The Bachelor bachelorette Lexi Young has revealed that she was hospitalized while filming Joey Graziadei's season due to her battle with endometriosis.

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On The Bachelor's 28th season, Lexi told Joey that she lives with endometriosis, an incurable yet treatable condition in which uterine tissue grows outside of the uterus and can cause severe pain.

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Lexi also fully opened up about her health crisis on social media, sharing intimate stories about her struggles over the years.

But Lexi left out one shocking detail -- that she went to the emergency room in Los Angeles, CA, while competing for Joey's heart early in the season.

"I actually ended up going to the UCLA hospital while I was on the show," Lexi told People.

"I had an ovarian cyst burst because I froze my eggs two weeks before going on the show. And so my ovaries were so enlarged from all the hormones that they hadn't come back down yet."

The digital strategist from Atlanta, GA, insisted that The Bachelor producers took good care of her.

"I wanted to keep it private, but I think it just goes to show it wasn't the perfect ride," Lexi shared.

"I was dealing with this the entire time. I'm just very headstrong and I powered through it."

Although Lexi is clearly a strong woman who has learned to deal with chronic pain, she admitted that dealing with endometriosis was "hard" while living in a chaotic environment and traveling internationally during the show.

Lexi had surgery for endometriosis in 2019, but she'll need a second surgery soon.

Lexi said she still experiences "endo belly" symptoms, in which her abdomen becomes swollen, up to four times a week but she's managing her pain through hormone therapy, physical therapy, and watching her diet.

Lexi had quit The Bachelor during Week 6 of the competition in Montreal, Canada, because her short timeline for getting married and having children didn't align with Joey's plans for the future.

While Joey told Lexi that he definitely wants to have kids, he said he'd like to have a two-to-three year engagement and then be married to his wife for a couple of years before bringing a baby into the picture.

Lexi, meanwhile, may not be able to have children of her own due to the disease in her reproductive system. She would therefore like to start a family as soon as possible since she may have trouble conceiving.

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Lexi recently shared of her situation on Instagram, "My doctor wants me to have my second surgery as close as possible to the time I want to try to start conceiving."

"Having a third or fourth surgery later on could cause a lot of scar tissue," she continued.

"I am kind of in a place right now of a waiting game. I'm in a lot of pain. I'm not in a place to have children right now. I am hopefully going to be there soon, but I just can't have the surgery at this moment."

When asked if she regrets quitting on Joey halfway through The Bachelor, Lexi told People, "I do feel as though I made the right choice... for both Joey and myself."

"We're on different timelines and that's okay," she noted. "So I stand down in my decision. I think I could have stayed, and it wouldn't have been fair to Joey. We would've been walking into a marriage with different expectations on what that looks like."

When Lexi broke up with Joey, she unexpectedly showed up at his hotel room in Montreal and caught Joey off-guard.

"As someone who has infertility, I have to take that really seriously as I date, knowing I'm in my thirties now. [Having a kid] is something that's going to have to happen at a little bit of a faster pace for me," Lexi explained to The Bachelor star.

Lexi therefore concluded, "I think it would be unfair of me to [have you] keep me here when I'm just on a different timeline."

Joey admitted he was "stunned" by her decision to leave him. He told Lexi that he'd never forget their one-on-one date in Malta and, up to that point, he had zero doubts that he could see a future with her.

"I never felt scared when you said that," Joey insisted to the bachelorette. "If anything, the only thing I felt... was, 'Does that mean she needs to have kids now? Because I need to get my head wrapped around that.'"

Lexi was very emotional when dumping Joey, who admitted he was "crushed" by the news.

"I hate this. This isn't what I had in my head of what I thought was going to happen... But you're going to get everything that you want, and you're going to make a remarkable mother," Joey told Lexi.

Lexi told People she was "so nervous" about sharing her story on television but she's so glad that she did.

"It's a heavy topic to bring up, and it's so hyper personal to me," Lexi explained.

"I just wanted to make sure that I spoke about it in the correct way, and I wanted to make sure I told my story in a way that I'd be proud of. And I do feel like I did."

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Click here to learn more about Joey's The Bachelor bachelorettes or click here to read spoilers that reveal how Joey's season ends and who he picked as his winner.

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About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski

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