Life Uncut - LIVING WITH ENDO. Talking endometriosis with Bridget Hustwaite

Episode Date: May 10, 2021

Hey Lifers! Whether you suffer from it yourself or you’ve got a friend or family member who does, we’re sure you’ve heard that living with endometriosis can be super challenging. We thought we knew what endometriosis was, but as it turns out, there’s a lot of misinformation and misunderstandings about endo. Endometriosis currently affects 1 in 9 Australians assigned female at birth (and 176 million people worldwide) but diagnosis takes on average 7 - 12 years.  After years of dismissive doctors and misinformation, Bridget Hustwaite, who you might know from her ‘Good Nights’ show on Triple J, finally received a diagnosis for her intensely heavy periods, pulsing headaches and excruciating abdominal pain in 2018. In this episode Bridget gets real with the truths and myths about endo and how to navigate the inconsistent answers from health professionals, how living with endometriosis can affect your dating and sex life and what it actually costs to have a chronic illness in Australia. Bridget recently released her first book titled “How to Endo” which is a definitive guide to surviving and thriving with endometriosis. She also hosts an Instagram account, @endogram, where a community of women share their experiences of living with endometriosis. You can find Bridget on Instagram @bridgethustwaite.  If you loved the episode please hit subscribe, 5 stars, leave a review and share the love, because, well, be love love xSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. Your girls are back from holidays. And by your girls we mean Brittany and Laura. And here we are, and ready to bring you today's episode. You know what? We needed a couple of days off last week, and we're sorry that we didn't bring you our arse gun cart, but we're feeling refreshed and rejuvenated. Britt went to Perth, I went to Byron Bay.

I'm pretty sure Matt and I are just going to now buy ourselves a property in Byron Bay and start a nudist colony, and then maybe have like 15 kids. My favorite part about that was learning that that was your plan on Instagram. Yeah. Leaving me and the podcast on Instagram. You can come join the nudist colony. I saw your thirst traps on Instagram over the weekend. I saw you thirst trapping Jordan from afar and I don't want you nude in my nudist colony.

It's too distracting. Do you know what I think is actually funny? Two things actually. One I've just noticed right now. I'm literally sitting here holding my breast. That is so funny. We're so comfortable with each other that Brittany feels safe. She's doing the podcast record holding her left hip.

It's a comfort thing. I often wake up. I didn't even realize I was doing this until right now. It's a comfort thing. I will wake up in the morning and sometimes my hand will be my pajama top or even if I'm nude, it will just be holding my boob. It's like a – you know how some people have a comfort blanket? I just hold my breast and I'm doing it right now.

That's cute. I wake up in the morning and usually I've just lactated out of one breast and one of them is deflated and the other one is about 17 times bigger. But speaking of thirst trap, look, I put a thirst trap out there for Jordan. We know. It was great. Yeah, it didn't work. Oh.

the kiddo the kid doesn't ever comment on my gram what he will what he'll do is he'll wake up in the morning checks the gram and then he'll message me his thoughts about the gram but he won't do it on instagram so he'll write to me and he'll be like you look cute today cutie i was like write that on my fucking post and i'm like cute why didn't you write that why didn't you say that in the post then why didn't you say publicly so everyone can see i love you you're my boyfriend i was like why didn't you say that if you thought it? He goes, well, I didn't know what to write. I'm like, exactly what you just told me. That's how Instagram works. I appreciate that. He's like, I sometimes write on them. And I'm like, yes, you sometimes do, but not very often.

Okay. So Matt commented to me and was like, wow, Brittany looks fire in that photo. And I'm really fucking happy he didn't comment that on Instagram. Matt, where you at? I could have had that comment. Did he really say that? Cute. Brittany looks fire. Anyway, guys, we've got such a good episode for you today. And it's one we've been wanting to do for quite a while. We're interviewing Bridget Husswaite, which some of you might remember, know her, heard of her before. She is a Triple J host, but she also has a really, really interesting story around endometriosis. And we've been wanting to do an episode about endometriosis and women's health for quite the time now. And this interview is something that Britt and I are both really proud of. Bridget speaks so well

about her experience with endometriosis and I think even if it's something that you don't struggle with what I loved about this episode is the fact that neither Brit or myself have endo and sometimes when you don't suffer with something it can make it really hard to be empathetic towards other people who do and I know that I have some very close girlfriends and the statistics of women who are struggling with endo are really really high and we get into that in the episode but being able to sit down and speak to Bridget really made me realize just how debilitating it is and just how much it affects women's lives and by having that conversation and better understanding what it is it's really helped me in my relationships with my friends who are

struggling with this and also from a work perspective with my staff who are struggling with this to be a better employer so I recommend that every single person listens to this episode whether or not you struggle with endo you're absolutely going to get something out of it But not even that, she's also released a book that is a bestseller, of course, because everybody needs this. It's the book you didn't know you needed. It's called How to Endo, and it's a guide for surviving and thriving. So we're going to get into that a little bit later too.

But first, now, Brittany, there is a research study that is really important that I want to bring to your attention. Okay. Do you know what? It's always so concerning when you come at me with a research study. Well, we are in the middle of a pandemic. You know, there's lots of medical studies that are going on. I'm expecting to learn something here.

One of them really stood out to me this last week. Okay, so a team of scientists at Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, sounds very official, has done an incredibly important research study. A team of scientists have studied the noses and genitals of recently deceased corpses to determine if the big nose, big hose theory is true. And I just want to let you know that apparently if a guy has a big nose, he's got a big hose. I have a question, straight up.

Why do they have to be deceased? Why couldn't they ask for some volunteers that are alive to come in and measure their penises and noses? So they were using cadavers, but apparently you can't get a cadaver to get a stiffy, so they just had to stretch it out and just assume that the stretched out size would be equivalent to the stiffy size. Well, somebody that has a science degree, I have some questions.

Does anyone say stiffy anymore? Is that a thing? I think that's an age thing. I think we say stiffy. I think no one listening to this podcast will actually know there'd be 50% of you that would have said a stiffy. And the rest of you say hard on. Do people still say boner?

Wow. I don't think anyone says these things anymore. I was a boner generation. I was a stiffy generation. I was a stiffy and boner, but boner at the end of, like when I was at school, it was a stiffy from like year seven, eight, nine. And then when you're a bit cooler and older as a boner. Well, I think that because this research study has been done on cadavers, we can call them

stiffies. Okay. But this is my question. You missed my joke. I didn't miss it I was just I was moving on to something okay anyway there's a lot of questions I have about this I mean considering what is happening in the world I'm questioning why we're putting resources to this but the other thing is I read this article and then I took about 15 minutes to mentally go through all the men I've had sex with and think about their noses and I'm gonna

say anecdotally and subjectively this is absolutely real I'm running through the list right now in my head. Can you all do this with us? Think about every man you've ever had sex with. Yeah. Think about it. You know, start at your toes, start at your nose. Every single guy that you've had sex with, think about their nose and then think about the comparable size of their wang. And I want you to DM us and tell us if you think this is true. I'm going to out my sister right now. Sorry, Sherry. I know she once hooked up with this guy for a little while on our trips. she was like sort of casually seeing him as we were traveling he was so hot anyway we were just traveling together for a little while and they had a fling whilst he was a babe he had a big nose

you couldn't take away from the fact that it was there but you didn't sort of see it because everything else he was like built and ripped and like fire f-i-y-a-h fire he had a real I remember her saying he has a really really big penis so that's my first corroboration with this research study so if you're a man that's listening to this podcast and you've been thinking you got a big nose and maybe you want to get you know a nose reduction or what are they called nose rhinoplasty a rhinoplasty don't do it you know what the women out there need to know what you're packing and this is how they're going to find out what i would like to know in this research study why did that i want to know i have a question they do it no i mean a why b do they do these

studies how are you supposed to do it because if it was a live person that came in and volunteered i would expect two measurements a flaccid measurement and a stiffy measurement how because you know you know some people can have a really small penis when it's not hard and when it's erect it can like quadruple in size that thing's a grower not a show my girl exactly so how are they going to do that on deceased people well look i mean it's the first study of its kind maybe there'll be more to come for a reason like there's not any more study why are we wasting our money in a pandemic when we could be putting all that money in research towards finding a cure why are we trying to figure out a man's penis in relation to his nose so apparently it is nose size

versus stretched penile length and we don't even know if stretched penile length has anything to do with erect penile length but anyway look what about we're getting in on all circumcised this is okay we're getting far too into the nitty-gritty i just wanted to give you the top overview i didn't read the whole article i got three quarters into it and i thought this is very unnecessary but i will share it with everyone on the podcast okay well i have a better story this is not a competition brittany no it's just as cute as cuter than you better than a stretch penis it's definitely better than a stretch penis just so you can see if your nose and your penis relate like i'm like great research but i'm just going to bring it back to the core values of life

uncut i have a question for you before you do that have you ever tried to have sex with a guy who had a semi hard-on and they tried to stuff it in anyway oh no wow that de-escalated quickly Okay, right. Anyways, we'll continue. Laura's like, no, me either. Every single woman out there who's ever had sex with a guy who's had like a semi-erection and they've just been like, it's fine, just get it in.

How did this even happen? We're talking about deceased cadaver. I mean deceased cadaver. Cadaver is deceased. Anyway, we're moving on. New study. Tell me your story. Bringing it back to the core values, that is love.

Something really cute and beautiful happened to me in Perth. Not directly to me, but I involved myself in a situation because that's what i do best we were on a picnic in a place called king's park in perth so king's park is so my tour guide told me which is renee's mom my best friend's mom joe hey joe also rachel was there too rachel listens hey rach so is there anybody else want to say hello just want to shout out to my fans i want to thank my mom and my dad and for this academy so we're in this park and now this park is the biggest park that's located in a city in the world it's beautiful it's like a national park within a park it's insane it has beautiful views the laws of manicure there's like

a war memorial it's really lovely so we were having a picnic the four of us and about 40 meters away in front of us closer to the water closer to the view was this couple and they were having their own little picnic they had two little kids running around that were like i'm talking two and three years old very little kids anyway we were just like talking amongst ourselves and then we clocked her we heard her say really loudly but we didn't witness anything at the start and then she threw herself on him cuddling him and we were like oh my god did we just is this a proposal are we part of a really special moment in their life well we weren't sure because we missed that they were both on their knees picture them both on their knees hugging each other so i didn't see

if he was on his knees she wasn't we missed the crucial moment but then we kept seeing her hold her hand out and i was like it's definitely a proposal she's holding her hand out but the angle was a bit skewed now joe who's renee's mom was like no she's got a bengal on i think it's a it must be her birthday and he's giving her a bengal and we're like no like she's crying and no one is gonna like gasp for a bengal you don't gasp for a bengal but unless it's katya we can't unless it's like kim kardashian's bengal that buys the country no so we were like okay was that an engagement or not we couldn't be sure it was like we needed popcorn we were watching we all sat back and watched this movie unfold because they were so emotional and she started crying and she was

hugging and laughing the kids running over then the kid ran over and pulled a box out and it looked like a ring box we're like for sure a ring but then the kid pulled another box out that was bigger we're like oh a bengal could have fit in that like what is it going to be anyway then she starts crying again she holds her hand up we're like 100 that is an engagement we're like this is so cute we're like oh i wonder if he's got someone filming it or taking photos anyway it was very evident when they started trying to take selfies that there was no one taking a photo then their two-year-old kid two and three-year-old kids come up and I see her hand the three-year-old phone and she's like and she's caught and we're like surely not and she's coaching this three-year-old

she's standing him there and showing him what to press and you can see that he can't even the phone's wobbling around and we're like bless them the girls were like somebody needs to go up and take this photo for them and they're like that somebody is only you Brittany because no one else is going to do it I'm like let's just give them their moment I'm not going to interrupt their engagement let's see how this photo turns out so we're watching them this three-year-old try to take the photo well I think he takes a few she goes back and takes the phone and this is the crucial moment we're like if she looks happy I'm just gonna leave it be and she looked at it threw her head back put the phone down she's like this is ridiculous and then my heart just broke I was

like I have a podcast I love love I have a relationship with love you're like and I can do Instagram give me your fucking phone girlfriend if this was me if this was my moment and I had my entire life you're not gonna let some three-year-old fuck it up for you but the man of my dreams to propose to me you want that shit captured right jordan if you're listening pay someone to capture that moment so when matt was proposing to me he was like assembling a gopro so there was a part of me that was like well i wonder what's gonna happen now just let me put this drone up he assembled a gopro and then started crying and i was like oh i'm kind of feeling like something's happening here so I didn't want to interrupt but I put myself in

a position I was like I don't want to be that person but also if that was me for sure I would want a photo that is memorable so anyway I was like I'm gonna have to do it I'm gonna have to do it I walked over she had gone to chase a child so all of a sudden but she she went to chase a child as I was going over so I was just approaching this man on his own anyway I walked over and I said hi as she was walking back I was like I couldn't help but notice that something was happening over here and she came back and I was like did you guys just get engaged and she's like yes and I was like oh my god congratulations I started hugging them which is ridiculous I don't know I know Rachel's filmed it I'll put it up on our gram there's this moment of me walking over

and hugging them I was so excited for them and I was like I couldn't help but notice also that you tried to get your three hot to take a photo I'm guessing it didn't turn out I was like would you like me to take a photo and she was beside herself she was like that would mean so much anyway it was a full photo shoot I did a whole shoot I was like I was like all right kids let's get this together the sun is shooting this way I want you to turn around I got the lighting on them then I started to do portrait mode I did close-ups far away I was directing I'm imagining like Renee there with the light on her phone like like using it as a torch just okay well we don't have a ring light so this is just gonna have to do guys get the three-year-old to hold a white sheet and bounce

the light off and then I even started to position them I was like just raise your hand onto his chest and now if you look at him lovingly so i took all these photos and then i was like now forgive me if it's crossing the line but i would love you to kiss each other so they started kissing and i took all these photos it was so good at the end were they like could you please leave us alone now they're like trying to go home and have sex and britney's like that's great just like get on top of her now that's perfect i love it i love it great in black and white i'm not a pervert i I thought I was doing them. It was like a public service.

I was like, I was doing them and say, we're going to start renting Brit out for like a thousand bucks per photo shoot. If you need her, just slide into our DM. But then I plugged the podcast. I was like, look, I have a relationship podcast. If you want to listen, I'm probably going to talk about this next week. She goes, what's it called? I was like, Life on Cart, find me.

Anyway, if you listened, I just want to say congratulations. Anyone else is thinking of proposing, slide into my DMs. I can be there. We could do this. We could make this a thing. Maybe we should become marriage celebrants to make this a full, well-rounded experience. People can book Britt and Laura as their marriage celebrants.

Could you imagine you and I marrying people? I mean, actually, that could be fun. No. Someone – no, have you ever – I've been invited to weddings on Instagram. Have you been invited? No. People have – no one's invited me to their wedding. Guys, if you remind me, invite Laura.

Anyway. People have slid into my DMs and said we would – I know this sounds weird, but my husband and I really love you. We'd love you to come to our wedding. People have asked me. Literally no one has ever asked me to come to their wedding, which to me is not surprising you were the very nice person in this podcast and I'm I'm the one that serves it we are equally nice anyway guys I love you all even if I don't get

invited to weddings but that is it from us and Britt and I we haven't seen each other for over a week so we need to do our catch-up live on the podcast for you all to be involved I also want to say thank you to everybody who came up whilst I was away and came up and said that they listened to the podcast and there were some really really awesome chicks that I met in Byron who were all like we love love and it made me really really happy are you just trying to be nice to get some wedding invites or i'll rsvp by the weekend but we do have time now for our very favorite part of every episode which is accidentally unfiltered brit you can go first or should i go first no yours is probably funnier than mine mine's just cute so i'll go first okay for those of

you who don't know or are very new to life on cart accidentally unfiltered is basically where where we just read out your most embarrassing stories. So you can slide into our DMs at Life Uncut Podcast and send us your embarrassing stories. But for now, Brittany, hit me. So this one escalates from like a slightly embarrassing moment to something that's super cute. So work story, guys.

A couple of weeks ago, I did a presentation at work and had inputted a part of an educational podcast into the presentation. Now, let me reiterate, an educational podcast. The presentation went really well. so much so that one of my male colleagues, a very, very cute male colleague, came up to me shortly after and asked if I could send him the remaining part of the podcast because he wanted to continue to listen. Me, in the middle of multitasking at work, said, yeah, yeah, yeah,

of course, I'll airdrop it to you now. Only to realize once he walked off, I had fucking airdropped the podcast I was listening to on the train to work. Let me reassure you, this was not an educational podcast but in fact it was life uncut episode 108 to be precise i quickly called him over and said please please disregard that podcast do not listen and explained that it was not work appropriate now i forgot to mention my male colleague is the type of person that once he has ammunition he will absolutely run with it so for the rest of the day he was giving me shit about your podcast because it was about digmatizing flash panning kitten fishing etc and he thought it was absolutely hilarious now fast forward three days he told me that on his way home from a work

trip siri the low-key goat accidentally played your episode that i had airdropped him through his car audio he waltzed into work and said chelsea i owe you an apology and i take it back i'm obsessed with life uncut and then he said they now catch up for weekly discussions about life uncut i just think it's the cutest thing ever okay that's not like our typical i pooed myself hilarious story but that is very adorable also I'm just going to call the colleague out on that Siri didn't accidentally play our digmatizing podcast through your car audio you went and played that buddy no the amount of people who have told me that they've been in compromising positions where the podcast is played out loud and they haven't realized all that they've gone to pick

up something and then out blaring out of their car windows has been our podcast and you know talking about sex or shitting themselves or something equally as inappropriate and they're like oh sorry about that anyway if you're listening get more male friends onto the podcast thanks okay I have one for you guys here we go so I've got an incredibly embarrassing story and a bad one for you guys yesterday while in town doing my essential shop I ran into a girl and her partner I know and we have never been really good friends but she was always someone I would say hello to and have a yarn with anyway I saw them and I said hey and her partner replied but she just turned her back and didn't acknowledge me. I was slightly pissed off at how rude she was but I went on with

my shopping. So today I get a snapchat from her with a tour of the new house they have moved into me still being slightly pissed off at her about yesterday. So I sent a scathing rant that involves some not so great swear words to my friend about how rude she was and how I couldn't fucking believe that she didn't speak to me and that I really couldn't care about her new house. Let me guess where she sent it but i actually sent it to her i had to reply to her snapchat so now i've just full-on cast this girl out by accident and i have an unopened snap sitting there from her in my inbox leave it unopened leave it fucking delete snapchat yeah just just remove snapchat stop drop and roll woman get out of there i pray that when we're all allowed back out in the world

I never ever see her again these are stories where you accidentally send this stuff to someone else they make me cringe more than anything because especially now that she knows she's got a message back that's unopened it makes me I don't know if that's my personality type so this has happened to me before right I've had a message from someone that I knew wasn't going to be good I didn't want to open it and my friends are like open it so you can see what it is and I'm my personality is I would rather never open it and never see what's in there I would rather not know I will die not knowing I will happily die never knowing what that person had to say to me I would just delete the app just remove them block them you never have to think about again

pretend like it never happened because ignorance is bliss once you know what's in there you can't unsee that you can't unknow unread or move on with your life and there's also no point well I mean like look you can apologize I'm not going to say there's no point apologizing you can apologize but you're only apologizing because you got caught out and you're probably still bitch to your friends again in the future there's also no way out of it if you write back to that you're going to have to literally say, I'm so sorry that you found out that's what I think of you. It's like, there's not any other way. Hey, I'm really sorry that I hurt your feelings because I hate you.

I'm not sorry I said it. I'm sorry I got caught. That's literally, that is literally my ex-boyfriend right there. Story of my life. That's Britney chapter five. Anyway, guys, let's get into this interview with Bridget. We absolutely loved this interview, guys, and we really hope that you get something out of it too.

Guys, you may know today's guest from Good Nights on Triple J. However, we have Bridget Husswaite with us today, and she's not speaking about her career as a radio host and producer. She is going to be talking to us about endometriosis. And Bridget is a fierce advocate for women who have endometriosis, sharing her own experience, particularly across her Instagram account, which is Endogram. And she's also a published author of the book, How to Endo. So Bridget, welcome to Life Uncut. Hey guys, thank you for having me. So awesome that you're here. We've been wanting to do an episode on this for such a long time and we appreciate and understand just how many women are affected by endometriosis. So we're really stoked to have you on the podcast

today. Yay. No, it'd be good to talk about it. I mean, I've been talking about it a lot lately, but it's something that you can never grow tired of talking about because still so many people don't know much about endo and it's a very confusing thing. So this can be a mini crash course, hey? 100%. And I mean, that's us included because Laura and myself, neither of us suffer from endo. We are really, really lucky in that sense. But I have a lot of friends that do. We have a lot of listeners that do. And the general consensus is that people still don't speak about it enough. Doctors aren't diagnosing it enough or they're misdiagnosing it. And we know the stats are that one in nine people suffer from endometriosis. So that is huge. But before we

get into that Bridget here at Life Uncut we love to expose your most embarrassing stories. Yes we're here to talk about something very serious but before we do that please tell us about how you pooed in a cup or something. All right so look I mean there's probably been many an embarrassing story that I could share but the first one that sprung to mind not so much poo related definitely vom related. I've spent probably majority of my working life in retail. I spent a long time working at Diva, the like fashion accessory store. I know Diva. I know Diva well. I was a loyal team member for Diva for many years and then that kind of turned into Lavisa. But then yeah, when it was still Diva, we had a work party. It was actually 10 years ago. It was the end of 2011 and 2011 was

probably like my wildest year. Like I got out of my first breakup, everyone was turning 21. It was definitely the year that I kind of not not so much went off the rails but definitely drank you lived your best life yeah you're like I have I have good memories and then I have some memories that I don't remember like my 20s they suppress memories that we'll never speak about again yeah we farewelled many brain cells that year it was yeah I guess the perfect send-off to the year that was 2011 we had our work Christmas party and it was at Melbourne Central at Hoyt for I can't remember which twilight it was was it breaking dawn I don't know it was like one of the the second or third one so they had all like the diva workers from across the state like we all came in

and they gave us little drink tokens and you know like when you get to go to a work party it's actually so funny in comparison to work now because like abc life we don't even get like a work like a drink tab or anything because abc um but at diva we did and i think we were all just really excited by the fact that we were getting free drinks it just was like such a neck minute situation like things escalated before the movie even started girls were sloppy with like all their fashion jewelry on just earrings swinging around everywhere everyone on like the champagne with orange juice because we were young and couldn't hack it and like but before the movie even started there were girls literally passed out in their seats in the cinema it was so sloppy that is wild

and I was doing really well at the time but then I can't there was one scene and I just remember the screen being shot on Bella and she had a really serious face and I could just remember like my head rolling around and then I look over to my friend Emily she's passed out I'm like this is pretty fucked it's meant to be a real tame Saturday night like there's young girls there but the overage ones just got yeah a bit carried away but long story short I vomited on myself and my regional in my chair that's better than someone else instead of you know spewing into my popcorn bucket or whatever I thought it was going like a super-sized cup of just here we go well that would make far too much sense Laura she's

not in a state to make any conscious decisions no but also I probably was like protect the popcorn protect the popcorn but yeah just bombed all down like my dress and my regional manager leader had to like come pick me up and like I had to go over her shoulder and she was carrying me out and one of the girls that I worked with her dad was an AFL coach he coached uh Richmond I think at the time so he didn't come pick me up but his wife did and they dropped me to my sister's house who she's like a sports journalist and she was mortified that this coach's wife had just dropped me off and I'm just covered in vomit and just she was like where have you been I was like it's all twilight and I was just so embarrassing yeah and that was when you got your promotion

look I think I think our Christmas parties are a bit litty but usually that's because we end up at a bar but I don't think I've ever known anyone to get quite so munted going into a Twilight movie but good for you I'm glad you're that person do you know what I loved about this story and I'm missing the point for sure it's not about the vomit you just really brought me back to like I remember when you upgraded in my hometown in Port Macquarie there weren't a lot of shops so I remember when everyone went to Diva like every single person because it's all there was but then And when LaVisa came to the shopping center, everyone upgraded. And if you had LaVisa, it was like going from Supra to Gucci.

Everyone was like, oh my God, you've got LaVisa. I'm still on diva. And I'm like, yeah, but I have like a part-time job now. So it's also like that graduation from like girlfriend to Dolly magazine as well. Like where you can open the sealed section. Yeah. Dolly talk about shit. All right, Bridget.

Well, let's get into the endometriosis chat. I want to know. And for anyone who hasn't heard of endometriosis, or maybe you have a friend who has it and it's still a bit vague to you, can you tell us what is endometriosis? Yeah, for sure. This is the best question to start off with because sadly, there's a lot of misinformation. Like if you Google endo in Australia, the first result that comes up is actually incorrect. So just to, yeah.

That's a great start. I know. It's so tragic, honestly. Very frustrating. but essentially, so endometriosis is chronic inflammatory condition where tissue similar to the lining of the uterus. So the lining of the uterus is called the endometrium, but it's not the endometrium. It's a tissue that has like a lot of biochemical differences and that grows outside of the uterus. And it's actually been found in every major organ of the body. So it's

not just a reproductive, you know, issue. It's a whole body disease of sorts with whole body effects. And yeah, it can cause a lot of pain, can stick organs together. And for up to 50% of people, it can cause infertility as well. So it's quite complex. There's no known cause. There's no established cure. We're kind of scratching our heads more often than, you know, getting clarification, like more questions than answers, but yeah, it's tissue similar to the lining of the uterus that's growing outside of the uterus. And I guess because it does have this ability, well it grows on all different organs throughout the body that people will display such different symptoms because one person might have it attached to one organ and somebody might have it on another

and therefore the presentation of what they're going to come to the doctors with would be vastly different and maybe that leads into why it's so significantly misdiagnosed but what are some of the symptoms that you experience but that you also know other people experience from having endometriosis yeah well that's the thing because it is found in so many different areas and the varying symptoms are so huge so the main association is usually painful periods like you know really bad periods that's not the be all end all defining sign as to whether or not you have endo I've got many friends with endo who don't have painful periods but they do experience other things for me personally that was my biggest concern and it was the first red flag I guess literally when I was

like 15 I was having we love a pun here oh yeah I mean I don't come up with them often but when I do I'm very proud so thank you for acknowledging it I always but yeah painful periods for me was the first the first concern when I was about 15 I first got my period in the first week of high school and I was like so excited it was quite light and you know there was a real novelty to it I suppose but then it like escalated and got heavy and uncomfortable and became really frequent There was a point where it was like every two and a half weeks when I was like 15. As the years passed, it kind of spread to other areas of my body, but I didn't know, well, I didn't think to link that all together or to connect the dots.

So I was having fatigue, bloating. So there's this thing bloating, otherwise known as endo belly. So all the swelling from the inflammation can cause some people's bellies to fully inflate. And the cruel irony of that is that they look pregnant. so people are like oh when are you expecting and then you know infertility is like a really big symptom and then you're being asked if you're about to pop and it's like unfortunately no it's endo and it can also prevent me from even being pregnant endo belly is a pretty gnarly one painful bladder like when you're emptying your bladder painful bowel movements that was a big

thing for me abdominal cramping as well there was a time where I got like really sharp shooting pains higher up. And I just hadn't, I thought it was just something that I ate, but it would continue to show up at any given time. Like when I was working in retail or when I was over in Croatia, like on a Europe trip with my girlfriends, that was, yeah, just so unpredictable. But because there was very little conversation about endo for me throughout my, I guess the first half of my journey for answers, but yeah, I didn't think to connect the dots until after my diagnosis and learning more about endo so yeah so many things can happen brain fog as well but those would be the key ones yeah so this might sound naive but can you develop endometriosis at any

stage like could you have your period for five six seven ten years and then it happens or is it something that's developed and sort of shows its ugly head from the moment you get your first period no it can actually happen at any point in your life there was like one myth is that it doesn't happen in teenagers which is incorrect because that's where everyone usually shows those first signs but because of the you know the challenges of getting a diagnosis it's not until you're in usually like your 20s or your 30s that you get those answers and especially for say our mums the generation uh before us the surgical procedure they didn't have a laparoscopy developed until like the 80s or something like that it used to be a much more invasive procedure so it wasn't

something that was just done as often as what it is now and endo was also considered to be like a career woman's disease like there's been so many weird assumptions about the condition but in terms of when it can start to grow I suppose it has been found in unborn fetuses so it can actually happen yeah at any stage and even later in life there's no one set time frame as such but usually it's when you're in your teenage years that you can see some signs developing. Talk me through this idea that it's a career woman's disease. Like where did this myth come from? But like you're so stressed and run off your feet that that's your body's response. Yeah. I mean, you should be at home in the kitchen and it's your fault that you have endometriosis. Yeah. There's so

many sexist notions just that have been deeply rooted into the medical system for years. Yeah. Like hysteria. All we have to do is think of that word. And there was literally a doctor who used to cut off clits as a way of curing hysteria it's disgusting the way in which women fall behind in terms of medical research like the default anatomy is has always been the male anatomy so that would be another reason why it takes so long to get a diagnosis and why there's so much misinformation well that was obviously a male doctor anyway that said that the penis was the default anatomy yeah right only a man would say that yeah uh checks out but yeah it was 60s 70s like around that era where they did only consider it to be a career woman's disease

I don't even know the full reasoning behind that like I don't even think you can even justify it it was just some bullshit thing some dude said and you know obviously the attitudes have kind of changed now but like that's what we started with well I was actually talking to one of my girlfriends who recently had the operation for endometriosis and she had been suffering with terrible terrible periods and a whole myriad of other symptoms for years and had been misdiagnosed and she really got to the point where she was like this is so futile and there's something wrong with me but no one can tell me what's wrong with me and it really really affected her mental health and I mentioned to her that I was interviewing

you today and she was like I'm reading a book and I'm so excited to listen and you know I think being able to give a voice and give validation to people who are experiencing this is incredibly powerful which you've done but one of the things that she mentioned and you did just touch on then was this idea of an incredibly historically misogynistic healthcare system. And she was like, you know, if a man had ever presented at the doctors and said, I am in excruciating pain, I have blinding headaches, I can't go to the toilet properly. And she's like, they would do a myriad of tests to figure out what was wrong with that person. She's like, they would never just say, oh, periods are meant to be painful. Periods are painful. And she said, you know,

the upsetting thing was that it didn't just come from male doctors. It came from a whole lot of different doctors who hadn't even thought to kind of suggest endometriosis but before I get too off track telling you all my life stories one of the questions that we did want to ask you and something that we know really impacts women who have endometriosis is their sex life and now not to go too far into your sex life but tell us everything what's your favorite position but sex and endo can be two quite conflicting things and what is it around that and what is it like to have endometriosis and to be able to try and live and have a happy normal sex life yeah are you in a relationship uh well um i've been single for a few months now so i just got out of a five-month

relationship before the book came out which is a real time but i'm really happy and it's a bit of a daunting thing i just turned 30 as well so i'm kind of like happy birthday happy birthday welcome to the next decade it's not so bad yeah no you know what 30 is when you come into yourself I reckon 30s are like the best years of my life so far people think it kind of goes downhill and I'm like nah it just gets better and better that's what I want to hear and I was low-key like how do I turn this chat into not about my book and about dating advice for me babe you know when I hit 30 I got dumped on national television so come to me I'll give you advice I'll turn it around for you here we go let's talk about relationships guys that's

what you came to the podcast for well Brit I'm on Raya I wanted to tell you that that is a place like isn't it well do you know what Raya is extremely interesting like I did put my super likes out there for Chang Tatum he didn't return them but I found my current partner on there so don't give up hope I know yeah I did read that and I was like okay maybe I will just continue to pay $16 a month maybe I could actually maybe set you up with someone let me think about that all right okay back on topic guys I'll keep it over here all right back to sex and endo okay so you are you are recently single yeah and this is a really it's going to be a really interesting time for me because it's my first time navigating endo with a confirmed diagnosis

as a single person and you know doing these things like dating even though yeah I don't know how to talk to people so I think I've got to figure that out first and then we'll get to the sex part I guess with sex and endo when I lost my virginity when I was 18 with my first serious boyfriend and it was really painful I knew it would be painful because you just you know starting off first time first time on climb and break but it just continued to linger that pain and I knew it wasn't right and my partner at the time he definitely knew but he was really good about it he wasn't ever like oh what is wrong with you he was just really concerned but again at that time didn't know endo was a thing let alone it was a symptom of endometriosis and then you know

we broke up and then I did have like a period of singleness and but my sexual encounters were very very rare and it would always involve alcohol and I think that was probably a way of masking the pain and because I did have a lot of dread you know I didn't have that association of like sex is pleasure and fun I was like god it's probably going to hurt again how am I going to get around this because I want to do it and then yeah got into the last relationship which was for five years and again had a really understanding partner which was amazing but it was definitely a challenge and I think it's hard for the partner as well I think that's something to acknowledge too because even though you can be clear with communicating and they know

it's like your condition and it's not you as such there's still a sense of rejection and this sense are feeling like they're undesired so it's something that I yeah definitely want to normalize this conversation because it is another thing that we tend to internalize and just another thing to chuck to that pile of like self-blame and guilt that you kind of inflict upon yourself over those years of not only dealing with the pain but searching for a diagnosis and then how it does filter into your relationships but in terms of sex I mean I've kind of had to learn a bit more about it. And I've talked to other people with endo. I've talked to Chantelle Otten, who's a sexologist here in Melbourne. And we've interviewed Chantelle as well. She's been on the podcast.

She's so great. She's really great. Yeah. And I just love how, especially just how well she uses social media and really does help normalize the entire conversation for young people. The biggest thing that I've kind of taken out of it is just redefining your idea of sex. With endo, typically the endometrial kind of implants if they're on your pelvic sidewalls wherever they're embedded down there when it comes to penetration the pulling and the tugging and the thrusting that can cause so much pain so it's just a matter of finding out other ways because penetration doesn't have to be the be-all end-all of sex it's just redefining that idea of what sex means to you and your partner and how you can both kind of get to that point where you're both having fun and you

should be going into it as a team being like how can we both get the most out of this that doesn't necessarily mean a bit of like dick up in there and then he goes and then you're all good like I've never heard sex explained like that get your dick up in there but I have a really good girlfriend and I mean I'm in the medical industry we do the ultrasounds we do all this kind of stuff with it I know a lot about it but I didn't know the ins and outs I'd never spoken to someone and actually heard their symptoms you know we just know what to look for when you do a scan but I have a really good girlfriend and I didn't realize how much it can affect your whole life until we were speaking one day and I was like you know she's single I was like have you been hooking up

like you know give me this give me the goss she's like I haven't had sex in 18 months now she's in her 20s she's a babe I'm like why what what's going on let's go out and get you hooked up with someone let's get you late and she's like I just can't be bothered to date anymore because dating leads to sex and sex is the most painful thing for me that she couldn't even be bothered to go on first dates anymore and I just was like I just didn't realize that it can affect someone to the point that they're like I'm giving up on even trying to find romance because it was that painful for her so I think it's really important to normalize it and have people to go to people's like your books and Chantal Otten's page and and realize that there are other ways around it and

she did meet someone everyone I know you're all on the edge of your seat for that she met someone and she's like and she's working it out with that partner because she has found someone she's been honest and you know they're like what you said there are other ways to have sex as long as you're openly communicating yeah totally and that's such a sad reality is that people with not even just endo any other conditions that will be associated with painful sex like you look at this thing that's meant to be like the ultimate form of you know human connection it's meant to be a really beautiful thing but you're looking at it from a completely different perspective because of your experience with pain we're gonna play a little bit of audio from your instagram account

which you took after one of your shifts at work at triple j so i made it through my shift um i'm gonna cry again i'm in so much pain i mean it was uncomfortable and then it just got really painful during live at the wireless at like eight o'clock. I was like crying all through half of the set. I don't even know what to say, but I made it through and I'm going to go have a bath when I get home. I don't even want to get up right now though. Cause I'm like in pain. I just need to like sit for a moment. Bridget, tell me what can someone do when they're experiencing pain like this at work? Oh boy. It's a good question. That audio is, it's a lot to like listen back to and think of that time because it's very vivid like how that was yeah four weeks after my surgery and

returning to work thinking that you're fine I think when yeah when your endo is affecting your work it's a really oh it's a really tricky thing because you you should be open and you should be able to communicate the fact that you're dealing with this with your colleagues and stuff but that conversation can be so terrifying and intimidating and unfortunately not all workplaces are as understanding I think I'm really privileged in my position in the sense that I have a platform so I can talk about it and it would look really bad you know if my endo wasn't dealt with the right way because I would talk about it you know but for some people who feel like they don't have a voice in the workplace it could be really hard I think it's really important to utilize the support

networks that are available through endo organizations quendo which is q e n d o they've done a whole bunch of blog posts about work and endo and the things that you can do the people that you can contact whether it's like HR or other networks and organizations that specialize in I guess health and the workplace and also just utilizing other support groups with fellow you know endo sufferers who have gone through that experience and you can I say in my book like even chatting to people and like role-playing these conversations and how they might play out and like writing down what you need out of your work you know if it's like some sort of chronic illness plan where this is something that I need to probably start looking at is you know having a

day off a month when my period hits because the day that my period comes in I have to do all my show prep from home on the couch have like two baths during the day and then get into the studio in order to go on air at 6 p.m and it's a really long day for me like my period already just takes all the energy out of me, but then I have to go on air for three hours and be real chirpy and hype up some music and stuff, which it could be worse. Like I'm lucky that no one sees me at work and I can go in there looking like shit with a heat bag stuffed down my trackies and it's fine, but it still does take a lot of energy to do that. So yeah, I guess if you are having a difficult time with your endo and work, the first thing you have to do, and it's easier said than done

is to communicate it because people won't know otherwise and just figuring out the best way to go about that and knowing that you're not alone there's this really great project out there from these two young girls it's all volunteer run it's called the vermillion project and they're just massive advocates for chronic illness people and being in the workplace and how you can get support and kind of fight for your rights i suppose because i think we tend to forget that yeah we do have rights when you have like a serious condition a chronic condition of which that is constant you deserve to have you know things accommodated for you and you deserve to be able to work as well like you shouldn't be punished for something that you can't control yeah I don't know

if this is helpful I guess just like utilizing those resources and knowing that you're not alone and you know more and more people are talking about it there's so many great endo accounts who share their experiences not only at work but like doing uni and like tertiary education making the most of like the student services the health services that are on offer on campus like they're there to work for you so it's just a matter of you know taking that on and I do think like the more that we have these conversations the more that people are aware of it because the lack of knowledge is what adds to this lack of help a lack of understanding you know especially like as a boss or somebody who's an employer being like oh you want to take time off every time you get a period

like if they don't understand what endometriosis is that does sound like you're being a bit hysterical like it does sound like you like why do you get a special treatment when all the other females in the workplace don't get that treatment but with understanding and with this conversation and knowledge that's what really empowers people to be able to be empathetic and to go okay I better understand what you're going through and how significantly different it is to what everybody else goes through it's because it's like this hidden disease as well it's like it's not like you go to work with a runny nose and sneezing and you can't speak because your throat's so swollen and and you know you've lost your voice and it's not something people can physically see

so for you to go walk in looking fine being like I can't tell you it's like somebody's stabbing me in the stomach and no one else can see that they're like yeah yeah like you know you want a day off whatever yeah that is a huge problem like because it is invisible like I look fine otherwise but in inside there is just havoc you know just being wreaked on my body and yeah the fact that we do have to keep talking about it. I'll never forget, you know, when my diagnosis was shared on hack, I had like this female tradie message me and she was like, thank you so much. Like we all listen to, you know, hack every night in the workshop, me and the boys, but I've had time off. I've had to keep going into the hospital and I didn't even know how to tell them, but they listened

to your story and your diagnosis. And that, you know, created this dialogue for me to be like, hey guys, this is actually why I haven't been at work. And it just made it so much easier for her. and that's what it's all about you know if it's just like one person that gets that opportunity to have that conversation a conversation that they didn't know how to bring up otherwise then it's just yeah so rewarding to to share that and the thing what you mentioned brit even with with periods and it can also be like when we were talking before about like the the gendered side of it you know not all male doctors and all men are really bad with this like i've the worst experience that I had was with a female GP there can be a huge lack of empathy and I think it probably comes

from a this internalized misogyny which has kind of been conditioned in all of us that you know we all need to constantly work on but be the fact that they might have their period too so they immediately use their experience with their period as the frame of reference and then they're like oh it's not that bad you know we all this is what we all deal with when actually you know it's a pretty different thing like having your period with endometriosis and then just having your period without said chronic condition so we're like yeah you this is not something we all experience your period is not the same as mine otherwise you wouldn't be having this opinion yeah it's just yeah it's really damaging though especially for female professionals to be just as dismissive

it's just yeah it's something that everyone needs to work on well speaking about your diagnosis what was your diagnosis like because you hear a lot about it being misdiagnosed and people going to doctor after doctor and all these tests and everyone just letting it go by saying you know we can't find anything wrong with you do you find that that's with a lot of people you speak to and what was it like for you to be diagnosed finally yeah that's sadly such a common thing I don't think I have really talked to anyone who's had a true smooth sailing journey in which the first doctor that they went to believed their pain referred them and they got the right you know surgery and the right diagnosis for me personally it was a 12 year trek to get that confirmation

that's based on the first time I went and saw a doctor when I was 15 about my period and very generic consultation just like oh it's time for you to go on the pill no mention of endo just yeah went on the pill didn't really do much and then yeah fast forward to my surgery so that was 12 years later in 2018. And yeah, I had stage four endo, which stage four isn't like, I mean, it's the most severe in terms of where it's spread, but it doesn't correlate with like the symptoms or necessarily your pain. If you've got stage one endo, for example, you can still like black out from your periods. Like that's what happened to my friend from WA who has, yeah, a lower stage than me, but her pain is more debilitating to the point where she can't even

work so yeah it was 12 years for me the first doctor was yeah just generic talks about the pill the mention of endo probably didn't come up for another eight years I guess through my friend that I was working with in retail who had endo but we didn't really talk about it much because it's probably still felt like a bit of a taboo topic like she was just going into hospital but didn't really go into the full depths as to why and then I remember I saw another doctor when I I was, I used to be a travel agent and I was earning peanuts and they referred me to a gynecologist, but I couldn't even afford the consultation because it was like $250. And it was literally, do I have groceries this week or do I go see a specialist that

I don't know what the outcome will be? So there was a bit of inconsistency, me just kind of going back to the situation to have another crack, but then being like, oh, it's too hard to deal with, or I'll just deal with the pain like what I'm going through is probably normal or whatever but it wasn't yet so 2017 was a pretty defining year where I was referred to this female GP in Ballarat where I'm from and I was really excited to see her because based on these recommendations I thought she'd really understand and get me on to a really good specialist but yeah man she just didn't want a bar of me she couldn't even give me eye contact like she was literally rolling her eyes and just

like moving around her chair and sighing as I was telling her my my pain and my experience and then yeah flat out said you don't have endometriosis others have it worse than you and I was just like okay oh my gosh yes so brutal and I was like well I mean I still really want to see a gynecologist if you can please refer me and she was like I don't think you need to see one and I was like I've been wanting to see one for years can you please just give me the referral and so she finally did, but she handed it over with like, like it was such an effort. And yeah, she was like, I don't know if it will help anyway. And then I took it and got into my car and I just sat in my car and I was like, what the fuck just happened? Like that was the most insanely disappointing medical

consultation I've ever had in my life. Not what I expected at all. I was like, so looking forward to it. And then I didn't even end up going to see that gynecologist because I was so scared that she had called them up and was like just look out for this girl like she's a bit of trouble or she's a handful of a hypochondriac yeah and I was terrified so I just gave up on it and then the following year 2018 I moved to Sydney that year for work and I decided you know what I'm in a new city I've got a bit of time on my hands I'm going to find a GP and really get on top of it because at that point my period got really bad every single month and I really was you know this was my first time doing full-time radio but like yeah before each show I was there with my heat bag

just so nauseous and just feeling like how the hell am I going to get through my shift and sound like everything is awesome but then yeah luckily found a really great women's health GP who was so understanding and she's like how long have you been dealing with this for and like I said you know so and so years and she was just mortified and she referred me to a gynecologist who was really good but at the time you know I didn't really do any additional research to endo so I just trusted what was going to happen and I had my surgery but I had I guess training surgeons actually do it he kind of supervised because it was through the public health system it gets really complicated there's two surgical techniques that are really important to know about endo and removing

it because the way in which you remove the disease can really impact I guess how you deal with it moving forward and your overall quality of life there's this thing called ablation surgery so ablation is when you burn endo so it's like weeds and you're just burning the surface and then there's excision surgery which is almost like a like a trowel like a shovel kind of thing and you're physically cutting it out from the root so the whole thing comes out ablation only gets the surface which means it's a higher recurrence rate so it's likely to grow back it's never fully left in the first place and unfortunately so many people don't know the difference between the two and not all gynecologists are trained in excision surgery when they really need to be because at the

moment with no cure that is like the gold standard treatment but not everyone can access it most of the gynecologists are through the private health system it's a very classist kind of issue because how your treatment is really is dependent on I guess your income and where you live whether you're in a regional or a metro area. But anyway, I was lucky to have excision, but it was done by training surgeons. So they didn't actually remove all of it correctly. So I had to have my second surgery last year, June, 2020. And that was in Melbourne through private with yeah, like an endo specialist. And I should still be endo free at this point. Like the disease has gone, symptoms are still kind of lingering, but I'm managing them a lot better than what I was after the first

surgery but yeah it's a really long complicated windy road to get answers and unfortunately my story is very common you know so the excision surgery ideally can cure it it doesn't grow back with excision it doesn't cure it but it's the best shot that we have of ensuring like it's the best chance of it not growing back and living like a small symptom-free life yeah well the thing is with surgery, like surgery doesn't necessarily, you know, instantly remove the symptoms because for many people, these, this pain and the way in which our body responds to the pain has been building up over years, you know, because of the delay in diagnosis. So your body almost teaches itself new ways of coping. I guess a good example is with your pelvic floor because there's usually

a lot of pain in, you know, your pelvic floor. So the muscles down there and stuff tend to tense up a lot but they get to the point where they kind of get into gridlock and you can't relax them so that's why pelvic physio is really important that was a big thing for me I had to like train myself to loosen those muscles again and relax and get in sync with that because my body over the years just built up all these crazy responses and kind of took it into its own took matters into its own hands the best shot is removing the disease correctly and then kind of looking at like a multidisciplinary approach whether it's pelvic physio or seeing a sexologist even seeing a psychologist for the mental health aspect of chronic illness diet as well because some food

can trigger flare-ups and stuff so if you see a nutritionist or a dietitian we're not told these things you know I remember after my first surgery I went back to the GP I went to a different one actually and I asked about physio and she's like oh you don't need that that's got nothing to do with endo, but it actually has such a strong relationship that just so many medical professionals aren't across this multidisciplinary approach that you really, really need to take on. You touched a little bit on how classist getting treatment for endometriosis is. Can you talk me through the costs that are involved and what different accessibilities we have for treatment of endometriosis? Yeah. So I guess I'll start with telling you how much

I spent in the last financial year. So yeah, last June, I don't know why I did this guys. Like I just thought it would be fun to like be, I had some, I was recovering and I was like, let's calculate how much I've spent on my endo in the last 12 months. And I think that's great. I hate my life now. Could have gone to Europe. Who needs Europe? It's COVID anyway. Yeah. Self-inflicted salt in the wound. But you know, I calculated specialist appointments, ultrasounds, you know, medication, pelvic physio, acupuncture, surgery, out-of-pocket costs, like kind of excess costs that weren't included in my private health, but then also included, oh, did I include my private health? I don't even think I included my monthly private health costs into that. You better add

that bad boy on. Yeah, cool. That's cute. The final total was just under $12,000 in the space of 12 months. So yeah, could have been a cute little holiday had COVID not happened. Could have been a cute secondhand car could have been a nice spending a thousand dollars a month yeah yeah that is insane when you think about it like that yeah it factors you know that kind of trickles into so many other things when we talk about work again so many people hate taking time off work or they may not have sick leave accumulated for endo but then they can't take work off because they need that money to pay for their chronic illness and I've been legally prescribed medicinal cannabis for probably eight months now.

Luckily, I'm not heavily dependent on it because my pain isn't so debilitating. It's just around my period, but that is so expensive as well. It's- Did you find that helped? Yeah. The medical cannabis?

Yeah, it definitely has reduced my painkiller intake, which is really good because, you know, if you're stuck on like opioids and all that kind of stuff long-term, that's got a lot of effects. It has been really helpful. It's just a tricky thing when I take it. I love getting my period on the weekend because I have two days to just blaze out you know

but when it's a weekday I can't really do that and then go do a live national radio show and like you're like hey guys yeah like that's not good is there any medicare rebate for this so what do you get back and I think you know a lot of the things that we get treated for within the public health system overall it's pretty good in Australia there's a lot of treatments that you can get and not have to be, you know, have any money out of pocket, but what can you get back when it comes to endometriosis? Yeah. Well, I mean, we are lucky in comparison to other countries. Like I've got a bunch of endo friends in America and I would, if I was living in America with endo, I'd be utterly screwed because it is so expensive and they don't have those benefits, like a

Medicare rebate or whatever. There's a scheme in Australia. It's like the chronic pain management plan and you can use it for things like a psychologist or a physio. I used mine for physio and I think it was, I think it was up to six sessions a year where you would get a, like a decent rebate back. So you weren't paying the full cost of those physio appointments, which is so important because for some people they have to go to physio like weekly, you know, mine started weekly and then stretched out fortnightly to monthly. Now it's just every couple of months, But yeah, we're lucky that we do have, you know, a chronic pain management plan that you can talk to your GP about. There's also like the mental health care plan that you can use and that's been extended because of COVID. And I think that's just important. Like I went and saw a psychologist last week for the first time since year 12 to like, I mean, part of it's chronic illness, other part is just like life and how do we do it? but yeah, that would be a really important one for anyone. I mean, anyone in general,

but anyone with a chronic illness, because that psychological impact is so, it can be so detrimental to your health, but otherwise it's just sadly with the accessibility, a lot of endo, true endo specialists who are trained in excision surgery, they're not everywhere. They're definitely not in regional areas. There's a current situation in the Northern territory that I've been kind of keeping an eye on. They don't have any endospecialists up there. So people have to fly to Brisbane or to Sydney to get treatment, which is terrible for an entire state. Luckily in Melbourne, where I am, there's a handful of specialists, but most of them only operate privately. Some of them do have a public waiting list, but that list is minimum two-year wait

to get that surgery. And unfortunately, the truth of it is that there are a lot of specialists out there that have this real yeah classist attitude where they're not interested in talking to public patients but if you're a private patient you'll be treated like royalty you know and it's just it should be consistent across the board like I can't think of any other condition in which there is so much inconsistency and it really is based on what you earn and where you live endo isn't as terminal as something like cancer but you would never hear about such inconsistent cancer treatment like someone getting a really dodgy way of removing cancer and other people who can afford it will get the proper way. You know what I mean? We'd never stand for it. No, you wouldn't. It's

so problematic. So whilst there's a lot of effort being put into research for finding out causes and all that stuff, I still think we're a really long way off finding those answers. So for now, we need to kind of act on, okay, well, the best that we can do now is offer excision surgery to people. how do we make that accessible for everyone and make it fair? Because that's what needs to happen first and foremost. Like we need to improve our quality of life by doing that particular technique, but unfortunately it's just not available for everyone. And it sucks. And it's just something that you're not told about. I didn't know about the differences leading into my first surgery. It was only after my own research that I realized and was like, holy shit, I got lucky with my first

one. But moving forward, I need to make sure that I'm asking the right questions to whoever I'm seeing to know that they can really take on this case. Going back a little bit, you mentioned that like the day you get your period is you really hope that that's a weekend. Is the day you get your period, is day one the worst symptoms that you get for endo? And how does that differ throughout your period and then throughout your whole cycle? So do you ever have a day that is pain-free, whether that is in your period or in the middle of your cycle? Yeah, I do now. It's really interesting leading up to my diagnosis it was always around my period that was the most pain and then if I had sex or whatever but then after my first surgery so the first surgery I was

diagnosed got endo excised or whatever and I also got the IUD inserted my gynecologist said that it prevents growth which is incorrect it's not true there's no evidence to suggest that the IUD can do anything to prevent the growth of endo and birth control for that matter so birth control can help suppress symptoms but it doesn't do anything in terms of disease management it merely serves as a band-aid which is fine if it helps you do it as long as you know it's not actually doing anything directly for your endo but some doctors like to tell you that it does stop endo growth which is not true anyway i got the myrina inserted and i was really scared to do it because i heard some horror stories, but I also heard some promising stories. And my time with the Mirena

personally was just a train wreck. Like I was getting flare ups almost daily and they were really unpredictable. And it got to the point where I had to stop planning things in advance. You know, I couldn't plan my weekends because I didn't know when pain would hit. I was using my heat bag like every day of my life. In the lead up to my surgery last year, my second surgery, I decided to get it removed during that procedure. My specialist found my Mirena sideways, like in my cervix. So it was almost like it was trying to get out itself. Like we both just wanted to end this, you know, this 18 month partnership. This is over. It's very toxic. Don't call me. I'm leaving. Yeah. Yeah. It was like, who could like leave the relationship first, you know? So I got

that removed. And since then, yeah, I haven't had any of those flare ups that come at any given time it is only around my period. So it's really good in that I know when it's coming and I can plan ahead. It's usually the first two days before I start bleeding where I get real, real heavy, dull cramps and I feel really sick and lethargic. And then the day that I bleed, it's really heavy the first few days and it's painful, but I just have to kind of, you know, use the heat bag. And if I can use my cannabis without it affecting work, do that. And then the end of my period isn't so painful. It's pretty cruisy. It's, I guess on average, it would probably be three to four days of the month that it really topples me over. But the good thing is that my cycle is

really regular. So I can look in my calendar and I know when it's going to happen. So I'll not schedule anything for that time and just deal with it. But it's still shit. You know, like there are some times where I get really down about it. Cause I'm like, God, is this ever going to end? Is this what it's going to be like even beyond if I have children, which is something that I definitely want to do at some point. It's just sad to think that it's just going to be a constant thing until there is a cure. On fertility and children, we know that endo can affect fertility. Have you done any tests, fertility tests? Have you had any sort of prognosis in that sense? I haven't, no. So the last update I got when I had my surgery last year, my specialist,

you know checked out my tubes and stuff and everything was good he said you would be fine to you know have kids in the coming months if you wanted like you would you shouldn't have any issues but you know that was June last year and the thing is with endo and the state of I guess your reproductive organs you don't know what they're like until you have that surgery and they're actually in there inspecting everything so I don't know if endo has like potentially grown back and if it has started to you know affect my tubes or whatnot I did have a problem with my left ovary for a while that it was immobile because it was attached to an adhesion. So like scar tissue that formed probably following my first surgery. I have a feeling that it may,

that adhesion attachment to my left ovary may be like happening again, just because I've kind of started exercising a lot more recently and I get this pulling sensation on that side and that's the only pain that happens because of it. So that's something that I'm going to have to monitor, but probably next year I would probably look at having like that because you can have like a fertility test to look at the quality of everything right my friend had it the other week and she had a really bad result and she so I've had it recently too and I got a really low result so I was like you know what I'm 33 we got a fertility specialist on the podcast we did an episode with her and when I finished the episode I was like I'm for sure going to test mine because I was single and 33

and it came back really low very very low so I'm in the process now of freezing my eggs I was like okay I need to do this ASAP in case in the next year or two it depletes to the point that there's nothing left so that's definitely food for thought for anyone out there endo or not you can go and get your test whenever you want just a blood test and an ultrasound test there's also power in in knowledge so you can make those choices that was the big thing that we experienced when we interviewed Cheryl Foy who was from Jenea which is the fertility specialist she was like if you know at least then you can make plans if you don't know and you stick your head in the sand like all that means is it makes the job a whole lot harder and it limits your ability to have

choices and to make the best decisions for you because some of those options may not exist anymore so like there's no harm in knowing even if you don't action anything yeah it's just being aware of it. So you can make the choice that you, what's going to work best for you. Like we do need to know those things. And we are lucky now that we, we do have, I guess, more access to these kinds of things like egg phrasing. It's like a, you know, it's a really special insurance kind of thing for us. But again, with the access, it is also the financial aspects, you know, like, cause don't you have to pay like a storage fee as well? There's like rent, you know? Yeah. You rent, you rent out a storage and you can rent it for like 10 years. I think that

mine's going to cost like I think the average cost with all the medication and the original tests and everything I think it's about ten thousand dollars yeah it's and that's for the storage the medications the consults the tests so it's not cheap for me it's a priority so it's something that like like you said you've spent twelve thousand dollars in that year on something that you had no choice not to spend it on for me it's a priority I know that I've got very limited of time left before my eggs are gone for good gone on vacay and don't come back love that for them but I think one message that we do want to get out in regards to that also in regards to your endo like you said if any doctor comes and says to you you don't need to worry a if it's about

fertility there's no way for them to know that so if you want to go and get your test you push it the same with you if you know something's wrong with your body and your doctor is like you don't need a specialist referral to a gynecologist if you know what's wrong you just say look I'm literally here you're servicing me I'm asking you for a referral I know something's wrong so really trust your body and push for what you know you need yeah that's the dynamic that really needs to change with these consultations because there's a huge power imbalance you go in there they are meant to be working for you they do service you but you go in as if you have to present a case to prove that you are unwell when in fact you're kind of most days proving that you

are well because you have to mask it so much and yeah it's just having that confidence finding that confidence to not settle and if you have a doctor that you're not happy with and maybe they're pressuring you to try something that you don't want to do or they're just dismissing you go seek a second opinion like because that can literally be life-changing what's one thing that you wish you knew about endo and something that you would like to leave people with that are listening to this that think they could have it or that do have it and don't see a way out oh it's such a hard question because there's so many things that I wish I knew about endo when I like read my book I wrote a book I think it's just probably knowing that you can take matters into your own hands and

that you can do your own research like that's something that I never did throughout the process of my diagnosis because I guess I trusted the process. I trusted that everything that I was being told was standard and the correct line of what needed to happen. Whereas I should have done my own research and had questions that I could ask in order to know that I was getting the right answers and that I was in the right capable hands. And then from there deciding if I should stick with that professional or go seek someone else. I think that's a really common one. a lot of people feel stuck with who they go and consult you don't have to stay with a professional that's not you know meeting your expectations as to the level of care in which you should

receive and whilst there are a lot of not great professionals out there it doesn't mean you have to stick around with them there are there are a lot of fantastic ones that will help you straight away so I think yeah just finding that confidence to challenge them doing your research unfortunately endo is something that requires a lot of self-advocacy and self-research and self-education but luckily now with especially social media like you know all of these social media channels weren't really a thing for me as I was going through high school and there wasn't any public figures talking about endo but if 15 year old Bridget was dealing with it now I'd definitely have a quicker diagnosis because there are endo accounts there are these organizations who are

creating invaluable resources there is public conversation having so yeah you're going to have to put in a bit of work but you also need to know that you deserve the best level of care so just keep fighting keep persisting if it takes 12 months if it takes 12 years like you will get answers and you deserve to have them sometimes a lot of people do slide into dms wanting really personal advice on their situations and it's impossible to give thousands of people that every day and that's the whole reason you've created your instagram and it is the reason Bridget has written a book how to endo it is already a bestseller so if you guys are looking for that information someone that's gone through it personally someone that's really raw about it

you can go and get her book at any good bookstore how to endo that's from Bridget Bridget why don't you tell everybody where they can find you on your Instagram on your endo Instagram so endogram is just yeah e-n-d-o-g-r-a-m very simple my mum came up with the name um I was really surprised like go mom i know deb i couldn't believe that handle was like it wasn't taken already it's just like it makes sense so endogram and then my personal account's just at bridget huswate but yeah how to endo is in all good bookshops it's in department stores like i saw it in target the other day at my suburban westfield it was so exciting how surreal congratulations like fangirling yourself taking photos in the book aisle like i am an author i'd be doing that for sure absolutely

every damn time it will never grow old and just people like sharing photos people take stunning photos like the book in like this picturesque location like there's mountains and rivers and I'm like Jesus Christ you know people are reading it in Canada there was one girl I want to say it was like an Italian coastline or whatever but it was like so bougie and I was like what is my book doing there obviously she wasn't having to flare up that day it's been some places Bridget thank you so so much for coming on the podcast thank you so much for sharing everything that you've experienced your story I know that so many people who have endometriosis will be able to relate to this but more so the thing that I'm excited about is for people who don't have it who have a friend

or a sister or somebody in their network who does to be able to better understand that person and to be able to be more empathetic towards people who do experience endometriosis so a huge thank you to you for that Bridget good luck on Raya I hope you I hope you get back into the dating world if you've got any problems or questions slide on into my dms i'm happy to help and guys go give bridget a follow on her instagram buy her book if you have endo or you know someone with endo guys you know that we never finish an episode without our suck and our sweet our highlight and our low light of each and every week i think this week is going to be pretty obvious what it is but we're going to do it anyway obviously your sweet see me oh my sweet is that it's been a week

since i've seen you brit and now here you are a vision okay do it properly what's your suck my suck for the week was coming home on the flight so the flight there amazing two children the picture of perfect children the flight home was perfect until we got to about 25 minutes outside of sydney and then marley lost the absolute freaking plot and then lola and you know how you have to have kids strapped to you so you get like a kid's seatbelt I can imagine you strap yourself in then you strap them to you she just screamed into my face for the last 25 minutes of the flight she does just screamed just screamed and screamed and screamed no I think her ears must have popped and I know everyone's gonna be like you got a breastfeeder but I tried I was

trying to breastfeed her I was trying to put the dummy in her mouth she didn't want a bar of it and she screamed in my face and then it made me rethink the fact that I want to have like 15 kids and live in Byron for about 25 minutes until she stopped screaming and now we're good again. I literally walked in and you were like, I want to have more children and live in Byron Bay. That's what you said. So it hasn't made you reconsider it that deeply.

I'm ready for number three already. Okay, watch your switch. Well, you're not having, I'm banning that for now. You're not doing that. I'm so clucky. It takes us five hours to record an hour podcast. You cannot have another child yet. I don't know what's wrong with me.

I don't know why I want to have so many babies, but I want to have like seven. I just want so many kids. I just want to run myself ragged. You're unwell. That's your suck. Okay. My sweet, my sweet is just that we went to Byron Bay.

We had the most amazing time. We stayed at a place called Elements. It was absolutely phenomenal. Honestly, we almost didn't stay there because I thought that it wasn't that kid friendly, but it truly was the most beautifully kid friendly, amazing accommodation. I loved everything about it. It was the best. It was the best holiday that I've had as a family in so long.

and then there was also the adults pool which I also went and spent some time at. I did see that and that was really great with a few coconut margaritas. That was the best part. It was truly the best part but I needed to go away somewhere and have some recharge time and that for me I feel like a different person since coming home. Oh good I'm glad I'm glad to hear that. Thank you. What is your suck and what is your sweet? Well I have two that's similar two sucks they both involve the airplane. One I mentioned last week but it was when I was flying out and that's when my bag exploded. If you have listened, I was on the way to the airport, literally running so late and my 23 kilo bag exploded and the clothes were everywhere. That was the start. So that was my way

to the airport. If there is ever a suck, that is it. On my way home from the airport was another suck because I also, it was like I was sitting next to you. I had two screaming children next to me the whole flight. And I was like, I am trying to be patient because kids, this is what kids do when they're having trouble. But my flight's five hours. Mine isn't an hour from Byron back to Sydney. It was five hours of screaming children. That was definitely a suck. My suite, literally the same thing. I had an amazing week in Perth with Renee and her family. We had such a great time. We had great weather. We went down to some vineyards. I went and watched a surf company, Margaret River. It was just really, really nice. And I'd never been there.

So for me, it was somewhere new, which I love because usually I'd be traveling overseas at some point to try to see a new country it was always what I wanted to do was try and see new places I try to avoid going back to the same place over and over but we can't really do that anymore you know we're covered we can't we're going to have to go back to the same places Byron Bay I'll go back a thousand times but it was so nice to go to a new place and just chill out for a while so that's it it's not exciting guys but it was lovely no our holiday was exciting mine was just chill it was the best oh no but like holidaying with kids it's it's not relaxing there's nothing relaxing about it for some reason i've come back and i feel like i'm ready to hit this well guys

that is it from us we hope you loved the episode and keep your questions coming in for thursday's ask uncut please keep your accidentally unfilters coming for the tuesday episode just slide on into the dms on instagram life uncut podcast same thing for the discussion group on facebook and if you have any i can't believe they said that just you know those moments where someone says something and you have that second where you're like, I can't believe they fucking said that. If that happens to you, we want to hear about it because we do want to bring that segment back.

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