Spiels of a Quill

I have decided to finally move away from my blog to Medium so that my content can be easily accessed by a larger audience. If you are interested in following my writings, you can find me on Medium at nidhimenon.medium.com . I have a Medium publication by the name Spiels of a quill  that currently has all the posts from my latest #EndoTheStigma series. Most other posts will be ported to this publication at a later time. This blog and its name have always been close to my heart, and will continue to be so! It is just getting a makeover by moving on to Medium, to hopefully be received with love by more people than before. See you there! 🙂 Merci!

I think over the past 11 days I have spoken about most of what I want to share about endometriosis and my journey with a larger audience. Don’t get me wrong- there is so much more that I am going through and there is so much information about endometriosis that I could share, but that’s probably a better discussion with my endo sisters than the readers of my blog. The past two weeks weren’t easy for me. It was in late February that I made the decision of being openly vulnerable for the first time in my life this Endometriosis Awareness Month. Back then I had little support for my decision to do so, but I was passionate and determined to speak up. It took every ounce of courage I had to be an open book. Anthony Bourdain once famously said: “The journey is part of the experience — an expression of the seriousness of one’s intent. One doesn’t take the A train to Mecca.” So when I look back today, I must say that this has been an incredible two weeks of my journey to being an advocate for

Living with a chronic illness is a lesson in resilience. You learn that you cannot change your path, but you can change how you handle it. You learn that it doesn't get easier, you just get stronger. Fighting a battle with your own body is pretty damn exhausting, but you learn that you can heal without being cured. It makes you a warrior. It makes you resilient. What is resilience? Why is it important? How will you know if you are resilient enough? Resilience is your capacity to withstand adversities in life, and your ability to grow despite life's downturns. Being resilient doesn't mean that you don't experience stress, suffering, and emotional upheaval. Nor does it mean that you learn to always be happy about the changes in your life. Instead, it means that you are capable of handling the challenges and emerging stronger than you were before. People who lack resilience find that they may easily become overwhelmed by difficult experiences in life. They tend to dwell on

Did that one friend of yours cancel plans again complaining of pain or fatigue and make you mad? Did you notice a colleague going on leave for 2-3 consecutive days every month and you think that it is unfair? Did you tell them they don't look sick, or that others have it much worse than them? If you did these or one of a hundred other things, there's a chance that you were unnecessarily hard on someone who could have really used your support. And it would mean the world to them if you were more empathetic of their condition. But it is often hard to understand what endo warriors and others with chronic illnesses are going through if they don't open up. So here are some of the thoughts that go through the mind of this endo warrior, with the hope that someone might find it useful: 1. I am sorry for canceling... again We finally put together a plan to meet after months! I am as excited as you are! But I want you to know that there's a chance I might wake up that morning wit

The first step towards change is awareness. The second step is acceptance. I have been aware of my condition since 2019 when I got my endometriosis diagnosis. But until recently, I had been in denial. But like they say, denial is the worst kind of lie because it is a lie you tell yourself. As humans, we tend to go into denial almost every time we are put in a difficult situation because it acts as a shock absorber for our souls. But we fail to remember that the protection is temporary and that we need to learn to cope with reality at some point. Denial is a very dangerous drug because in the long term it makes you a bitter, miserable person who is at odds with themselves and envies others who get to lead a different life. And that is why the journey from denial to acceptance is an important one. The path to acceptance is not easy. Like every other process, it takes time. It takes patience. It takes everything you have got. But it is still a path worth traveling. When diagnosed with a c

Today, I want to talk about the second chronic illness that I was diagnosed with following my MRI - Adenomyosis . Another weird and scary term? Adenomyosis is a chronic condition in which the endometrium (uterine lining) is found in the muscular wall of the uterus.  It often co-exists with endometriosis, thereby giving it the nickname of being ' endo's ugly twin sister' . Some also refer to adenomyosis as  'endometriosis inside the uterine muscle'.  While in most cases it is difficult to diagnose this condition with ultrasounds and MRIs, it is not an impossible task for an expert eye. The symptoms of adenomyosis almost always overlap with those of endometriosis - heavy abnormal bleeding, painful periods, spotting, pelvic pain, and infertility. The one known treatment option out there for adenomyosis is hysterectomy - the removal of the uterus. But this clearly isn't a suitable option for most women, especially ones that choose to be conservative with the intent

PCOS is one of the most common hormonal disorders in women with an incidence of 6-8%.  It is not clear what causes this condition. PCOS is characterized by the following features: 1. Menstrual abnormalities:  Women with PCOS will initially have  infrequent or absent periods but they may eventually develop heavy bleeding. 2. Excessive hair growth or acne:  This is also referred to as hyperandrogenism . 3. Polycystic ovaries:  An ovary  with multiple small cysts, ranging from 0.2 to 0.9 cm in diameter, found on ultrasound  examination. 4. Obesity and metabolic disorder:  PCOS can be associated with diabetes, high blood  pressure, and elevated cholesterol and triglyceride levels. It can also be associated with  insulin resistance. When there is insulin resistance, the body produces more insulin because  the body does not respond to the normal amount of insulin that is produced and this increased  production of insulin can add to the excessive hair growth and acne discussed above. If a wom

  Sometimes when things are falling apart, they may be actually falling into place! After my first visit to Dr. M's office, I had more than a dozen blood tests done. When the results came back, she was able to confirm that I had PCOS and that my hormone levels were greatly imbalanced. We also found that I have insulin resistance (a condition that leads to high glucose levels) due to my PCOS which  puts me at a higher risk  for pre-diabetes and type 2 diabetes. To manage this, I was put on Metformin. I was also asked to cut down on carb-high foods and sugar to manage my PCOS and insulin resistance. I tried this new regime for about a month, and neither did my physical health improve, nor was there a decrease in the amount of pain I had to endure around my menses. The only noticeable effects at the end of 30 days were that I was experiencing bloating, nausea, and mood swings due to the medication. I was also more hungry and cranky since I was trying to get used to a diet with as few

We often talk about the 'last straw'. But like Stephanie rightly said - There is always a final straw but it isn't any worse than the dozens of straws that came before. They were the same. You just finally learned that you are more than you settled for. After I graduated in Dec 2018, I moved cross-country to relocate myself to California - the Golden State. I had found myself a job and an apartment in the heart of San Francisco, and I was content with it. I didn't know anyone in the new city, and I was eager to meet people and make friends. The thing with not being a party-animal in a city like San Francisco is that you miss out on the general events and venues where you get to meet people. But then I discovered that SF had its very own local chapter of Asha for Education. For those of you who don't know, Asha is a volunteer-run non-profit dedicated to support the education of physically/mentally challenged and underprivileged children back in India. Though I had h

"All was black, gloomy and awful. There was no light at the end of the tunnel - or if there was, it was an oncoming train."  This quote by author Terry Pratchett aptly summarizes the 11 years of my life before I was diagnosed with the chronic illness called endometriosis. Back home in India, having lost all hopes I tried to learn how to live life with the constant pain and fatigue. On days when the pain was really bad I would just stay home and not attend school or college. The comfort of my home, my bed, and my family somehow gave me the strength to lay down and wait for the storm to pass. But on days when I was out of home and my periods unexpectedly decided to show up, all I could do was sit in class squeezing the life out of my lower abdomen, waiting for the lecture to get over so that I could sprint back home. It was a routine I had started getting used to. While I always knew that some day soon I was going to travel halfway across the globe to pursue my dreams, I had ne

" Drug seeker ", " Hysterical ", " Difficult ", " Attention seeker " For years I knew something was wrong with my health when month after month I went through painful periods, fatigue, and diarrhea. The ordeal was beyond explanation. Growing up in a family that chooses to resort to home-remedies initially for any and all illnesses, I tried my best to find things that might work but in vain. So I started making appointments with doctors to talk about my symptoms that were affecting all aspects of my life to a great extent. Sadly, instead of listening to my concerns and probing into the probable causes to give me a diagnosis, all they did was label me. The labels were more than I could count on my hand, but there was usually a common pattern. I didn't know back then that behavior like this is referred to using the term medical gaslighting .                Pic credit:  @autoimmuneabbey                                        Pic credit:   @r.a.r.

Let's start at the very beginning A very good place to start When you read you begin with ABC When you sing you begin with Do-Re-Mi... And when you talk about endometriosis, you start with "Periods". I first heard the term during hushed conversations at school back when kids thought talking about 'adult stuff' was cool, and girls couldn't wait to turn into women 🙄. I remember initially ignoring the talks thinking it was some made up hogwash until I got the 'period talk' - a rather short and awkward one - from my grandmother after which I had no choice but to believe it. Since that day I waited nervously till that wave of red came crashing down on me. Luckily (or should I say unfortunately for me) I didn't have to wait much longer for the onset of what would go on to be the cause of 99% of my problems in life.         Thanks to my heredity, I have almost always been anemic. So to my doctors it felt like the logical reason for irregular periods. Als

We all love to imagine life filled with What Ifs ... We all love stories about invisible monsters... don't we? Let me walk you through a scenario and let's see how much fun you think it is: Imagine a life where you had a hidden chronic illness that leaves you in debilitating pain, but every single time you tried seeking help you became a victim of medical gaslighting. Nobody understands you, your symptoms, or your behavior. You continue living life this way for over 12 years before one day you collapse in pain on the side of the road. You go into the doctor's office expecting to be dismissed, but this time you finally walk out the door with a diagnosis for a condition that has no cure. If you think that is scary, look around because 1 in 10 women live a life just like this thanks to a mystery condition called ENDOMETRIOSIS. Never heard of it? I wouldn't be surprised because I myself never knew of it until that fine August morning back in 2019 when I sat across from my g

"You come from a broken family." That's a line I am so accustomed to hearing over 2 decades that I really started believing it in my subconscious mind. It ate away at me every time - no matter where, when or who said it. The stigma around a single-parent household has been so traumatizing that as an adult I struggle to deal with social and relationship anxiety. Very recently I was prompted to think over why this affected me so much, and why I felt compelled to believe that I hail from a 'broken family'. Were you one of those people who grew up believing that you knew the mathematical formula for what the society calls a 'family'? Did your formula look like: Family = Husband + Wife + kid(s) If the answer is yes, I wouldn't be surprised because honestly that's the image society put in our heads ever since we were little kids. But it is time that we took a pause, looked around and asked - Is this really what a family means? If we were to look around