7 Life Lessons Learned From Being an Endo Warrior

Welcome back to another episode of The Endo Belly Girl Podcast! In today's episode, I reflect on the life lessons I have learned as an endo warrior. Through my personal experiences with endometriosis, I share my insights and hope to inspire others on their journeys.

In this episode, you will hear:

- The important lesson of learning to love my own body, despite any challenges.

- The significance of tuning into my body's intuition and the impact of making simple yet crucial choices, such as listening to her body's signals for hunger and rest.

- The importance of accepting help and how it has been a transformative lesson for me.

- I talk about the relationship between nutrition and well-being, highlighting the profound impact of choosing the right foods for her body.

- The concept of feeling empowered in managing my health journey, a pivotal lesson that I share, including the shift from feeling helpless to taking charge of my well-being.

- Advocating for myself, both in medical settings and everyday life, is another crucial lesson that listeners will hear about in this episode.

- I delve into the significance of community and the support it provides, particularly in connecting with others who understand her experiences as an endo warrior.

As you listen,  l invite you to reflect on your own journey, life lessons, and experiences as endo warriors. As 2023 draws to a close, I hope this episode serves as a source of inspiration and encouragement for those navigating their own health challenges.

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Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational purposes only. This may not be the best fit for you and your personal situation. It shall not be construed as medical advice. The information and education provided here is not intended or implied to supplement or replace professional medical treatment, advice, and/or diagnosis. Always check with your own physician or medical professional before trying or implementing any information read here.

Transcript

Alyssa Chavez [00:00:00]:
Hello and welcome back to the Endobelly Girl podcast. I cannot believe that this episode is going to be the very last episode of 2023. That blows my mind. I cannot believe that just a few days after this episode airs, it is going to be 2024. But it's also very exciting because I have some big plans coming for 2024. I don't want to spoil anything yet, but there are definitely things coming your way to be excited about. So I will just leave that little nugget there and share more with you as the new year begins to progress. What I'd like to do for today's episode is to talk about some of the life lessons that I personally have learned from being an endowarrior.

Alyssa Chavez [00:00:52]:
As anybody who has endometriosis or really any chronic illness is aware of, it impacts your life in many, many ways. It impacts your health. It impacts your day to day life, the choices that you make. It can impact your relationships and your work and so many things. And so it's hard not to learn lessons from that. And so I wanted to share with you some of the lessons that I have learned in hopes that maybe it will help some of you along your own journey. So let's dive in. Lesson number one, learning to love my own body.

Alyssa Chavez [00:01:31]:
And I know this is a tough one for a lot of people. I can't say that I am 100% at it either, but I do my very best. I'm certainly much better than I used to be. I remember, especially when I first was struggling with endometriosis or first discovered that's what it was anyway. I was really hating on my body. It was a lot of how did this happen? I feel like I take such good care of myself. How did it manage to progress this far? Because I had stage four endometriosis. Not loving on my body for being in pain when I really wanted to be able to get things done that day.

Alyssa Chavez [00:02:07]:
Certainly not loving on my body for not being able to get pregnant when I wanted to. There were a lot of things coming up that were causing me to not particularly love my body. But what I've learned along the way is that hating on your body is not going to help it in any way. One thing that, a piece of advice that I heard from somebody somewhere along the line was to picture your own body as if it's a young child. If there were a young child in front of you and they were in pain or they were hurting or they were struggling with something, you wouldn't sit there, I hope, and berate that child and yell at them and tell them what a terrible person they were for being in pain, for example, you would sit down and hug them and snuggle them and love on them and help them to feel that much better. And so I really took that to heart and have done my very best, made it my life's mission, one of my life's missions, to try to approach my own body that way. So when my body is hurting in some fashion, I'm experiencing symptoms. Especially because now I don't experience symptoms anywhere near to the level that I used to.

Alyssa Chavez [00:03:18]:
Because of all of the work that I've done over the years, I do my best to picture my body as this young child who just needs some love in that moment and loving on my body, honoring my body, and even in the good moments, right? Trying to really say thank you. When I have those really good days or weeks, even where I have nothing, I have no symptoms, my body actually feels good, and I have energy and all the things that I used to wish that I had, I try to take a moment of gratitude for that and just enjoy those positive moments as well. So that's lesson number one that I've learned, is learning to love my own body. Lesson number two, tuning in to my body's intuition. So, okay, this is semi similar to the other one, but a little bit different, because this is more about listening to what my body actually needs. Because so often we ignore that. Even simple little things. I'm going to go from a very basic level.

Alyssa Chavez [00:04:17]:
Things like eating when you're hungry, going to use the restroom when you need to use the restroom, and not holding it, or waiting until it's convenient for somebody else or whatever. Going to sleep when you're tired, instead of forcing yourself to stay up and do that one more thing before bedtime. Just simple little things like that. Really listening to what your body needs, or sometimes even when it comes to food, listening when my body really needs a little bit more. Maybe I need a bigger meal that day. And that's what my body's telling me. Great. Or the opposite.

Alyssa Chavez [00:04:49]:
Maybe I don't actually need to eat that much today. And my body's telling me, hey, Alyssa, you're full. Stop eating. And I've been learning to actually listen to those needs instead of ignore them like I did for much of the rest of my life, where I was like, I'm fine. I'll be fine. That was kind of my motto for many years. And so that has been a major learning lesson for me, is just tuning into my body's intuition, and you can learn so much from that. Our bodies are very intuitive, and when we really listen to what our bodies are saying, we learn so much just from that.

Alyssa Chavez [00:05:25]:
Okay, lesson number three, it's okay to accept help. And let me tell you, this has been a hard one for me. I am definitely one of those people who likes to do everything myself. I like to feel productive. I like to feel useful. I like to feel like I can do it all. But the truth is that sometimes we all just need a little help. And sometimes that will be when I'm on my period.

Alyssa Chavez [00:05:51]:
For example, I let my husband make breakfast for us because I'm just not feeling super up to it. And he may not love doing it as much and isn't a world class chef, but he's kind enough to help out with that or simple little household tasks. When I'm not feeling up to it, sometimes it's a matter of reaching out to family and friends when I need support. There are so many places in our lives that we could accept help and sometimes don't. I think I've talked about this a little bit before on the podcast, but I actually have even started working with a practitioner myself to help me with my own health because it's one of those things. It's really hard to be your own client, even if you have all the knowledge and know all the things. Actually, having that accountability has been really helpful for me to just continue to fine tune my health. And it's one of those things.

Alyssa Chavez [00:06:44]:
You have to practice what you preach, right? I always talk about the importance of finding those practitioners that can help you along your journey, not having to do it all yourself, kind of taking that load off your plate. And so that's something that I actually took on this year, was kind of passing the torch on that and be like, you know what? I'm going to continue to help other people with their health. And this is something that I really love and enjoy. I've come a long way with my own health, and I'm very thankful for that. But I'm at a point where I want to be able to pass the torch and kind of just have somebody else help me get a third set of eyes, get another opinion, and just have some help and guidance for myself and learning that that's okay, to accept that I don't have to be able to do it all myself. Okay, lesson number four, you really are what you eat. Or more specifically, because I just can't help myself. My nutritional therapy practitioner brain won't let me, you are what you can absorb because you do have to have optimum digestion in order to actually absorb nutrients from your food.

Alyssa Chavez [00:07:50]:
Anyway, that's a story for another day. I just couldn't let this one slide without popping that in there. But really, truly, I feel remarkably different when I eat better. And I'm sure you all have noticed it, too. Those days when you eat super clean, you cook home cooked meals and you put down the junk food and you actually eat really well, I'm sure that you have felt the difference in your own body. I know that's been the case for me. It's been a huge learning curve for me because I used to just tell myself, oh, I can eat anything, I'm fine. That word again.

Alyssa Chavez [00:08:25]:
I'm fine. I feel like I lived the first 30 years of my life just saying I'm fine. Maybe that's the big overarching theme of the day here is I'm not fine, or maybe I am, but I need to do certain things in order to be fine and feel fine. So anyway, really it comes down to learning about the impacts of food on my body. And of course, we're all different with that. It's not like there are specific foods that every single person should be eating to feel really good. We're all different. But I've been learning what works well for my body, what food, and what nutrients I really need that make me feel good.

Alyssa Chavez [00:09:06]:
And noticing the changes when I do eat really well and not, sometimes I slip up myself and don't eat great. And I definitely notice the difference then, too. So sometimes it's a continual learning lesson, but that's okay. And lesson number five, the importance of feeling empowered. And this is a big one. It's such an interesting thing. I've been hesitant to mention this and talk about this on the podcast because I feel like it's likely that there's going to be some pushback from it. But shoot, I'm just going to do it anyway.

Alyssa Chavez [00:09:40]:
I hear a lot of talk out there about how we don't want to blame people for having endometriosis. It's not your fault, which I 100% agree with. I'm certainly not going to argue with that. I don't think it's anybody's fault. I certainly am not going to sit here and point fingers at myself for having a disease. But I personally love the feeling of being empowered, that there's something that I can do about it. So I think it's a two sided coin. People think that, oh, if you say that changing your diet will help with your endometriosis.

Alyssa Chavez [00:10:16]:
That means that you've been eating the wrong things, and because of your diet, you have endometriosis. But that's not the point, right? It's not about blame. It's about empowerment. Yeah, sure. You may be able to do some work on improving your diet, and that can help with your symptoms. It doesn't necessarily mean that the foods that you were eating were causing your symptoms. It just means that the symptoms that you're having are telling you something. It comes back to that intuition thing.

Alyssa Chavez [00:10:47]:
Your body's telling you that it needs something, that it's looking for support in some fashion. That's really why we have symptoms in the first place. It's your body's way of communicating with you. And so, personally, I really love the feeling of being empowered and knowing that there's something that I can do when I am experiencing symptoms in some fashion, be it digestive symptoms or pain or fatigue or hormone imbalance or anything that may be going on in my body, I love the feeling of knowing that there's something that I can do about it, because when my journey first started, I was in a whole lot of pain, definitely a lot of fatigue, a lot of those symptoms that I'm talking about, and basically told, okay, here's a pill. Take this for the rest of your life. Good luck. And I didn't like the way that that felt. And I remember even asking my doctor, hey, is there anything that I can do? Is there anything that you would recommend as far as diet or supplements or anything that I can do from my end to help with all of this? And she, at the time, kind of just brushed me off and was like, well, anything that you think might help.

Alyssa Chavez [00:11:51]:
And I just didn't love that. I want to feel like there's something that I can do. So I ended up going on my own journey and ended up doing a whole lot of research, and I won't go through the full story today. Ended up doing what I'm doing now because I learned so much along the way, went through multiple trainings and certifications, and learned all the things about nutrition and gut healing and hormones and all of this stuff. And it has left me in a place where I do feel empowered, where, even if I don't know, something, let's say there is something comes up that I am not familiar with, or I have never experienced that symptom. I'm not quite sure how to address that. I have resources that I can turn to. I have mentors.

Alyssa Chavez [00:12:33]:
I have many, many resources that I can turn to to learn that information that I know are reliable and accurate and will work. So that has been something that has been really life changing for me. Definitely as an endowarrior, but just as a human being in general. If there's ever anything now that I don't know, I'm not familiar with, I don't know how to do. Rather than just sitting down and feeling defeated, I've realized that, oh, all I need is knowledge. I just need to learn more about this so that I can feel empowered. Even if it's something like learning a new piece of technology or learning how to do a task that I've never done before. Whatever it may be, once I've learned it, once I know how, now I'm empowered for the rest of my life.

Alyssa Chavez [00:13:16]:
And I really feel like being an endowarrior has brought that out in me so much more than it ever was before. So I actually feel really thankful for that lesson. Okay, lesson number six, the importance of advocating for yourself. Now, this is something that was really, really hard for me at first. In fact, I would say to some extent it's still hard for me, but it's definitely something that has been super, super important for me to learn. And so I wanted to share a little bit about that today. So, for starters, for me, advocating for myself was about talking to my doctors. For example, the first doctor that I went to in regards to endometriosis, the doctor who initially told me that she suspected endometriosis, she recommended not having excision surgery.

Alyssa Chavez [00:14:08]:
She recommended going straight to options like birth control and IVF and medications and all these things. And I did do some of that for a little while and it just didn't feel very aligned with me and my beliefs and how I felt. So I decided to advocate for myself and look elsewhere, really. I ended up meeting with another doctor who actually also recommended not having excision surgery at the time. But I just knew in my body that things felt off. I knew I wanted to remove this large endometrioma from my ovary. I just knew that it was not doing me any favors in there and I wanted it out in addition to whatever else might be going on in there. So I actually continued to advocate for myself and ended up going on and finding a third doctor who I felt was much more aligned with me, much more on the same page did end up moving forward with the excision surgery, and I'm really happy that I did that.

Alyssa Chavez [00:15:11]:
If I just sat down and listened to that first doctor that I talked to, I might still be experiencing some of the symptoms of that that are now much better because I was able to listen to what my body's needs were and have the surgery that I really needed at the end of the day. And I'm very happy with that choice. But I think when it comes to advocating for yourself, it's so much more than that. It's about speaking up for what you want, what you need. Talking to your doctors until you actually get that stuff, until you get what you need, until you get what you want. Continuing to look for different practitioners if you don't feel like they're aligning with your own thoughts and goals and ideas and ideals in your world. Because at the end of the day, it's your body, it's your life. And even though a doctor sure has a lot of knowledge in their particular area, you're the biggest expert in your own unique body.

Alyssa Chavez [00:16:10]:
So continuing to advocate for yourself is so important. I mean, that's why endometriosis often takes so long to be diagnosed. They say it takes an average of seven to ten years from the onset of symptoms for a person to receive a diagnosis, and that's nuts. And honestly, a lot of it probably comes down to people not being listened to. I definitely want to sometime in the future do a whole episode on medical gaslighting and all of that because it's such a big thing these days. But I know this was my story. I mean, I had period pain, really bad period pain back in my late teen years. And honestly, it was so normalized, just the people around me, much less doctors, that I didn't really even think to dig deeper and look for answers.

Alyssa Chavez [00:16:58]:
But it wasn't until I was much older that I started to realize the importance of that, of, you know what? This isn't normal. Despite what people are telling me, I know in my gut that this isn't normal. And I want to know more. I want to know what is actually going on in my body. So I did and ended up learning so much along the way. And in advocating for myself, I was able to get the medical care that I needed. I was also able to get the training that I needed to be able to do what I'm doing now. And it was all about speaking up for what I need.

Alyssa Chavez [00:17:32]:
And advocating for yourself, can even be advocating for yourself in your workplace, letting them know what's going on with you and that you may not be able to show up every single day, even though you really, really want to. If you have these symptoms going on. Advocating for yourself, for example, when you go out to a restaurant. We talked about this in our last episode in my interview with Alexa prass about eating a gluten free diet and advocating for yourself. When you go out to eat or go eat at a friend's house, it's totally okay to speak up for yourself and let people know what's going on to the extent that you feel comfortable. But at the end of the day, everyone's going to be so much happier and more comfortable if they know exactly what's going on, exactly what's in the food in front of you. There's no questions, there's no wondering. It's all about just speaking up, speaking your truth, and honoring that.

Alyssa Chavez [00:18:25]:
Okay? And lesson number seven, the last lesson I'd like to share with you all today is the importance of community. Now, this is another one that seems obvious when I say it. It seems like, well, yeah, everybody needs a community of people around them. We're talking family and friends and loved ones and anybody who might be in your community. But for me, I've always been very much an introvert. I consider myself, at this point in my life, to be more of an extroverted introvert, meaning I definitely recharge by being by myself. That's still a thing. But I do actually enjoy the company of people as well.

Alyssa Chavez [00:19:05]:
When I was younger, as a kid, I was extremely introverted. I mean, I was super shy. I definitely was more of a homebody and liked to do my own thing. I could sit there and just dive into a book and read half the day and was totally fine doing that. I certainly had some friends, but I was definitely more of a few friends, a few close friends kind of person. I didn't need a huge group of people around me at all times, and I'm still that way. I'm definitely more of a small circle kind of person. I don't need massive amounts of friends or anything like that to make me feel good and satisfied.

Alyssa Chavez [00:19:46]:
But I have really recognized the importance of community. I have recognized how beneficial it is to have somebody to talk to about what's going on in my life, to have those deep conversations, whether that be with my husband, with my family, with close friends of mine who I can actually sit down and have these deep conversations with that are really meaningful to me. And that's super important. I also have recognized the importance of finding a community of other people who actually understand what I'm going through. Because sometimes even family and friends who are very well meaning, they may be wonderful listeners, but may not actually truly understand what you're going through because they've never experienced it themselves. So connecting with other endowarriors and other people who have struggled with fertility and other people who have experienced similar things has been so profound for me. I've connected with so many wonderful people over the last several years or so, and it has had such a huge impact on my life. I just feel so not alone.

Alyssa Chavez [00:20:57]:
I used to feel very alone in this journey, like I was the only person in the world going through it. I knew I wasn't, but I just didn't know anybody else who was really struggling with the stuff that I was struggling with. And it was really a challenge for me because I just felt very lonely. And so building that community around me has been huge for me. All right, my friend. So those are the seven biggest lessons that I have learned from being an endowarrior. So just a little recap on that. Lesson number one was learning to love my body.

Alyssa Chavez [00:21:30]:
Lesson number two, tuning into my body's intuition. Lesson three, that it's okay to accept help. Lesson four, you really are what you eat. Lesson number five, the importance of feeling empowered. Lesson six, the importance of advocating for yourself. And lesson seven, the importance of community. So those are the biggest lessons that I have learned being an endowarrior. I'm so curious to hear from all of you and hear if you've learned similar lessons or if you have other lessons that have come up with being an endowarrior.

Alyssa Chavez [00:22:09]:
So if you are willing, I would love to hear from you. Reach out to me on Instagram, send me a little DM at Endobelly girl, and just let me know. What lessons have you learned? What of these lessons would you like to learn? If maybe that's not something that you have actually embodied yet? Some of this stuff, I'm certainly still working on myself, so no judgment on that. But I'm just curious to hear what other life lessons you all have learned through your journeys, because I know we all have had very unique journeys along the way and have different takeaways from that. So I would love to hear from all of you. All right, my friends. Well, you have the most wonderful last few days of 2023. Soak it all up.

Alyssa Chavez [00:22:52]:
Enjoy it. Be sure to take some time to rest and reflect on this year gone by. Maybe start to think about some hopes and dreams for the coming year. And I can't wait to see you on the other side. Much love, my friend. Bye.