My Struggle
With
Endometriosis AS TOLD BY DEBORAH A. RIGHT from the beginning, I need to say that I am not the sort of woman who is constantly concerned about her health. I do not get disturbed over minor aches here and there. I try to take life as it is. Some days are good; others are bad. However, during my teenage years, I began struggling with severe pain. During the difficult days of my menstrual period, I often had biting pain in my ovaries as well as headaches, diarrhea, dizziness, nausea, and lower back pain. Sometimes I would suffer from more than one of these symptoms at a time. I noticed then that exercise and rest helped, but it was hard to find the time. Pain is a personal thing. You cannot measure it, and you cannot always describe it to others convincingly. Sometimes I would spend whole days in bed, exhausted from the symptoms mentioned above, or I would force myself to get up and follow a more active routine, drugged with painkillers. My ability to work and carry on a normal life was hampered. I was extremely disappointed. I had the feeling that something was not right. But when I had my routine medical checkups, the reassuring words of doctors chased that thought away. The symptoms worsened as I passed the age of 30. Burning aches came and went for no apparent reason. Severe pain woke me up in the middle of the night. At one point, I slept only a few hours during a whole week. Moreover, I occasionally had a moderate fever for a number of days. I ended up using painkillers for various aches, spasmolytic pills for my bowels, pills for my stomach, and ointments and pills for my back. A Master of Mimicry The symptoms tormenting me could be attributed to a number of well-known illnesses. My condition was putting on the appearance of migraine, pelvic adhesions, dysmenorrhea (menstrual cramps), irritable bowel syndrome, colitis, and gastritis. I kept blaming much of the aching on dysmenorrhea, but at the time I did not know that the intensity of dysmenorrhea pain is totally different from what I was experiencing. I was told that it was common to have difficult periods and pain and that heredity, lack of regular exercise, long hours working at a desk, hormonal problems, fatigue, and stress as well as having passed the age of 30 without giving birth could be factors. One doctor even told me that all my symptoms were a sign of good health! But what about the other disturbing symptoms? My exhaustion was attributed to hard work and stress. My fever was attributed to fatigue. My bowel pains and stomach disturbances were attributed to stress and bad diet. A problem in the spine and bad posture were blamed for my back pain. So everything seemed to have an explanation. Yet, the fact remained that I was feeling really terrible. At Last, a Proper Diagnosis I had an ultrasound in April of 1998, but the results indicated that my ovaries were clean. During the following four months, my health deteriorated further. I decided to visit a doctor. He ordered an ultrasound again and found something very large outside my uterus. Then he sent me to a gynecologist. The gynecologist confirmed that I had either a very large cyst or a formation of cysts next to my uterus, measuring 4.1 inches by 4.6 inches [10 by 12 cm]—as big as if I were four months pregnant! And then he suspected that the cause of my problems was Endometriosis. At first I was perplexed. I knew very little about Endometriosis. I had so many questions. What causes it? How would this affect my life? The next feeling that came over me was relief. For many years I had felt as if I were trapped in a tunnel of pain. When after repeated medical exams no soothing therapy or satisfying explanation was provided, I really felt helpless and depressed, and I ended up accusing myself of overreacting to normal, everyday pain. I told myself that the intensity of the pain was only in my imagination. Now, however, all the puzzling symptoms had an explanation. Ref:watchtower.org Ask theHealthFoodGuru what food may help stop the pain caused by Endometriosis. | 
