A woman revealed on TikTok that she accidentally left her tampon in for two years after initially believing she had Lyme disease.
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Melanie Galeaz recalled a time when she was a teenager when she began to experience discomfort and pain. Although doctors suspected she had Lyme disease based on her symptoms, Galeaz explained that she had been bitten by a deer tick as a child and thought she had it again. However, the tests she had were inconclusive, and doctors prescribed her medication to relieve her symptoms. During her sophomore year of high school, she began to experience the symptoms again, as well as vaginal problems.
“I went to the doctor, but I didn’t really mention the issues happening down south, which I know was my fault. But the doctor was really disregarding me and he was being mean and scary. I was really embarrassed, I was about 14. It was really disgusting and embarrassing, and I just didn’t want to deal with it. But I kind of just hoped that it was something related to Lyme disease, and that I could just ignore it with the meds and it would go away.”
@melaniegaleaz Not my proudest moment #fyp ♬ original sound – <3 @melaniegaleaz Replying to @livvvv_420 don’t be mean to me I beg of you I know this was very bad and it could have ended very badly #fyp #foryoupage ♬ original sound – mel
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During her senior year of high school, she was still having gynecological issues and sought a second opinion. When she went to the gyn, the doctor conducted a pelvic exam and discovered the tampon was stuck horizontally under her cervix. The doctor also said the object was dissolving inside Galeaz and which was causing her pain.
“Doctors think I had some sort of infection in my body from the tampon, which makes sense. For everyone asking about the smell, I come from a family that absolutely would have destroyed me if it smelled bad. It didn’t. At times, it did smell bad, and I was very sad thinking that I just smelled like that naturally, so I figured out ways to mask it.”
She also claimed that she used tampons during that time period and was unsure how long they were in for. “So I had one in me for two years, one in me for an unknown amount of time, and one in for about 8 hours,” she explained. Initially, Galzeaz uploaded the video to discuss Toxic Shock Syndrome and its risks. Since its upload, her video has been viewed 16.9 million views.
Toxic Shock Syndrome is a bacterial infection that is caused by strains of Staphylococcus as reported by News AU. The symptoms include a high fever, low blood pressure, vomiting, diarrhea, rashes, seizures, headaches, and confusion.