Welcome Guest Blogger, Melissa Turner of Endoangel,
My Journey with Endometriosis feels like it is coming to an end.
It has been a very long journey, this road with just me and my fellow companion: Endo. We met each other when I was only 19 years of age and we have certainly tested all the various recommendations that exist out there. There are so many different paths to go down and somehow we had to travel the journey exploring a whole heap before finally reaching a path where we feel more certain of the destination. That destination of feeling certainty in healing, feels quite close now and I know that when I get there, Endo will no longer be by my side. Our journey would have ended and we will go our separate ways.
I can see the glimmer of hope of real healing because I can feel the changes happening in my body each day, each week and certainly each month. I don’t get nearly as much pain as I used to. I don’t get nearly as much exhaustion and challenge within my life. Endo is slowly leaving it’s position of being around all the time.
Initially when endo and I met for the first time, our relationship was not a favourable one. In fact, I think I spent most of my 20’s resenting and hating it. I would hate how it dominated my life and my body and how no matter what I tried, nothing seemed to help it or make it go away. I would go into boughtS of depression because of endo. It would leave me feeling hopeless and so isolated from everyone else. I just hated it being in my body.
Over the many years we have spent together however, I have actually learned to accept that endo was there. It actually became a big motivator for choosing a more natural approach. It had a distinct advantage: it would tell me when it wasn’t keen on what I was eating or doing to my body. It was like my weather gauge, or shall I re-phrase: pain gauge and it kept me clean and healthy which naturally is helping my whole body. Endo also made me feel such compassion for other women and for many other people who suffer with pain or conditions which are unexplainable and yet somehow they still have to live with them.
The funny thing is, now that Endo is leaving, I feel it has shown me all it’s different sides. It has shown me it’s strong and dominant side but also a more delicate and pleading side. A side which perhaps many of us with endo never really get to or understand. We spend so much time fighting with it, that we never really get to know that side. It is soft and delicate and largely misunderstood. It is a side that requires nurturing and such incredible delicate care. That care for me, came from a place of truly loving all that I am and all of my body. To accept this endo for all that it was and to recognise it’s incredibly powerful message.
For me that message was quite simply that I couldn’t keep mistreating my body with poor diet, poor lifestyle choices and lump it with a large basket of stress. I had to really love it, like it was a child, a delicate child that needed special care and treatment. It loves massages, long baths and lovely cups of healing teas. It doesn’t cope well with worry and contemplation and overthinking on what it is doing. It prefers the messages of hope and possibility and that wonderful deep meditation that comes through quite stillness and comfort.
I want more women to experience a positive journey with Endometriosis. I want them to understand and appreciate that Endo doesn’t need to be this nasty, invader or something we need to fight with. It has such incredible lessons to teach us. The most important one, that I felt it has taught me is that I can become empowered within myself and the choices I make for my body each day. I can choose what foods I eat, what messages I tell myself, how I choose to move and how I look upon my endo in itself. I can do all of these and they will not just benefit the endometriosis become less dominant but it will provide me with the fuel and energy to live a more for filling life. I can have a whole complete body health with these tools, a wonderful package of healing, just for me.
If you are battling with Endometriosis, I invite you to a new realm of looking at it. A new place where Endometriosis is no longer something we simply try to fight, cut out or control but rather a place where we appreciate what might spawn it on to grow, we recognise the value of self care in various forms but mostly we support each other with an often isolating condition.
Having discovered the cause of her endless pain at the tender age of 19, Melissa has dedicated her life to finding a way to just live a “normal” life with Endometriosis. She explored all the recommended options including hormonal treatments and after 7 operations decided that there must be a better way for her body. She was tired of dealing with symptoms and covering up her pain with pain-killers! After starting her personal blog in 2010, she started to explore natural healing methods including diet and lifestyle changes. Her research to finding a way to heal from Endometriosis has turned into a huge passion not just for her body and it’s amazing abilities but to help empower more women with Endometriosis, so they too can lead a normal life.
