Tell me about ovarian cysts.

In My Humble Opinion
1

I ended up in the ER yesterday with severe abdominal pain on my right side. I’d already had my appendix out, and this felt VERY similar. Turns out I have an approximately 4.5 cm cyst on my right ovary. I’ve had a small cyst there before, about 2.5cm, but it didn’t hurt and went away in about six months. This hurts like a bitch. I’m home from work now on Percocet because walking is very difficult.

Some strange things: The doctor in the ER told me that the radiologist said that it looked “weird,” but since I have a history of cysts (one, two years ago, half the size), they were letting me go to my gyn to watch over it. I’m going into the gyn on Friday afternoon. The doctor also said that it was just on the borderline of being large enough to do immediate surgery on. Yikes.

Needless to say, I’m a bit frightened. I don’t want to go on hormonal BC–it messes me up something awful, plus I am going to TTC next spring and don’t want to wait while I wean my body off of hormones. I have a copper IUD and have since 2003. I also have none of the symptoms of PCOS, so I don’t think it’s related to that.

Anyone else ever go through this? What happened?

2

I went through this. Similar, that is. Being frightened is natural. I was scared, too, but am fine. Mine was removed by a surgery that is similar to a c-section. My story…

Years back, I suffered a miscarriage in the first month of my pregnancy. The doctor asked me to go to the hospital to get an ultrasound to make sure everything had “reset”. The ultrasound showed I had a cyst on my right ovary. I had no clue it was there (unlike your pain)

Not just any cyst, though. Mine was know as a ‘dermoid’ cyst. I was told this kind of cyst is different than others in that it contains ‘genetic crap’. Mine had teeth and hair in it! And it was the size of a large orange. How’d nobody doing regular OB/GYN appointments not notice it before if it’s that big? They do feel your ovaries when they do a normal routine physical, I thought!

They also told me that since it was filled with genetic crap, if it ruptured, the stuff inside could seriously hurt me. And since it was attached to the ovary, the ovary could torsion and it could seriously hurt me. They also said, however, that I probably had it since birth!

The doctor said I needed surgery, but they wanted to wait to see if it grew any larger first. My response, “If it doesn’t grow, what happens?” “Well, we operate and take it out.” “And if it does grow, what happens?” “Well, we operate and take it out.” My response, “Then why don’t you just take the f-in thing out NOW!?”

I pretty much demanded surgery and got it. They removed the cyst in a single surgery with a cut across the bikini line and took half the ovary with it. They told me that the remaining part of the ovary was healthy and that the eggs on it still looked good (I wanted kids!) The recovery took about 6 weeks or so.

They’ll run more tests to determine exactly what you have and will act accordingly.

Oh… And for the happy ending I have two beautiful little girls who came along a while after the surgery.

I’m here if you need me. Zen hugs. I know how scary this is!

3

Not I, but my mother. Unfortunately in her case, she waited and waited to get them operated on (single mother substitute teacher with no insurance - she was trying to wait it out until summer vacation so she could work and feed us) and some of them ruptured, causing even more pain. She lost consciousness and I called 911 and she was whisked in for emergency surgery, where they removed a whole bunch of cysts, several “the size of grapefruits”. I was 7 or 8 at the time, so my memories are a little hazy, but I think I lived with my neighbor for a couple of weeks so I could go to school, and Grandma’s on the weekends while Mom was in the hospital. She must have been 35-36 at the time.

She spent about 20 years on hormone therapy, because they had to remove both ovaries and the uterus. She has had a hell of a time in the last five years or so trying to get off the hormones. When she stops them, she gets all sorts of cardiovascular problems, not just the hot flashes and sweats, so her docs put her back on the hormones and then try to wean her off again.

So, I guess the moral of Mom’s story is: don’t wait. Go to your gyn and stay on top of it, 'cause I’m sure if the operation is done early and in a more controlled (ie, non emergency) manner, it won’t be so hard on your body or your family.

4

Drain Bead—I grow cysts regularly, and have had several surgeries to remove the ones that didn’t go ahead and rupture on their own.

The last go-round, I also got to wait six weeks to see if it would go away, but that one chose to grow really big so it was removed surgically. Sometimes you can have laparoscopic surgery to remove those suckers but in my case, I’ve had too many bikini line surgeries for that to be an option.

Also like you, hormonal BC was NOT an option for me. I make bunches of estrogen on my own TYVM and adding more to the mix did nothing but make things far worse for me.

Boggette has already shared how her surgery went, and mine was about the same. Feel free to PM me if you have questions or just want to vent. It’s very difficult to have some sort of strange thing growing in your body and be told you need to wait to see if it grows or not. That was the part I hated the absolute most.

5

I had a cyst in my ovary about five years ago. I have PCOS and I was getting an ultrasound to see if I had polycystic ovaries (which I don’t), but my doctor discovered a simple cyst. I didn’t feel it before the ultrasound, but after, I would sometimes get this ache in my adbdomen that got much worse if I did anything other than lie down. I think I got an ultrasound every few months to check on it, but eventually it dissolved and the pain went away. I haven’t gotten another one since, although I’ve been on hormonal birth control for the last three years.

Good luck, I hope everything works out ok.

6

I went for a checkup and to get a tubal ligation after my 2nd child was about 2 y.o. Doc said the uterus looked tilted. Then, “Oh, wait. That’s not the uterus.” Turned out I had a cyst on one ovary. On an ultrasound they said it looked suspicious. It was removed and biopsied. They found it to be a “borderline lesion.” At the time I thought that was just descriptive adjective, but later found that is a specific term for a growth that might, or might not, turn cancerous.

Given that ovarian cancer is very difficult to find and diagnose, I’m sure the removal was the right thing for me. That was over 30 years ago.

My younger daughter was diagnosed about 15+ years ago with a dermoid cyst, but was treated with hormone therapy and no surgery was needed. Dermoids are indeed weird.

Good luck, and the best thing is that it’s only one ovary. Most women can get along just fine just one, no need for HRT.