Dramatic Cramping

Dear my ovarian cysts

Thank you for the dark hair all over my body even though I’m blonde. Thank you for the dramatic cramping, the feeling of being shot in the groin on a random Tuesday afternoon when I’m walking to my favourite smoothie bar. Thank you for the gut I will be obsessively trying to get rid of until I accept it’s part of my body. Please, just calm the fuck down.

Ella, UK

Give Me a P, Give Me a C, Give Me an O

Dear Uterus,

I want you to know that I am sorry for fighting you and never trusting that you know what you are doing.

I had to try for so long to get your polycystic ovaries diagnosed, thinking you had endometriosis.

I want you to know that I'm not frustrated with you, even when my period comes later on in your preferred window of 34 to 60 days. I don't like my hairy chin or arms, but now I know that we have PCO (without the S), we can both be at peace with it.

I'll try harder to be calmer, for both of us, and I'm always in your corner.

I love you uterus.

Anonymous, UK

Thanks but No Thanks

Dear Vaginismus,

You will not beat me! Ever since the ectropion made sex no fun and I had to have the cysts on my cervix cauterised you've hung around.

In some ways, I should thank you; you've brought my partner and me closer together and made our relationship about more than being physically intimate. In other ways, I wish we'd been able to have a normal sex life during my 20s ...

Now that I'm 30 we're working on having a family and with him at my side, we will overcome you. So thanks but no thanks. Goodbye!

Anonymous, UK