Endometriosis advice

[starwishing]

I am also going to post this in infertility and pregnancy so hopefully one of the three will be a hit...

A bit of background to start with. We have a 3yo DC that was conceived instantly. We weren't trying and just had a happy surprise. In September 2015 we decided that we were going to try for our second so we would have a nice age gap. However between then and now we have not had a hint of a positive even though we have put a lot of effort in.

I went to my gp for help and we were started on the way to fertility investigations. My OH has 4% morphology but his motility and count is really high so they haven't seen that as a problem. Despite this though he has started a healthy eating diet and upped his exercise to help. I have had my bloods done and (from what I can remember) they are normal for my age of 35. I'm aware though at 35 time is running out in terms of quality and quantity.

I have recently had a laparoscopy that came up with my ovaries and tubes being clear and bilateral. They removed superficial endometriosis from my POD and flushed my system.

When looking online it says that superficial endometriosis shouldn't cause infertility, yet when I saw my consultant he was really positive and said we should find things easier now. Which is right though? It was o my superficial so why was he so positive? Was it just to give me false hope? Positive thinking?

If anyone has any ideas I would appreciate the advice. My hope for a baby is quite fragile so I'm just researching like crazy and it's driving me insane!

Hi,

I was diagnosed with endometriosis when I was 14 (I'm now 30) and have over the years done a lot of reading up about it.

I think the one thing that can be said about endometriosis is that it is a mystery.

I think generally fertility is slightly lower even when there is nothing "in the way" and no one is sure of the reason for that but that might be why it's taking longer to conceive? However it's really great that your ovaries and tubes are clear, because that could have been a big issue.

I honestly don't know if your consultant was just trying to be reassuring or if what they did during your lap will have made a difference, but by the sounds of it there is nothing stopping you from getting pregnant at the moment so I hope you have a BFP soon! :)

My endometriosis has always been a lot worse with stress, and its possible the stress of TTC is becoming a vicious cycle? Yoga, reflexology, massage, acupuncture and other complimentary therapies can be really beneficial to help lower stress levels and I have found them really helpful with dealing with my endometriosis and periods. Might be worth a try if you haven't already.

There are some studies into food and diet which may be beneficial for endometriosis too, it might be worth looking into ideas on what food to eat or avoid, even if it's just to give you a feeling of having some control over the situation. No harm in it anyway.

Good luck!

Thank you @KnitKitty for your reply. I'be tried acupuncture and reiki before but might give them another shot a again now I've had the surgery. My acupuncturist actually said there was something there even before the surgery.

I might look into diet. We both eat a healthy diet for the purpose of being the best health (not really for weight loss as we are average weight within the normal bounds). I'm vegetarian and heard soya can be detrimental so that might be getting cut!

I'm still tracking and got a positive opk today and now I'm so much pain. Hoping it's just my cycle returning to normal.

To be honest there isn't a huge amount actually known about endometriosis and information seems to differ depending on who you talk to.

My surgeon told me that endometriosis doesn't normally affect fertility unless deep infiltrating endo is present and endo is found on/around the ovaries. Although he did say he believes there can be a slightly higher risk of miscarriage if there's lots of adhesions, But I'm not sure if that's based on any research. But he also recommended TTC within the first year of surgery as that time frame normally holds the highest success rate

Sorry just realised I've written similar to KnitKitty, teaches me for not reading things properly

@Bambamber that's ok. It's good to hear the same things from people as it reaffirms it.

I know not much is known. My DH asked why caused the endometriosis and was annoyed no one could tell him. He likes to know how and why things happen and unfortunately this is one of those times when it's a complete mystery.

My consultant is meant to be the best in the area and specialises in endometriosis and fertility. He said we should keep ttc as soon as we wanted. He said he was confident it would help our chances and hopefully he would see me back only once to sign off the case. His assistant said if we do conceive and we wanted another afterwards not to leave such a big age gap this time! Errrrr we started ttc when our son was 8mths old 😆 we didn't pick the age gap!