Exercise with Endo

Exercise with Endometriosis has always been a struggle for me.  This April, two months after my surgery, I started going to the gym with my mother.  I really like it because I do not like running so it is something else for me to do to be active.  I do a cardio machine and the do weights.  Being active is always something that makes my endo worse.  I am always looking for new ways to exercise that do not put me in so much pain.  Endo can cause heart issues in the future, so it is important to stay active.  When I am having a bad week, it is hard for me to walk let alone do a whole workout.  If you have any tips for me please leave them in the comments.  You can subscribe using your email below to be notified whenever I publish a new blog post.  Thank you for reading!

My Endometriosis Story: End?

My surgery was scheduled for February 24, 2016.  I will never forget that date.  It was a very easy surgery but I do not remember a lot of it.  The doctors were very nice and my family was so supportive.  After my surgery, my pain decreased a lot.  When I got home from my surgery my friends and family were so supportive.  I received some great gifts that really helped me get through the next couple of days.  Every once in a while I will have days that I am in a lot of pain, but I need to learn how to control it.  In the meantime, I take a birth control medication to help with the pain.  Endo is known as an “invisible pain”.  Most women, including myself, with Endo put on a mask and act like we are fine.  We do not want to ruin other people’s day because we are in pain.  We most definitely do not want to ruin relationships and friendships either.  I am so thankful to all my amazing friends and family who have helped me through this very hard time.  I would like to use this platform to inform people and advocate for this disease that affects ten percent of women.  The only way to create a cure for this disease is to inform people about it.  Please help me spread the word about this debilitating condition.  Feel free to send me your stories because I would love to read them! Thank you for reading.

My Endometriosis Story: Middle

In my previous posts, I talked about how my gynecologist did not really do anything to help my situation.  Finally, the gynecologist thought there was something wrong with my pelvic floor muscles.  I went to physical therapy for four or five months but I knew there was still something else wrong.  We came to find out that I did have tight pelvic floor muscles but that was BECAUSE of my Endo.  I felt trapped inside my own body.  Like no one understood what I was feeling and I felt very alone.  I still feel like this sometimes but I am lucky to have great friends who always allow me to talk about it with them.  In research, my mother found that there is a clinic at Boston Children's Hospital specifically for teens with endometriosis.  This was amazing news for both my family and I.  Since we had been to so many different doctors that could not tell what was wrong with me, I was definitely ready to go to Boston.  Within minutes of being in my appointment, my doctor could tell me that I most definitely had Endo.  Of course, the only way to find out for sure was to do the surgery.  Stay tuned for the last part of my Endo story.  Thank you for reading!

My Endometriosis Story: Hospital Visits

Over the summer, I go to a two week overnight theatre camp.  This was in August and I started getting the pain in June.  This camp is my favorite place in the whole world and it killed me that I had to sit out of a lot of it.  Every afternoon I would have to go lay down in the infirmary because my pain was just too bad.  So finally, the nurse told me that I needed to go to the emergency room.  She said there was nothing she could do for me and she did not want to see me in this much pain all the time.  I did not want to leave camp at all, but I knew it was the best thing for me to do.  Early the next morning, my father came to pick me up and drove me to the emergency room at the hospital in my city.  I was there all day while they ran tests and took so many blood samples.  They tested my blood for almost everything that it could possibly be and then some.  All the tests came back negative which was good, but we still did not have any answers.  I had to miss one day and one night of my camp which made me so upset because we did not find anything out, and the next morning I went back camp still in the same amount of pain I had when I left.  I spent the rest of camp really trying to do as much as I could but I still had to take a lot of breaks with the nurse and get carted around in a golf cart everywhere I went.  I am glad that the summer after my surgery I was able to enjoy camp a lot more and only had to rest in the infirmary ONCE while I was there.  Stay tuned for the next parts of my story. Thank you for reading!

My Endometriosis Story: Beginning

For those who do not know, the dictionary definition of Endometriosis is a condition resulting from the appearance of endometrial issue outside the uterus and causing pelvic pain.  I am a fifteen year old high school girl and I suffer from Endometriosis.  On June 10, 2015, my life changed forever. I was sitting in math class when I started getting excruciating pain in my lower abdomen.  I thought it was just cramps from being on my period that week, but I was very wrong.  I asked my teacher to go to the bathroom, and when I stood up, I could hardly walk down the hall.  The pain has never stopped since that day.  I got home that day and told my mother but she also thought it was just period cramps.  It was about a month before we started visiting different doctors.  First we went to our family doctor and she sent me over to get an ultrasound at the hospital.  At first everyone thought it was my appendix but the pain just did not go away.  I ended up having three different ultrasounds and a CAT Scan, but no doctors could see anything wrong with me.  We went to a surgeon, but he also said he did not see anything wrong with me.  Our family doctor finally recommended we go to a gynecologist, so we did.  Still no one knew what was wrong with me.  The gynecologist was not very helpful.  After several visits she basically told me I was lying about how much pain I was in and being a dramatic teenage girl.  This made me so mad.  My mother had brought up the possibility of Endometriosis to her, but she totally dismissed it.  My aunt and grandmother had both suffered with Endometriosis so it was not unlikely that I might have it.  Normally, Endometriosis is found in adult women, not teenagers, that is why it is so hard for us to be diagnosed.  Stay tuned for the next parts of my story.  Thank you for reading!