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Depression Updates January 10, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : Depression , trackback

Disclaimer: This post is going to discuss female hormonal changes. If you have issues with words like Blood, Menstruation, Cycle, Period and other words like this…  Then DON’T READ!

So I had my appointment yesterday. The upshot is that the week of menstruation, I should increase my medicines to 90mg, but then drop back to 60 mg. I need to track all of this to understand what is happening when.

Cymb@lta has been great. I am very happy with how it works. However, the hormonal issues surrounding a woman’s menstrual cycle wreaks havoc on everything.

A friend of mine often said "Never trust anything that bleeds for a week and lives". I sometimes agree with that. But seriously, a female is caught is a terrible roller coaster of hormones every month. At the beginning of the cycle, starting with menstruation, we suffer from a crash of progesterone. We believe this is what is triggering my depression. Then after the progesterone levels are down and stable, estrogen starts to increase as the follicle develops and grows. Once we hit a certain level of estrogen, we then have a small surge of the lutenizing hormone (LH) which triggers ovulation. Once ovulation occurs, we then have the cyst left over from the follicle producing progesterone for about 2 weeks. When that level starts to drop, we menstruate… And start all over again.Menstrualcycle

Given all of this, now consider that depression is a chemical imbalance. How does progesterone affect serotonin? How does this all work together? It is clear to me, that the researchers still don’t know. My doctor is very good at dealing with women and discussing how women react differently to medicines than men. Those damn stable men…they don’t have this hormonal up and down to deal with…

So, I will track things. I will increase my dose right before menstration, and drop shortly after.(3-4 days). And hopefully, we can keep the darkness of depression away….

Comments»

1. OmegaMom - January 10, 2007

Hah. I had a discussion of this exact same thing about a year back, though mine tends to be hair-trigger temper, *then* depression. My cycle-related depression would last about 2 days, but the temper lasted quite a bit longer.

Good that you’ve got a doc who listens to you, and that he’s got a game plan.

2. lisa - January 10, 2007

This is my exact problem! And the doctors don’t seem to know what to do. I am going to go back and ask for a solution…I am a totally differnt person the week before my period, and NOT in a good way…

3. Mariah - January 11, 2007

Hope this works for you, girl.