I feel like nobody I come across will ever understand what Endometriosis has done to me mentally. I'm 19 and had my first laparoscopy in December after nearly 4 years of feeling unwell. I was put on to Mycrogynon 30 when I was 15 and it helped a lot however I still had a constant dull pain in my abdomen. I became exhausted and my grades started to fall. I went from being 14 and predicted to leave school as an A* student to leaving with A's, B's and one C at GCSE level. I was heartbroken and disappointed, everyone was saying that they weren't bad grades and that if I'd missed less school and revised a little harder I would have done better. No body understood that I physically couldn't have done that, mentally I was desperate to but after a day at school I couldn't sit up and look at books. I was too tired and felt too low. I missed at least a day a week from school throughout my last year.
I managed to obtain a place at my chosen college who had assured me that they would help and stand by me to allow me to achieve my predicted ALevel grades of ABB. My attendance dropped to around 50%, my friends didn't notice, and when they did they didn't realise how bad it was. I couldn't wake up in the mornings, and when I did I could so easily fall back to sleep between getting up and leaving for the bus.
I had never been a 'bad' student. I'd always been very very academic and thrived under exam pressure, I was seen as a 'gifted and talented' student, but everybody seemed to ignore that from my records and blame me for being a lazy teenager. I became depressed throughout this time yet was too scared to tell anyone. Every time I have tried to confide in my mother she totally misses the point and we end up in an argument, I'm too ashamed to go to my doctor or even tell friends, partially because I feel I am being ungrateful, there are people with far worse physical symptoms from endometriosis but it was mentally killing me.
I finished my Alevels with one single E grade. I was devastated, I wanted to go to uni, I'd always wanted to and I've always had the mental drive and capacity to do it, my body just wouldn't allow me to get to college to absorb the information I needed, and even when I was there I felt too ill to concentrate.
I got a job in a a coffee shop working awful hours, I missed a lot of time until I had my laparoscopy - it then took me a month to recover enough to be able to return to work, and even then I was on reduced hours (probably more due to the nature of the job: fast paced, always on my feet and super early starts). Eventually, 3 months after the op I realised I was no longer in constant pain, I had energy to do things, I could get up at 4am to go to work on 5 hours sleep, whereas I used to struggle getting up at 10am after 10 or 11 hours sleep. I felt well for the first time in almost 4 years.
However now the excitement and novelty of feeling well has worn off, I've realised I'm in a really bad position, and one that i never ever dreamed I would be in. My friends are finishing their first year of university and that's where I thought I would be right now. Instead I am in bed in my onesie, sobbing. With my curtains closed and door tightly shut. I have already finished work for the day after waking up yet again at 4am. I have no grades, nothing to show for the last three years of my life. I hate my job, I hate my body and although I know I have the ability to fix it all, I almost feel that I don't want to, I've always hated it when things don't go to plan the first time around. I won't be able to get into university without first retaking my a levels, but I don't want to go back to college, especially now as I am too old to get it free. Unless I was magically able to get into university for a start this september I can't see myself ever wanting to go, I feel (arrogant as this sounds) too mature, like I've dealt with too much to have to live with people years younger than me. I have learnt that there are more important things to life than drinking and partying, mostly because I have never been well enough to do either of those things.
I'm feeling really, really down at the moment, I feel like I will never be able to escape where I am right now, both physically and mentally. I need a new job or I need to study, but who wants to take on a 19 year old with no qualifications? It just frustrates me so so much that everyone thought I was milking it and would be fine come exams days and results day. Yet now I'm sitting here - yes i proved them all wrong but I feel like the rest of my life has been ruined by this and that I will now never be able to forget my time suffering from endometriosis, because even though it's not inside my belly anymore, it's still inside my mind and it's still making me miserable.
I'm looking for someone who understands how I'm feeling that can give me some advice on what to do and how to move forward from this place because right now I feel like this is where I'm going to stay for the rest of my life, and that thought makes me want to stop living, because it seems there is no point to it.
I really really want to progress in life and be in a reasonably paid job that I gain some level of enjoment from - or at least feel accomplished and porud of myself- even if it has to be 'proud considering the circumstances' so that I can truly feel I have completely overcome my endometriosis... at least until next time.