I've talked about stomach issues & IBS before on the forums and I know a couple of my EF friends have told me they too suffer from it! I've dealt with both IBS & endometriosis (both usually come hand in hand) since I was 15, but I know it's not something most people like to talk about. Anyways, I had finally gotten rid of most all the symptoms of both (ibs and endo) for the past year or so & I've talked a little about that with some of you regulars on the forums. Unfortunately, I've came to a big road block & have been suffering from it all over again. As soon as I noticed it bothering me again, I got on top of it & am now working my way out of it before it can get worse. There is no way I can deal with years of no life besides a bed, bathroom and severe pain. So I'm trying everything I remember to get back on the right track. So I was wondering if others here suffer from it? Have any of you ever gotten over it, like actually gotten better to the point of feeling totally healed? I did get there & it wasn't extremely miserable, but I have been so freaked out because I never want to feel the pain of either of those problems one more day in my life. I remember when I was really ill with them both taking over my life -- our sex life was so off. We wanted to do it so badly, but most days I was so sick that I couldn't eat, much less have sex. And the days we would try, almost every single time it resulted in some freak flare up where I'd be left in pain for the rest of the night. Now though, after all the healing I went through the past year or two, our sex life has finally got to be everything we wanted! So I worry about that too. Has anyone else had that issue -- where a big flare up of pain (and ahem, sometimes more) came after sex? Never could figure out why sex seemed to send me straight into a flare up. A lot of times it would happen during sex! I'd feel so bad about it.

I know I put this in the women's health section, but I hope men who also deal with this or who have a spouse who deals with it will not hesitate to chime in! For those of you who have healed from either of these, do you have anything to share on how you did it? I've talked about the methods I used (herbs, aloe vera mostly, coconut oil for a little while, etc) I definitely have started taking my aloe and garlic again for the last few weeks, but tonight had some issues and sadly, I've eaten all my aloe plant except a tiny amount which I just swallowed. It's like instant relief! We're planning to go hunt down a mature plant tomorrow so that I can start taking it regularly right away until things get better, which took me less than a month last time! And I'd suffered for years & all it took was one month! So that is what's keeping me hanging on to hope. I had surgery for SOME of the endometriosis lesions, but some are still there... deep. Surgery is definitely not something I plan to go through again. It'd be beyond a last resort. I've worked my a** off to stay as healthy as possible ever since my surgery so I really don't think things with the endometriosis has gotten to some extreme levels again. When I seen my dr. for it again several months ago, I was in the clear -- nothing had worsened as far as the lesions go.

Anyways, if anybody else has dealt with these types of things or if you know someone who has, it'd be really nice to hear how you/they got through it or how if it affected their sex lives as well. I read up on support forums for both conditions & it seems that most people don't really have issues with sex for either of these & it's the complete opposite for me!

Well, thanks in advance if anybody does feel comfortable sharing. I've been hanging out on other sites specifically for these issues & they've been pretty dead all week. I figure there just might be someone here who would feel comfortable sharing how things have went in their own journey with this. I know it's not easy to talk about, so if you don't want to do it so publicly, but want to message me, I'd love that too.