Disclaimer: I am not a doctor and this post is purely educational. If you’re experiencing some of these symptoms please reach out to a doctor for help.
I was 19 when I was diagnosed with Vaginismus and a few months later I was told I also have Vulvodynia. It was so confusing and I couldn’t help but wonder why I had this and what had caused it. I kept thinking I’m healthy and young why did my body do this to me?
What makes those diagnoses harder is that I struggle with anxiety which can worsen the symptoms of vaginismus and vulvodynia.
What is Vaginismus and Vulvodynia?
For those of you who don’t know Vaginismus is. It is the body’s reaction to the fear of most types of vaginal penetration. The pelvic muscles contract and you have no control over it. Symptoms of this are;
- Difficulty inserting tampons.
- Difficulty with penetration or sex.
- Burning or stinging pain during sex.
On the other hand Vulvodynia is considered a chronic pain around the opening of the vagina. It can make sitting for long periods of time extremely uncomfortable and it can make sex very painful too.
So there I was 19 with the diagnosis of two chronic Vaginal issues. My thoughts were how am I going to get better? How can I recover from this? When am I going to start seeing progress? Until one day it clicked. And after months of hard work I started to get better. There’s a long road ahead of me but I’m excited to reach the end.
What I am doing to heal myself.
At the moment I have a women’s physio who is helping me to do stretches and giving me guidance for work I can do at home. I was recently referred to go see a sex psychologist. Hopefully it will help with the psychological issues I am dealing with in relation to having vaginismus. If there is one thing I can recommend to you is a book called ‘Completely overcome Vaginismus’. I found this book really insightful and it gave me a lot of tools to help me progress in my treatment.
Remember if you’re struggling with Vaginismus or Vulvodynia there is hope and treatment available and it does get better. Most importantly there is no shame in getting help.
Yours always,
The lovely being x
