These 14 Stars Are Transcending the Pain of Endometriosis

The comedian and Trainwreck star Amy Schumer is hilarious, but she’s not joking around about endometriosis. In a 2019 episode of Dr. Berlin’s Informed Pregnancy Podcast, she spoke frankly about why she needed a C-section to deliver her son, Gene.

“I was throwing up through the first hour of my C-section. It’s supposed to take about an hour and a half — mine took over three hours because of my endometriosis,” revealed Schumer, “and that was really scary.”

In an Instagram post while she was still pregnant, Schumer criticized how little funding endometriosis gets. “Amy is still pregnant and puking because money rarely goes to medical studies for women such as [on] hyperemesis [gravidarum] or endometriosis and instead goes to things like dicks not getting hard enough or old guys who want harder dicks.”

After more than a decade of painful symptoms and multiple surgeries, actress and YouTube star Tia Mowry-Hardrict penned an essay for Women’s Health to shine a light on her experience — particularly what it’s like to be a Black woman living with endo.

“I thought I was alone because no one I knew personally had dealt with this. And then I realized: I’d never really seen someone African American in the public eye talking about endometriosis or their struggles with infertility,” she wrote. “And when you don’t know or see anyone else who looks like you talking about what you’re going through, you feel alone and suffer in silence.”

The cookbook author is also active on her Instagram account bringing awareness about the inequitable treatment Black women receive when faced with this disease — and sending messages of hope. “After some dietary changes, and focusing on my health and wellness, I was able to make becoming a mother a reality for me. Not just once, but twice. So here’s to all my endo sisters — continue to hope and continue to heal!” she wrote in a post highlighting her pregnancy.

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In early 2018, the Girls creator and star penned an article for Vogue describing her decision to have a hysterectomy at age 31 to relieve excruciating symptoms caused by endometriosis. Dunham had lived with the disease for a decade and had gone through eight surgical procedures to treat it.

Explaining her decision to make the drastic surgical choice, she writes: “I know that a hysterectomy isn’t the right choice for everyone ... that it’s not a guarantee that this pain will disappear, and that you are performing it due to your deeply held, essential and — to my mind — feminist belief that women should be able to make a choice about how they want to spend their childbearing years.”

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From early adolescence, Padma Lakshmi, the Emmy-nominated actress and Top Chef host, suffered intense pain, cramping, nausea, backache, fatigue, and excessive blood flow that debilitated her for a week every single month. It took more than 20 years for her to get a diagnosis, even though she had good health insurance and access to the best doctors.

Her experience led her to cofound the Endometriosis Foundation of America in 2009, becoming the first celebrity to bring this condition into the spotlight. She teamed up with the doctor who finally diagnosed her, Tamer Seckin, MD. “I didn’t want the next generation of women to go through what I went through, to feel betrayed by their own bodies or to feel alone,” she says on the organization’s website.

Cravings cookbook author Chrissy Teigen bravely took to Twitter in February 2021 to share that four months after suffering a pregnancy loss, she was having surgery to treat endometriosis. And she did what any advocate does best: She asked fellow endo warriors for their recovery tips.

“I truly feel kicks in my belly, but it’s not phantom. I have surgery for endometriosis tomorrow ... but the period feeling this month is exactly like baby kicks. Sigh,” she wrote on Twitter.

Right before laparoscopic excision surgery, she shared a hospital selfie in her Instagram stories and wrote, “Endometriosis surgery please endo this pain lol lol lol.”

The Lip Sync Battle cohost candidly shared that it was a difficult healing process, “whole belly’s got numbed … It makes it hard, every little cough and stuff … But it is truly still better than the contractions and the pain of endo.”

She also shared a post-surgery photo on Twitter of her bandaged abdomen and later her scars. Many endometriosis patients replied to Teigen’s tweets sharing that they too had surgery for endometriosis and offered advice for finding comfort as the incisions heal.

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Mandy Moore, the This Is Us star, opened up about how she almost underwent surgery for endometriosis before discovering that she was pregnant.

“Because of the issue with my uterus, I was very hesitant to believe it and put any stock in it,” Moore told Romper in 2021.

Moore explains that after trying for a baby for a while, she consulted with a fertility specialist who suspected that she may have endometriosis. The doctor recommended that she have surgery before carrying a child.

“I was fully prepared to go have surgery and fix my uterus and hopefully get rid of the endometriosis, if it was there,” she said in the interview.

Last July, the model and designer Alexa Chung shared a picture of herself on Instagram that was a little less glamorous than some of her others: She was standing in a hospital corridor. Giving a double thumbs-up, she shared, “I don’t want to belong to any club that would accept me as a member, but here I am. #endometriosisclub #lifelongmembership #sorryifyouhaveittooitsucks #endometriosisawareness”

The post, which has more than 65,000 likes, sparked an outpouring of support from women with the same condition.

When Julianne Hough was a teenager, several doctors wrote off her concerns that her heavy and painful periods were a medical problem. “They all said what I was experiencing was normal,” says Hough, a professional dancer, former Dancing With the Stars performer, and judge on America’s Got Talent. “I just thought, ‘This is what it’s like to be a woman.’ Everyone talked about bad cramps. I didn’t realize at the time that mine were worse.”

After finally getting a diagnosis years — and two laparoscopic surgeries — later, Hough sticks to the basics when her severe abdominal pain flares up. “As simple as this may sound, I soak in the bathtub with Epsom salts. It’s a psychological thing, too, because I put energy and love in the area that hurts,” she says.

In 2018, Hough froze some of her eggs, aware that endometriosis can make it more difficult to conceive naturally.

Ashley Nicolette Frangipane — the 25-year-old Grammy-nominated singer known professionally as Halsey — has boldly taken to Twitter to share her experience with the disease. In 2019, in a since deleted Twitter post, she revealed that she’s had three miscarriages, four surgeries, and pain pretty much every day of her life. “I’ve donated/raised upwards of $300,000 in the name of research and support [to endometriosis]. I’m not trying to be quirky. Or different. I’m just trying to normalize an underdiscussed illness.”

The actress, comedian, and talk show host Whoopi Goldberg was diagnosed with endometriosis nearly 40 years ago, and she considers herself very lucky to have found a doctor who diagnosed her and helped treat it. So she was surprised when she discovered how few women had even heard of the disease, including her own daughter.

At the Endometriosis Foundation of America’s Blossom Ball in 2009, Goldberg said, “There is nothing dirty about it. No religious group is going to be pissed if you discuss this. Because if you don’t discuss it, many more women are going to find themselves unable to have children, or find themselves close to dying because [the disease has] led to something else.”

Speaking in a video for the Endometriosis Foundation of America, the actress and activist Susan Sarandon said that she spent years suffering with the condition and “thinking of myself as someone who was weak and somewhat hysterical.” She imagined that the pain was just part of being a woman, and there was nothing to be done about it. Sarandon also acknowledged in her characteristically candid way that it affected not just the way she saw herself but her relationships as well. “Endometriosis was definitely another character in any relationship that I had,” she said.

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The Star Wars actress was diagnosed when she was just 15, and her symptoms flared in 2015 because of the stress of rising stardom following her performance in the hit movie franchise. “I was in my flat going nuts, and then my skin got really bad with the stress of it all, and I hadn’t been well,” she told ELLE Australia.

In a since-deleted Instagram post, Ridley had this message for her followers: “Any of you who are suffering with anything, go to a doctor; pay for a specialist; get your hormones tested, get allergy testing; keep on top of how your body is feeling, and don’t worry about sounding like a hypochondriac. From your head to the tips of your toes we only have one body, let us all make sure ours are working in tip top condition, and take help if it’s needed.”

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The daughter of Stephen Baldwin and sister of Hailey Bieber was diagnosed with endometriosis in 2016, according to the Endometriosis Foundation of America. Since then, Aronow has been been posting about her battle with endometriosis on Instagram to help educate others and create a community of support. In March 2019, she shared a photo of her surgical scars with her followers as a “way to bring a small glimpse of the reality of living with this disease.”

Aronow also serves as a junior board member of the Endometriosis Foundation of America and was one of the honored guests at the 10th Annual Blossom Ball, which raises money for the endometriosis community.

ESPN host Molly Qerim had never heard of endometriosis before she was diagnosed with the painful condition eight years ago and was told that it had spread throughout her body. “The endometriosis was not just in my reproductive organs, it was everywhere,” Querim told the ABC News anchor Amy Robach on Good Morning America in 2018. “It had all compiled into a cyst, which burst,” she said. “And then the toxins were all in my body.”

Qerim, who has stage 4 endometriosis, has often had to hide her fatigue, pelvic pain, and bloating while appearing on live television. She manages her disease by practicing self-care. “I have to really be diligent about getting my sleep, getting eight hours a night, limiting alcohol and sugar, and getting acupuncture once a week,” Qerim told the Endometriosis Foundation of America’s blog The Blossom in a 2018 interview.