What No One Tells Black Women About Fibroids
Our tumors are usually larger and we’re more likely to be hospitalized. This is a crisis.
I was lying in a white-sheeted hotel bed in Chicago when I realized my fibroids had returned. It had been nearly three years since I’d first experienced these symptoms, but they were unmistakable: an incredibly heavy menstrual cycle that had lasted longer than seven days? Check. Passing clots of blood through my urine? Check. A throbbing in my lower back that wouldn’t subside? Check. Three years after having a robotic myomectomy — an outpatient surgery that removes fibroids from the uterine wall while also preserving fertility — I knew what to expect. Or so I thought.
It would take more than 13 months to be approved for a second myomectomy to remove five new fibroids. In that time, I underwent a battery of diagnostic tests: cervical biopsies, vaginal ultrasounds, two cycles of a medication that would later put me in heart failure, and a gynecologist who continually tried to persuade me to have an IUD inserted instead of removing the fibroids.
By the time I had a second myomectomy last year, I’d shelled out more than $1,500 for co-pays, tests, and medications, developed an iron deficiency, and bled through more panties than I could count. I’d also reached my emotional and…
