text: what does it feel like to have  menstrual cramps so men can understand it? i am a man simply wondering about periods -- exactly how does it feel, emotionally/physically. imagine this:  you wake up feeling like crap. your head is spinning and heavy, your body feels bloated, like last night's dinner expanded to the size of texas. your head aches. your awareness of surroundings become like - footsteps outside your room is like an elephant tromping outside. imagine someone who asks so many questions you get annoyed by this person - and you didn't even like him in the first place. now imagine that same feeling towards everyone who talks to you. imagine now in that mood, someone comes and makes some stupid remark about you in jest. you snap back, right?  imagine you're having a stomachache from having too much food. your tummy, in parts, is killing you, right? now imagine that happening to you every month.  imagine you are sitting over a table, hunched for 8 hours of work. wow, your back aches. now, imagine that ache on a menstrual woman's back.  imagine you did something horrible. suppose you had a child, and in some horrible twist of fate, you had to give that child away. now you are so wrecked with guilt, you feel tears well up in yourself because you swell with emotion thinking of the child you lost. just put it into context here, put that feeling (not the child story and stuff, just the feeling), and feel how a woman is so emotional at this point.  periods suck. but what can we do? it's part of being a woman. we have to take it - like a woman!  jenova (d.yuffie@gmail.com)