My first three weeks as a freshman at Hope College was spent with LOTS of tampons and pads. This three week period had me pretty freaked out, but I tried to remain calm by telling myself it was only because of the stress of adjusting to a new place and people and life. Um...no. Stress usually just stops the period. I knew that.
Back then, I wasn't into the whole "Periods are normal! Let's talk about them!!" thing, so I kept it to myself for most of that time. As two weeks turned into three weeks, I was like, "Dude, I'm going to bleed to death..." So I told my parents. I talked to both of my roommates who were doing premed and the nursing program. I messaged my aunt, who is a nurse. They all casually told me I probably had a cyst on my overies and that I should go to the med center.
That didn't sound very casual to me, so I did as they suggested. By the way, I haaaaate going to the doctor. I got a female, thank you God, who told me if it didn't clear up within the next couple days I should come back for a pap test. (You're supposed to have one after either you have sex or turn twenty one, and she told me I was close enough anyway at eighteen.) She also informed me that I was quite anemic from this. (Imagine that.)
Not to ruin the rest of this story, but I still haven't had that test done yet and I'm almost twenty two. I am a scaredy cat. With no insurence. Put those together and it means I'm NOT going to the doctor unless I absolutely must. *whines* But I really should do that soon... One of my best friend assured me recently it really isn't that bad and I should just get it over with. Hmm.
Anyway. Then I went to the first Bible study of my college life with one of my best friends where we met our other best friend. Shout out to Kirsten and Sparky!! (Sparky, please don't hate me for mentioning you in a blog about periods. 'K'? Thanks.) At the end, we each wrote a prayer request on a small slip of paper and put the slips in the middle so we could each pick one at random. Then we'd have that person's request with us for the rest of the week and be reminded to pray for them.
On my slip of paper, I wrote that I needed healing for something physical. Had I been who I am now, I would have written. "I've had this freakish period for three weeks and I don't want a pap test! Please pray for this to go away!"
I don't know who got my slip of paper, but I know they prayed because God did what he does and I was healed. Yay!
Morals of this story:
Go see a doctor if anything is weird with your period. Truly. Go have it checked out. Don't be a scaredy cat like me.
God cares about our periods, ovaries, uterus, all that.
I also just have to share quickly that with the past two periods I've had, I didn't have crazy mood swings, nor did I have any zits! Double hooray and good day to you.
