7 Reasons You Might Be Having Painful Menstruation

By Moyin Kalu

I remember when I was way younger, and the first time I saw my period. I was in school, having a lesson. What got me running to the bathroom was the sharp, punch-like pain I felt in my lower abdomen. I knew what having a menstruation meant; I had learnt enough in biology. What I wasn’t taught and prepared for, was the fact that the pain could render me useless for some hours.

Thankful for having a Doctor as a mum, I learnt that, painful menstrual periods are called Dysmenorrhea or Period Pains. They are painful sensations felt in the lower abdomen that can occur both before and during a woman’s menstrual period. The pain ranges from dull, to severe and extreme. Menstrual cramps tend to begin after an egg is released from the ovaries and travels down the Fallopian tube. Other symptoms may be nausea, vomiting, loose bowel movements and loss of appetite. Dysmenorrhea can be divided into two:

• Primary dysmenorrhea – this occurs in women who experience pain just before and during menstruation, but are otherwise healthy.
• Secondary dysmenorrhea. – This condition occurs in women who have had normal periods that later become painful. This might be caused by problem affecting the uterus or other pelvic organs.

Whichever the case, these are some reasons which explains why girls or women experience cramps during their periods….

1.  Under the age of 20

When you are young, the tendencies for your body to experience this pain every month is much higher. You are just finalizing your stages at puberty and your womb shedding the lining every month might be your bodies way of adjusting to your periods.

2.  It’s in your genes

If your mum, sister or grand mum has dysmenorrhea, there is a 90% chance that you might get it too. It doesn’t mean that there is anything wrong with you or your health, its just one of those ‘things’ nature hands passed down from one generation to another.

3.  You’ve never had a baby.

9 out of 10 women, are said to have stopped experiencing painful periods after having children. There is no medical explanation or reason for this, let’s just call it another gift. I personally like to think that after 12 hours of labor, your womb, pelvis and cervix has received enough stretching for a life time that they automatically reset themselves (I’m not a doctor o).

4. Endometriosis

We all remember the lining of the uterus that occurs every month in the hope that your body will accommodate a baby, but when this doesn’t happen, it sheds, coming out as the blood we see?. Now Endometriosis is when that lining occurs outside the uterus. E.g, the Fallopian tube, the cervix, or the ovaries.

5. Uterine fibroids

These are tiny tumors that grow in the uterus region. They vary in size, from very small to very large, enough to make your periods as painful as possible.

6. Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID)

These are infections or diseases mostly likely caused by bacteria which can be gotten through unprotected sex.

7. Early puberty

Younger women who reached puberty before the age of 11 are more likely to develop primary dysmenorrhea, which will most likely decrease as they get older.