My story

[Joannavh]

Hi everyone,

I have put up a couple of posts now so thought I would share my story with everyone.

At the age of 13 I started my periods, every month I had serve debilitating pelvic pain, and heavy bleeding which I was told by doctors was 'normal' the pain made me vomit and I had to have time off school because of it. After many visits to the doctors I was admitted to the hospital for a laparoscopy, they told me I had appendicitis and removed my appendix, I thought 'great no more pain' but I was wrong, six months later I was back in hospital with the same pains and diagnosed with stomach head aches (which I had never heard of before) they gave me medicine to help this, but unfortunately they were yet again wrong with their diagnosis. I am now 23 and have only just on Thursday been diagnosed with stage 2 endometriosis. I was constantly visiting the doctor with the same stomach pain and they kept on diagnosing me with IBS. it has taken 10 years to finally get diagnosed. only within the last year I have realised that something is not right with being in constant pain And what I was feeling was not 'normal' I did not know about endometriosis until I researched about why I have stomach pain and I eventually had to ask my doctor to refer me to a gynaecologist and suggested to her that I had endometriosis. This is not how it should be and women should be understood more. The gynaecologist has been absolutely brilliant and luckily I have private health care so I could get things moving along quicker, however I wanted to make awareness of this condition because I had no awareness and have been living with this since I started my period. Hope this helps anyone who is scared or worried about asking their doctor. Better to be checked out!

[vickflick]

Hey, sorry to hear you have had to go through so much but happy to hear you finally have it sorted! I have been in and out of a & e with what i was told was a grumbling appendix, I too had my appendix removed in 2012 but was still getting the same pain! Finally I might have an answer to the pain! It's crazy when you think how common endo is that doctors can take so long to diagnose!!