Nazly Martin’s Story

My name is Nazly Martin, I was born in 1994 in Colombia. From a very young age I remember being sick often — unable to eat normally, with sharp abdominal pains and daily migraines. When I was 13 I started my period. The bleeding and pain were so severe that sometimes my clothes were soaked in an hour or two, and the cramps would pin me to bed for hours. Doctors told me it was “normal,” that I just needed pills for the pain. I grew weaker and fainted often; my body weight fell. Ibuprofen stopped helping, so I began mixing painkillers just to get through.

In 2012 I began university. Despite the physical and emotional pain, I excelled in my studies and made a small decision that changed my life: I started going to the gym. Little by little I gained muscle and strength. My immune system was still fragile and infections were common, but I found a reservoir of resilience inside me.

At 23 I began to feel a strange pressure and burning in my vagina — a squeezing pain that made walking and sitting unbearable. I was diagnosed with vulvodynia. Thanks to Dr. Sonia Salamanca, who treated me with corticosteroid injections and proper medication, I could move again without collapsing from the pain. Her care gave me back a measure of normalcy.

Soon after, during my master’s in Hungary, I traveled to Uganda and became so ill I could barely stand. Local doctors found a mass on my ovary and suspected a cyst or cancer. They also said I had septicemia and urged me to seek urgent care in Hungary. When I returned back to Hungary, I underwent surgery and antibiotics. Waking up, the surgeon told me the operation had been difficult but that my tubes were cleaned now and — finally — I could still have children (I did not know I could not before). He also said there was endometriosis and an endometrioma. That news explained much of my past suffering but opened a new, frightening chapter.

The next year I suffered heavy menstrual bleeding and extreme weakness. My hemoglobin hovered near the low end of normal while I felt anything but normal. While visiting my boyfriend in Slovakia during my PhD, I had a sudden episode of intense cramps and lost sensation in my right leg. Neurology told me it was sciatica, but the numbness persisted. I started sleeping on the floor to manage the pain. In December I experienced stabbing pain in my lower abdomen and gluteus so severe I begged God to end it — I could not bear it.

Then one day, a YouTube video appeared in my feed: “Endometriosis almost killed me”. For the first time I saw my experience reflected in someone else’s story. I cried as I listened, but I also felt less alone. That video led me to the Nancy Nook Endometriosis Facebook group, where I began to learn. There I discovered that endometriomas often signal advanced disease (stage 3 or 4) and that true experts in endometriosis exist — surgeons who treat complex cases.

Through the group, I found Dr. Gabriel Mitroi. His waiting list was long, but he gave me priority because of the severity of my condition. With the support of my boyfriend Tibor — my savior — we traveled to Bucharest, Romania, and at the end of January 2024 I underwent surgery.

The operation revealed endometriosis far beyond my ovaries: on my bladder (which I had mistaken for repeated urinary infections), on my rectum (explaining pain during bowel movements), in my vagina (a small endometrioma pressing on my pudendal nerve), and along my pelvic ligaments and joints — mostly on the right side. After surgery, the numbness in my leg disappeared.

Recovery was long and difficult, nearly a year. My ferritin had dropped to almost nothing, leaving me with anemia-like symptoms, so I began supplementing. Slowly, I rebuilt my strength.

Now, after months of healing, I feel like I am walking out of a nightmare. My migraines are rare, I get sick less often, and I have regained weight and resilience. I am still restoring pelvic muscle stability and balance in my body, but I am recovering — and I refuse to accept that what I endured is “normal.”

Endometriosis taught me hard lessons: about medical gaslighting, about how invisible pain can be dismissed, and about the importance of advocating for myself. But it also revealed my resilience. I earned my degrees, managed experiments for my PhD through recovery, and found the courage to seek the care I needed.

I am the only person who lives my life and feels my pain — and because of that, I must be my own fiercest advocate.

Endo is a part of my story, but it does not define me. I am stronger, wiser, and more determined than ever to live fully — on my own terms.