Anyone who has ever dared to love has been plagued with a broken heart or worse—plagued by the ghost of an ex-lover.

Unfortunately for me, my ghost was more of a possession.

For most, the breakup is the most devastating part of the relationship. For me, it was the way he stuck around after, and I don't mean late night calls or awkward bar sightings.

I mean the way my body revolted against me because of what he had left behind.

My boyfriend and I had been on and off for a long time, but we finally seemed to get the hang of things, and we had a pretty solid year-long run. It was then that I started to notice my body behaving differently.

At first, it was only during sex. It became painful, and I found myself trying to find the fastest way to get him to finish—his favorite position, saying the craziest things, even trying my hand (or foot) at some weird fetishes, if you know what I'm getting at. Sometimes, I'd have to stop him altogether. It was becoming unbearable.

Then, I noticed I was getting fully fledged UTIs. I was in severe pain, and just using the bathroom felt like needles in my urethra (sorry, TMI). Every time I went to the doctor with the symptoms, though, the results came back negative. There was never any indication of a UTI, yeast infection or anything of the sort.

My doctor suggested I go see a specialist. So off I went to see if I could find out what my body's deal was.

Fast forward to about three hours of the specialist running tests and asking questions, poking and prodding. And, get this. She says, "I think your body is rejecting his bacteria," and gestures to my boyfriend a the time.

How crazy is that?

So, I have more tests run by other doctors and specialists. I'm screened for any and all STDs. Every time, the only plausible answer was that my body is rejecting whatever bacteria my boyfriend holds.

I was devastated by this. What does this mean for us? Can I be cured? How can my body be revolting against the love of my life? Will we ever be okay again?

My mind was running wild, and my emotions were in even greater turmoil.

Of course, as I'm sure you could have guessed, this put a great strain on our relationship.

And, not so coincidentally, we broke up about a month after receiving this news.

So now, here I am, almost six months after our break up. I wake up with a searing pain in my lower abdomen. I can't go back to sleep, I'm writhing on my bed. Something is wrong.

I call my doctor, they tell me to come in.

They run tests, as usual, and I tell them how these symptoms are all too familiar.

Skeptical as she may be, my doctor listens to me and runs a few more tests and it is deduced that my body is reacting to the same bacteria I thought I had ridded myself of months ago.

Apparently, since I was exposed to him for such a long time, my body had harvested some of his bacteria. Now, without reason or explanation, my own body will attack itself whenever the bacteria decides to make its presence known.

So, not only do I have to live with the ghost of the love we once had, but I also have a very real (and very painful) reminder of where things went bad.