For three weeks out of every month, I am an absolute dream to live with.

Well maybe dream isn’t exactly the word Alex would use, but I am pretty cruisy.

But for that last week?

Well, let’s just say there are rules that we all need to stick by in Amyland so no one gets hurt.

Which I think is perfectly understandable, given I am no longer in charge of my emotions.

No, that honour belongs to the perpetrator of the heavyweight championship which plays out in my uterus each month and I am just a puppet to their whims.

Seriously.

Do you think I like crying at baby product ads?

Do you think I want to be overcome with an urge to scrub my bathroom at two in the morning?

Do you really think I normally consume a family block of chocolate only to feel so disgusted with myself I have to eat a packet of biscuits to make myself feel better?

Well, do you?

Do you think they sound like the actions of a happy, sort of balanced, educated woman to you?

Exactly.

Which are why there are rules.

And these rules are really quite simple.

Number 1 – Don’t provoke me.

Number 2 – Don’t annoy me.

Number 3 – Don’t contradict me

Number 4 – Don’t try and get me naked

Number 5 – Don’t make up stupid little songs about my mood.

See – easy.

Before I met Alex there was only one rule.

Don’t provoke me.

Since then, however, Alex has managed to turn provoking me into an Olympic sport, hence we now have rules two to five.

Basically, rule number one means don’t tell me I am wrong when I know I am right, just because you like to see me turn a particular shade of red.

This is not to be confused with rule number three – don’t contradict me, which is reserved for situations like fat days.

Logically, I know the chances of me putting on 100kg overnight are slim to none.

But the hormones controlling me don’t know that.

So when I am having a fat day, telling me it is all in my head does not make for a happy Amy.

Because while I know I probably don’t resemble Jabba the Hutt’s long lost sister, I certainly feel like her.

And the only way to combat it is to stuff my face with something sweet.

And yes, I know this sounds stupid.

But like I told you, I’m not in charge of my actions.

So this wouldn’t be the time to try and take the chocolate/biscuits/cake mix/milo tin away from me.

Because that would be annoying.

And annoying hormonal Amy makes her very cranky.

Trying to get me naked in this frame of mind also makes me very cranky.

Now Alex has seen me naked more than any other man on this planet.

But for seven days out of every month, I don’t want to be seen naked. I don’t want to be seen, full stop.

Which Alex doesn’t get, because seriously, if there weren’t rules against it, the man would be nekked every chance he got.

But removing the fat-day clothes I have swathed myself in only serves to remind me how fat I feel, which in turns leads to contradicting me, which ends up provoking me, which on the whole thoroughly annoys me, thus breaking rules one, two, three and four.

And it is usually at around this time that Alex decides to break rule number five.

He has a new favourite, one he likes to sing to the tune of AC/DC’s TNT, while doing a stupid little dance.

“She’s got PMT

“She’s Dynamite.

“She’s got PMT

“And she’s looking for a fight.”

Now I’m pretty sure that a jury of my peers (my peers being 12 hormonal women) would acquit me for throwing him out of a window.

Which he usually realises at around the same time I do, because after finishing his little dance, he makes a run for it, and by golly, when he puts his mind to it, that bastard can move.

So plotting his demise becomes my favourite pastime, until some stupid commercial for baby shampoo comes on and I lose it.

And none of this would have happened if we all just stuck to the rules.

We are just entering the Amy week of horrors and Alex has gleefully broken rules one, two and three.

And I am reliably informed he is working on a new ditty.

God help us if I ever fall pregnant and that one week turns into nine months.