Managing Your Triggers

It is possible to still live a decently normal life while still dealing with endometriosis. Once you understand what triggers your endometriosis, it gets easier. While your life will never be completely normal again, you need to learn how to get your endometriosis under control and the rest will fall into place.

Diet
I had a really hard time figuring out what triggered my endometriosis diet-wise. I had always just eaten whatever was convenient or whatever my parents made for me. I never paid any attention to what kinds of food I ate.
Once I found out about my endometriosis, I began to pay close attention to what I ate. Over time I found that dairy products were my main issue. Anytime I ate anything with a lot of cheese or milk, I found myself in a lot of pain.
Cigarettes and liquor were two other major triggers for my disease. This was harder to stop but I did quit smoking cigarettes. I also stopped drinking hard alcohol for the most part. Cutting these things out of my life has made living with endometriosis much easier.

Exercise
Unlike many people, I found that exercise actually irritated my endometriosis. Any type of strenuous activity causes a lot of pain for me. I even found that standing for long periods of time can irritate my endometriosis. It became very hard to work long doubles at my job. I would have increasing back pain over time that would not go away until I stopped exercising.
Now, I need to find a replacement for strenuous exercise. I have begun looking at other options like yoga or Pilates to replace treadmill running or weight lifting. I think that once I begin doing one of these things, I will feel better and my pain will diminish.

Once I changed these two aspects of my life, my pain from my disease got better. It is important to find what triggers you with your own endometriosis and react accordingly. This can really change your life once you begin to understand what your body is telling you.