Update 2016: this post was written in 2007. I now know that all systems can be impacted by trauma. Trauma is an agent of general destabilization and dysregulation in our bodies, minds and spirits. As holistic beings everything is impacted. This article doesn't surprise me at all anymore. ***I got turned on to this article (reprinted below) via Stef at Life with PMDD. This is really shocking in my mind. I know that other mental distress has a close link to childhood and adolescent trauma, but I wouldn't have guessed that severe PMS would have that same link. Unfortunately after this study in 1998 there seems to have been no more interest in this finding. Dropping the ball on studying trauma and mental distress seems to be the way it goes with that which gets labeled mental illness. (since 2007 when this was written the tide has been turning. Trauma is being recognized as significant to everyone. We live in a traumatic world)