In this Access Hollywood video, dancer and actress Julianne Hough talks about her endometriosis journey. Hough explains that she first started to experience endometriosis symptoms at the age of 15 but as many young girls and women do, she chalked it up to being a normal part of menstruating.

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It was only after she met a friend who also had endometriosis that she realized that the pain and suffering she was experiencing was not a normal part of being a woman. When she was finally diagnosed with the condition, her doctor advised her to have surgery the following week to remove the endometriosis.

Hough now spends a lot of her spare time advocating for the disease, helping to educate women and young girls that acute menstruation pain and other symptoms are not normal and need medical attention. In this video from AbbVie, she explains that an estimated one in 10 women of childbearing age suffer from endometriosis, many of whom have yet to be diagnosed.

MORE: Why increasing awareness of endometriosis is so important

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