Bad Periods is the catch-all term doctors and many people use to characterize the chronic pelvic pain, extreme fatigue and other debilitating symptoms many women experience during their menstrual cycle, from their actual period all the way through to ovulation.
Bad Periods are not rare.
Chronic pelvic pain affects more women than diabetes,
176 million women experience endometriosis
and 80% of women will get a fibroid in their lifetime.
All of these conditions, as well as polycystic ovarian syndrome, adenomyosis, interstitial cystitis, burst ovarian cysts, functional cysts, and endometriomas happen only to bodies with female genitalia (with the exception of a few rare cases of endometriosis in men).
Unfortunately because of systemic clinical gender and institutional bias, Bad Periods go undiagnosed and untreated causing a serious deterioration in quality of life for millions of American citizens.
What this means is that when you go to the doctor you get answers like “we can’t find anything wrong”, you have “IBS/fibromyalgia/constipation/hip pain etc.”, “you are just built that way” or “it must be hormonal”. This leads to a lot of what are called treatment failures and gaps in care – basically doctors not sure what to do with you, not sure how to diagnose you or treat you.
At best they may give you no guidance and do not interfere, and at worst prescribing drugs or treatments based on myth, conventional wisdom or pharmaceutical marketing information that can result in permanent bodily and psychological damage.
For example, even though hysterectomy is the number one treatment prescribed for both endometriosis and fibroids, a hysterectomy does not cure endometriosis, and is never medically necessary unless you have cancer or you choose to have one.
Unfortunately, the underlying assumption in traditional medical care today is that if the doctor cannot identify your pain and diagnose it, then effectively it does not exist. For female bodies, anything having to do with our periods or pelvis’ might as well be another planet due to a lack of medical training in these areas, thus the doctors can’t recognize the symptoms and so we go on, virtually unseen in the medical system.
There are also deeply embedded historical clinical beliefs that women make up pain, and/or tolerate pain better than men. Culturally, women’s felt experiences consistently go unseen and invalidated. As well, our air, food and water are currently filled with toxins and endocrine disruptors that can cause and exacerbate Bad Periods. This combination of institutional and cultural factors playing out on your body might make you doubt yourself about your Bad Periods. But don’t doubt, they are very real.
This site was created to validate you and the symptoms you feel as well as help you translate your experience into clinical terms doctors will respond to so that you can get the right diagnosis and treatment.
Use this site as a launching pad to self-advocate for your diagnosis and care. Learn everything you can, and use your intuition about the right course of treatment for your body, since you are the one who knows it best.
Not getting properly diagnosed can lead to depression, increasing pain and debilitation, anxiety, and a breakdown in your ability to function from the physical symptoms alone.
Most women soldier on, through incredible pain with no relief for years. I had Bad Periods for thirty one years before I got a diagnosis and proper treatment. I created this site to validate, empower and educate other women who might be suffering from the same so they can self-advocate for better care.