Britt was diagnosed with adenomyosis after years of struggling with very painful periods and heavy, frequent, bleeding. Adenomyosis had a big impact on her life. In this short clip Britt speaks about her experience with adenomyosis, from symptoms to diagnosis and treatment.
Adenomyosis is a condition that causes the lining of the womb (the endometrium) to bury into the muscular wall of the womb. To learn more about adenomyosis visit NHS Inform https://www.nhsinform.scot/healthy-living/womens-health/girls-and-young-women-puberty-to-around-25/periods-and-menstrual-health/adenomyosis
Britt also speaks about how to manage menstrual health conditions in another video produced by the ALLIANCE. Watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyxQiCnFRRY
This video was produced by the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland (the ALLIANCE) in support of the Scottish Government’s Women’s Health Plan. This video is part of our ALLIANCE Live series, Women’s Health at the Centre.
Women’s Health Plan: https://www.gov.scot/binaries/content/documents/govscot/publications/strategy-plan/2021/08/womens-health-plan/documents/womens-health-plan-plan-2021-2024/womens-health-plan-plan-2021-2024/govscot%3Adocument/womens-health-plan-plan-2021-2024.pdf
Speak to your GP or gynaecologist for personal medical queries.
Timecodes
0:00 Intro
1:16 Symptoms
3:26 Seeking diagnosis
5:36 Treating adenomyosis
7:18 Challenges
Adenomyosis Adenomyosis is a condition that causes the lining of the womb to bury into the muscular wall of the womb it can affect the whole room or just one part of the womb adenomyosis is not a life-threatening condition but the symptoms can have a big impact on your day-to-day life so
It’s important to get support hi I’m Brett I’m a patient advocate for Women’s Health and I also lead the Glasgow endometriosis UK support group and today I’m here speaking to you about my adenomyosis journey and what that looks like for myself and dealing with what what would be adenomyosis for years
But I didn’t always have something that I could put a name against you know for many years it was um it was all in my head and it was a matter of I just had bad periods and I needed to get on with it and difficulty with periods has started back
From you know when I was 11 when I started administrating so I’m now 33 and it’s been a very long journey symptoms of adenomyosis can include heavy periods that last for a long time severe period pain a feeling of pressure in your tummy and bloating it’s also possible to have adenomyosis
And have no symptoms throughout this entire time I’ve really suffered from severe um menstrual cramps and the closest thing that I can associate it with is labor type contractions where they do come in really big pushes to the point where I can nearly feel like I’m going to pass
Out and I break into a cold sweat because they’re so bad and and sometimes depending on how they are it’s a matter of you know you can’t stay still so you have to rock or you have to try or you can’t even get up and other symptoms
That I’ve had with it alongside that throughout this entire time and as it progressed and as it got worse is really heavy bleeding so what happened for me was that it started off where you know when I was younger when I first started my cycle it was you know probably I always
Had a longer one so seven to ten days and then my cycle started extending into being you know okay it was 14 days and then it went into three weeks you know and then really you know it started to get to the point when I was 25 26 that
And they finally had put me on the coil and inadvertently just to see if that helped with things and I bled nearly every day for a year like great okay do I do I have enough sanitary towels do oh I can’t wear this outfit because I’m bleeding like you become so
Self-aware and it really gets you down it really gets you down and for me actually I would I I became anemic a really bad attention whereas you can see that it’s my uterus and that lower part my lower stomach my pelvic area is so swollen and distended and to the point
Where you know I don’t want to be touched I can’t really wear you know much on it so it’s just where like you know a very big t-shirt and it’s like all these things that you know became my normal and and I didn’t really think anything about it I
Found ways to mitigate it seeking diagnosis you know I was like this you know this isn’t normal I shouldn’t be bleeding foreign I shouldn’t be you know so anemic just because of my cycle you know there needs to be something more I shouldn’t be in this much pain and it
Wasn’t actually until my sister first mentioned actually endometriosis to me that my that I kind of really started digging I had tracked my symptoms for six plus months at this point and I attract not only when how you know how long I was bleeding what the contractions were like or period pain
Was like when I felt distended by Tracked as and when everything that I took around it I tracked what things I had to cancel because I had a massive impact so sometimes I’d be like yeah it’s okay I can go and meet my friends but actually I couldn’t because either I
Was bleeding too heavily and I was too self-conscious or I was exhausted because of the pain and just being anemic at the time down the endometriosis she actually what led to me also being diagnosed with endometrium but because of that it was actually one of my treatments that I was receiving
Led to my diagnosis I’m for adenomyosis as good as it is to have something that you can put a name against to give you that explanation it’s a very Bittersweet experience you know you know it’s not all in your head and it was a lot of frustration because I’m like why why up
Until now has nobody else noticed I had one previous other surgery they didn’t notice and you know and for me the the size of my uterus for contacts due to so much tissue going into the muscular wall was is the size of somebody who’s had you know three to four children and I’ve
Never had any children so you know it’s a lot to take on and it’s a lot to process and as I said you know for me it’s good to know that I can now start telling the difference between matte endometriosis pain and my adenomyosis pain which helps me kind of better for
Pain management and isolation of what my treatment options are and what my treatment pathways are treating adenomyosis there are different options to treat adenomyosis including anti-inflammatory medication to help relieve mild pain treatment during your period to help reduce the amount of menstrual blood loss hormone therapy such as the
Contraceptive pill to help control heavy or painful periods and a hysterectomy this would only be considered in extreme cases please discuss treatment options with your doctor I tried every other Under the Sun that you can think of eight of Zeds um tablet and patch for hormonal um treatments and and combined
Progesterone only and I was still struggling with my adenomyosis symptoms um and in my case I took really bad um migraines so I couldn’t take combined so it really limited what options I had and so for me I went on the coil you know what I asked about that was okay
Why do you think this is the best one like what is the impact it will have on my body what can I expect you know will my bleeding just stop after a certain amount of time um you know these are all the questions that if you think of kind of okay my end
Goal is to have pain control to get my quality of life back so it is me you know is the marina coil as an option for treatment gonna help me get to that end goal and for me it was a means to that you know
It was a means to trade okay right if it can help me get my bleeding as example I’m under control that is massive to not be bleeding every day so if that that’s one step closer challenges as far as my other symptoms with it you know swelling contractions and things
Like that I still I still do suffer from that and you know I’ve gone through additional treatments such as chemical menopause my side effects from it were really severe and it impacted my mental health and so I came off of it and I’m now in the position where I’m doing
Other surgery excision surgery for my endometriosis and that’s the first part of call to try to manage the pain to see okay we’ll do this again and then see where your adenomyosis is if my pain doesn’t improve you know I am then looking at a hysterectomy for
Um my for my treatment option and that’s a really really difficult thing and I think you know for me the biggest part in that is people understanding that it’s not easy to get one it makes a lot of fertility decisions for me it makes you know it
Brings a lot of things that maybe I would still have you know a couple more years to think about forward you know um in terms of how I manage my fertility and I think that it’s really important to know that saying things like you know just get a hysterectomy or and then in
Term just do IVF to help you if you’re adenomyosis is bad and you may and struggle getting pregnant or things like this saying those things and not bringing in the full understanding of how much how grueling it is to your body is a really frustrating misconception and and I
Think you know again I’m sharing this and not for sympathy but for people to understand that it is multifaceted and and saying you know just do this or just do this or just do get a hysterectomy or seek this other line of treatment is not an easy thing if you’re worried about
Your period symptoms or your periods that affect in your day-to-day life visit your GP