Burning inside

Women suffering from chronic pelvic or genital pain may be suffering from a condition that can take persistence to get correctly diagnosed.

Almost a year ago, Penny Ashton started experiencing an unpleasant sensation “down below”. “I got into my car to drive to Christchurch and thought, hmm, that feels weird,” she recalls. “It was like a burning, not itchy but sore.”

Ashton, an Auckland actor and comedian, has been presenting a podcast, Showy Ovaries, which is focused on women’s health and in particular the menopause transition. She was 47 at the time and assumed this must be related to her changing hormones.

On her way south, she stopped to buy some lubricant to see if that eased things but it didn’t help. Then she thought she might have an episode of thrush, but that proved not to be the case either.

“I was rubbing all sorts of things in but it made no difference,” recalls

Ashton, who by then also had pain down the sides and backs of her legs.

Finally, a sexual health specialist diagnosed her persistent pelvic pain as vulvodynia. This is a condition that affects the vulva – the outer part of the female genitals – and it is not very well known or understood. Diagnosis tends to be via a process of eliminating other possible conditions, and so typically it can take a while.

Auckland physiotherapist Jamie Thomas is a pelvic health specialist and has treated many women, along with trans and non-binary people, with the condition.

“Some have been told that it’s all in their heads and so it takes them a long time, and a lot of courage, to continue seeking answers,” she says.