I have nutcracker syndrome and its left me in constant agony doctors said it was just bad periods

A woman who has spent years “in constant agony” due to a rare condition called nutcracker syndrome is trying to raise money for life-changing surgery.Katie Shalka, 28, has had flank pain for nearly a decade but first started visiting the doctor about it in 2018 after when it shifted from “bad” to “horrendous.”She spent months going in and out of appointments and visiting hospitals for tests — and was consistently told her results were “normal” and the pain was likely “just bad periods.”It wasn’t until her family demanded more scans — after roughly a year of uncertainty — that a specialist finally diagnosed her with nutcracker syndrome, which is when the left renal vein becomes compressed.The compression is usually due to becoming trapped between the abdominal aorta and superior mesenteric artery.The condition got its name because the compression of the renal vein is similar to a nutcracker cracking a nut.Katie, who lives in East London and is an actor, says she has struggled with pain on the side of her body since she was a child.Things deteriorated in 2018, and she started booking appointments at the doctor — but feels she was never taken seriously.“I was in appointments all the time and they kept saying all the typical stuff to me.

‘It’s just your period.Are you sure you’re not pregnant? It’s just because you’re a woman,'” she said.“It was so frustrating because I was in all this pain and no one knew what to do.”One day, when Katie was working at a bar, the pain became too unbearable and she collapsed.“I just couldn’t take the pain,” Katie said.

“I was taken to [the] hospital and they did tests — but they all came back normal.”The pain persisted, though, and Katie took herself to the emergency room on several occasions.But still, no abnormalities appeared in blood tests.Eventually, Katie’s family demanded doctors conduct an internal scan, which Katie describes as “excruciating.”“It was indescri...