisode.
This is how it's going to be.
I didn't know what was going on.
Honestly, I was clueless.
You know how that?
(17:57):
There I think there's a sayingand it's like ignorance is bliss
, like when you don't know aboutsomething.
It's almost like it's blissbecause you're more happy not
knowing, because you're notbogged down with the labels of
what that means, like I talkedto, I used to live in Hawaii for
a lot of years for five yearsand I used to always be downtown
(18:18):
.
I mean, I lived downtown inWaikiki and I would always be on
walk runs and just spendingtime at the beach Every day.
We were at the beach and therewere a lot of homeless people
and I would see them andsometimes because everybody
pretty much wears island gearlike a tank top and shorts, like
you, sometimes you don't knowwho's homeless and who's not,
(18:38):
because they're fitting in witheverybody else, like we're all
looking like little beach bumsand we're all happy about it.
And I just remember meeting somany amazing homeless people at
the beach and in Waikiki andHawaii and just being like they
don't even like they're homeless.
They act like they're just atthe beach, just like us.
(18:59):
And I have my daughter she wasyounger at the time and we would
just have like the most amazingtime.
And I really started to thinkabout what it looks like when
you add things to your identitythat weren't there before, how
you almost feel the need toshift into that identity and act
how an individual who has thisidentity is supposed to act and
(19:20):
don't do the things that causedamage that this identity does
and you become hyper-focused andhyper-working on it.
And I thought aboutpremenstrual dysphoric disorder,
because all of my clients aredoing that Like once they find
out, especially my hypervigilantPMDD sufferers.
They're like I'm on it, I havePMDD, let me research every
article, let me get in everyprogram, let me work on myself.
(19:41):
And they do that and leavetheir partners in the dust.
They literally leave theirpartners in the dust because
they're so hyper-focused on Ineed you to see that I'm a good
PMDD partner and I can overcomewhatever PMDD is throwing my way
to be this version of myself.
And you lose yourself.
And then you become bitter andresentful because you're doing
(20:02):
all the work and you're lookingat what your partner is doing
and all of a sudden, it's notacceptable.
Even though your partner wasn'tdoing anything before, you
weren't doing anything before,but now that you're actually
doing something, you're likethey should do this and they
should do this.
And you put on, you project allof these expectations on your
partner and they're like whatthe heck is going on?
They're completely overwhelmed.
(20:24):
Yes, they're supporting yourjourney in PMDD, but they don't
understand why, all of a sudden,there's this projection of
expectations of what you'resupposed to do, what it's
supposed to look like, becausenow you're in a PMDD
relationship.
Do you know that before yourpartner even understood that you
have premenstrual dysphoricdisorder, they were just in a
relationship.
(20:44):
They were not in a PMDDrelationship.
They didn't sign up to be in aPMDD relationship.
They didn't complete a courselike the course that I have.
My partner has PMDD, now what?
Which is why I created thecourse.
If you don't have it, you needto contact me.
I've taken it down off of mywebsite, but if you really want
that course, please contact me.
Dm me on Instagram, drrose,underscore InLoveWithPMDD.
(21:07):
Same thing on TikTok, or youcan email me, rose, at
InLoveWithPMDD.
If you are in a relationshipwith someone and they didn't
know that you originally hadPMDD, and now all of a sudden
they know that you have PMDD,they're not qualified to be in a
relationship with you based offof you.
You know surveying them andkind of like dating them to be
(21:29):
like hey, are you, you know, areyou eligible to be with me in a
PMDD relationship?
They just were with you andthen you discovered that you
have PMDD.
Or they discovered that youhave PMDD and now you're just
throwing spaghetti at the walland trying to make it work and
every month you're just wishingand hoping and praying that you
make it one more month.
(21:50):
They've not been through anytraining.
I thought about this the otherday because one of my billion
jobs I do have like a billionjobs, I do a lot of things it's
a human resources director and Iwas thinking about the hiring
process.
I was thinking about talentacquisition, my talent
acquisition team.
I have a big team that doesstrictly recruiting, strictly
(22:12):
hiring.
They're doing a lot of researchon the position and they're
doing a lot of research on theposition and they're doing a lot
of research on the organizationand I allow them and encourage
them to do a deep dive on thepersonalities within the
departments that they're placingindividuals in, not just what I
see on your resume.
So when I am doing the finalinterview, I allow them to do
(22:34):
the preliminary interviews, thefirst couple of interviews.
I have to do the finalinterview where I am actually
offering them the job or makingthe decision not to offer them
the job because it's not a goodfit, or redirecting them to
another department to where itis a good fit.
I always say that if someonesays that they want a position,
what have they done to provethat they have been operable in
(22:55):
that position or how do theyhave the potential to operate in
that position and be trainable?
So what I mean by that is goingback to PMDD relationships.
If you said to someone, oh, Iwant you to be a good PMDD
partner.
Like and a lot of times thishappened like after you've
already been in the relationship, what have they shown you that
(23:16):
would prove that they're a goodfit for the job?
Are you even clear on what itmeans to be a good, supportive
PMDD partner?
Are you even clear on what itis that you need in a
relationship with someone whileyou have PMDD?
How would you ever hire someone?
I would never do this.
How would you ever hire someoneto work for you to fill a role
(23:39):
that hasn't proven a history orpotential to sit within that
role and it be profitable, andby profitable it being a
desirable relationship whereyou're getting your needs met.
A lot of you are inrelationships with individuals
that are not qualified to be aPMDD partner.
They're not qualified to be ina PMDD relationship and a lot of
(24:02):
times that's because they'venever signed up to be in a PMDD
relationship.
They weren't vetted to be in aPMDD relationship.
They were vetted to just hey, Ijust wanna be in a relationship
with you.
I like you, I love you, we havefun.
I just want to be in arelationship with you.
I like you, I love you, we havefun.
We have similar values.
Let's be together.
When you add premenstrualdysphoric disorder to your
relationship, there is a longlist of things that need to be
there, and if they're not there,the suffering is there.
(24:24):
The absence of the tools is thepresence of the suffering, and
that's what I really recognize.
And so the next time that youthink about nagging your partner
, going off on them, arguingwith them, fighting with them
about not being a supportivePMDD partner, ask yourself what
(24:46):
have you done to help them?
Because a lot of times, for theindividuals that are suffering
with PMDD, you are the one thathas PMDD.
What have you done to help yourpartner be a more supportive
PMDD partner?
Are you just expecting them tojust learn it out of thin air?
You don't even know how tooperate within the realms of
your luteal phase withoutsupport, so how are you
expecting them to operatewithout support?
They are suffering.
(25:06):
Partners are suffering hardright now and they're holding a
lot of it in until they can't,and then the reactions that
they're having from holding itin are even more damaging, and
I'll talk about that a littlebit later.
But all of my private clientsthat are partners, they're going
through it and so if you're notin a place of like, hey, I want
to be supportive for thejourney that you're in from
(25:27):
being in a relationship withsomeone who has PMDD, like I
want to help you with thatbecause I know that it's hard,
it's not easy being with someonewho has PMDD and I'm going to
repeat that because I reallywant that to set in, because I
know the ego and the pride andit's thinking about all of the
qualities that you have outsideof PMDD and you're like, oh, but
(25:47):
I'm this, but I'm that, but youhave premenstrual dysphoric
disorder which alters your moodevery single month, and you're
dealing with an individual whosemood is probably not altered
every single month.
So you're always going to havethat level of, you're going to
have to have that level ofhumility to being like, hey, I
know that we actually haveissues in our relationship and I
know that it's things that I'mworking on, but this issue
(26:10):
because I chose to be with youit's probably a PMDD issue, like
, let's just be honest with this.
Let's just be honest Out of 8billion people in the world, you
chose to be with this person.
So this is for the individualsthat have PMDD.
You chose to be with thisperson.
Why would you choose to be withthis person and then all of a
sudden feel dissatisfied, feellike you're not compatible, feel
(26:32):
like you should just be single?
Why is that?
Could it be that you have PMDD?
Could it be that premenstrualdysphoric disorder is distorting
your reality of what's going onin your relationship and how
you actually view your partner?
Because I know, for me, if I'mchoosing to add someone to my
life, they need to be providingsome kind of value.
(26:53):
And at one point you thoughtthat, out of 8 billion people in
the world, that this should beyour partner and I don't want
you.
No one forced you to be in thisrelationship and I think a lot
of times you're.
You know, for the individualthat's suffering with PMDD, like
you're treating it as like thisthing has just been dropped on
your lap, like, oh, I'm withthis person, you chose this
person, and so if you'recomplaining if you're not
(27:15):
satisfied, if you're not beingas supportive, but what part of
you accepted this individual asyour person?
I had to go really deep to workon that and think about the
people that I've chosen to be inmy life, that I've chosen to be
connected with and was like whydid I choose them?
Like, there has to be a patternthere and I encourage you to go
(27:36):
on this journey because whenyou think about who you were
prior to PMDD, I would thinkabout that version of yourself
and I don't mean before you hadPMDD, I mean before you knew
what PMDD was, and that you hadPMDD and all these things and
what made you choose that person?
What does that version of youlook like, was and that you had
PMDD and all these things, andwhat made you choose that person
?
What was that?
What does that version of youlook like?
(27:57):
And then, what made you choosethe partner that you have?
They must have offeredsomething to you that you were
just like.
This is my person.
And so what happens is when youget in relationships and you
realize, okay, I'm admitting,you fast forward from that
discovery process and said okay,I know PMDD is a problem For
(28:18):
those individuals that are veryaction-based, like they're very
proactive.
They're like okay, I'm going tostart working on myself.
When I started to prove myselfto my ex-PMDD partners, it was
not good.
It was not good because I waswilling to burn myself out.
I was willing to ignore myneeds, I was willing to do
(28:39):
anything that I could do toprove that I was worthy of being
with this person.
And I put them on a pedestalbecause in my mind, I'm like
well, they're not the one thathas PMDD.
I am like so I need to makesure that I'm this and I need to
make sure that I'm that.
The intimacy went down because Iwas less vulnerable about how I
was really feeling, because Ialmost took my vulnerability as
(29:00):
a sign of weakness.
I felt like well, I can't tellthem that I'm not on my best,
because then they're going tothrow it in my face and then I'm
going to feel less worthy andthen I'm going to be like my
poor PMDD partner, like I'mmaking them go through this
again and again and again.
And I went into this mode of.
I just felt like I needed to domore because I was the one who
(29:22):
had premenstrual dysphoricdisorder.
I really did and I said I needto prove myself, I need to prove
that I can go out and that Icould do the work.
And I needed their validation,I needed their approval in order
for me to feel worthy to be ina relationship with them.
So I'm going to give you somesigns about what it looks like
when you're trying to proveyourself in your PMDD
(29:44):
relationship.
The first thing is youconstantly over-explain yourself
.
I used to do this all the timewhere I feel like I need to
justify every feeling ordecision so that they don't
misinterpret it and call it PMDD.
I would be like, oh, I'm reallytired, but it's not because I
have PMDD, it's because, youknow, I worked a long day, or oh
, I did this Like I almost wasover explaining myself to
(30:06):
redirect my partners from makingPMDD the problem, because if
PMDD was the problem, then I wasthe problem.
I identified as having PMDD.
Therefore I was the problem.
So I was always over-explainingmyself.
I didn't allow myself the graceand permission to have an off
day.
I didn't allow myself the graceand permission to be
(30:27):
overwhelmed or stressed orfrustrated, because I felt like
I needed to prove that hey, it'snot hard being in a
relationship with me, it canactually be easy, and when I
made it easy for my partners, itwas always harder for me.
It was always harder for me.
It wasn't because a PMDDrelationship is easy, because
it's not.
It was because I made it easyfor them, because I felt like it
(30:48):
was my job too.
I felt like it was myresponsibility too.
So the next sign is that youapologize even when you didn't
do anything wrong.
Now, when I did this, Ideveloped the three things that
I tell you to always avoidBitterness, resentment and
unforgiveness.
When I started to say I'm sorryfor things that I didn't do just
(31:09):
to keep the peace, I felt worseabout myself.
I felt like I guess I have toalways be the problem.
I'm always you know what to sayLike I'm always the bad guy,
like I'm always the one that hasto be in any issue that we have
.
It's because of me.
I didn't really let my partnerknow what I genuinely felt about
the situation.
There was no point.
(31:29):
I knew that if I tried todefend myself and my point of
view in the relationship, thatit was going to cause a fight.
It was going to cause anargument.
So what did I do?
I said, oh yeah, I'm sorry,babe.
And then it was so horriblewhen they were like okay, yeah,
that's okay.
But it was horrible because Iknew I didn't mean it.
I was lying to my partner andsaying that I was sorry about
(31:50):
something that I genuinelywasn't sorry about, because I
didn't feel like I had doneanything wrong, but I wanted to
just keep the peace.
I wanted to keep the peace.
I didn't want to be the onethat say if things are going
really good, I didn't want to bethe one that messed it up,
because every single time in anargument it's like we were doing
so good and then you came inand so I felt horrible about
myself and so I just startedsaying sorry and apologizing
(32:14):
when I did nothing wrong.
So that's the second sign thatI felt the need to prove my
worth.
The third sign is you agree withthings that you don't believe
in just to avoid having anotherPMDD fight.
I again this is abandoningyourself.
All of these things that you'redoing when you're doing these
(32:34):
things are abandoning yourself.
All of these things that you'redoing when you're doing these
things are abandoning who youtruly are, at your core.
You're abandoning yourself forthe sake of the relationship and
not in a noble way, not in awow.
You're sacrificing yourself forthe sake of the relationship.
That's amazing?
No, it's not amazing, becauseyou're abandoning the core of
who you are meaning.
Your self-worth is lowering,your self-love is lowering, your
(32:57):
self-care is lowering andyou're gonna start to feel like
crap about yourself.
You almost fear having your ownopinion because you think that
it's gonna be met with rejection.
Your partner's gonna reject howyou really feel about a
situation, or they're gonna gooff on rage.
They're gonna fight, they'regonna argue.
They're gonna to go off on rage, they're going to fight,
they're going to argue, they'regoing to get defensive.
You're fearing that.
So you just start to agree withthings.
(33:19):
This is how you lose yourself.
This is what I mean by I lostmyself, because when you start
to do these things and yourecognize that oh wow, when I
agreed with this, even though Ididn't really agree with it, we
didn't have a fight.
So cognitively your brain islike that's a good thing.
So now I'm going to continue todeny the core of who you are
(33:41):
and just project who you feellike you should be in the
relationship, and the next signis you abandon your needs to
meet theirs.
I remember being in arelationship and prioritizing my
PMDD partners morning routine,which I talk about all the time.
And then I was in arelationship and prioritizing my
PMDD partner's morning routine,which I talk about all the time
.
And then I was in arelationship with someone that
didn't.
They didn't, they didn't likethat.
(34:04):
I did the morning routinebecause they like to connect in
the morning.
So what did I do?
Because I was trying to provemyself to my partner, I started
to prioritize their needs overmy own.
I didn't make sure that I wasgood by doing my PMDD partner's
morning routine.
I made sure they were good byconnecting with them and in turn
(34:26):
, I suffered.
I suffered so much because Ididn't use the tools that I had
already had in place to managemy PMDD symptoms.
Even before I knew that I hadPMDD, I had a morning routine
because I knew that, hey, when Ido these things, these things
make me feel my best.
I didn't know why.
I just was like, hey, if Idon't do this, I feel like crap,
(34:47):
if I do do this, I feel great.
So I developed this morningroutine even before I knew that
I had PMDD and when I got in arelationship with someone that
was like we can sleep in, or oh,you don't need to get up and
work out, or oh, you don't needto spend that time alone.
I did it because I felt like Ineeded to prove myself.
I'm like, oh okay, I mean, I'mwith this person.
(35:08):
This is not their thing, butnow we're together, so let me
just do this.
I abandoned myself and I paidfor it because now all of the
symptoms that I would have hadlessened by doing my morning
routine were now there and Icouldn't say anything about it.
I had to hold it in and it mademe have to suffer in silence,
(35:30):
which leads to the next one,where you feel like you're
walking on eggshells.
You scan the environment tofigure out what version of your
partner you're going to gettoday.
What version of you do you needto be today in order to meet
your partner's needs?
Everything was about them.
I felt like if they're in agood mood, I need to be in a
good mood, even if I woke up andI felt like crap, and I was
like bogged down by fatigue andI felt like I didn't want to do
(35:53):
anything.
If they wanted to do something,I was like sure, babe, sure,
yeah, let's go, let's do this.
This leads into the peoplepleasing.
I'm like, yeah, let's do it,not because I genuinely wanted
to do it, not because I evenenjoyed myself when I did do it,
but because I felt like I hadto in order to prove that I was
good in a relationship with them.
Because I felt like if I evergot to the point where I wasn't
(36:14):
doing those things, theywouldn't want to be with me.
They could just be with someonewho didn't have PMDD.
And that fear made me feel likeI needed to prove myself.
And so the next thing thatyou'll end up doing is you try
to be perfect in order to avoidtriggering them.
I didn't feel in a lot of myrelationships that I could be
authentic to having any negativeemotions.
(36:36):
So every single time that I'vegone off on PMDD rage and I've
been so stressed and I've beenso overwhelmed, it's because
I've been holding in all of thelittle feelings that I had
before that I didn't feelcomfortable sharing, because I
felt like I wouldn't be perfect.
They would love, bomb me andsay all these amazing things
about me, like oh, you're sonice, you're so this, you're so
(36:58):
that and I would live for thatlevel of self-validation.
I would live for them tellingme how great I was, and so I
felt like I couldn't do anythingto make them feel that I was
less great, because I would nolonger get that love bombing,
that self-validation, thatfeeling good about me being in a
relationship, and I would justbe like, oh, I have PMDD, but my
(37:20):
partner thinks I'm amazing.
My partner didn't know who Iwas because I was abandoning
myself by denying the reality ofhow I was actually feeling.
So it's almost like being in arelationship with a bot, like an
AI bot, like I wasn't being thetrue core of who I am.
I was being who I thought thatthey wanted me to be.
I was being who they thoughtthat they needed me to be, and
(37:42):
so the next sign was youconstantly seek validation or
praise from them.
I was stuck in this cycle for solong where I needed my partner
to say nice things about me inorder for me to feel good about
myself.
I relied on their affection,attention and validation to feel
(38:03):
like I was enough, and I lovehearing that I impact
individuals' lives.
I love hearing that I'm adoredby a partner that, wow, I'm
really happy that you're in mylife.
I'm really happy that I haveyou.
You know I love you, I adoreyou, like all of these things.
I like it does something for me, probably because my love
(38:28):
language is words of affirmation.
But what happens is when I feellike I needed to prove myself, I
set a level of expectations.
I would be with someone and getto know what are the times that
they said those nice thingsabout me, what are those times
that they showed me that I wasvalid.
Okay, so let me just repeatthat cycle.
Let me be that person that theyneed and want me to be in order
(38:50):
to continue to get thatvalidation that left me reliant
on.
If they gave me the validation,I felt good about myself.
If there were times where theydidn't and it didn't mean that
they didn't think highly of me,but maybe they forgot, or maybe
they would I would feel horribleabout myself and I would be
like a little puppy waiting foranother treat.
Tell me I'm great.
Tell me I'm amazing.
(39:11):
Tell me that I make your lifeso much better.
It makes you desperate, itmakes you clingy and it makes
your self-worth go in the toilet, in the garbage, in the garbage
.
It's horrible.
And the next time is you replayarguments in your head trying to
see what you could have donebetter.
There's so many times wherethere've been big blowups in my
PMDD relationships and I'velooked at it and I'm just like
(39:34):
that was horrible.
I can't believe we just wentthrough that and I would just
like feel horrible about it,like, oh, I could have done this
differently, I could have saidthis differently.
I was always the one that took100% of the blame, even when it
(39:54):
probably was like 60-40 or 80-20.
It was always an imbalance, butI always went out of it when I
was trying to prove myself as,like I'm 100% of the problem.
So I would even look at some ofthe things that they would do
and then I would be like, ohwell, they only did this because
I did this.
I would make excuses for theirbehavior and say that they only
did those negative thingsbecause they were in response to
things that I did, making me100% of the problem.
(40:16):
And a lot of the times thatgave a level of control, because
it's like, hey, if I cancontrol who's to blame, then I
can fix it.
If the other person's to blameand they're not willing to admit
that they're to blame, then Ihave to sit there and wait for
them.
So, in my mind, it was betterfor me to just take 100% of the
blame.
Therefore, I could do 100% ofthe fixing it.
(40:38):
And so the next sign is yousuppress your emotions to seem
easygoing or low maintenance.
I have lived my entire beingand being in relationships
trying to be low maintenance inrelationships.
Oh, you don't have to pay mybills, you don't have to come
and pick me up.
I can come there, I can catchan Uber there.
(41:00):
You don't have to do this.
You don't have to buy me thesegifts.
I made it so easy for people tobe good to me because I felt
like if I made it harder, theyweren't going to do it.
So I was scared of expressing myneeds, my desires, my
boundaries, my expectations,because I thought that it was
going to cause them to not showup as to who I wanted them to be
(41:23):
.
So if I knew that I wanted tobe with this person, I felt like
if I gave them my expectationsand say, hey, if you want to be
in a relationship with me, theseare the things that you need to
do, I felt like that was tooharsh.
That was like over the top.
Like, who am I to do all thelike?
Now, looking back, I'm like,yeah, I deserve to have
expectations.
(41:43):
But I was literally thinking,who am I to provide expectations
to a partner on how they needto be and removing them from my
life if they're not choosing tobe that way?
I felt like I was going to endup with no one.
It was that scarcity mindset IfI put up these boundaries, then
they're not going to stay.
So I was scared of expressing myneeds because I felt like if I
(42:05):
really put it on the table ofwhat I really desired and I've
always been really clear becauseI'm very self-aware, I've
always been really clear on whatit is that I wanted, I needed,
but I wasn't really clear to mypartners on the requirement for
them to be that Like, hey, it'skind of like if you're going on
a rollercoaster, if you want toride this ride, you need to be
this tall.
(42:25):
If you're not this tall, comeback next year, maybe you'll be
this tall.
And that's a lot of times howit needs to be in relationships.
(42:57):
If you want to be in arelationship with me, these are
the requirements.
Every tick that's on thatlittle ruler that's saying how
tall you need to be is arequirement that I have, and you
have your own set ofrequirements, and I encourage
you to measure me against yourrequirements.
I measure you against myrequirements and we decide if
we're able to ride together, andit's as simple as that.
(43:18):
And if we can't, if I don'tmeet up to your standards and
requirements and you don't meetup to my standards and
requirements, then how would weever get on the ride together
and it not become chaos?
Somebody lowered their tick.
You know how you have the thingwhere you need to be tall
enough.
Some people in theserelationships are like you don't
have all the requirements.
Okay, I'm just going to let youon anyway.
(43:39):
How many times have you seenthat where the person is almost
tall enough to go on the rideand then the attendant is like,
oh, just come on, they're goingto pay for that, because if
anything happens while they'reon their ride because they're
not at the level that they'resupposed to be at, you're going
to be held liable for lettingthem on the ride when they
weren't qualified to be on theride.
The same thing happens in yourPMDD relationship, when you
(43:59):
allow someone into your lifethat's not qualified to be in a
PMDD relationship with youbecause you think that you could
.
Just it's going to give you alittle bit of leeway.
You're gonna be missing thatone thing.
That tick was there for areason and if you let them on
without them being fullyqualified, you're gonna end up
suffering and the relationshipis gonna end anyway for that one
reason that they were neverqualified from the beginning.
(44:20):
And the next thing is you'reexhausted and you're anxious and
you do not recognize yourselfanymore.
If you have been in the realmsover I don't care if it's days,
months, years once you get in apattern of proving yourself to
your PMDD partner, you're goingto burn out.
You're going to becomeexhausted.
(44:41):
You're going to become anxiousand hypervigilant to their
responses or their lack ofresponses, and you're not going
to recognize yourself becauseyou're going to be so busy
overworking instead of justbeing.
You're overworking and provingyourself and your nervous system
is on high alert all the time.
And what happens cognitivelyright In your brain in your PMDD
brain or in your individualbrain if you don't have PMDD?
(45:03):
As you begin to have an anxiousattachment, your brain sees
every response from your partneras rejection or rage.
They think it's a threat toconnecting, and so you develop a
lot of these behaviors likepeople pleasing, apologizing,
over-functioning, beinghyper-vigilant.
You develop that from trying toprove yourself to your partner.
(45:25):
You're proving yourself to yourpartner.
You probably have an anxiousattachment style and for the
trauma responses you know howthey have the fight, the flight,
the freeze or the fawn.
If you are trying to proveyourself to your partner, you
are definitely in the fawn modeand what that means is that the
trauma response where you try toplease someone, to avoid
(45:47):
conflict or even abuse.
You're like whatever I have todo to not have them yell at me,
whatever I have to do to nothave them go off on me, whatever
I have to do to not even letthem put their hands on me,
whatever I have to do to nothave them.
Childhood trauma for our kidsby seeing them go off.
You're walking on eggshells andyou're stuck in this pattern of
(46:08):
feeling like you're the problem.
You're like if I just tryharder, things will get better
and if they're angry, it must bemy fault.
You're damaging your nervoussystem because when you have
chronic cortisol spikes, whichis what your nervous system, the
stress hormone, is you start todevelop a lot of fatigue and
you start to develop a lot ofbrain fog and you start to
(46:29):
develop a lot of anxiety.
And this happens in a lot ofindividuals that don't have PMDD
the partners.
You're like I don't havepremenstrual dysphoric disorder,
but I have fatigue, I havebrain fog, I'm trying to
function at work.
I can't really function at work, I'm forgetting things.
I've had individuals that havelost their jobs because of that.
And then you have really bad,severe anxiety.
And then you have thishypervigilance where you're
(46:52):
constantly scanning for dangersFor the individuals that have
PMDD.
You're on high, high, highalert.
You're always like one stepaway from going off on PMDD rage
One step away, one step away.
And when you're in arelationship with someone who is
one step away from going off,your nervous system can never
calm down.
And then so you get this lossof identity.
(47:13):
You become an individual thatis tied to how your partner sees
you and how they validate you.
If my partner says I'm great,then I'm great.
If my partner says I'm a pieceof crap, I'm a piece of crap.
And so everything about yourself-worth is tied to what your
partner says about you.
And so, when I really got to theroot of feeling like I've been
proving myself for way too long.
(47:34):
I had to really dig myself outof that and it was a strategic
process and I'm going to talk toyou about some of the tools.
But I did develop a programthat's really, really going to
help you with all of the littlethings, because it's not one
thing that you do for this.
You have to think about howlong you've been proving
yourself.
What are the ways that you'vebeen proving yourself, what are
(47:55):
the things?
You've been doing it with yourwords.
You've been doing it with youractions.
You've been doing it in yourday-to-day life.
So I created the Me Before PMDDToolkit.
With this toolkit, I'm going toput everything in there that's
going to help you rewire yourPMDD brain or, for your
individual that doesn't havePMDD, it's going to help you
rewire your nervous system intonot feeling like you have to
(48:17):
prove yourself to your partner.
When you get out of this mode,you're going to see the
relationship clearly and you'regoing to be able to do things in
the relationship that are stillgood.
But it's not gonna come from aplace of proving right.
It's not gonna come from aplace of, well, I need to do
this and I need to do that and Ineed to do this.
You are gonna be in a placewhere you're gonna feel calm.
(48:39):
When things are not going yourway, you're gonna be like, okay,
I have tools on how to handlethis.
So what I really want you tounderstand about being in a PMDD
relationship is you really,really really have to stop
trying to prove yourself to yourPMDD partner so many times.
(48:59):
When you're in the luteal phase,you're always looking for ways
that you need to be a differentversion of yourself in order for
your partner to accept you.
This is for the individual whohas PMDD and the individual that
doesn't.
You're saying things like Ineed to work on my PMDD more, or
I need to work on being a moresupportive PMDD partner.
You need to do all of thesethings that are taking you out
(49:21):
of the core of who you are.
So you're not gonna be able tohave the intimacy with your
partner, because intimacy isthat closeness with the true
core of who you are.
You're going to begin to getbitter.
You're going to get resentfulfor feeling like, in order to be
with this individual, I have tochange who I am.
If your partner cannot acceptyou for where you are in that
(49:43):
journey.
It doesn't mean that you're notcompatible.
It doesn't mean that youshouldn't be together.
It means that you're not havingto change who you are.
They need to understand thatI'm in this place on the journey
.
Maybe you're working on yourPMDD, maybe you just found out
that you have PMDD, or maybeyou're working on being a more
supportive PMDD partner.
That's fine, but don't beworking on yourself so much that
(50:06):
you become unrecognizable.
You're going to get bitter andyou're going to get resentful
and you're going to look atyourself one day and you're not
going to recognize who you arebecause you're going to be
feeling like your identity isbased off of proving yourself to
your PMDD partner so much thatyou don't even recognize who you
were when you first came intothis relationship.
(50:28):
Remember, you chose yourpartner and you chose your
partner before any of thishappened.
So you need to make sure thatyou stay true to the core of who
you are.
Of course, you're gonna havebitterness and resentment and
unforgiveness if you start toact so much out of character
that it's not in alignment withwho you want it to be.
(50:49):
So don't fall for the trap ofcoming outside of yourself and
feeling like you're not enoughand you have to prove yourself
to your PMDD partner.
You should just be able to bewho you are on this phase of
your journey and allow them tosupport you and accept you where
you are, because, if not, yournervous system is going to get
(51:09):
overwhelmed cognitively, it'sgoing to cause your PMDD
symptoms to be worse and, as thepartner, you're going to begin
to have hopelessness and feelinglike I don't know what more I
could do.
I'm just in this place and Ijust I want to be a more
supportive PMDD partner or Iwant to be a better partner in
this relationship while havingPMDD and you're not going to
know what to do.
(51:30):
So remember, if you came into arelationship and you came into
it trying to be loved and toreceive love you weren't created
to perform for it.
You were not created to performfor love.
You were created to receive itas you are, your worth is not in
the hands of what your partnersays that you are or that you
(51:51):
aren't.
That is within you.
So if this episode really hithome for you, I invite you to
start a new pattern withinyourself, like I've had to do,
like I've had to do withinmyself, of finding the core of
who I am and really getting outof that realm of feeling like I
need to prove myself to anyoneelse.
(52:12):
So the link for the Me BeforePMDD toolkit is going to be in
the show notes and this episodewas really for anyone who's ever
said you know, I really misswho I was before PMDD took over
our relationship.
That version of you isn't gone.
They're just buried undersurvival mode of what PMDD has
brought into your relationship.
That version of you isn't gone.
They're just buried undersurvival mode of what PMDD has
brought into your relationship.
(52:33):
So this is why I created MeBefore PMDD.
This is not a healing guide.
This is a toolkit of thingsthat you can actually do.
So you're going to get scripts,you're going to get checklists,
you're going to get identityresets and actual tools that I
use with my private clients thatyou can use when your symptoms
start of feeling like you needto prove yourself to your
(52:54):
partner.
So, whether you're the suffereror you're the partner, you're
going to be in the place of whenyou feel like you're doing it
and I'm going to give you thesigns in the toolkit of what
that looks like.
You're going to have the toolsof what you can do about it.
So grab your copy atinlovewithpmddcom or you can
click the link in the show notes, and I look forward to
continuing to work with you.
We got this.
(53:14):
I love you.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Herd with Colin Cowherd
The Herd with Colin Cowherd is a thought-provoking, opinionated, and topic-driven journey through the top sports stories of the day.