‘A secret little world’:
Disclosing symptoms
Living with the unpleasant and diverse symptoms of
endometriosis was a deeply private affair for the women in
this study. Menstruation problems and bowel and bladder
pain and irregularities are not easily disclosed even though
they affected the women profoundly. Work raised particular
problems as pain and other issues affected the
women’s everyday functioning. One woman commented,
for instance, that she could not take meeting minutes
because gastrointestinal problems meant she needed to go
the toilet frequently and, at times, urgently.