For women only...

[Beachgrl486]

Just wondering are there any women at the LS who have endometriosis? I just want to know if there are and what kind of symptoms you experience and has it changed your like? I am not sure if I have it or not but I am getting surgery next month for it to find out. I was just wondering what to expect with it from someone who has it. I that 55 million american women have it so it is common. I will appreciate some input...thanks

[pearlsasinger]

A few doctors suspected I had endometriosis but I am still not certain. I had a lot of symptoms but they diminished when I started taking birth control, which can often help endometriosis.

 

A few of my symptoms:

 

-I had pain in my lower abdomen that came on a lot. Once I woke up in the middle of the night and I felt like I was going to throw up but I tried to walk to the bathroom and I couldn't walk and collapsed on the floor. The pains in my lower abdomen became so sharp I felt like I was going into labor! The doctor thought it was appendicitis at first, but then diagnosed it as pelvic inflammatory disease. This happened again about a month later.

 

-Overall fatigue and nausea, peeing sometimes uncomfortable, really painful periods. I spent a lot of that summer in bed. I also became depressed because I thought I woudln't be able to have children. (PID is the main cause of infertility.)

 

-The worst part was that sex was really painful. Needless to say, it was extremely hard on my new boyfriend and I. After many months, I finally found a birth control pill that didn't make me sick, Yasmin, and I felt a lot better. We could finally have sex. It still hurt a little but NOTHING like it did before. (It just sucks that Yasmin costs 40 bucks a month, but it's the only pill of it's kind out there.)

 

The doctor told me there is really only one way to find out if you have endo and that is by a laparoscopy...they make a small incision in your abdomen and insert a telescope and gases to identify if the tissue is there. Is that what you are having done?

 

I also saw a urologist, who thought my symptoms may have been due to Interstitial Cystitis (condition in which your bladder gets inflammed)...they have similar symptoms so I still don't know. It was a very confusing and frustrating time! I'm still concerned I may have to deal with it in the future.

 

It's a big step in the right direction that you are going to find out for sure if you have it or not...sometimes women don't know and it just gets worse.

 

Two of my aunts had it so I wonder if it is hereditary. They had surgery and now are doing just fine. However, my one aunt who had it really bad can't have children. Just keep a positive outlook! More women deal with this then we realize!

[Beachgrl486]

Yea I am getting a Laparoscopy the 20th of septemeber...actually I went to a urologist too for Interstitial Cystitis. He is actually going to be there during the surgery on the 20th too so he can do his routine to check for that too. The symptoms of both are a lot alike. I have really bad pain around my periods. I also experience constant lower back pain which is also a symptom. I get the fatigue and a few other symptoms. I am just hoping I will be able to have children if it turns out to be it. I hear like 40 percent are infertile. But we will see.

[pearlsasinger]

Have you tried going on birth control? Did it do anything?

 

I think exercise is supposed to help ease symptoms...but at the time I was experiencing symptoms exercise was the last thing I felt like doing. I cried all the time because it took forever to figure out what might be going on and I was so tired of being prodded and poked down there. (I definitely cried one time during an exam.) If I could go the rest of my life without another pelvic exam, I'd be a very happy girl. Wishful thinking, I'm sure.

 

Good luck and let me know how it turns out.