I recently had an ultrasound (I’m not pregnant and I will not be going that route in this life as it’s not an interest. It’s a vaginal ultrasound – a long wand with a magical light at the end of it is stuck into your vagina. At the end of it you want a hot chocolate from Starbucks and some self-cuddling on the couch under a blankie), which shows a big endometrial cyst, also known as a chocolate cyst or endometrioma, on my ovary which needs to be removed asap.
I have endometriosis, which is where the blood in the uterine lining grows abnormally as cysts or lesions outside of the uterus in your pelvic region and less commonly in other areas of the body. I also have two smaller chocolate cysts (delicious, I know), at least what can be seen in the ultrasound, and small uterine fibroids. It makes sense now with the wretched discomfort the last couple of years.
Having endometriosis is extremely painful and burdensome – it’s a state in which you have to be as still as possible, otherwise, the precise corner of a heavy wooden dresser weighing down on you will finally cave into your ovary and crush it into nonexistence. Or the insanely precise edge of a metal bar will do the same. You learn to develop a heightened awareness and a stillness and drudgingly accept for the moment that your desires and wishes in life will somehow and hopefully manifest.
I’ve had routine ultrasounds to monitor this current cyst, which has to be monitored like a bomb about to detonate but this last examination showed it grew dramatically within a couple months. Years, or a lifetime, ago and ten days before my 23rd birthday, I had a large ovarian cyst which had to be removed immediately for fear of it bursting or having internal bleeding, etc. I was told I would likely lose my ovary and was in emergency (invasive) surgery the morning after seeing my doctor. Fortunately the ovary was saved. I took the semester off from law school due to a three month recovery and plowed through the last year and a half of school on birth control to ‘graduate on time’ and not incur additional costs I guess. The pill doesn’t work.
Needless to say along with the other horrors of life, my 20s were awful but thankfully and haphazardly found acupuncture to help with pain relief and other crippling symptoms like constant dizziness, vertigo, leg pain and numbness (do I even have legs?) and difficulty breathing/heaviness among numerous others. I found much relief and healing through it and Chinese herbs, going off pain medications like Naproxen, Vioxx, and tons of Advil – gotta have my m&ms and there is just little relief. I’ve seen my mother take so many prescription pain meds and some women are even on oxycodone. I have spent over $15,000 just on acupuncture out of my pocket because insurance doesn’t cover it in Western PA and it’s just cheaper even without insurance.
Acu helped with feeling like I had some method to help me and with not having to go through lots of procedures/laparoscopies. My perspective is that with the pain relief provided through acu, maybe we can avoid multiple procedures. I did have one six years ago to remove an endocervical polyp. Plop plop, fiss fiss, oh what a relief it is. The exhaustion never leaves you though.
For many of us, covid has been a trying time. I felt something major was about to happen and went into observation mode with acceptance, providing astrological explanation to those looking for answers. But then I noticed the precise corner of that metal bar grinding into my lower back and spine, a pain getting worse. And even as I knew that the Pluto-Saturn conjunction of January 2020 heralded covid as well as other changes to come, I had trouble coming to terms with its conjunction to five degrees of my 12th house Capricorn south node, simultaneously squaring my Pluto-Libra stellium. Balance issues including around my health were coming on.
I was unable to see my acupuncturist for six months of 2020 and had minor and major bleeding for two months straight. Having these treatments taken away for half a year when it helped me function for over eleven years was brutal. Thanks a lot, communist China. The number of pads you go through numbs your mind and senses. I was so exhausted and felt like I had been whacked with that stupid metal bar over and over again. It took me over a year to get somewhat back on track with another month of terrifying bleeding in between, the type where you feel like you are going to die and have made peace with it all and friendship with loved ones. I am the eternally leaking faucet.
With endometriosis, there are so many moments you numbingly wonder why you exist and what you’re supposed to do with your Saturnian time-space reality. You want to barf all the time and hate food. I just want to go to the mountains somewhere, preferably the Himalayas and sleep, do Yoga Nidra and drink tea for all of time. Good god how much can life revolve around food even to the point of your entertainment involving food and restaurants. I know you’re not supposed to hate but sometimes I can’t stand food so I eat it like it’s garbage and thus my subsistence on cookies and tea.
Now at age 40, I’m waiting for a call back from my gynecologist’s office to schedule a laparoscopy to remove this wretched cyst. I’ve left two messages and wondered where I went wrong. Of course my 8th house Pluto will probe into the why of this but I’ve also come to a point where I’ve stopped asking why for too long. I think part of the unfathomable power and meaning of what Pluto brings is an understanding that it directs you, you can’t direct it. You have to work with its’ power, learning when to activate it and when to hold back, or just be with it for some time. Power is not just yang it’s yin. You have to harness and let Pluto take its’ course.
You shed tears feeling that you’re not an Empress yet, one who is abundant, healthy and elated. You had always envisioned yourself having a ‘clean 2nd chakra’ and being a total Goddess or Queen. But then you accept that even though you feel like a Queen on some level and look good wearing your Indian outfits, matching jewelry and decent make up, you see blood everywhere, underneath your dress and in the perimeters around you, at gatherings, meetings, all around the house. You feel beautiful but it’s marred. Something is never whole.
I guess you can’t keep complaining if you’ve come to a point not liking the results about how things should be ‘better,’ ‘cleaner,’ and ‘healed.’ Because what’s in front of you regardless of how you perceive it is Healing. These heavy rocks in my 2nd chakra are part of my Pluto path and they’re necessary. They’re my pattern, my power and powerlessness, and if Lord Shiva wants to take me on this journey with these harsh waters so be it. There is cataclysmic change and destruction, at least that’s how we humans have defined it. Pluto is the Soul and Evolution. Transformation, regeneration and power dynamics are the themes and as ruler of Scorpio, guides the understanding of your psyche and the nature of growth.
I feel the Divine has gifted me with Pluto power as I learn the journey of healing through death and rebirth, realizing it’s all a part of my destiny. As horrific as this disease is, rendering you an invalid for months at a time, if not a week or more per month during your period years (well over three decades), I am grateful for it all. If it wasn’t for this disease, I would not have been introduced to balance (8th house Libra stellium), self-nurture and care (Cancer north node in the 6th) and learning what my needs are (Taurus Moon conjunct Chiron).
My shocking experience in law school thrust me into an unexpected path, one I’m still coming to terms with years later. Instead of becoming a lawyer with an absent uterus who does her dance stuff on weekends, I became a conflict resolution professional, astrologer and educational something who plunged into psychosomatic healing and trauma work all within a wild schedule and with one too many naps over the years while arranging dance events with fellow artists in Pittsburgh. Basically, I am poor, waking up to panic and dark moments after my naps over my slim winnings, having had to move home to build a dream, or a plan. WHAT?!
The force of Pluto makes you do things you would have never consciously chosen. The conflict and inertia created is unbearable at times. I am in no way anti-establishment or any path that can help assist the female body or life. To each their own. But I am constantly scared into choosing what I view as an authentic life even when I don’t want to for fear of maybe something worse, choosing an ‘alternative path’ that feeds my wellness. How much scaring into submission can one take? That is a choice for every Soul to make.
Through all of this, you learn compassion for others and yourself because you know what it’s like to be completely submerged under heavy furniture and threatened by the various metals surrounding our existence. This is not easy whatsoever. As Jupiter transits Pisces in 2022, I hope my sense of compassion deepens and that I can feel further Surrender. I hope that whatever it is the Divine wants to Create through me and my Ovary, I come into further Acceptance and Joy.
~ Love and Peace ~
For more about endo, visit: https://www.endofound.org/endometriosis
To donate menstrual products to those in need, visit: https://www.endofound.org/periodnow
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