Testimonial – Tracy

Tracy Pennea:
I’m Tracy Pennea and I was diagnosed with endometriosis in March of 2010. My life includes taking care of the horses, bringing them in, turning the out, bringing up all the hay in the tractor, lifting up the big bales of hay, get 40-50 pound bags of grain that we always have to lift on our shoulders and carry around so it’s a lot of heavy lifting and a lot of heavy physical stuff.

Tracy Pennea:
About 1996 is when I realized I had some cysts on the ovaries and became pretty painful with the periods but I thought that was normal, I thought everyone was supposed to feel the pain. I met Dr. Seckin actually, my brother, his best friend is Dr. Shane Dawson, who also works surgery with Dr. Seckin. He told me that there was the best endometriosis specialist he knew was Dr. Seckin. I made an appointment and was able to see him right away.

Tracy Pennea:
I was able to see my doctor and she prescribed birth control pills, which of course then shrunk the swelling and everything seemed fine. Then, I think about 2007, it came back real ugly. There’s a cyst grew back, I had stopped taking the pill, didn’t want to be on that anymore, and it got to the point where I could not walk forward without holding onto something, I had to hold a doorknob or a wall. The pain was so severe that I would basically curl over and, fortunately, it never happened while I was driving because if it did, I don’t know what would’ve happened but those periods of just complete anguish and pain would last 30 seconds, it seemed like a minute, and then they would pass. I was living on two Advil, four Advil, a day when the pain was really, really bad and I just continued with my life thinking that this was totally normal. I had no idea how bad it was.

Tracy Pennea:
This went on from 2007 until just this year, 2010, when it got so severe that I couldn’t get out of bed. I was a woman that stacks hay for a living, rides horses for a living, I was completely down for the count, couldn’t get out of bed, 24 hours in bed, didn’t know what was going on. And I went to my gynecologist to see what we could do. I was definitely taking at least two to four Advil at the beginning of every period and she decided that we would do what’s called a cryoablation, which is the freezing of the uterus, which was supposed to then end my period, which would’ve been all well and good if I didn’t already have cysts on my ovaries. That wasn’t going to have anything to do with the other. And I had a full hysterectomy.

Dr. Seckin:
We wish we did not have to do hysterectomy.

Tracy Pennea:
Right.

Dr. Seckin:
If it wasn’t 15 years ago, probably we could have prevented this.

Tracy Pennea:
Right. And I’ve had no pain since. Going from the level of pain, the one to 10 scale, I was at 10. There were times where I almost passed out to now, I don’t even have to take an Advil. I don’t take over the counter meds or anything and this is two weeks after surgery so I’m really psyched and I can’t wait to get back on the horses. And the relief that I felt knowing that he could take care of me and help me, it’s just a man that you put all your trust in and all your faith in. I just felt so good going and seeing him knowing that in a couple weeks, the pain would be gone. It was amazing. And it’s gone, it’s really good. Two weeks later, I’m back at the barn. I’m not lifting hay, I didn’t do it, Dr Seckin [inaudible 00:03:25] but, overall, it’s been very good.