I was diagnosed with Endometriosis in 2014. I thought having a heavy, painful period was just normal. As it turns out, everything I was suffering with was not normal and was part of a chronic condition I was not familiar with. My mum and my sister have both suffered with this disease but had assumed that I would not inherit it.
When I first started having periods at a young age, they were heavy and traumatic. I had no idea how to deal with them. I wasn’t allowed to use tampons, due to the fear of Toxic Shock Syndrome. I would suddenly bleed through clothing, I was vomiting and I had severe stomach and back pain. I was miserable. My mum took me to the doctor’s surgery, where I was put on the pill. This allowed me to live an (almost) normal life.
Fast forward to the year 2012. My husband and I had been married for almost 2 years and were starting to think about expanding our family. I stopped taking the pill and assumed it would be easy. I also assumed that the heavy periods I had started to experience were normal, and perhaps part of coming off the pill. The link between infertility and gynaecology issues were not something I had considered at this point. I started to have extremely heavy periods, bladder pain, and migraines. I wrongly assumed all of this was a normal part of any monthly cycle.
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