Millions of women in the UK go to work, school, or sit quietly on the sofa every month dealing with pain that would send most people to A&E if it came from anywhere else. Cramping, nausea, back pain that radiates down into the thighs — and the standard advice, still, is often “take some ibuprofen and get on with it.” The problem is that for a lot of people, ibuprofen barely touches it.
Period pain — the medical term is dysmenorrhoea — affects roughly 80% of women at some point in their lives, and for about one in five, it’s severe enough to interfere with daily life. That’s a huge number of people either taking time off work or just quietly suffering because they assume this is normal. Some of it is normal, technically. But that doesn’t mean it has to go untreated.
Why Does It Actually Hurt That Much?
The short version: the uterus contracts to shed its lining, and those contractions are triggered by hormone-like substances called prostaglandins. Higher prostaglandin levels mean stronger, more painful contractions. It’s essentially the same mechanism that causes labour pain, which should probably give more people pause when they’re told to “just take a paracetamol.”
For some women, there’s also an underlying condition involved. Endometriosis, fibroids, and adenomyosis can all cause significantly worse pain, and they’re frequently underdiagnosed. Endometriosis alone takes an average of eight years to diagnose in the UK, partly because women are so conditioned to accept period pain as inevitable that they don’t push for answers. If your pain is consistently severe, it’s worth talking to a GP rather than just managing symptoms indefinitely.
That said, primary dysmenorrhoea — pain without an underlying condition — is also genuinely very painful for a lot of people, and that’s also worth treating properly.
What Actually Helps (and What Doesn’t)
Heat is probably the most underrated thing. A good quality heat patch or hot water bottle applied to the lower abdomen has decent evidence behind it, and for mild-to-moderate pain, it genuinely works. Some people swear by it over painkillers, though most do both at once, which makes sense.
Over-the-counter NSAIDs like ibuprofen help because they reduce prostaglandin production rather than just masking pain. This is why they tend to work better than paracetamol for period pain specifically, as paracetamol doesn’t do anything to prostaglandins. The catch is that standard doses of ibuprofen aren’t always enough, and some people can’t take it due to stomach issues or other health conditions.
Mefenamic acid is a prescription NSAID that works on the same principle but is specifically licensed for period pain in the UK. It’s not a new drug — it’s been around for decades — but it’s often the step that people miss between “ibuprofen isn’t working” and more drastic options. If you’re looking into period pain relief options beyond what you can get off the shelf, mefenamic acid is worth knowing about, and you can now access it through online GP services without needing to wait weeks for an appointment.
Hormonal contraception like the pill, the coil, or the implant, can also significantly reduce period pain for many people, partly by thinning the uterine lining and reducing prostaglandin production. This isn’t the right choice for everyone, but it’s worth raising with a doctor if pain is a regular issue.
The Bigger Problem With How Period Pain Gets Treated
There’s a long history of women’s pain being dismissed or minimised in medical settings, and period pain sits right at the centre of that. “It’s just cramps” is something women hear from GPs, from partners, from employers who don’t understand why someone is calling in sick for the third month in a row. The cultural assumption that this is something to endure rather than treat has meant that a lot of people are suffering more than they need to.
If your periods are regularly putting you on the sofa with a hot water bottle and a grimace, that is worth taking seriously. Asking for better treatment isn’t being dramatic. Good options exist, and most people don’t realise how many there are until they actually start asking.
