Kristyn Watkins had her first menstrual cycle when she was 10 years old and then suffered from what she describes as debilitating and heavy periods for almost the next three decades.
“As a child, I thought it was normal to have an extremely intense flow and it continued throughout my life,” Watkins, 37, told Good Morning America, adding that she was often embarrassed by her heavy periods. “I have never talked about this with anyone in my life because it is a private matter.”
Watkins said his mother had the same complications, as did Watkins’ grandmother, who she said had undergone a hysterectomy at age 32 because of her excessive bleeding.
“I remember my mom saying, ‘Oh, I know, honey, Nanny and I are going through the same thing and we know it’s difficult,'” said Watkins, a school principal in Indiana. “I don’t think they realized it wasn’t normal either.”
Watkins lived with her heavy periods – which often forced her to stay at home or near a bathroom – without knowing better or having any relief until she was 33, when she gave birth to her first child, a daughter named Georgia.
“I thought my cycle was heavy before I had children, and after I had it, it was even worse,” said Watkins, who finally talked about his menstrual bleeding with his obstetrician, Dr. Todd Rumsey, medical director at Cameron Memorial Hospital Community in Angola, Indiana.
“When I talked to him, I realized that ‘my God, this is not normal,'” said Watkins. “I was suffering when I didn’t have to.”
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Menstrual bleeding that lasts more than seven days or is very intense is called menorrhagia. It affects more than 10 million American women each year, or one in five women, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Non-surgical treatments for menorrhagia include treatments such as iron supplements, birth control pills, hormone therapy and over-the-counter pain relievers like Advil, according to the CDC.
Watkins, now a mother of three, chose a more invasive treatment for menorrhagia, undergoing endometrial ablation last December.
Watkins’ procedure was performed by Rumsey using the Cerene Cryotherapy Device, which was approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2019. Rumsey is the first doctor in the U.S. to perform a commercial Cerene cryoablation, the first of which he last December.
“The procedure itself is designed to decrease intense menstrual flow and reduce the need for hysterectomy in the treatment of heavy menstrual bleeding,” Rumsey told “GMA”. “I warn my patients that there is no device [to stop periods] but what they are all designed to do is decrease your need for hysterectomy. “
While traditional endometrial ablations use heat and therefore require anesthesia, Cerene cryoablation allows patients to undergo the procedure in a doctor’s office because it does not require general anesthesia, according to Rumsey.
The procedure takes less than seven minutes and works by freezing the endometrial lining of the uterus, Rumsey said.
“This is a non-hormonal way of controlling menstruation,” he said, adding that the recovery from the procedure is only a few days, compared to possibly weeks for a hysterectomy, which is still an option for women.
“I believe that hysterectomy can be very appropriate for some women and, when appropriate, allowing the woman to proceed is very important,” he said. “If we can offer medical or surgical options that do not represent significant downtime or significant long-term risks, I think it is an advantage for women.”
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Watkins had to wait until after having his last child to undergo the procedure, because although it does not cause infertility, it makes a pregnancy risky in the future. It is highly recommended that patients use contraceptives after the procedure, according to the FDA.
Women should also be screened before the procedure to ensure that their bleeding is not caused by underlying causes, such as cancer or fibroids, according to Rumsey.
He said that when women think whether they are menstruating or not, they must think whether menstruation is an interruption in their daily lives.
“When menstrual flow disrupts a woman’s day, her ability to interact with others, when it disrupts her being an employee or boss, wife, best friend, mother, sister, when it comes to how to do these things, then we need to have a discussion on how we can make this less disturbing, “said Rumsey. “Taking away your ability to do these things is not right.”
Watkins said he noticed a marked difference in his period since he underwent the procedure, saying he felt like a “new woman”.
“This is something that has been in my family for a long time and I feel sad thinking about my mother and my grandmother and my great-grandmother and great-grandmother,” she said. “Think about how many people are going through the same thing and have never told anyone or just thought it was normal.”
Although Watkins has already been extremely reserved on the subject, she is now speaking in hopes of helping other women.
“I want people who read this to know that it is not normal to have to be near a bathroom for about a week a month for fear of what could happen,” she said. “We know our bodies better than anyone. If you feel that something is not right, say something.”
New tool that helps women suffering from heavy menstrual cycles originally appeared on goodmorningamerica.com