Family
Life
Once the condition was diagnosed, family life was shall we say…uneasy. Neither
my husband or I knew enough at the beginning and although we did spend many,
many hours talking about it, we just went around in circles, which nearly always
ended up with me getting angry or frustrated. It’s probably true to say that in
the early years, the topic of Endo and treatment consumed our lives.
As I struggled to understand and accept what was happening to me, I was barraged
with ‘good ideas’ and the positive outcomes of various scenarios played out by
well meaning friends and family. After each visit to the doctor, I was
'encouraged' by all and finally got so tired of statements like: "there must
be a cure", "get a second opinion", and "don’t give up" that I started getting
angry and left the answering machine to deal with it.
For me, this approach did not work, and in retrospect, what I really needed to hear was that the Endo was a part of me.
An unwelcome part of me, but one that I had to accept and live with. I never
heard those words during the early years, and in fairness should not have
expected to hear them from anyone, except me. I think that the pursuance of a
cure on my part was not so much for me but more for everyone else that so
desperately wanted me to get better.
So, I tried, I cried, I got angry, I felt sorry for myself, I hated Endo, I
wished I was someone else, I took to my bed, I shouted and screamed at my family
and stopped going out just in case the pain started when I was having fun.
Then, late one afternoon, over four years after my diagnosis, fate, kismet,
chance, providence, the inner me – call it what you will, decided that enough
was enough and stepped in.
I was lying on the settee in the front room trying hard to concentrate on a
movie and waiting for the painkillers to work. I had a packet of rice cakes on
the table next to me – with one missing – all that I had eaten that day. It had
been a particularly rough week pain-wise and I was tired and just wanted to
sleep; sleep for at least 3 days and not have a single dream. The type of sleep
that I imagine I would have had in my mother’s womb. The type that was reserved
only for the innocent.
I gingerly raised myself up and reached for the rice cakes and slowly removed
the cellophane on all of them and proceeded to throw them around the room. I managed to
pull myself up and stood there looking at the mess I had made.
"That’s Endometriosis", I said to myself. "And what to we do to Endometriosis?"
I asked.
"Smash the hell out of it!!" I shouted, and proceeded to jump up and down on the
‘Endo’ on the floor! As the ‘Endo’ broke up and flew around the room, I heard
myself screaming "Die, Die, Die". My pain was forgotten, I was in a frenzy! I
was freeing myself of all the pent-up emotions I had allowed to build up and
most of all I was having fun!
When I eventually stopped, I was standing in the middle of the room surrounded
by all this ‘dead Endo’ with a huge grin on my face!
I had at last exorcised the ‘demon’ in me! I was free! I was still in pain but I
was no longer an ‘Endo victim’, I was Angela! I was me!
I hobbled over to the settee, picked up my dressing gown, walked upstairs to the
bedroom, got into bed and a fell asleep. I slept long and deep. I slept the
sleep that had eluded me for so long.
When I woke up, it was late. I was pain-free and hungry. I remembered
the state I had left the living room and went downstairs. I walked
in and the room was
spotless. My husband was in his favourite chair reading. I stood just inside
the doorway wondering what he had made of my latest ‘outburst’.
He slowly put his
book down, and looked up at me and I noticed his eyes were twinkling – something
I hadn’t seen in a long time. He smiled and said simply, "Welcome back, It’s
nice to have you home".
"Why didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t you tell me to learn to live with it or
something?" I asked. "Because" he replied "It would have been cruel to say so,
it was a decision you had to reach by yourself".
That night, we talked, laughed and made plans; things we hadn’t done in a long
time.
The next day, my husband took the day off and took me shopping.
Was I in pain for some of the time on my day out? The answer is "Yes".
But what was paramount to me was that I was enjoying myself and was no longer
scared of
how I would cope with the pain outside of the cage I had built.