Loving Your Body With Endometriosis
Endometriosis broke my heart into a million pieces and then taught me how to put it back together again…
…so that I could love my body, and appreciate her more deeply than ever before.
March is endometriosis awareness month. 1 in 9 people assigned female at birth share their bodies with endometriosis. 1 in just 7-8 in Australia.
The average time spent waiting for a diagnosis is a staggering 10 years.
Whilst commonly thought of as a “hormonal disorder”, endometriosis is an inflammatory immune response that can affect the entire body .
This response can contribute to the abnormal growth of endometrial-like tissue outside of the uterus, leading to the development of endometriosis lesions. These lesions have been detected on various organs, within tissues, muscles, joints, and even the brain.
Almost 4 years ago, I remember waking up from my first surgery, and learning I had stage 4 endometriosis. I felt relieved. And that was conflicting for me because it’s not something I wanted.
But I was relieved because it meant I wasn’t crazy..
..for all the time I had taken off work, and people I had believed I let down, sleepless nights and times spent rolling around the floor screaming and crying with pain.
It is easy to get mad at our bodies sometimes.
Even though I’ve had many reasons already to learn this lesson,
Endometriosis taught me more than anything that we can’t fight against our bodies, we can only fight FOR our bodies.
And we should. Because they are the only ones we’ve got.
I am more fascinated now than ever before with the human body, and this wildly perplexing condition, that currently has “no known cure”.
I understand that every symptom is my body asking me to learn more, love her more deeply, and share it all so I can support others experiencing the same thing.
Remember, consistent, chronic, cyclical pain is not normal, and there are strategies to help you feel better.
So please, ask questions, connect with me, whether this is for you or to better understand what a loved one is going through.