Cramps, tenderness and a whole new load of emotions - periods aren't much fun, are they?

But there's another annoying side-effect of your time of the month which many women are too embarrassed to talk about - diarrhoea.

It's completely normal to suffer from it at that time of the month and it's northing to worry about.

But why does it actually happen?

We asked Dr Preethi Daniel, the clinical director at London Doctors Clinic , to explain.

It's horrible (

She said: "There's no reason to worry about getting diarrhoea at the same time as your period.

"About a third of women experience tummy symptoms around the time of menstruation, including diarrhoea and constipation.

"The main reason for this is something called prostaglandin. This is what causes the womb to contract, shred it's lining, cause the bleeding and also is trying to contract and limit the bleeding so you don't bleed out.

Dr Preethi Daniel

"By telling the womb to squeeze squeeze squeeze, is also telling other muscles to squeeze squeeze squeeze so the bowels go into overdrive and you end up having diarrhoea."

So there you go, nothing to worry about at all.

However if you're worry about your diarrhoea or it becomes a problem you should visit your GP to get it checked out.