For people who experience severe period pain, some of the hardest parts can be the uncertainty, isolation, and struggle to be believed. For Kate Downey and Kelsey DiLanzo, co-creators of CRAMPED, those experiences became the foundation for a podcast that asks difficult questions, challenges the silence surrounding period pain, and helps listeners feel less alone.
Kate and Kelsey met in college and became longtime roommates and close friends. Kate had experienced severe period pain since she was 14, pain she describes as “death cramps.” Yet she rarely talked about it. Over time, she learned how to explain her pain and ask Kelsey for support when it became too difficult to manage alone.
Eventually, Kate imagined a podcast that could help her find answers. At the time, she had no diagnosis or effective treatment. “Initially, Kate saw the podcast as a way to get answers,” Kelsey recalls. Three years later, the pair secured a grant and began creating CRAMPED.
Their partnership is central to the podcast’s approach. Kate brings lived experience, a background in entertainment, and a deep curiosity about medical research. Kelsey, a journalist, brings an objective perspective and a commitment to accessible storytelling. Kate describes that balance as essential: “Sometimes when you are coming at something from your own personal experience, you’re not very objective. And that’s fine and normal, but you need someone there to be objective and help make those calls” about what belongs in the final story.
For Kelsey, Kate’s curiosity was contagious. “This was her passion project, which made it my passion project. Kate was the catalyst, first and foremost.”
That combination of personal experience and journalistic inquiry shapes every episode. Rather than positioning Kate as a medical expert, CRAMPED asks questions, talks with medical professionals and people with lived experience, and shares information listeners can use. Its goals are to help people enter medical situations better informed and prepared to advocate for themselves, build community, and connect listeners with resources for diagnosis and treatment.
The mission is rooted in Kate’s own experience. “For me, the most traumatic thing about my experience was how alone I felt,” she says. When people cannot get answers from the people they expect to help them—whether a school nurse, gynecologist, or other medical professional—it can become easy to believe something is wrong with them rather than recognizing that the system has failed to provide answers.
CRAMPED intentionally reaches beyond endometriosis. Although endometriosis is a common cause of debilitating period pain, it is not the case for everyone. The podcast is for anyone experiencing severe period pain who feels stuck in what Kate calls “diagnosis limbo.”
Storytelling is one of the most powerful tools for disrupting the silence around period pain. Hearing other people’s stories can challenge that isolation while demonstrating that period pain does not look the same for everyone. “Being able to connect to each other’s stories and also realize that they are also different is such an important facet of understanding period pain,” Kelsey explains.
For new listeners, Kate recommends starting with Season 1, Episode 1, which follows her journey toward diagnosis. Across the first ten episodes, listeners accompany her as she researches her questions, speaks with experts and people with lived experience, sees a specialist, and ultimately receives a diagnosis.
The creators also highlight Episode 4, “Who’s Researching New Treatments for Period Pain?” In it, Kate visits one of the very few U.S. research labs receiving NIH funding to study the mechanisms of period pain. She remembers the experience as especially optimistic: “They’re coming at it from a problem-solving point of view…it was very hopeful.”
The response to CRAMPED has demonstrated the extent to which this work is needed. Originally planned as a limited ten-episode series, the podcast continued after listeners shared how it changed the way they approached their health care. Some said they learned more about period pain from the podcast than through their own experiences working in women’s health. Others reconsidered planned ablation surgeries after discovering treatment options they had not previously known existed.
Now, Kate and Kelsey are working to make CRAMPED sustainable and listener-supported and launched a Patreon after Season 1 to reach this goal. Eventually, they hope for CRAMPED to become a larger organization where people can get more information, find community, and feel less alone. Kate imagines an organization offering funds to help people access appropriate medical and specialist care, and resources to navigate insurance, learn from others' experiences, and make informed decisions about one’s own health.
That vision is already taking shape through relationships with organizations including the Endometriosis Foundation of America, the White Dress Project, and Tight Lipped. Kate and Kelsey are intentionally building a community where people can not only find information about what might be happening to them but also discover where to go next to find effective treatment.
Ultimately, Kate hopes CRAMPED will become unneeded. “In a perfect world, it will not be necessary because the medical community will not keep people in diagnosis limbo for twenty years, but we’re not there yet.”
Until then, readers can support CRAMPED and its pivotal mission through the podcast’s Patreon.
