6 ways to relieve period cramps at home
Periods are not fun. There's so many tips and tricks online that can possibly help those cramps back off, but here's what I've found gives relief the best from my cramps, and those bloody messes, back pain, muscle aches, and other stomach-twisting period symptoms.
1. Pills
I try to approach most of my issues with more natural remedies, but sometimes the pain is just too much to bear. After trying out various over-the-counter drugs, like Advil or Pamprin, I've found that Tylenol works best for me. I currently have a bottle of Tylenol Extra Strength and pop two pills on the first day of my period immediately after I feel the cramps creeping in.
2. Hot pack
Ah, the blessed hot pack. Anything warm is helpful during my period, but I love having my warm, fuzzy, lavender-scented heart-shaped hot pack on my stomach/uterus area. It's really soothing to have after suffering in bed from the pain. My lovely hot-pack is from Warmies. I'll put the link in the Resources section if you're interested in getting one of these too.
3. Warm/hot bath
Like I mentioned, I really like anything warm for cramps. Now, before you say "yuck" to the idea of getting into water during your period, that can be pretty easily solved if you use tampons or menstrual cups.
Also you could try getting into the bath when you're near the end of your period especially, since there's probably not as much of a heavy flow.
If you've tried taking a hot bath with some epsom salt and bubbles (affiliate link?), you'll know it can be heavenly for your muscle aches.
It definitely helps my cramps and back pain a lot and it's really not as messy as you might think. I'm the type to pee in the shower, so I'm not really grossed out by it anyways.
4. Moving around
Cramp pains can get really bad and just make me want to lie down forever. But usually lying down just makes it worse because I can't find any position that will take the pain away.
If it's the second or third day of my period and the cramp pain has lessened a bit, I find that working out or doing some light exercise really helps shorten the duration of my period and gets my blood flowing (both period blood and bodily blood? :)) If your cramps are really bad, try to at least walk around a bit and see if you can do some light stretches to get the blood flowing a little faster to ease to pain.
4. Birth position
I always shift my sitting position to try and find a good way to ease the pain, and I eventually realized that sitting in the birth position (knees bent on the side) relieves some pain and aching. This means that squatting down might help too. It might feel awkward at first, but hey, we're at home and I'll really do anything that gets rid of cramp pains.
5. Good posture
We should all really practice good posture in general, but there was one time in particular when sitting up straight for a while really helped my back pain during my period.
6. Drink lots of water
I see this tip everywhere for everything. Wanna get rid of headaches? Drink water. Wanna get rid of acne? Drink water.
I believe it reigns true. Drinking at least a liter of water a day (I’m drinking at least two now) can really make a big difference - how you feel, look, and function. Water is just so good for you - we are made of up to 60% water after all.
I used to drink soda almost every day. One day, before going to dance practice, I drank about a bottle of water’s worth instead of a can of soda, and I felt SO good at practice and had much more energy than usual.
Since then, I’ve cut out soda almost entirely from my diet and it’s been amazing.
Try to drink a cup of water every hour of the day, or at least more than you did yesterday.
I think room temperature water will help more than cold water too for cramps. Cold foods/drinks are not really recommended during your period, but, hey, who can say no to some ice cream... :)
7. FlexDisc
Flex is a company that created menstrual cups, which you can read more about in my other blog post here.
They offer FlexDisc’s, which are supposed to help reduce cramps. I haven’t tried the disc, but I have tried the cup. You can read more about the disc here.
If none of the previous 6 tips help, it might be helpful to look into a disc as another method to alleviate the pain.
Conclusion
Period cramps really suck, but there are natural ways to alleviate the pain. If these methods don’t work, just popping some pills or inserting a disc could be your holy grail.
Hope it all feels better soon,
Suzanne <3
Resources:
Pink Warmies Heart Heat Pad:
https://warmies.com/collections/warmies%C2%AE-heat-pads
Taking a bath during your period:
https://flo.health/menstrual-cycle/health/can-you-bathe-on-your-period
Water content of humans:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/what-percentage-of-the-human-body-is-water
