A woman who spent years battling an excruciating chronic health condition will today call on the Government to help find a cure.

Dian Shepperson Mills will represent millions of endometriosis sufferers at the House of Commons.

Dian, from Hailsham, and fellow trustees of The She Trust will hand over a petition to MPs asking for more funding into endometriosis research. The disease is thought to affect two million women in the UK.

It causes tissue which normally lines the womb to grow elsewhere in the body, creating internal bleeding and severe pain. No one knows why it happens.

Dian, 56, suffered from endometriosis in 1981 and from 1987 to 1989.

A qualified nutritionist, she had three operations but believes she conquered the symptoms by adapting her diet.

She now offers advice and support to women and girls across the country. One sufferer in Eastbourne was aged just nine years. One of the oldest women to seek the help of the trust was 73.

Dian said: "The tissue is growing in the wrong part of the body. I had four huge cysts.

"I was crawling on the floor for three years. I was in agony.

"I just talked to someone who had a lump the size of a grapefruit.

One woman was coughing up menstrual blood from her lungs. Everyone is different."

Dian has been running the Eastbourne endometriosis group since 1989. She promotes self-treatment through healthy eating.

She said: "There are drug treatments which put you in a state of pregnancy or a state of menopause. Often they're temporary and the symptoms come back after 18 months. I got well with nutrition."

Many sufferers are misdiagnosed. The condition impacts on their work and their relationships.

It can also reduce fertility.

Dian said: "It is disastrous.

We need more research and more money to find a cure and find out what's happening. It is the only tissue in the body that starts growing on the wrong organ. It is the second most common gynaecological disease."

Today a petition with 1,500 signatures will be presented to the House of Commons. Tomorrow Dian and colleagues will meet MPs to talk about the results of the trust's Pain and Quality of Life survey.

The She Trust was due to have a stall in Eastbourne's Arndale Centre at the weekend.

Find out more by visiting www.shetrust.org.uk or call 07941 435659.