A decade of pain before endometriosis is diagnosed

At just 12 years old, a terrified Zaynah Ahmed lost so much blood during her period that she was left in a life-threatening condition and needed an urgent blood transfusion.

- REBECCA THOMAS HEALTH CORRESPONDENT

Doctors and nurses rushed around her, using words like the pill and haemoglobin levels - all things that, as a child, she could not understand.

One medic even joked, “imagine you’d been shot in your leg and you just like bled out” in a bid to explain how serious her blood loss had been.

“The doctor... basically said that if you hadn’t come within that week, it would have had a life-threatening impact on my life,” Ms Ahmed, now aged 19, told The Independent.

Years later, in 2023, she was finally diagnosed with endometriosis, which affects millions of women in the UK. The condition occurs when cells similar to those that make up the lining of the uterus appear in other parts of the body. Symptoms can include pelvic pain, painful periods, heavy period bleeding, pain when going to the toilet or having sex, and fatigue.

Figures from the charity Endometriosis UK show that it takes an average of eight years to get a diagnosis.

Just nine months before her first A&E admission, and then aged 11, Ms Ahmed knew something wasn’t quite right when she experienced severe bleeding, heart palpitations and lost chunks of her hair during her first period.