I've never really been one to talk about my endo because people get grossed out when you mention anything to do with periods but now I have found this I feel like I may need to blurt out my story and see if it sounds quite normal.
I got my first period when I was 14/15 and everything was normal for about 6-8 months: I was regular and had a normal cycle pattern that lasted 4-6 days. then I started getting really bad pains and just thought that it was normal to be going through so much pain. I sucked it up for nearly a year because people were saying I was just being dramatic or that it was normal and that they obviously are just worse for me because I was over weight.
I went to the doctors when I was 16 because my sister was told she had polycystic ovaries and that was effecting her weight. when I told the GP (not my regular because I was too embarrassed to see him) about all the pain I was having and, by then, the irregular bleeding, she prodded and poked at my tummy for about 30 seconds before she told me that I had EITHER a cyst on my ovary that was the size of a tangerine or my ovary was enlarged. she also told me, at 16 while I was on my own, that the chance of me having kids were slim. I ran home from the doctors in tears and when my mum found out she made a formal complaint.
I then when to my local family planning center for an ultra sound and she said that, although i do have polycystic ovaries it was only a mild case. this put my mind at rest but didn't answer the pain or irregular bleeding. so she put me on the pill the month after my 16th birthday. i stayed on that for all of 6 weeks because my pain got worse and my bleeding became more irregular. I then was referred to the gyne unit in my local hospital (where i had to sit in a waiting room surrounded by expectant mothers which was torture and also made me feel like a fraud because of the contraction pains i was having... one woman told me "its probably just Braxton hicks, don't worry") where i raised the issue of endo and asked if it was hereditary as my auntie has had it since she was 14 and now, after having it on her bowel and bladder as well as one of her kidneys, has a gorgeous 6 year old son and a complete hysterectomy. The gyne told me that endo only appears in women over the age of 18 and that it wasn't hereditary. she told me because the pill didn't work we would just wait and see if it settled down on its own.
So as you can all imagine, it didn't settle down, it only got worse. After failing one of my AS level exams because i passed out in pain and ending up in A&E; chewing through a plastic bottle and ending up in A&E; going through a phase of just passing out without warning and ending up in A&E and the uncontrollable pain that i was going through even when i wasn't ovulating or on a period, i went to a private gyne in Liverpool and pad £400 for a consultation only to be told that if i went to my doctor and asked to be referred to him, the NHS will pay for my treatment.
i had to wait till i was 18 as they couldnt send a "child" to a gyne... so as soon as i turned 18 i started 6 months of injections to stop my periods which worked but made me very very depressed.. . i then had my first lap and laser removal, and i also had the marina coil fitted. the coil has changed my life. i know it doesn't work for some people but it worked for me. It took about 6 months for it to settle in and stop hurting but ive now had 2 and i get slight pain on a day to day basis and when i would be due on or due to ovulate i get back ache and nausea but that is a far cry from what i was going through. every now and then i get horrendous pain and i start to think maybe its not working anymore or the endo devil has morphed and isn't being tricked by my coil anymore haha but then i sit with my hot water bottle and i wake up the next morning to a new day. i haven't had a day off work due to my endo since i was 17. I struggle with uni at the minute because my pain comes through the night or early in the morning because ive been sleeping on my back so i cant get to seminars in the morning but other than that i am okay. i have a very high pain threshold and i still deal with pain as part of my life but it is nowhere near what it used to be like.
Been told by gynae I'm too old for endo but gp disagrees? 
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