6 Keys to Prevent Period Pain from an Endo Warrior

Reaching the bliss of a pain-free period after nine years of agony

A painful period is normal, they say — until you find yourself stuck on the bathroom floor at 3 AM, with cold sweat running down your back, paralyzed in a cramp so tight it feels like your inner organs are being ripped apart.

Have you ever wondered how much pain your body can take? Before it shuts down? And did you ever experience what happens to your body in a state of unbearable pain?

Most humans, luckily, never reach that point in their lives. Women who face endometriosis go there regularly — once a month — like clockwork. I have gone there countless times. And every time, it feels like entering the arena of the gladiators, not knowing if and how you’ll make it out again.

Chronic pain conditions — like endometriosis — turn the body into a living battlefield. As a survivor of many years of excruciating pain, I made it my top priority to figure out how to menstruate in peace. Without agonizing pain attacks and without relying on heavy pain medication.

Ever since doctors told me they assumed I suffered from endometriosis, I tried many alternative routes to avoid surgery. Though the final diagnosis has to be made by surgery — and that is something I always decided against up to this point — I do experience all the symptoms, and they have progressively gotten worse over the years.

In my worst days with this condition, my period cramps would get so bad that I was tied to the bed for days, oftentimes unable to walk, stand up straight, or engage my abdominal muscles in the slightest bit. I’d usually end up frozen in the fetal position, crying on the bathroom floor, or winding in agony for hours on end. The intensity of the cramps would sometimes make me vomit or even pass out.

If I could’ve ever imagined hell, it would’ve been these lonely moments with little hope for things to get better.

See — surgery is not a cure for endometriosis. At least, that’s what doctors always explained to me. Officially, there is no known cure, and the pain, in many cases, returns after the first surgery. Practically, that means, when it comes down to it, most of us are given painkillers and left to handle our recurring crises alone.

And so I did because when facing this level of pain, there is little to do but to desperately keep seeking relief. And even though I am not free of symptoms today, I am proud to say that after years of battle, I found my personal formula for experiencing a pain and medication-free period, and I have done so many times within the past few years.

Ever since I shared my story on my social media, people have been reaching out to me, asking for tips on how to manage endometriosis holistically. So here is the best advice I can share from my own experience so far:

To start, I want to share the necessary change in attitude this condition forced me to make around my period and special needs.

Make self-care your top priority

Being a woman nowadays is very different from how it used to be, and therefore, different from how our own genetics are programmed to deal with. As emancipated women, many of us work busy schedules and take on lots of responsibilities that do not always harmonize with our natural feminine needs for self-care around our menstrual cycles. Others manage a home and family life and are used to pouring every bit of their energy into their loved ones before ever attending to their own needs.

When my condition started to increasingly interfere with my capacity to be able to work and handle stress at the workplace, I learned the hard way why it is so important to prioritize my menstrual needs above everything else when my body calls for it. Many of us establish an attitude of sucking it up and functioning on our periods, just as a man in our position would. But the truth is, we aren’t men, and our systems, by nature, work on different rhythms.

The more I prioritized my need for self-care and rest during the most vulnerable time of the month, the more energy I had and the less painful my cramps would be. Oftentimes, a consequent break from everyday responsibilities for the first two days of my period would prevent a major pain crisis altogether and help me flow through the rest of my menstruation without triggering any major inflammation symptoms.

Self-care is our very foundation to show up as our best version, and it is my personal opinion that menstruation is, by default, a time of rest and rejuvenation for the female body. I therefore want to encourage everyone to honor and respect this principle and watch how the body will thrive.

Remember to celebrate this divine gift with gratitude

Those of us who suffer from difficult and painful periods hardly find a blessing in our menstruation. Unless, of course, we have been worried about an unwanted pregnancy. To me, this shows the disrupted relationship many of us have with our feminine cycle because there’s already the general presumption that our menstruation is somehow bad or a curse.

From personal experience, I am convinced that the cells of our body always listen to our internal processes, thoughts, and intentions. I think the resulting emotions are a path of communication between our mind and body, as they are both registered by our mental awareness and also experientially felt by our body.

If we feel resentful towards our bodies for executing our reproductive cycles, we create disharmony. In my personal experience, my body has always done best when I sweet-talked it through my menstruation and expressed my gratitude for the hard work my system was doing.

Once I became aware of my poor attitude towards my menstruation, I remembered that the only period that I was ever happy to discover was my very first one. When it finally happened, I was so proud to have achieved this important milestone on the journey of being a woman. And I was determined to take good care of my womb during this time. I felt gifted and blessed with the sacred power to grow and give life.

But the older I got and the more I adapted to society’s high standards of productivity, having a period felt increasingly inconvenient. Over time, the distress towards my periods grew, and so did the pain crises.

As grown women, we are so used to bleeding every month that many of us forget the great gift that lies behind this symbolic gesture of the body. As women, we have the ability to create life, to grow another being inside our womb. But this precious gift comes with sacrifice and vulnerability. It comes with the need to care for this sacred space within our bodies and protect it.

Our womb is to be adored and spoiled with everything that it needs, whenever it needs it, because our womb is a holy space.

Here’s what endometriosis taught me about the needs of my own body during menstruation:

1. Sleep

For as long as I can remember, I have had an extensive need for sleep. Ten hours, and if I didn’t get them at night, I’d be tired during the day and crash around the afternoon.

Now again, our highly productive society doesn’t calculate with a need for 10 hours of sleep. I quickly learned to get by with less, and it’s possible. On my period, though, my body needs as much time to recover and rest as possible. If that means 12 hours of sleep, you can be sure that I will be doing so. There is simply no deeper rest than sleep. It’s the time when our nervous system naturally regulates, cell repair happens, and our body has time to rejuvenate without disruption.

Whenever I go into a pain crisis, my first response will be to get into bed and calm my pain to the point of being able to fall asleep. Whenever I wake up, the pain has usually calmed down, if not completely subsided. Not only that, I noticed that the more sleep I got during the first days of my period and in the week prior, the less difficult my menses turned out. So, sleep is the number one factor for me.

2. Eat light or fast

Menstruation is a natural time for cleansing and release. Once I understood that, I noticed that the more I detoxed prior to my period and the less processed and unhealthy foods I consumed, the lighter my period was and, therefore, less difficult.

I went so far as to experiment with fasting to see how that would influence the flow. And my results were astonishing. Whenever I fasted or consumed only liquids on the first two days of my period, I wouldn’t experience any pain, nor would I need pain medication, while my energy levels were significantly higher than when I had been eating.

The more I studied this phenomenon, the more sense it made to me. Menstruation is not the time for heavy meals. Digestion takes a lot of energy, and depending on what we eat, it can create abdominal tension and turmoil during menstruation. Much of the endometriosis pain is linked to extensive gas and painful bowel movements. Having an empty stomach, on the other hand, feels like peace and stillness in a situation where every wrong move can trigger an internal explosion.

To support this effect, or on days when I didn’t fast and experienced a subsequent pain crisis, I found it helpful to use warm water enemas, which helped the internal muscles relax and, of course, release what was bothering the system.

3. Keep the nervous system calm

The next important thing is to avoid stress at all costs. While I’m on my period, I cannot be bothered with stressful things because it’s not the time to handle such things. We all know the stereotype of females on their period being ‘bitchy’ or even aggressive, and I personally think it resulted from the fact that during menstruation, our nervous system is not very equipped to handle triggers, be they physical or emotional.

We get irritable because, in our most sensitive state, our precious energy is reserved for taking care of our own needs, and anything that is not supportive but challenging to us can feel invasive.

As my endometriosis progressed, I started to notice how being around aggressive people or situations would trigger immediate pain in my reproductive organs. It was like my body signalling me, this is not a safe space to menstruate—get out! But also emotional disagreements and confrontations started to have a similar effect.

So, for me, that means menstruation is by default a time of withdrawing from all stressful situations and triggers. Now, of course, I understand that for many, it is a luxury or just not possible to lock themselves in their room with a hot water bottle, tea, and a blanket for two days. In these cases, I think it helps to still take it as easy as possible, letting your environment know that these days you’ll appreciate peace, and the difficult tasks and conversations can be saved for another day.

You might also help your nervous system stay at peace by incorporating specific nervous system regulation techniques into your day and in difficult situations. These can be soft humming, deep breathing, listening to soothing frequencies, or even taking a hot bath.

4. Raspberry Leaf Tea

Raspberry Leaf Tea is a true miracle in helping the cervix soften and the womb to release with ease — no cramps.

Tea, in general, is a great way to support the body in menstruation and healing. I started to have a whole liter of herbal tea in the morning before I ate anything, and it made a whole difference in how my digestive system harmonized with the rest of my body. Some of my favorite herbs are:

Peppermint — to release excess gas

Ginger — to reduce inflammation

Alchemilla — to support the womb

There is a wide range of herbs that will benefit you. But my all-time favorite tea for a peaceful menstruation remains raspberry leaf.

To see its full effects, it has to be consumed regularly for at least a whole cycle and later throughout the week leading up to menstruation. Another way of using the herb is as yoni steam, right before and after menstruation.

5. Spirulina

I already mentioned that a clean system will make the period cleaning process much smoother, as the body has fewer toxins to handle and flush out. Adding spirulina to my diet has always worked in helping my body detox fast and effectively since it binds heavy metals and helps the body release them. It is also a natural source of high-quality protein and rich in minerals such as iron and magnesium, which support the body in a healthy blood flow and ease cramps.

6. Castor oil packs

Castor oil packs are another way of helping the body cleanse but also nourish the reproductive organs with important minerals that will support easy menstruation and reduce cramping.

For that, you soak a clean cotton cloth in castor oil, place it on your lower abdomen, and cover it with a towel and a hot water bottle or heating pillow. Alternatively, you can rub the castor oil directly onto your lower abdomen and cover it with a clean towel and a hot water bottle. Leave it on for 15 minutes or as long as it feels comfortable, and repeat either a few times a week or whenever you experience acute cramping.

Castor oil packs are a beautiful way to create comfort in the lower abdomen and give the body a sense of wellness and being taken care of. It’s a beautiful ritual to create relaxation in the body.

Menstruating with ease is an art, in my opinion. The art of listening to our body and falling in love with taking care of our most feminine needs. By following the mentioned tips religiously and adapting my life to the needs of my menstrual cycle, I was able to enhance my life quality by 100 percent.

Yes—I had to change carriers and find a work environment that supports my period. Yes — I had to let go of relationships that turned out to be huge stressors and didn’t show much improvement over time. Yes — I did have to make sacrifices in my diet and learn to discipline myself in certain moments.

But as someone who has experienced horrific trauma around menstrual pain, I feel more than blessed to say that I eventually learned to appreciate and even enjoy my period again. I was able to travel the world full-time, despite my condition, and live a life of freedom instead of being disabled by my menstrual cycles. And I do hope, with all my heart, that my tips and stories can help other brave women on their journey as well!