Women’s History Month is a time to celebrate how far we’ve come. At The Fibroid Foundation, it’s also a time to be honest about how far we still have to go, especially when it comes to the health of the very women whose stories we are here to tell.

This March, The Fibroid Foundation has a full-page ad in TIME magazine’s iconic Women of the Year issue. Here’s exactly what we said, and why we said it.

Don’t Fight Fibroids Alone.

That’s our message. Four words that we believe every one of the 26 million women living with fibroids in the United States needs to hear.

For too long, that is exactly what women with fibroids have been doing – fighting alone. Fighting to be believed by their doctors. Fighting through periods so heavy that they can’t leave the house. Fighting through pelvic pain, anemia, fertility challenges, and exhaustion while being told their symptoms are normal. Fighting to find information, to access care, to make decisions about their own bodies, and often without adequate support, resources, or even a proper diagnosis.

Twenty-six million women. One condition. And for decades, a silence so pervasive that most of those women have had no idea they weren’t alone at all.

It’s past time for that silence to end.

A Condition That Has Been Ignored for Too Long

Here is a number that should be making national headlines: up to 80% of women will develop uterine fibroids by age 50. Fibroids are one of the most common health conditions affecting women in the United States, and yet they remain one of the most underfunded, underresearched, and underdiscussed.

The consequences of that neglect are real and serious. Women with fibroids often wait years for a diagnosis. They are frequently offered limited treatment options, many of which come with significant trade-offs. Across the board, women with fibroids are too often left to piece together their own care, armed with too little information and too little support.

This is not a niche women’s health issue. This is a national health crisis, and it is long overdue for the attention it deserves.

Why Sateria Founded the Fibroid Foundation, And Why She Keeps Fighting

Our founder, Sateria Venable, knows what it means to fight fibroids alone. After her third fibroid surgery, following years of heavy bleeding, pain, and a medical system that too often left her without answers, Sateria made a decision. She would stop navigating this in silence, and she would build something that made sure other women didn’t have to.

The Fibroid Foundation was born from that conviction: that no woman should face this diagnosis without community, without information, and without a network of people fighting alongside her. As Sateria has said: “Every woman living with fibroids has a story that deserves to be heard.”

The ad in TIME is a direct extension of that founding belief. It is a declaration that the era of women fighting fibroids alone without answers, without advocates, without a seat at the table, is over.

Uniting Everyone It Takes to Change This

Telling women they are not alone is only the beginning. Because the truth is, solving the fibroid crisis requires more than awareness — it requires action from every corner of the health ecosystem.

That is why our message in TIME speaks not just to patients, but to everyone who has a role to play in transforming fibroid care: clinicians who treat women every day, researchers working to develop better diagnostics and therapies, and policymakers with the power to direct funding, shape legislation, and drive systemic change.

Twenty-six million women cannot afford for any one of those groups to sit on the sidelines. When patients, clinicians, researchers, and policymakers work together, when they stop operating in silos and start pulling in the same direction, that is when real change becomes possible. That is the movement The Fibroid Foundation exists to build.

We are not just raising awareness. We are building a united front.

Why TIME Magazine, and Why Now

When the opportunity arose to place our message in TIME magazine’s Women of the Year issue, we didn’t hesitate. Women’s History Month is not just about celebrating the past, it is about asking hard questions of the present. Which women are still being failed? Whose health is still being dismissed? Whose pain is still being minimized?

For 26 million women living with fibroids, the answer has been yours for far too long.

The Women of the Year issue celebrates women who refuse to accept the status quo. That is exactly what The Fibroid Foundation does every single day, for every patient who deserves better care, every researcher who needs more funding, every clinician who wants better tools, and every policymaker who is ready to act.

Placing our message in TIME is a statement to the nation: fibroids belong in this conversation. Women’s pain is not a footnote. And not one more woman should have to fight this battle by herself.

See Our Message for Yourself

Our newest ad is featured in this month’s TIME magazine Women of the Year issue, on newsstands now! Pick up a copy, share it with the women in your life, and help us make sure this message reaches every woman who needs to hear it.

Twenty-six million women. One condition. Long ignored.

We’re changing that – together.