What It’s Really Like to Have Vulvodynia

Do you plan to go to work today and earn a living? Well, you can plan however much you want. In the end, the pain will always make the final call for you. And it can surprise you with its illogical patterns – daily. So if you’re waking up hoping for a good day but it is not meant to be – you won’t get to work. Simple.

If somehow you’ve forced yourself to get to work — as you know that calling in sick three times per week will end up with your boss showing you the exit door — then be prepared for another challenge.

The following test is to sit for the next eight straight hours. You might fidget in your chair, trying to lift up your crotch to give yourself even mere seconds of relief. Because you know that getting up every 5 minutes is not an option.

Even though you’ve forced yourself to go to work, you’ve already missed so many days that you are simply afraid of losing your job. Plus, you know that you’re bound to call in sick again in the near future. You’re afraid of losing your income which stresses you even more and makes you feel hopeless.

You are aware that with your chronic condition, you might not be hirable. Plus, vulvodynia is not a “simple” health problem.

Before being hired, you don’t want to reveal your health issues because it can have some bearing on the hiring decision. However, once hired and happy for the given opportunity, you feel too embarrassed and scared to talk about your intimate V problems. Congrats, you just got trapped.

Do you plan to go out? Have you been waiting for this evening for an entire week? Wait, are you just getting a flare-up? Again? Like most of the time, the pain will decide if you can see your friends or not. You are forced to cancel. Your friends are angry, disappointed and tired of you flaking out on them yet again.

In the end, you don’t even want to make arrangements anymore.

You aren’t stupid and you’re aware that it isn’t fun to be around you. And you suspect that your constant and repetitive problems can become pretty heavy for others. Who likes to be around sad (and sometimes angry) people?

Your friends expect you to be happy, but you simply don’t feel like it. And constantly faking it is tiresome. They have other problems that, for you, are trivial, as you don’t even have your basics covered – like your damn health.

You see other “happy and normal” people, and you feel really bad about yourself and your life. Plus, you don’t want to hear others’ happy stories because they only make you feel worse.

You are on a special diet to keep your body in one piece. Some foods or drinks give you flare-ups and make your symptoms worse (like alcohol). So, you stop consuming them.

However, going out and finding a place that can suit everyone starts to be very challenging. Adding to that, you can’t really enjoy the moment or relax because you are still worried that something may trigger the pain.

Because of all the challenges, you’re facing when going out, it’s simply not your priority anymore. To not feel miserable and avoid all these troubles, you prefer to stay away from your social life.

Some people stick, some people don’t. They can become tired of listening about your problems (that are so different from theirs), your life’s constraints or dealing with your moods that fluctuate depending on the level of your pain.

Your body is breaking like china in a glass case. You want to live a normal life (who doesn’t?) but your body and its complicated “relationship” with the pain is not allowing you to do so. You have a hard time to put your pants on. To sit. To walk. And sex has become a blurry memory. I’m talking about basic stuff here, nothing fancy pancy.

So, no surprise that you hate your broken body. Yourself. And your entire life. You might even fantasize to be someone else, with a different body obviously.

You blame yourself for what is happening in your life. For your broken relationships. Then your partner for a lack of understanding. Then again yourself for not being the woman that you want to be. For canceling meetings. For calling in sick. Then also your doctors for throwing their hands up and calling you crazy. And yourself again, for your doomed destiny.

You feel like you have done something to deserve all of this.

Hell yeah, you are! You constantly live on the edge. You balance between “will I survive today?” and “will it defeat me today?” Everything in your life fluctuates depending on your level of pain. Trivial comments can gut your heart. And when someone or something tips the scale, you simply explode.

You’re emotionally exhausted and because of this, your feelings flip from anger, frustration to even despair.

Well, think about it. You have no clue when your body will decide to break again. You don’t trust it anymore.

You fear new experiences, as you don’t know how your body will react. What if during a trip or night out you end up with an unbearable flare-up?

You fear new relationships. Emotional involvement and emotional pain. In the end, what is the point? Why would anyone like to be with someone who can’t have sex?

There are sometimes hours of loneliness in your bed, suffering. Hours of you thinking what the heck you should do with your life. Hours of you wishing that you would like to be out with your friends. But you can’t. You know that people may not understand you. You don’t want to moan and be heavy.

You don’t want to make decisions or promises anymore. Because you don’t even know if you will be able to keep them!

It may manifest during a deceptively trivial process like picking clothes for the day (and believe me, this can be damn hard). Or going on a trip with your friends. In the end, the pain dictates your plans. And you know it.

You face a pain of unknown cause and cure. Because of that also an unsure future. You can howl for help however much you want but all roads seem to end at the same cul-de-sac.

Doctors can’t help you. Western Medicine doesn’t invent medications for your problem. They throw their hands up and tell you “this is all in your head.” But you can feel it. You know that the pain is real.

You don’t even have an idea where to start. How the hell should you share with others what you are going through? It’s pretty embarrassing to tell your boss that you can’t crawl to work or to tell your date that you can’t drag yourself to the cinema because your vulva hurts.

No surprise that you are negative, and engage in negative thinking and self-talk. You worry daily for your future — even 20 minutes away from now. You don’t truly know when the pain can take over again. Because of that, you expect little or nothing from life.

Well, because after flare-ups that last entire nights — when you are visualizing your vulva being thrown out of the window — you really don’t give a crap how you look like.

You feel envious. Of other people’s happiness. Of other people’s amazing sex life. Of other people’s pain-free life.

Hell yes, you feel like this. The nature of your condition is not helping you to feel any saner. Especially when doctors tell you that you are emotionally or mentally unstable (because they can’t find the cause or cure for your condition).

Your sexual life is pretty much buried. You don’t want to have sex because you’re in pain. And when the pain decreases and you even briefly consider it, you are afraid of another flare-up (which btw has happened so many times during and after sex that you don’t want to even try anymore).

Imagine that you have a knee injury. After some period of rest, your knee starts feeling relatively okay and you decide to run again. You run and boom. It hurts again. Now imagine this happening 100 times — in a row. Would you feel anxious at the very thought of attempting your 101st run?

Your sexuality is suppressed. You want to share joy, happiness, and pleasure with your partner. But you know you can’t. And you don’t know if you ever will be able to.

You cause arguments just before the atmosphere starts to heat up — to get away from sex. You also ignore any signs of affection from your partner. You even start covering yourself to not look sexy. But then you feel guilty and blame yourself for trying to avoid any intimacy altogether.

Firstly, you can barely put your life together. Because of that, you can’t even imagine taking care of another human being. Secondly, you can’t even have sex. And yes, there are other ways to get pregnant but… even the thought of being in pain with no meds for 9 long months is nerve-wracking.

Some partners just don’t understand. They might think that you’re exaggerating. Or that you’re having an affair. Or don’t love them anymore. And that’s why you are pushing them away. But honestly, who doesn’t want to have super hot pain-free sex?

She/he might walk away because of a lack of sex, tension, arguments, unfulfilled expectations, pain – all this crap that litters your relationship. And as a form of defense, you act up and push your significant other away, hoping that it will hurt less if you’re the one making the decision to leave. But it does not.

You end up with a sexless relationship. There are some partners that are ok with that. And there are others who aren’t, as sex is too important for them. And they can’t imagine waiting for someone for more than __(fill the blank). Plus, this is lack of sex is happening on top of all the other problems that assail your relationship. It is all simply too much.

Because of all this shit going on in your life, you prefer to stay single. It’s better than having to go through the same mess again and again.