How well do you know your body? Do you know the ins and outs your menstrual cycle? Are your cycle days consistent, or do they vary from month to month? Do you ovulate every month? How many days are in your follicular phase? What about your luteal phase? If you know the answers to these questions, you are way ahead of the game.

However, it’s much more likely that you don’t know these details. People tend to take their bodies for granted, especially if they have no major health issues that force them to pay attention. Women who take oral contraceptives have even less reason to chart the cycles because the packaging of their medications does that for them. They know exactly when to expect their period.

Yet knowing your body is an essential part of treating PMS. Medical diagnosis is an exercise in deduction: your doctor evaluates you, looks at your medical history, asks questions, maybe runs some tests, and, you hope, tells you what's wrong. But accurate diagnosis depends on good information. Not being able to provide that will considerably extend the diagnostic process.

Let’s say you go to your doctor because you get splitting bloating, indigestion, and mood swings during PMS. You your doctor to suggest or maybe prescribe something at that when he or she asks you about your symptoms and when they in your cycle, you can only give general answers. Your doctors probably ask you to chart your symptoms for a couple of before going any further. Now the health problem you wanted treat today has just been pushed back two months.