Heavy Periods Aren't Normal

 

From the moment my periods first started, I knew deep down that something was wrong and that my body wasn't working correctly. I've always suffered from unnaturally heavy and unbearably painful periods that would leave me bed-bound for days or weeks at a time, resulting in me missing school/college/university/work. A period for me means changing my sanitary products every 30 minutes so that I don't bleed through my clothes, it means taking endless amounts of pain relief to try and relieve at least a little bit of the pain. It means passing large blood clots, chronic pelvic pain and taking medication to help the iron-deficiency anemia they leave me suffering with.

I have been suffering like this for around 14 years, which is when my periods first started. Periods are such a taboo subject and I often get a lot of hate, even from those close to me, about how open I am about my periods and everything I've gone through. The way I see it is that if what I say helps just one person realise that what they are going through isn't natural, then speaking up is completely worth it. 

The biggest problem and reason I'm still trying to find out what's going on with my body is that we're conditioned to think that talking about periods is bad and gross and that's not how the world should be. Had I have known a lot earlier that my periods weren't normal, I might not be where I am today, my life might have been easier and I may not have dealt with so much pain. Another reason is how hard it is to figure out why periods aren't natural, why they are so heavy because the tests they do need to be done at the right moment in order to find out exactly what's wrong and I've just never got answers.

I've spent a lot of my life not knowing when my periods are going to come, I've gone months and even years without one, not knowing what to expect, and being terrified about how much pain I'm going to be in or how much blood I am going to lose. Periods are something that every woman has to deal with and to live your life in fear of something you're going to have to deal with for the majority of your life is traumatic. 

When I first realised that my periods weren't normal, I forced my mum to take me to the doctors where they ran basic tests and told me it was just a phase and that as I grow into a woman they would come more frequently, be less painful and I wouldn't lose as much blood when this happened. I believed them because why wouldn't I? 

I've had hundreds of doctor's appointments, dozens of hospital referrals, dozens of exams, and blood tests to still end up none the wiser as to what's going on with my body. It's my body and I deserve to know what's wrong and to be expected to still not have answers after so long after so much trauma is exhausting. 

In around 2016 I experienced some of the worst pain I have ever experienced in my entire life, pain that I wouldn't wish upon anyone. After multiple tests spanning over a 6 month period, I was told I had an ovarian cyst that needed to be removed as it was attached to my tube, twisting and damaging it. I eventually had laparoscopic surgery, lasting around 6 hours, where they removed the cyst, but had complications with my fallopian tube and had to remove that too. I've been diagnosed with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome and have been told by so many health professionals that I probably have Endometriosis but they still haven't been able to confirm this.

A lot of my periods leave me needing to change my sanitary products every 30 minutes or risk bleeding through my clothes, passing blood clots bigger than my palm. They leave me in constant pain that honestly feels like someone is repeatedly stabbing me and I'm not even talking about the constant period cramps which are agonising. My periods leave me losing so much blood that I get dizzy, I pass out and I'm anaemic.

I have so much more to talk about with regards to my periods and the journey I've been on and the journey I will continue to go on for potentially the rest of my life. I want to help people understand what's normal and when to get checked so will follow this up with additional posts.

Iceland

Iceland was like nothing I had ever seen before, truly magical and I definitely visited at the right time of year. Everything was covered in a crisp white layer of snow, and it made everything so much more beautiful. I've never felt cold like it, but still dream of it to this day. I took multiple boat trips on the hunt to see the northern lights, which I kind of saw, but also not really. Other boat trips were whale watching trips, again I wasn’t lucky here either, but found it was of course due to the freezing temperatures and cloudy skies. I walked endlessly through the streets of Reykjavik, finding amazing things I never would have otherwise, like little museums, churches and quirky Christmas shops that are open 365 days a year. I went on a Golden Circle tour that took us to see the Gullfoss Waterfall, the geothermal area in Haukadalur which contained huge geysers and Thinvellir National Park where you can see the boundary between the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates.

 Iceland truly was a dream.

Liverpool's Cat Cafe

Look at me, posting again, I can hardly believe it myself! It was a couple of months ago now, but my best-friend and I decided it was time that we visited a cat cafe. Cat's, free drinks, and friends, what's not to love? The way this Cafe works is you pay for the time you're there in 5 minute slots, all drinks are free for the duration of your stay and you can have as many as you want. PURRfect.

I absolutely adore cat's, if you do too and haven't been to one, head on down to a Cat Cafe, you won't regret it!

It's been a minute

I’m back! Don’t worry, I know that no one has been sat there eagerly awaiting my next post, but that doesn’t stop me from hoping. It really had been a minute, 6 months worth of minutes to be exact and hopefully I’ll manage to stay for awhile this time. I’m really glad I took a break from blogging, I think everyone should do that every once in awhile. So many pressures come from blogging without even realising them, I would often find myself questioning what I’m posting and wondering why people would care about it, typing countless words only for them to be deleted a moment later. I’ve decided to create my content for myself going forwards, I’m not going to force myself into tight deadlines, I’m only going to post when I actually want to and I’m not going to worry about whether people are interested in everything I post because I can’t please everyone.

A lot has happened since I was last here, and I’m looking forward to sharing that with you in this post and in future posts.

In October my husband and I were sent to The Liverpool Women’s Hospital as we have been trying to conceive for over 12 months and have had no luck. Now you already know the journey I’ve been on with PCOS, and that I’m down a Fallopian tube and to be honest, that’s why they didn’t hesitate to transfer me to a fertility clinic. We attended a few appointments at the clinic and were told that the pro norms ultimately come down to me, which is something we already knew. I don’t qualify to have any kind of fertility treatment at the moment because I am currently above the preferred BMI. Knowing that they wouldn’t help me because of my weight absolutely broke my heart because your size doesn’t determine how much you deserve a child. Everything always comes down to weight, regardless as to whether that’s the cause of the problem, that’s the thing blamed for everything. During our experience at the fertility clinic, we were told it was unlikely that we would be able to conceive on our own because although I’m actually producing more eggs than normal, these eggs aren’t developing fully. I was put on Metformin, which is a drug for diabetes, but apparently helps with ovulation in women who suffer with PCOS. I was also put on something called Norethisterone, which forces my body to have a period every 3 months, I was out on this because I don’t have periods myself naturally. That’s one thing I would love, to have period naturally, now I’m on these pills I’m having the lest periods I’ve ever had. After being given the above medication we were discharged from the fertility clinic, and no I’m here. Still not pregnant. Having the worst periods.

I really am so glad to be back, and I'm already super excited about future posts, but until then ...

Mr and Mrs Barrow

May I present to you Mr and Mrs Barrow!

“Now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the great story no one on earth has ever read, which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.” - C.S Lewis

On the 21st July 2018 one of my oldest friends said “I do” to her soulmate and now husband. The wedding was held at the most beautiful venue and was more perfect than I could ever explain, the entire day was as if we were living in a real life fairy tale. From the stunning decor to one of the best live bands I’ve seen in a long time. From the beautiful dresses to the gorgeous food. This day absolutely took my breathe away and I couldn’t be happier for Mr and Mrs Barrow.

Congratulations again to one of my favourite couples

Happiness

Positivity is a very important part of life, although sometimes it can be hard to keep the positive feelings going. Every month I'm going to pick one word, and I'm going to write a post about that word. Words can have different meaning, it depends on how you look at them and who you are as to how you analyse that word.

Happiness 

Have you ever really sat there and just thought about one single word? One single word could have a different meaning to everyone on this planet, yet it could have the same meaning at the same time…what does happiness mean to you?

Here's how google defines happiness … but why leave it for someone else to define what that word means? That word is worth so much more than this.

happiness

ˈhapɪnəs/

noun

noun: happiness; plural noun: happinesses

1.     the state of being happy.

"she struggled to find happiness in her life"

synonyms:	contentment, pleasure, contentedness, satisfaction, cheerfulness, cheeriness, merriment, merriness, gaiety, joy, joyfulness, joyousness, joviality, jollity, jolliness, glee, blitheness, carefreeness, gladness,delight, good spirits, high spirits, light-heartedness, good cheer, well-being, enjoyment, felicity; More
antonyms:	unhappiness

First and foremost happiness is a word, but if you forget about that factor for a moment then you will realise that it's so much more than just a word. You'll realise the true meaning of happiness, you'll realise that there may not actually be a true meaning of this word, it can be a feeling, an emotion, it can be a way of life and it's defined differently by everyone. 

It's thought that happiness is basically living the perfect life, it's often seen as living your life full of positivity, prosperity, and good health. How can you define a word as any one thing when it can mean so much, or so little, to each individual. 

To me happiness is the most important thing in life, everything that you do should be to gain complete happiness, and if there's something occurring in your life that isn't making you happy, then it probably shouldn't have any involvement in your life. I think that to be happy in life is to be the greatest that you can be, if you're living a life of happiness, you're more likely to spread that happiness around you. If there's one thing in the world that we were brought here to achieve, its happiness.

The more I think about this word, the more I begin to realise that happiness is a word that's hard to define, it's something that you can only truly know of once you've experienced it. What if you were to experience something in your life that made you drastically happier than something that you thought truly gave you happiness…how can we ever truly know what happiness actually means?

"Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy."

- Anne Frank

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