I See YOU Warrior

You've spent years searching for help with your abdominal pain. 

You want to say you're in pain and actually feel empathy and compassion from a health care practitioner. 

You've tried all the "Endo Diets" but that Endo belly has taken up permanent residence & the pain doesn't make your discipline any easier. 

You look at other women's lives and are clueless how they half all the energy for that!! 

You've done all the Endo procedures. Taken all the prescriptions and pills. 

You've seen all the specialists & just pray you'll eventually find someone with resources that work. 

At this point, all of this and the HOPE you once had seems impossible and like a dream!! 

At this point you could be waiting for your fourth or thirteenth and possibly life saving surgery (like me). 

At this point, you don't remember how many days it's been since you showered, cleaned your apartment or called your best friend back. Your true social life is the closest local gas station attendant.

At this point,  thinking about your future means, waiting by the phone in the fetal position, for a script that will buy you twenty min of sanity.

I promise. 

I get it. 

I've been there, lived there, got all the t-shirts, mugs and all the  Endo Life swag you can think of. 

I KNOW and I BELIEVE YOUR IN PAIN..........

............ I want to say that again.

I KNOW that pain you're in.

I BELIEVE you're in that pain, but have HOPE my sweet sister, I CONQUERED that PAIN. 

Hi, I'm Stephanie Elaine. I am a licensed Life & Wellness Coach that specializes in Endometriosis.

I teach, coach and equip women how to take their health into their own hands, and design a strategic health and life plan design to their lifestyle and personal needs for their body. I have been active in the fitness industry for over two decades. I am a FORMER certified Yoga instructor. I am an ordained healing minister, an entrepreneur and the third of three daughters living in sunny Florida.  I am an entrepreneur. As a fatal stage Endo survivor it is my personal mission to help women beat the battle with Endo once and FOR ALL. I make your painful period, my personal problem to solve.  

Let me take you on a trip down my memory lane. I was TWELVE when my first period came.  I was in 6th grade and I was at school. I felt like there was a monster inside of my abdomen trying to break through my skin.  I was scared and confused about how painful it was.  When I got home I told my mom and she explained that that was just part of being a woman and this is what we 

had to go through.  When that period ended I had this dreadful feeling that it was going to 

come back the next month and for forever and this was when the trauma and anxiety associated with my period began. I wasn't just scared..

I was HORRIFIED. 

Not only was I traumatized by the pain but my body was beginning to change with the new set of hormones. I felt OFF and ALONE. Every month, the pain INCREASED. Every year each period became more traumatizing.  Fast forward to the age of sixteen when I was legal to drive, I would swipe the bottle of ALEVE and park behind a gas station and pop the ALEVE like skittles, until I passed out from the pain or the pills.  

At 21, I had my first surgery.  After the surgery I left without any understanding of why I needed surgery and the notion of excessive scar tissue.  There wasn't a diagnosis and I was left with an added dose of hopelessness and uncertainty of what was happening inside my body. The pain continued to get worse as I got older.  During that time of the month I would call into work and when I would get back I would feel the shame of being sick yet again and I would lose my job. I would have to miss school or cancel plans with friends.  

The shame and stress from work and disappointing my family, friends and colleagues began to weigh on me and created more stress and mental anguish.  

It became easier to isolate and bond with my own misery.  My life revolved around my once a month attacker.  I would plan my life around that week.  I knew I just had to get through the treacherous seventy two hours and then I could hopefully go back to work.  And SMILE like nothing had just happened. You know what? I thought this was MY normal.  That this was my story. This was my so-called  Endo Life.  

Month after month.

Year after year.  

Doctors. 

Pain.  

Exhaustion. 

Isolation.  

Shame.  

Guilt. 

I knew pain and misery more than I knew people. And I began to hate life. I would hide behind my lie of a smile, hating life and myself and the thought of my future.  This cycle continued for 21 years. 21 TREACHEROUS. HORRIFIC. UNCONSCIONABLE years of pain, depression, disbelief, and self hatred.  

At 33, I admitted for the first time that I was DEFEATED.  I was mentally dying from the pain. I was beginning to slowly shut down and embrace death.  Three weeks later. I made one final attempt at a doctor for help. This was life saving.  But I had to painfully travel 1,128 miles to Manhattan from Florida to see this doctor. All my hope was in this small man from Turkey's hands (literally).  

When I woke up from that final surgery, I was determined to NEVER be in a hospital bed again. Two weeks later the pain STILL persisted and I made the decision I was going to find a way to never have to have another surgery again.  

I made it my personal purpose to heal myself and in turn help other Endo sisters heal as well.  That's when I dove into the books again.

I began to write my new normal.  

I decided that living a life in pain was just not an option.  I began to change everything I did.  I also questioned everything I was taught. 

This is when the AMAZING things started happening to my mind and my body.... I began to heal. Not just the pain, but my brain. I could THINK. You know that crazy brain fog where you feel like you're fuzzy and floating through life.  

I began to SMILE without lying to myself and others.

I knew I was discovering something and I knew I had to dig deeper so I could help as many women as possible.  That's when this mission to help other women was conceived.  

If Endo was incurable then why was my body and life changing?

Was I actually CRAZY or was there a better way to take my health and my life back?

Was I still taking copious amounts of prescriptions?

 NOPE, for the first time in a decade I quit taking every pharmaceutical prescribed to me.  

Was I seeing every specialist I could find in my city and the surrounding cities? 

No, I was becoming my own. 

Was I going through crazy painful procedures?

No ma'am. 

*I began collecting data on my body and my life up until that point. 

*I was re-writing my new normal and I was beginning to THRIVE again.  

*I became selflessly selfish with my time, energy, and personal space.  

*I began to intensively study the human body and go back to all of my herbal remedy roots.  The  more I researched and studied the more my passion grew.  

*I went to school to become a certified Life and Wellness Coach.  

*I was finally FREE from the cycle of my so-called Endo Life. 

I know in the core of my being that this was my calling and part of my purpose on this planet.  I knew that if this was working for me that this was going to work for other Endo women like me. Women who were silently suffering behind their gorgeous smiles.

I began sharing my new found Endo knowledge with other Endo sisters. I was so passionate at what I was discovering, I honestly began sharing all I was learning with anyone who would listen. (Even men began hiring me based on my passion alone). So if you're out there, in pain, suffering in shame and guilt. Miserable in isolation thinking that this is just the way your life has to be. Let me be the first to tell you that that is the farthest from the TRUTH. 

There is a better, easier, PAINLESS way,  I am LIVING PROOF. 

It is an HONOR you're here and I am so EXCITED to meet you and I look forward to hearing about YOUR STORY with Endo too (seriously, send me your story ;).