Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD) is a severe form of premenstrual syndrome (PMS), and is thought to affect more than one in 20 menstruating women. Actor and stand-up comedian Bella Humphries suffers from PMDD, and told the BBC: “My period sometimes makes me want to take my life.” According to the International Association for Premenstrual Disorders (IAPMD), 34% of the people who have been diagnosed with the condition have attempted suicide. Humphries, 29, continued: “It’s secrecy and silence that will kill people, not the disease or the disorder.” According to the IAPMD, it takes on average 12 years to be diagnosed with the condition. Here’s everything you need to know about it… What is PMDD? PMDD is a severe form of PMS, and is characterised by debilitating physical and emotional symptoms that occur during the time between ovulation and when the period is due to begin. This is known as the luteal phase and lasts around two weeks – although the length can vary from person to person. In June 2019, the World Health Organisation (WHO) added PMDD to the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, meaning it’s now recognised as a legitimate medical diagnosis. What are the symptoms? People with PMDD might experience a broad range of symptoms, and it’s different for everyone. “In PMDD, symptoms are extreme and can seriously impact quality of life, work and relationships. Many women report feeling suicidal,” said Dr Ghazala Aziz-Scott, a specialist in integrative women’s health and bioidentical hormone balancing for the Marion Gluck Clinic. “Symptoms can be cyclical and chronic – they include mood swings, anger, irritability, anger, anxiety, depression, anhedonia [the reduced ability to experience pleasure], fatigue, and brain fog. Physical symptoms include breast tenderness, headaches, bloating, food cravings, and insomnia.” Are there any treatments? Treatments can include “antidepressants, oral contraception and counselling”, said physician associate Simisola Ade. “A discussion with a doctor should be had to decide on what treatment is appropriate and how bad the PMDD symptoms are.” Aziz-Scott continued: “PMDD has a complex aetiology [causes] and it is vital to evaluate the root cause of the hormonal imbalance and if there are also any coexisting psychiatric conditions. “A healthy diet and good lifestyle can go a long way in supporting the body, B6 and magnesium supplementation are helpful and the use of natural progesterone in the second half of the cycle can be very beneficial.” What other things can people do to help? “Women who have PMDD need to be mindful and easy with themselves. Self-care is very important,” said Ade. “Also keeping a cycle diary is key, especially if you suspect you have PMDD, because some people aren’t aware that they have PMDD until they actually start tracking their symptoms and notice that they are cyclical. This can also help diagnosis and treatment be much quicker. “Talking to other people who have PMDD can be very beneficial too. There are international organisations that can help. Be open with your doctor and tailor treatments for yourself to ensure you put things in place when you are in that luteal phase. Getting to know your PMDD symptoms will help to make those symptoms more bearable.” Dr Adiele Hoffman, medical advisor at Flo Health agrees and said: “It’s very common to experience both emotional and physical discomfort in the days leading up to your period. However, these symptoms should not be so severe that they significantly impact your life, work, your family, or your other relationships. “But if they do, however, consistently affect your life, you should show these logs to a doctor. It can be very helpful for the doctor prescribing appropriate treatment. Most importantly, remember that no one should have to live with debilitating PMDD symptoms.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live JW Anderson is teaming up with a major tennis star for new collection N-Dubz cement comeback with first new album in 13 years Irregular sleep patterns linked to harmful gut bacteria, study suggests

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A recent book called The Queer Parent, written by Lotte Jeffs and Stu Oakley, calmly opens with the line: “Ninety per cent of queer parenting is simply… parenting”. It’s a fair point. Whether you’re male, female or non-binary, single or partnered, and regardless of your sexuality, all of us who parent aim to meet the exact same needs for our children, day in, day out. The title caught my attention because I think there’s something very timely and profound about the act of being a gay or queer parent today. It’s doing the work that many (dare I say most) people want to see in society – namely raising a new generation of non-toxic humans, making the world a happier place to be different – but in the slow grind of parenthood, not just in the quick flash of activism. I really believe gay and queer parents are changing the world, in a very deep yet unsexy way. Mum and mummy being at the school gate, dad and daddy collecting a child from nursery, or as we’ll get into, dad giving birth to a baby son or daughter. They’re changing the world by being active, visible and engaged parents. But there’s a slightly awkward, under-discussed aspect to this that has truly got under my skin in the eight years since I’ve been a parent. I’m pansexual, so I fancy men as well as women, non-binary people and pans. But oddly I’ve always been frightened to talk about parenthood with most of my avowedly gay male friends – because I’m never quite sure if anyone’s going to derogatorily refer to me as a “breeder” or not. It’s hard to know how well-known the term “breeder” is. I personally used to hear it a lot more back in the mid-Noughties when I was in my early twenties. It’s essentially a slightly bitchy term that’s interchangeably derogatory to people with kids and/or straight people as a whole. As a word, it’s a pretty effective zinger. Straight people have tended to use sexual imagery to define and denigrate gay people. It seems fair that gay people would do the same to heterosexuals. “Breeder” reduces the pleasures of sex to a slightly dehumanised process. In fact, unconnected to sexuality, Gulliver’s Travels author Jonathan Swift used the term to reduce people to a brutal, almost farmyard functionality in a satirical essay from 1729. It’s important to establish that I’m not here to spank gay men on the bum. Neither am I here to accuse them of “heterophobia” either – which I’ve put in quote marks because I’m dubious that it can even exist as a concept. If I was an exclusively gay guy, I might robustly define my sexuality against heteronormativity in ways which could be punchy and sharp. I might also – by virtue of a lifetime of homophobia and trauma that may have started in the home as a child – have latently negative views about the whole concept of family. But I am who I am now, and despite understanding all this, I’m still getting weary of it as a trope, and also as a reason not to talk about the many genuine ecstasies of parenthood. I like being a dad and I like dating guys. These things shouldn’t be so controversial – yet weirdly, I find it’s gay men who have more slack-jawed incomprehension of these two facts than any other group in society. My own personal beef is very trifling in the scheme of things, however. The much bigger picture is that – newsflash – gay, queer and trans people have kids. Loads of them. While data is limited, there was a 40 per cent rise in same-sex parents from 2015 to 2019. Anecdotally, it seems to be a much greater phenomenon than is reported. The same goes for the rarely examined hardships LGBT+ people typically go through to even have kids: namely the incredible anguish of IVF and the epic emotional journey of surrogacy. You’d expect increased visibility of gay and queer parents would have phased out the use of the word “breeder” as a pejorative, but weirdly it lives on – especially on TikTok where, perhaps like an unkillable echo of my own twenties, it’s mostly young people using the word as a way of defining their queerness and riling up straights. What makes my heart sink, beyond knowing that a younger generation is using the same dumb-ass words people said 20 years ago, is that this is a really, really bad time to start being unsupportive of gay parents. While queer visibility may feel greater than ever, the world is going backwards in many respects. Even just in the realm of children’s culture, things as harmless as a drag artist reading stories can draw an angry mob of culture warriors – as happened at Tate Britain in London in February. Look at Florida – once the home of fictional queer icons The Golden Girls, now home to Republican governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis – and you’ll see books with titles as benign as This Book Is Gay banned as a result of his vociferously “anti-woke” legislation. We all know that creating this type of hostile environment will surely result in more bullying, more hatred, more lives blighted. While queer visibility may feel greater than ever, the world is going backwards in many respects It’s pathetic, cruel yet grimly successful at the same time. With every small news story or stunt, a palpable hostility festers. Thus anything that drives a wedge between gay/queer people and parenthood is a bad look right now – especially with elections looming in the US and Britain that I fear will see the issue of gender identity playing a huge, calculatedly divisive role. What better way to rebuff this negativity than by strongly standing up for gay and queer parents. Specifically, we could start standing up for men having babies. Trans men like the British journalist Freddy McConnell who a few years back gave birth to a child who seems to be doing great (and likes a good splash in the sea), or Iowa-born Tanius Posey, who thankfully was able to breastfeed his child despite simultaneously getting online abuse for it. Logan Brown, also from the UK, is a trans man who has been documenting his pregnancy over the past few months with genuine clarity and candour. He gave birth to his daughter Nova just over a week ago. Celebrated gay NYC artist Keith Haring frequently placed a baby into his work, a shining symbol of hope and playful optimism for the future. Maybe in the same spirit as Haring, we could all do with a new beginning in our attitudes to gay and queer parenting, inspired by a rather miraculous baby such as Nova. 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Here we have a great French classic made into a vegetarian treat,” says Michel Roux. “I’ve suggested a selection of vegetables, but you can vary them according to the season and spice them up with more chilli if you like a bit of heat. “Delicious as a main meal or as an accompaniment, this can be made in individual portions as well as a large tart. It’s fine to use shop-bought puff pastry – I do!” Vegetable tart tatin Serves: 4 Ingredients: 3 small heads of red chicory 3 small heads of yellow chicory 200g slender carrots, halved lengthways 300g kohlrabi, cut into batons 100g cauliflower florets or sprouting broccoli, halved 1 large onion, cut into wedges 2 tbsp olive oil 2 tbsp butter 2 tbsp caster sugar 1 red chilli, deseeded and sliced Leaves from 1 thyme sprig 350g puff pastry Flour, for dusting Salt and black pepper Method: 1. Preheat the oven to 220C/fan 200C/gas 7. Cut the heads of chicory in half (or if they are large, into quarters) and put them in a bowl with the other vegetables. Add the oil and toss, then season with salt and black pepper. Spread the vegetables over a baking tray and roast them in the oven for eight to 10 minutes. The vegetables should be partly cooked and have a little colour. 2. Melt the butter in a large (28cm) ovenproof frying pan, then sprinkle over the sugar. Place the cooked vegetables, sliced chilli and thyme on top, making sure to pack the vegetables tightly. 3. Roll out the pastry on a floured work surface to three millimetres thick. Place the pastry over the vegetables, tucking it in around the edges. Make a few holes in the pastry with the point of a knife, then bake for 20 minutes. Leave to cool a little, then place a plate over the pan and carefully turn the pan over to invert the tart on to the plate. Serve warm. Tagliolini with seafood “I love seafood, and pasta and shellfish are always a great combination,” says Roux. “Keep this simple with mussels and clams, or if you want to go to town, use other shellfish, such as razor clams or cockles, when they’re in season. The fennel seeds and pastis bring that lovely aniseed flavour that works so well with seafood.” Serves: 2 Ingredients: 400g clams 500g mussels 2 tbsp olive oil 1 shallot, chopped 1 tsp fennel seeds 2 garlic cloves, chopped 50ml pastis 150g shelled raw prawns 4 tbsp crème fraiche 300g fresh tagliolini or 180g dried tagliolini or tagliatelle Handful of herbs (parsley, chives, chervil), finely chopped Juice of 1 lemon Salt and black pepper Method: 1. Wash the clams and mussels well in cold water and discard any that are broken or don’t close when tapped. Remove any beards from the mussels. 2. Heat the olive oil in a large pan, add the shallot, fennel seeds and garlic and sweat until they start to colour. Add the clams, then the mussels. Pour in the pastis, cover the pan and cook for five to seven minutes until all the shells have opened. Take care not to overcook the shellfish. 3. Tip everything into a colander placed over a bowl, then pass the cooking liquid through a fine sieve or a strainer lined with muslin. Pick the flesh from the mussels and clams, leaving a few in the shell to use as a garnish. Tip the cooking liquor back into the pan, bring it to the boil and boil for five minutes. Add the prawns and crème fraiche, then, when the prawns have turned pink, add the picked mussels and clams. 4. Bring a pan of water to the boil and add two tablespoons of salt. Cook the pasta until al dente, then drain. Add the drained pasta to the pan of shellfish and stir well. Add the chopped herbs and garnish with some mussels and clams in shells. Season with lemon juice, salt and pepper, then serve at once. Almond and raspberry frangipani tart “I adore almond puddings and this French version of a Bakewell tart is one of my favourites,” says Roux. “It’s rich and indulgent but there is some fruit in there as well! Raspberries work perfectly with almonds but cherries would also be good here.” Serves: 6-8 Ingredients: For the pastry: 150g butter, softened 90g caster sugar 2 free-range eggs Pinch of salt 240g plain flour, plus extra for dusting 75g ground almonds For the almond cream: 200g butter, softened 200g caster sugar 200g ground almonds 2 tbsp plain flour 4 free-range eggs 1 tbsp dark rum or Ratafia (fruit-based liqueur) For the jam and fruit: 60g raspberry jam 250g raspberries To serve: Icing sugar Ice cream or chantilly cream Method: 1. For the pastry, mix the softened butter with the caster sugar until combined. Mix in the eggs, then add the salt, flour and ground almonds and bring everything together into a dough. You can do this by hand or in a food processor or stand mixer. 2. Wrap the pastry in cling film and chill it in the fridge for about two hours. Dust your work surface with flour, roll out the pastry and use it to line a tart tin or flan ring measuring about 24 centimetres in diameter. Chill again until needed. 3. For the almond cream, whisk the butter and sugar until pale, then add the ground almonds and flour and whisk to combine. Whisk in the eggs, one at a time, then add the rum or Ratafia. 4. Preheat the oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Remove the tart case from the fridge and spread a thin layer of jam over the pastry. Add the almond cream and arrange the raspberries evenly on top. 5. Bake for about 45 minutes until the tart is golden and cooked through. Dust with icing sugar and serve warm with ice cream or cool with chantilly cream. Don’t put this tart in the fridge. ‘Michel Roux At Home’ by Michel Roux (Seven Dials, £26). Read More After Le Gavroche, Michel Roux is taking his cooking back to basics How to cook to keep your gut healthy Leave Rick Stein alone – it’s totally reasonable to charge £2 for mayo and ketchup After Le Gavroche, Michel Roux is taking his cooking back to basics

Sebastian Vettel revealed he “has some ideas” about a return to Formula 1 in some capacity in the future. The 36-year-old retired from the sport after the 2022 season, leaving a lasting legacy with his four championship triumphs with Red Bull from 2010-2013. The German, who also raced for Ferrari and Aston Martin, is a climate change activist and campaigner and regularly spoke out about environmental issues towards the end of his career. Now, Vettel admits that he would be open to a return to F1 down the line, hinting that the sport’s sustainability could be a potential avenue. “We’ll see but I have some ideas,” Vettel said, when asked about a return to the sport whilst appearing at the Goodwood Festival of Speed on Sunday. “I’ve been to Monaco earlier this year. I had a very good meeting with Stefano [Domenicali, F1 CEO]. “Other than obviously the cars directly polluting, F1 has a huge responsibility because it’s a very big event. A lot of people attend, I think you had around 500,000 people at the British Grand Prix last weekend. “So there’s a lot more to it than just the cars but obviously the cars, everybody sees them. It’s important that it’s headed in the right direction. “But I’m talking and I have some ideas. Obviously, we’ll see what the future brings. I think sooner or later, I will probably figure it out and take on a new challenge.” Vettel drove exclusively with e-fuels during his drive of Nigel Mansell’s 1992 Williams car and Ayrton Senna’s 1993 McLaren at Goodwood. The four-day festival was impacted by heavy winds, forcing the cancellation of Saturday’s event, but it concluded without issue on Sunday. Read More How does Max Verstappen and Red Bull compare to the greats of Formula One? Mick Schumacher to drive father Michael’s car at Goodwood Festival of Speed Red Bull has handed Daniel Ricciardo the first step to Sergio Perez’s seat Daniel Ricciardo returns to F1 as he replaces Nyck de Vries The moment Norris came of age in British Grand Prix – and it wasn’t his super start

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