Lena Dunham Celebrates the 9-Month Anniversary of Her Hysterectomy With a Heartfelt Instagram Post
In the nine months since Lena Dunham underwent a hysterectomy to treat her endometriosis, she's gone through something of a rebirth.
On Wednesday morning, in honor of hitting that milestone, the actor and writer shared a series of nude photos on Instagram.
In the caption, Dunham explained the significance of the progress she's made since her November operation.
"I've never celebrated the 9 month anniversary of anything and I realized last night why that number feels so funny- I won't ever do it the way I planned to. My body is mostly healed and every day I find a new bruise on my heart, but today I offer myself gratitude: from the most pained place, I somehow knew to choose myself. The purest glint of who we are and know we can be is always available to us, calm and true at our center," she wrote.
Dunham then drew readers' attention to a tattoo on her side reading "RIP Judy" in a cursive font, visible in the first of her three photos. "My friend Paul named my uterus Judy, and when she was being uppity we called her out, hence the tattoo on my ribs, which hurt like f*ck even through the pain meds: #RIPJudy. Today I give thanks for Judy, for her graceful exit and for this body, which is stronger than I've ever given it credit for," Dunham went on. "Happy Giving Birth To Myself Day."
Dunham, 32, revealed that she'd undergone a total hysterectomy in an essay for the March 2018 issue of Vogue. In the essay, she described not only the steps she had to take in order to have her request to have her uterus removed taken seriously, but also how she still had to come to terms with the fact that she'd never be able to carry children herself.
"I may have felt choiceless before, but I know I have choices now. Soon I'll start exploring whether my ovaries, which remain someplace inside me in that vast cavern of organs and scar tissue, have eggs ... Adoption is a thrilling truth I'll pursue with all my might," she wrote in the essay. "But I wanted that stomach. I wanted to know what nine months of complete togetherness could feel like. I was meant for the job, but I didn't pass the interview. And that's okay. It really is. I might not believe it now, but I will soon enough. And all that will be left is my story and my scars, which are already faded enough that they're hard to find."
A total hysterectomy is typically a last-resort treatment measure for endometriosis, as SELF reported previously.
Pamela Stratton, M.D., who studies the link between endometriosis and pain at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and serves as an advisor at the Boston Center for Endometriosis, previously told SELF that hysterectomies used to be the go-to treatment for the largely misunderstood health condition: "[The thinking was that] if you don't have a uterus, it treats the pain," Dr. Stratton explained.
Now, according to Dr. Stratton, laparoscopic surgery to excise every detectable endometrial lesion is considered the gold standard. Dr. Sherry Ross, an ob/gyn and women's health expert at Providence Saint John's Health Center, told SELF that other treatment options include being prescribed non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) or stronger pain relievers, along with hormonal birth control (often progestin-only to avoid adding more estrogen to the situation).
If none of these treatments prove effective, a hysterectomy—partial or total—is typically considered as a necessary option.
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