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Eden, 21, shares her heavy and painful periods stopped her going about normal life as a teenager.
I got my period quite late compared to a lot of people that I know. I was 15 and from the very beginning experienced really heavy bleeding, severe cramps and other symptoms. My periods have always been very hard to manage and very unpredictable.
One specific instance where heavy bleeding affected me was when I was 17 I was in my health and social care class and started to feel really unwell. I then experienced a migraine where I couldn’t see and there was a ringing in my ears. I got admitted to A&E and had to have a spinal tap as they were worried that I had a bleed in my brain.
I’ve actually ended up in A&E three times due to my period and the intense cramps that I experience.
Another time that my period was really challenging was within the same year of being 17. I got really bad stomach pains where I couldn’t eat and had a lot of digestion issues. It was really hard to manage this as I was an active athlete who did taekwondo and I was also doing my A-levels but I wasn’t able to eat in school without throwing up. I was extremely fatigued and experienced dizziness as a result. This went on for a year and it was triggered by my period but thankfully it did eventually settle.
I think I first noticed that what I experience was heavier than an ‘average’ period was when I was talking to my friends and I realised that they don’t experience such severe symptoms and their periods don’t really stop them from doing things like sport. I also watched a webinar from the Wellbeing of Women website on endometriosis and then decided to visit their website and noticed that a lot of the symptoms that I was experiencing were similar to this condition and that’s why I realise that maybe my period wasn’t ‘normal’.
For me, the biggest challenges I face as a result of heavy menstrual bleeding would be missing out on overall life!
I think it’s not often understood how the symptoms of your period and heavy bleeding can affect you in all aspects of your life.
I really struggled in school and I think it was particularly hard as it was during my exams. I remember falling asleep in study and being in so much pain I was crying in the middle of class because I didn’t want to miss any more days of school.
I also did taekwondo and although exercise can help periods I was so much pain and the symptoms were so bad that I had to miss out on this a lot as well. It was also really hard as my taekwondo uniform was white which meant during competitions it was really hard to manage a heavy flow.
Some other challenges have been it’s affected my appetite and also the symptoms like headaches, dizziness and the pain has led to insomnia which consequentially has a knock-on effect on my day-to-day functioning during my period.
The education I received on periods was quite generic and there wasn’t a lot of talk about how it would affect you or anything about endometriosis or other types of conditions. Luckily I went to an all-girls school so it was quite common knowledge about periods but I think there was still a lot of stigma around talking about it and I think this would be something that would be important to be broken down.
I also would have liked teachers to have a better understanding and training on how to support young people who might be struggling with this, as well as more awareness and open discussions about conditions like endometriosis. I also think that there should be policies in place to arrange days off for conditions like this as I know some workplaces do this but I think they should be similar in education facilities and also in workplaces where this isn’t already available.
I think it’s important for young people to remember that they’re not all alone in experiencing heavy menstrual bleeding.
I know that it can be quite isolating and it can be really hard to navigate especially if you’re in education or in the workplace but it’s so important that you just look after yourself and do what’s right for you. Make sure that you are getting as much rest as you can and if it’s really having such an impact on your life then is important to seek medical professional help.
Do you have heavy periods?
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