vaginal atrophy

[Guest guest]

Hi Everyone.....

I've been a subsciber to this site for quite some time, but I don't believe I've written before. One of your more active members saw my posting on another group's board and suggested that I post here as well, in that many of you know a lot about hormones. I'm hoping you might share your insights.

Just to give you a brief insight. I've struggled with this pain for 10 years now. Playing detective on my own, after too many doctors shrugged their shoulders, I identified a reaction to any foods that broke down to sugar quickly. Then, upon moving to NY 2 years ago, I found an ob/gyn that thought my pain could be related to my allergies in general - in that I get a sore throat when the vaginal pain gets bad and it gets worse during the rain and when I have flowers here, etc.

I went to the ob/gyn yesterday. I'd cleaned EVERYTHING out of my diet, to

a point where a nutritionist told me my body thought it was starving itself

and I had to put in more calories. She suggested more fruit....since I can't

tolerate anything that breaks down to sugar quickly. I'd never had a problem with

fruit before (but I'd never done a lot of it), so I followed through. The

pain has been at it's worst ever since.

So I got scared, that maybe there's something else going on.

While she doesn't think this is the source of my problem, she does think it

could be making it worse, particularly since I've been keeping my diet clean.

She said that my vaginal walls are thining, as if I were in menopause, which

I'm not. And when I looked that up - it matches the symptoms I've been

experiencing. I don't know why it's happening - although one web site said "lack of

use", because you need to have sex to keep the blood circulating. Which brings me

to another question - how is it that so many of you seem to be having sex,

when you're in so much pain? This has completely destroyed my social life for

the last ten years. How do you even tell a man you have this problem?

But back to the atrophy......has anyone else had that diagnosis..particularly

before menopause. Granted, I'm 47, so I could be peri-menopausal....but I

still have regular periods. She prescribed vaginal estrogen. Has anyone tried

that? Any side effects? I'm particularly afraid of a yeast reaction.....since I suspect systemic yeast could be an issue for me - because of the way I react to so many foods.

I'd rather take it orally....but it seems like there are side effects. But

then again, I was on the pill for years .. actually, my problems began a couple

years after I got off the pill. So maybe I needed estrogen all along and the

pill was helping?

Please let me know if any of you can relate to this. I'm feeling a little

overwelmed. My e-mails come in by digest the next day, so if anyone wants

to e-mail me privately, please do.....jsyun4505@...

Thanks.....

Lori