Heavy bleeding hits mid-meeting. A wave of pelvic pain shows up right before a client call. You’ve excused yourself to the bathroom so many times today that you’ve started keeping count.
For many women living with uterine fibroids, work doesn’t pause just because your body is having a hard day, but there’s a lot you can do to make the day more manageable.
According to The White Dress Project, up to 80 percent of women will develop fibroids by age 50, and Black women are disproportionately affected — often developing them earlier and experiencing more severe symptoms.
Founder Tanika Gray Valbrun, who had 27 fibroids removed in a single surgery, has said: “We must stop normalizing symptoms that we often contribute to ‘being a woman.'” That mindset shift is a good place to start — including at work.
Here are five ways to make the workday itself easier while you manage fibroids.
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Unpredictable bleeding is one of the most disruptive fibroid symptoms during the workday, so remove the guesswork.
Keep a small, discreet kit at your desk or in your bag with an extra pad or tampon, period underwear or a backup pair of underwear, a few wipes, and a dark-colored sweater or wrap you can tie around your waist if you need it.
Having it ready means one less thing to panic about if bleeding starts without warning.
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Pelvic pain and cramping don’t check your calendar first. Keep a small heating patch or portable heat wrap, your usual over-the-counter or prescribed pain medication (per your doctor’s guidance), and a water bottle within reach at your desk.
If your workplace allows it, a few minutes with a heating pad during a break can take the edge off enough to get through the rest of the day.
RELATED: 4 Exercises to Ease Uterine Fibroid Symptoms
A simple symptom log — noting how heavy your bleeding is, when pain flares up, and how fatigued you feel — helps you plan around predictable tough days at work, and it gives your doctor real data instead of a vague memory of “it’s been rough lately.”
A period-tracking app or even a notes app works fine.
Communities like r/fibroids on Reddit can also be a useful gut-check for whether what you’re experiencing lines up with what other people with fibroids describe. Just remember peer stories are a starting point, not a diagnosis.
Bring what you find back to your doctor rather than treating it as the final word.
You don’t have to disclose a diagnosis to ask for what makes your workday functional. That might mean a seat closer to the bathroom, permission to work from home on predictable flare days, or a flexible start time after a rough night of pain or bleeding.
If symptoms are significantly affecting your ability to work, it’s worth learning whether your workplace’s medical leave or accommodation policies apply to you — CARE About Fibroids, an advocacy organization pushing for better workplace and insurance recognition of fibroid symptoms, notes that many people don’t realize fibroids can qualify.
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The workday challenges of fibroids are often the reason people finally book a doctor’s appointment, and knowing what to say can make that visit more productive.
Dr. Rachel Bervell, an OB-GYN and co-founder of The Black OB-GYN Project, has pointed to how often heavy bleeding and pain get dismissed as normal, particularly for Black women.
Walking in with specifics — how many pads or tampons you’re using per hour, how many workdays you’ve missed, how pain is affecting your daily function — makes it harder for symptoms to be waved off as “just periods.”
RELATED: 5 Ways to Advocate for Yourself at the Doctor’s Office
Some symptoms are a sign it’s time to see a doctor, not just push through the workday:
Fibroids are common, but “common” doesn’t mean symptoms have to be endured in silence.
RELATED: 5 Symptoms Black Women Are Told to Ignore (But Shouldn’t)
Walking into an appointment already knowing your options can make the conversation feel less overwhelming. According to Cleveland Clinic, treatment isn’t one-size-fits-all.
Options range from medication that can reduce symptoms and shrink fibroids, to minimally invasive procedures like uterine artery embolization or radiofrequency ablation, to a myomectomy, which removes fibroids while preserving the uterus for those who want to carry a pregnancy in the future.
A few questions to bring to your provider:
You’re allowed to ask for a second opinion if the first answer you get is “let’s just watch and wait” while you’re bleeding through your workday every month. As Valbrun has put it, “a patient’s story is data” — you don’t need a textbook case to deserve a real evaluation.
Organizations like the Black Women‘s Health Imperative, led by epidemiologist Linda Goler Blount, and the Fibroid Foundation, founded by Sateria Venable, exist specifically to close the gap between how often Black women develop fibroids and how seriously their symptoms get taken.
Managing fibroids at work isn’t about pushing through in silence, but it is about building a system that makes the hard days survivable, and knowing when it’s time to ask for more than a day off.
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