Age: 43 years old
Resides: New York
I am writing to tell about my surgery by Dr. Tirso del Junco Jr. in May 1997. For 25 years I had deeply suffered with female bleeding problems beginning when I was in high school. The next years only saw mild improvements with birth control pills and I always took prescription iron to keep the anemia under control.
As I have since learned, I quite miraculously had a son in my 20’s and then a daughter in my 30’s, but the bleeding became even worse after that. I had D and C’s and those didn’t give any answers. I saw a series of doctors but they didn’t want to do anything because I could still have children. At the time, I began having allergic reactions to the birth control pills, but I continued living with my bleeding problems in frustration. Finally, in 1991, I just couldn’t live like this anymore. Tests and hormone pills made me ill and didn’t help. Nothing wrong showed up on ultrasound and biopsy; it seemed my only solution was a hysterectomy.
But that was something I’d fought to avoid. During this time I left traditional medicine out of desperation and tried alternative health. I learned about nutrition and allergies, but I still didn’t have any quality of life. I’d already missed so much of my husband’s and children’s lives due to being severely anemic and tied to a bathroom most of the month. I could never have a job. Eventually, due to my allergies, I was not able to eat much. As the bleeding worsened, my hemoglobin level dropped below 6.
Then a doctor I visited confirmed numerous and severe problems: adenomyosis, endometriosis, fibroids, cysts and a greatly enlarged uterus. While doing a laparascopy, she removed some cysts and repaired damage done during childbirth, and she recommended Female Reconstructive Surgery with Dr. del Junco Jr. Without delay,my husband and I decided this was the best solution and made immediate plans to travel all the way from our home in New York state to an unfamiliar hospital in California, where we knew no one.
May 6, 1997, was the big day in California. Dr. del Junco Jr. performed the surgery with his fantastic team and my husband viewed it via closed circuit TV. We finally discovered what was causing me to lose so much blood: What hadn’t showed up on three ultrasounds by different doctors in the previous six months was a mass of adenomyosis the size of a large grapefruit. The weight of it had stretched ligaments and caused my uterus to prolapse, and there were also fibroid tumors and cysts. Dr. del Junco Jr. reconstructed my ovary, removed the cysts and tumors, cut out the uterine mass, fixed the ligaments and repositioned my uterus.
My recovery was amazingly quick for all that had been done. Within eight weeks I was swimming three miles a week and I was like a new person. Today, my life is so much different. I can make it through a day with energy and joy, I lead a worship team for dance at our church, and I’ve re-opened my redecorating business. The bleeding that plagued me for 25 years has not returned. Except for the first few months, I have not needed any prescription drugs for pain or healing, nor any hormones with their uncertain side effects. I am normal!
I’ve shared my story so you’d realize what a special surgery this is. It is the only one that could have solved my problems. Today, women from all over the world go to California for the same reason I did–we’re all desperate for healing and health.
I’m forever grateful to Dr. del Junco Jr. for his compassion and skill in this pioneering work for women with reproductive problems.
B.Q.