Getting married young is one thing. The endless questions about when I’ll have a baby. That’s another. But what most people don’t realise is that endometriosis plays a major role in my answer.
It all started when my mum rushed me to the hospital after hearing me scream in pain. I resisted at first, what 16-year-old teenager wants to go to the hospital? But with her medical background, she warned me that pain on the right side of my pelvis could mean an inflamed appendix. That scared me enough to give in.
Up until then, I had never been to a gynaecologist. As a Muslim girl with no relationships, it didn’t seem necessary. I remember feeling nervous and uncomfortable, but honestly, it wasn’t as bad as I had imagined. Sure, it wasn’t fun, but it wasn’t the nightmare people made it out to be either. After my exam, the doctors found a cyst on my right ovary. From that day on, I was put on hormones to shrink it.
No one tells you what a nightmare those pills can be. At 16, my body was already changing, and adding high doses of hormones only made things worse. I gained 10kg, which was brutal for my already struggling self-esteem. I had excruciating migraines, and my blood pressure dropped so low that my dad finally told me to stop taking “this sh*t” (his words, not mine). So, I did.
For years, I kept having cysts, and no doctor could explain why. The only solution they offered? More hormones. They temporarily got rid of the cysts and the pain, but no one ever told me how to stop them from coming back in the first place.
By 2021, I had my first surgery to remove an 8cm cyst from my right ovary. After moving to a new city and finding a gynaecologist who actually listened to me, she saw the excruciating pain I was in. When I refused to take hormones again, she told me surgery was my only real option. The cyst wasn’t going to go away on its own, and if it did, it would be agonising.
I woke up from surgery completely alone due to COVID restrictions. When the doctor stopped by, I was still groggy from the anaesthesia. That’s when he told me, “You have endometriosis. It’s basically tissue similar to the lining of the uterus growing outside of it. But it’s benign—we removed it along with the cyst.”
I had no idea what he was talking about. Not because I wasn’t paying attention, but because I had never even heard of endometriosis before. Like any Gen Z (or honestly, any person) would do, I immediately Googled it. And what’s the first thing that pops up when you search for endometriosis? Infertility.
At the time, I was 20 and newly married. My husband and I weren’t thinking about having kids anytime soon, but we wanted them someday. Seeing the word “infertility” sent me into a full-blown panic. I started crying and couldn’t stop.
At my post-surgery checkup, my gynaecologist laid out my options: I could either go back on hormones or wait and see how long it would take for the cysts and endometriosis to return. There was no way to know if it would happen in two years, five years, or never. I decided against the hormones because of my bad experiences in the past. The weight gain, migraines, and dangerously low blood pressure were enough to convince me that I didn’t want to put my body through that again.
Two years later, the pain was unbearable again. My husband rushed me to the emergency room, and, surprise, surprise, the cyst was back. Another surgery. More endometriosis. This time, they even found it on my bladder.
As I lay in the hospital bed post-surgery, the doctor told me something I haven’t been able to get out of my head since:
“It’s likely you’ll have trouble getting pregnant. But if you try before 28, you should be fine.”
Now, at almost 24, I still have no plans to get pregnant anytime soon. I always imagined having kids after 28, but ever since that diagnosis, the thought haunts me. What if I wait too long? What if, by the time I’m ready, it’s too late? Will I ever forgive myself?
But isn’t that a terrible reason to have a child, fear?
Right now, every time I get my period, I’m afraid. Not just of the usual period pain, back pain, knee pain, and all the other fun things endometriosis has to offer—but of something worse. Because having a cyst and endometriosis is a different kind of pain, one that I know all too well. Honestly, I’m just patiently waiting for the day I’ll need my third surgery.
But through it all, my husband is my rock. He always reminds me to stay positive, and to focus on what I can control rather than what I can’t. No matter what happens, he tells me, we’re going to be happy—because whatever happens is what God has planned for us.
Endometriosis is painfully underrated. There’s still barely any research on what causes it, what its long-term consequences are, or how to cure it. One in 10 women has this condition, and I was lucky to be diagnosed at a young age. Even though, some days, I wish I never found out—just so I could go a day without worrying that I might never be able to have a child.
If there’s one thing I want people to take away from this, it’s that no one should ever ask a woman when she’s having a baby. That should be old news by now.
You never know what someone is going through. You don’t know if they’re praying every day for a positive pregnancy test. You don’t know if they’ve just been told they may never conceive. And you don’t know how much your question might hurt them.
To all the women struggling with this: I hope one day there’s a cure. And I hope doctors start taking our pain seriously. Because period pain is normal, until it’s not.
Read our latest op-ed here: The ‘Let Them’ theory is great – until someone gets away with bad behaviour.