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Camden New Journal - HEALTH by TOM FOOT
Published: 12 March 2009

‘Doctors told me I’d never have children’

Endometriosis led to Charlotte Anders sufferering three miscarriages before a radical solution was found, writes Tom Foot

SHE endured three miscarriages and was told by medical experts she should forget about ever having children.
But Kentish Town resident Charlotte Anders has proved miracles can happen by twice giving birth. The 28-year-old has experienced huge mental and physical trauma in coping with endometriosis. This condition, often undetected in young women, causes infertility in the most severe cases.
“I had experienced crippling pain pretty much every time I had my period,” Charlotte said.
“Each month I was admitted to hospital. But it wasn’t until I had my third miscarriage in 2003 that doctors started looking at me properly. I was admitted to hospital for surgery and when I woke up I was told I had endometriosis and that the chances of me having children were basically zero.
“All I wanted was to be a mother. I had a really bad year – it drove me to take an overdose.”
Every woman has endometriosis cells inside the womb that thicken in order to receive an egg before a period. If no pregnancy happens then the cells break up and turn into blood that leave the body through the uterus.
In women suffering endometriosis these cells form outside the womb and have no escape route, causing pain when they are expanding and turning into menstrual blood. The cells scar the outside of the womb and block the fallopian tubes.
Charlotte said: “There was very little support on the NHS so we paid a lot of money to go to Harley Street – they confirmed the same thing.”
But after being hospitalised when the severe cramping pains returned, she was seen by a different NHS consultant. He put her on a programme of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) injections that convinced her body it was going through the menopause, but allowed for a small window for pregnancy.
It allowed Charlotte to give birth to two bundles of joy, James, four, and one-year-old Gillian.
“It’s not much fun coping with the menopause when you are in your 20s,” she said.
“I went from being a size 8 to a size 14. It made me agitated, fat and irritable. Then I got pregnant again. The second pregnancy was really difficult – I spent it in a wheelchair.
“Now I have one of each, a boy and a girl. They are my miracles.”
Charlotte now volunteers for the charity Endometriosis UK, which helps raise awareness about the condition.
She added: “Lots of women suffer from it but it is often dismissed by doctors. People don’t listen.
“I can talk to women who are as scared as I was. I can tell them that all you have to do if you have pain is go to the gynaecologist and be screened very easily. It is worth it because 10 years down the line it might mean you cannot have children.”

• Contact Endometriosis UK on 020 7222 2781 or visit www.endometriosis-uk.org

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