Lena Dunham hospitalized with ruptured ovarian cyst

Lena Dunham
(Image credit: Jason Merritt/Getty Images)

Girls creator and star Lena Dunham was hospitalized Saturday due to a ruptured ovarian cyst, her spokeswoman told People. She will need to undergo surgery before being released.

Dunham has been open about her endometriosis, a chronic condition where tissue that typically grows inside the uterus grows outside instead. In November, she wrote in her newsletter Lenny:

Endometriosis is not life-threatening. It doesn't manifest externally very often; the symptoms just look like a pair of sweatpants and a Charlize Theron–in–Monster–level grimace. I know I'm lucky in the grand health scheme, but I also know that I am one of many women who grasp for a sense of consistent well-being, fight against the betrayals of their bodies, and who are often met with skepticism by doctors trained to view painful periods as the lot of women who should learn to grin and bear it. [Lenny]

Approximately 1 in 10 women experience the disorder.

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Julie Kliegman

Julie Kliegman is a freelance writer based in New York. Her work has appeared in BuzzFeed, Vox, Mental Floss, Paste, the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact. Her cats can do somersaults.