Do I have endometriosis?

by Anonymous

Hi,

I have just turned 21 years old, and I'm a second year university student about to take my summer exams.

For many years now, I have had fairly intermittent but regular pain in my left side, which feels localised to just right of the hip bone but has recently started spreading to my back, abdomen and kidney areas on the left side, and occasionally on the right.

My last few periods have been unusually heavy and have started to get more irregular, with the last one being bang on time but the two before being just over a week late. In the week leading up to the last few and most notably the most recent period, I have been bedridden for multiple days at a time by this stabbing pain in my left side, fairly severe fatigue, constant bloating and nausea.

At the time, I was recommended to go to A&E as I had previously gone to a walk-in doctor for what I thought were bladder infection-related symptoms and it was thought that the pain I was experiencing might be a kidney problem. But in A&E, they ran blood work and urine tests and found that both were completely clear, indicating no infection of any urinary tract organ. Since then, I have done a lot of research, most of which has lead me to sites like these.

I have also been subject to severe pain when it comes to bowel movements, where the pain is often worse when I need to go to the toilet and continues until I have completely finished, if that happens at all.

This has been cast off by the doctor multiple times as IBS, but I always thought that there was something wrong with that assumption as I nearly always have diarrhoea during my period but constipation on-and-off for the rest of the month.

Anyway, these last few weeks have felt like an upward slog, where I have had the results of an internal ultrasound come back clear this morning, but still have had intermittent sharp pains in my side, what I feel is severe fatigue despite getting enough sleep, and the occasional nausea, and have been taking the maximum number of painkillers possible without much effect.

I was hoping that by writing all of this down, someone might be able to give some insight into whether they think I am on the right track with my attempt to get a laparoscopy via the GP to investigate whether these symptoms are because of endometriosis.

Thanks in advance.