Induced menopause for endo

[Lostandtired1]

I saw a gynae consultant yesterday she highly suspects from my symptoms I have endo. Plus I had an ectopic about ten years ago and when they removed my tube and ovary it was covered in scarring. She doesn't want to do a laparoscopy to confirm as she said it will only cause more scar tissue.

She has suggested medical induced menopause for six months with breaks for three months after every six months of injections and carry on like this until I go into natural menopause (I'm 41). Also
to start HRT on the second round. So I imagine the first six months will be pretty rough.

I'm happy to try this to help with my seriously heavy painful periods and severe pmt.

I'm really just seeking anyone who has had a positive experience with this route? As I am highly anxious about it but I am going to go for it.

Is the treatment Zoladex injections?

I've been put on this for six months in the hope that it will finally tip me into menopause, to which I have been surprisingly resistant, even now in my mid fifties and after years of extremely heavy flooding periods.

I've had my first injection and am due my next in about 10 days. So far I keep getting random bleeding, which isn't filling me with confidence that it will work any better than anything else has so far.

I have another hysteroscopy (my third!!) in late July so if it hasn't settled by then I might be pressing the gynaecologist about a hysterectomy instead.

I'd also be interested to see the experiences of others on this treatment first though, good and bad.

I had a course of Zoladex for Stage IV endometriosis - I was at the point of being in disabling pain. It was fairly full-on in terms of menopause symptoms (the full shebang, night sweats, weight gain etc) and I had to jettison the add-on HRT quite quickly because I developed phlebitis....to add to the joys, turns out I'm over-sensitive to oestrogen.

But it did stop the pain and I then had a Mirena fitted. I know it often gets a bad press on here but it was a lifesaver for me. No more periods, no more pain, my natural menopause happened while it was still in place and tbh I don't think I actually went through a true menopause except when I was on the Zoladex.

Heavy bleeding wasn't one of my problems though, so I'm not sure that's much help to you, OP. All I can say is that for me it worked well.

Mind you, if you're only 41 and your gynae suggests using it till menopause, that sounds like it could be a very long time to be on Zoladex. I don't think I've heard of it being used long-term like that. I could be wrong, though.

Best of luck, it's miserable having to try and sort this stuff.