UKC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/48243310

I thought this was really interesting and something which we don't discuss enough. Even if we are not seriously training, it's worth being open with climbing partners etc if we are more tired/ clumsy/ grumpy or anything else due to hormones. 

There was a climbing specific article about it a couple months ago, but I cannot find it now. 

I used to take combined contraceptive pills a for about a year or so. During that period I frequently got frustrated and angry while I was trad climbing outdoors and panic attacks occurred occasionally when I reached harder sections leading - up to a point when I cried and hyperventilated. Since then, I stopped taking the pills all together and my symptoms got much better instantly. I don't have any panic attacks or cries on climbs anymore at all. Frustration still occurs before period or when I miss my regular period because of PCOS. 

Isn't it fascinating how differently all of our bodies respond to the same hormones? I never had particularly bad PMT or cramps etc before going on the pill, but since going on it I have no hormonal effects at all. For me, it has removed all PMT, my periods are all but gone and I've not had period pains in years. It just suits some bodies and not others.

If you do come across the climbing specific article again at some point, I would be interested to read it.

It is fascinating, and I for one wish it wasn't quite so variable. I got an IUS to attempt to control my periods (I too have known the blackouts and throwing up on the first day of pretty much every period between the ages of 12 and roughly 25, when I discovered a painkiller that would actually help) and it made them longer, heavier and more painful. This is the exact opposite of what is likely to happen with the IUS. It also triggered a depressive episode and cyclic bouts of extreme insomnia, which I was also told was not likely. Couldn't wait to be rid of the thing.

Though the last two months, the first in my entire life, I have been organised enough to start taking the painkillers days in advance like I'm supposed to, and have been able to function on the first day. Last month I ran 5km. This month I walked the full 10-mile langdale pikes route. 13-year-old-me would never believe this was possible, with the help of very strong prescription painkillers. The lengths we must go to, eh?

Oh my, that sounds horrendous! It's just incredible that so many women go through really horrific periods and yet we don't talk about them and life just goes on!

Glad you have managed to get it under control eventually. Before I was on the pill, mine would never have been predictable enough to take pain killers in advance. 

Slightly tangent but it was on the radio the other day that most medication is tested when womens hormone production is at its lowest and may not work quite the same at other times of the month. 

In my late 20s I started suffering from very bad IBS - pain, bloating, and everything from diarrhoea to constipation. I had all the tests and diet trials and the final answer was ‘nothing we can do - try eating more fibre or maybe less fibre’. Although nobody ever asked, it finally occurred to me that the constipation, painful bloating and looking 9 months pregnant was the week or two before my period started and the opposite effect was the week when my period ended, and depending on how irregular my periods were, sometimes I would get a week of normality between and sometimes I wouldn’t. I decided to try hormonal contraception. I was cured almost overnight. I then had to have a bit of a fight with my GP to continue the jab when I didn’t need it for contraceptive purposes, because they thought it was a coincidence. I stopped the contraceptives as an experiment for a few months and actually started getting anaemia as I wasn’t absorbing the food properly, so now they are convinced and will keep giving me hormone jabs until I hit the menopause. But they really should have considered that themselves earlier on and asked me to chart if it was related to my cycle.

There you go, found it:

https://www.climbing.com/skills/train-like-a-girl-harness-your-womanly-phys...

The "time of the month" problem is long past for me ... only to be replaced by hot flushes at any and all times of the month, day or night. Grrr. It is embarrassing to be suddenly drenched at the climbing wall or the crag. HRT has been a blessing and I am not aware of any ill-effects. 

climbed with someone recently and she was open about this.She said something alone the lines of I may turn into a monster. 

I felt for her because 2-3 days a month she gets these awful migraines where she pretty much can't do anything. 

There has been a big push by runner Tina Muir (https://tinamuir.com) over the last couple of years to recognise the effects of training on periods – basically she gave up running to have a family due to amenorrhea. There has been much less about the effects otherwise in the running press.

Thanks, very interesting. It did annoy me though that she just discounted hormonal contraception as something you just shouldn't do. Surely there are many factors which play into what form of contraception you use and she could consider the effects of that. I happen to get on very well with the pill and want to stick with it!