Process of the Cycle

This morning I woke up to pain, so instead of getting up to do all I had scheduled out the night before I just stayed in bed. It wasn't until 10am I actually got up and decided to look for the heating pad. Popped a pain pill and ate some cereal to make it though the battle ahead.

The pain pill, I discovered is the actual cause of me throwing up a few months back at a dinner party. Glad to finally figure that out. How I figured it out this afternoon, wasn't such a joyous process.

I spent the day calling friends to say I couldn't make it to the various engagements I had planned. No parting hugs for my friend going to Ecuador tomorrow. No dinner with my pals tonite at church. No clean room today, stuck in my bed to stare at my dresser with hairspray, lotion and these stuffed animal gifts for a baby. I don't know why my mom sent me those for Easter, I'm not having a baby in any near future.

Days like this come once a month for me. I've changed my diet and am still in the process of changing it and incorporating exercise. So far I've mainly cut out caffine, and chocolate. I mean I ate chocolate a few times this month but significantly less than usual. I even went body surfing yesterday for a little while, and a brisk walk the other day. Been doing crunches whenever I get a chance too. So just trying to make a difference.

My OB says I have endometriosis, but there is no way to actually tell that I have that. She made the determination by random guessing. I have sever cramping every month that causes me to go home from work. Once I threw up on the way home. Another I popped chocolates to make sure I'd stay awake til I got home. The same thing doesn't happen every month but its always painful and I'm always pretty weak.

I have severe cramping in my lower abdomen and my legs are weak and my head is really spacy. Its like my whole body shuts down to address whats going on in my uterus. Kinda makes it hard to function. I've had this since I was 14, that I can recall. Its been on and off most of my life. I finally got sick of it and realized this isn't the way to live. This isn't normal.

So the OBs first suggestion was I go on the birthcontrol pill to control my cycle. So I did for two months. I came back and told her my cycles were longer than usual on the pill and that I still has the same pain. So she then diagnosed me with endometriosis - where the blood builds up outside the uterus and attaches to the organs. This causes scar tissue to develop and causes severe pain when the monthy cycle comes along.

So then she says what I should do now is take the birth control pill for three months straight then allow my body one week to have its natural cycle. I'd only have a period 3 times a year. Now I never wanted to go on the pill in the first place, being I don't need to control getting pregnant. But to be on it for three months straight would totally throw off my body. I asked her if it would mess my body up if I wanted to have kids later. She said no not at all. But later in my further questioning she said if I wanted to have kids later I just needed to stop taking the pill 6 months before I wanted to actually concieve. So I still have the severe cramping and pain for 6 months in the process of trying to have children.

The pill would just theoretically turn off my body and everything in it that is causing me pain. It wouldn't deal with the issue of why I have the pain. And honestly my OB doesn't know what is causing the pain. The only way to know that I have endo is to cut me open and look. Kinda major surgery just to check. But not only that they can't do anything else except turn off all the pipes to control anything even when they do find endo. So I pretty much told her nevermind, I'll try something else. She was kinda shocked.

So now I'm in my second month off the pill and trying to adjust my body somehow. I've read a bunch of things and I gotta change my whole life to really see if I can change this. The cost ... time, sacrifice, disicpline and even some pain until we see a breakthrough. Some say just get rid of pain but pain is your body telling you something is going on and I dont want to ignore warning signals and just turn them off. Duh, talk about denial. I only have one body and one life, and I think I got lots of time to experiement and see whats up. I'm no doctor but so what, they dont know why I have pain.

Some women have this really really bad from what I've researched. Its pretty horrible. On an upnote I've also heard its not so bad after you have kids. So Im like ok lets do it. Apparently as a good Christian girl who knows I have a destiny to live out I cant just grab the first man who walks by. Too much at stake. So just lying in bed with my heating pad and sleeping on and off.

Didnt realize it but writing this out is kind of an encouragment to not slump in attitude and self pity. Kinda like how I started out. But I'm in pain because I want to pursue healing. That is a good focus.