I had a doctor tell uh… a friend… that she had a tipped uterus. What does this mean? Are there disadvantages, advantages, or is it just useless information?
It’s pretty common. My wife has a retroverted or tipped uterus and has no problems at all. Try searching the phrase in Google. Lots of stuff like this.
A tipped uterus means that, instead of lying somewhat forward toward your bladder, it lies back toward your spine. I have one, and was told by my doctor that 1) it’s common, and 2) it would only present a problem if it were severely tipped, in which I’d have difficulty giving birth because of its angle. Mine isn’t severe, and chances are your friend’s isn’t either…at least I hope…
Think of your uterus as a deflated balloon; classically the non-baby-containing uterus will usually lie sorta flopped forward toward the bellybutton; but a tipped or retroverted one will fold back toward your spine.
Of course when you become pregnant, it’s like inflating that balloon…it’s much less obvious or not at all obvious that it’s tipped. One thing where it WILL matter is…if you have menstrual cramps. My GYN told me that most women will be more comfortable lying on their back when they have cramps…I’m less miserable when I’m lying on my stomach, which is probably related to my having a tipped uterus.
Since I won’t be having kids, I don’t have to worry about the other bit.
Corr
It’s supposed to mean you’ll have hell carrying children (and/or conceiving them) but I am living proof that it isn’t always the case.
I had a supposedly severely tipped uterus. (Thank God for hysterectomies!)
I am also the mother of four children. No problem whatsoever with conception. No problem whatsoever with carrying them.
Of course, your friend’s MMV. And yes, as mentioned, it is pretty common.
I also have a tipped uterus. No problem conceiving. I noticed that early in my pregnancies I didn’t have that need to pee every fifteen minutes, though I don’t know if there’s really a connection. I was warned that some women with tipped uteruses have bad back labor, but that wasn’t the case for me.
One more statistic here for having a tipped (my doctor at the time called it “retroflexed”) uterus and carrying three babies to term, no problems conceiving or delivering. At the time (I was about 18 and having my first “real” OB-GYN exam, Pap smear and everything), when I asked the doc what that meant, he just shrugged and said, “Well, all it means is you might have a little more trouble getting pregnant than other women, because of the cervix being slanted slightly the other way, so it’s not pointing directly down into that nice puddle of semen that your sperm donor just deposited at the top end of your vagina. But that’s all.”
It’s just a “thing” one has in one’s body, like the ability to crack your knuckles or wiggle your ears. Not terribly important, in other words.
If you don’t mind me hijacking the uterus thread, I have a question…
Many years ago, my gyn told me that I had a ‘wonderfully mobile uterus’.
I mean, I’m thrilled, but what does it mean? I can make calls from my car with it?
What’s a mobile uterus and what can it do for me?
jar
Jarbaby: How well did you get on with that doctor? Your question triggered a bell to go off in my trivia memory banks. Is it possible it was a subtle jab? A ‘mobile’ uterus was once thought by such great minds as Hippocrates and Galen to be the source for ‘hysterical’ behavior. There’s a bit about it here: Cite. Page down to “demons or black bile”. More here: Cite
that bitch
who could ever think I was prone to hysteria
We’d always wait until the uteruses were asleep and then we’d sneak into the fields and tip 'em over.
Wait…
no, that was something else.