Premenstrual Syndrome ( PMS )

Abstract

Premenstrual syndrome (PMS) refers to a wide range of physical and psychological symptoms women may experience in the days prior to the start of their menstrual cycle. A severe form of PMS is referred to as premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) in the psychiatric diagnostic manual (DSM). Feminists are critical of PMDD's inclusion in the DSM, and cultural understandings of PMS as a medical disorder, as it pathologizes normal female experiences, reproduces traditional notions of femininity, and emphasizes biological versus social causes for women's experiences of premenstrual distress. By labeling PMS as a socially constructed disease, feminist researchers and activists bring to light the biosocial interactions that produce illness experience and responses to it, as well as the role gender has in normative assumptions about health, illness, and normality.

Inscribing Gender: A Duoethnographic Examination of Gendered Values and Practices in Fitness Tracker Design

“…While a real health condition, PMS is highly stigmatized, represented culturally primarily as the butt of jokes, as evidenced by the phrase "kick crabbiness to the curb." PMS humor reproduces assumptions about women's moodiness, irrationality, and overblown emotionality due to their embodiments and hormonal cycles [37]. Thus, even on the rare occasion when the interface did acknowledge the particularities of women's health needs it trivialized our embodied experiences.…”