A young woman has opened up about living with endometriosis and her frustration at doctors not taking her complaints seriously.
Dubliner Laura Smith, 21, started suffering from chronic pain back in 2017.
But she wasn’t diagnosed with the disorder, which involves the tissue that normally lines the uterus growing outside the uterus, until August of this year, RSVP Live reports.
She said: “I always suffered from pain, but in September 2017 it got really bad.
“I was in work one day and my dad had to come and collect me because of the pain, we went to the GP and he sent me straight to hospital.”
Doctors thought Laura had appendicitis, so she underwent an operation to remove her appendix.
But the next day she was told she had a cyst on her right ovary which had ruptured.
She had that treated but two months later she got another cyst, which doctors refused to remove.
“They told me that cysts are common and it would probably go away,” she explained.
“But then on St Stephen’s day that cyst ruptured and I had to have another emergency operation.”
Laura was tested for endometriosis three times and doctors found nothing.
“Some doctors suggested I might be ‘imagining’ the pain or that it was just regular period pain,” she said.
“Others told me I should take painkillers - just deal with it, basically.
“I got so fed up of being sent home and not being listened to.”
In April the following year, doctors found a third cyst, and Laura was left on a waiting list for an operation for 16 months.
When she went in for surgery, it was finally discovered that she had endometriosis.
