Meet the woman making it her mission to get society to take women's pain seriously

Gabrielle Jackson knows what being in pain is like. A few years ago, when holidaying in India, Gabrielle was run over by a train.

She'd been running in thongs to catch it, when she slipped and fell between the train and the platform.

"I thought I was going to die. I had a broken shoulder, torn ligaments, cuts and bruises and strains all over me," Gabrielle told Hack.

She said that experience was eye-opening in many ways, not least of all because it highlighted to her just how biased we are when we think of pain.

"Every doctor understands that [being hit by a train] is a ten out of ten on the pain scale. So I know what pain is like; I've felt a ten."

"I can tell you that the pain you feel with endometriosis is a ten. It's just a different kind of ten because you get pain like flu-like symptoms. The fatigue is debilitating. So I feel like that put me in a good position to say, look guys, you want to talk about pain, come over here!"

'I thought I was a hypochondriac'

Gabrielle has had endometriosis since she was a teenager.

"At first I just thought I was someone with really bad period pain, but I'd also have these bouts of really bad fatigue that would totally floor me. I never put those two things together," she said.

Endometriosis, often referred to as endo, is a chronic disease that affects up to one in ten women. It's caused when endometrium cells that line the uterus and shed every month (forming a woman's period) are found in other parts of the body.

It took several years for Gabrielle to be formally diagnosed. And that's not unusual - recent research found that it takes on average between seven and 12 years for endo to be diagnosed.

"My GP that I had when I was a teenager was like, you've got bad period pain and you just have to put up with it," she said.

After several years of gritting her teeth and just getting through it, Gabrielle went to a conference on endometriosis. She said it was a lightbulb moment for her.

She then had surgery on her bowels to remove the endo.

"The doctor said, you don't have to live like this. And I just burst out crying. It was the first time anybody said that. I never thought I didn't have to live like this," she said.

"It was an absolute revelation... It was only then that I started to think about the way I lived my life."

'A lot of doctors don't understand women's bodies'

The experience of having her symptoms dismissed for years led Gabrielle to write a book about how and why the medical profession lets down women.

"There are a lot of doctors who don't understand women's bodies. They don't understand how pain works," she said.

"When you're in pain every day and no one believes you, of course that makes you anxious. Of course that makes you depressed. It can make you seem crazy to people," Gabrielle said.

Through the course of her research, Gabrielle found that women suffer disproportionately from chronic pain conditions like migraine, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and rheumatoid arthritis.

But until recently, the medical professional wasn't particularly interested in finding out why.

Anatomy books and classes focused on men's bodies, and until very recently, medication wasn't tested on women.

"Women weren't included in clinical trials until the 1990s.... They'd say, we can't test on women because their menstrual cycles might interfere with the results," she said.

'Things are changing'

But Gabrielle said things are finally changing.

"I wrote this book feeling really angry. But through the course of writing it, I met so many doctors who were doing amazing things, and I ended up feeling really hopeful. This research is happening now, people are talking about it, doctors who are doing a good job are really great advocates," she said.

"I don't want this to be about bashing doctors. My partner is a male doctor. He's not a sexist pig. This about a lack of knowledge; a systemic and historic issue," she said.

Gabrielle said there are things you can do if you don't feel like you're getting the care you deserve.

"I would say document all your symptoms, even if you don't think they're related. The best thing anyone can do is... go to the same GP. Make sure that GP know you and that you trust them and they trust you. Because they're the best person to help you."

She said society overall needs to do more.

"We need governments to pay for more research into the female body and how pain works, and we need everyone not just doctors, to listen to women. This is a big issue in society," Gabrielle said.

"Have hope. Things are changing. We're in a much better place but we've got a long way to go. If we can use our collective anger to demand change, then that's how change happens."

Gabrielle's book, Pain and Prejudice, was launched on September 3 through publishers Allen and Unwin.