ABC Listen, podcasts, radio, news, music, and more.

Just a heads up, this episode touches on the topic of suicide.

Take care while listening.

There are 24 hours in a day, seven days in a week, 52 weeks in a year.

Except for the parts where you're sleeping, you have

all of that time to get stuff done. Earn money, take care of your kids, see friends. But not

Laura Murphy. For about two weeks each month, she was basically non-functional. I would sleep

for, you know, 14, 15 hours a night, wake up, have breakfast,

and then need to go back for a nap again. Literally couldn't keep my eyes open.

She would also be paralyzed by anxiety and depression.

I'd have multiple panic attacks a day, and the depression was just exhausting to feel,

you know, like the bottom had just dropped out of your world for a week.

And she was irritable beyond words.

You know, storming out of the house, three o'clock in the morning, sobbing, crying.

You know, I used to look at my partner and this, again, this is really, really common.

I used to look at him and I used to just think, well, I don't love you.

I don't even you. I don't

know who you are. Why are we together? I don't know where we're together. I think we should

probably just leave it now, yeah? And he'd be there going, what are you on about? Like, for so long,

Laura didn't know why she was like this for a portion of each month.

It took 17 years and a period of feeling suicidal before she learned what she had was PMDD, premenstrual dysphoric disorder.

So PMDD is essentially a really severe form of PMS with a focus on some of the more emotional psychological type symptoms.

...