My Experience With Ovarian Cysts

Growing up we had a general rule in our house that if you weren’t feeling well, you wait about two weeks and if nothing has changed, then, you go to the doctor. My own rule was that if the pain isn’t bad enough to kill you, don’t go to the doctor at all.

In the fall of my senior year in high school, I woke up one morning with a cramp in my right lower abdomen. To alleviate some of the pain, I walked with a bit of a lean to the right. I didn’t complain to anyone, as I figured it was probably just a period cramp and would go away on its own. It lasted for two weeks and eventually disappeared. I had nearly forgotten about it as the months went by until the pain returned in early March. This time, the cramping progressively worsened and did not go away. I tried to keep quiet for as long as I could, afraid the problem was all in my head until I couldn’t hide my discomfort any longer. I got home from school one day, went straight to my room, and curled up on my bed. My mom asked what was wrong, I explained, and she responded exactly as I had expected. We would wait for about two weeks, and if it didn’t get any better, we would go to the doctor. I didn’t tell her I’d had them for a few weeks already.

Over the summer before my senior year, my cousin stayed at the beach with us for a few days. She didn’t say anything at the time, but I watched her eyes trail down to my stomach when she first saw me lying on the beach in my bikini. That was enough to confirm that she saw what I did as well, and if she saw it, then everyone did. I watched privately throughout high school as my stomach grew bigger and bigger, and I had no explanation for it other than I was gaining weight. I hid behind baggy clothes, hoping no one would notice. I tried eating less and working out more, and every attempt failed. I accepted that I wasn’t ever going to look the way I thought I was supposed to. I asked my doctor about losing weight, to which she responded with no real helpful information. After that, I wasn’t going to talk to anyone else about it. What teenage girl wants to talk about how fat she thinks she is?

Continuing the story from March, a week had gone by, and I found myself in such pain that I had curled up on the floor of the darkroom during photography class. Two of my friends developed my film for me and pleaded with me to go to the doctor. The pain had worsened, and the cramps began to cause the inability to catch a breath for seconds at a time. I texted my mom, and she was at my school in thirty minutes. We went to the pediatrician first, who was pretty skeptical when I told her there was no possible way I could be pregnant, so she sent me to a radiologist to have an ultrasound the next morning. After reviewing the ultrasound, the radiologist told me I had a “massive tumor” that would need to be surgically removed. Massive? That’s a pretty relative term. Does that mean the size of a golf ball? A grapefruit? I had no idea, and if I’m being honest, I didn’t think much of it. I was 17, an athlete who had never even experienced a broken bone, and was rarely ever sick I believed I was invincible.

After that appointment, I was sent directly to a gynecologist, then to a gynecologic oncologist, and afterward, to have an MRI. Looking back, I probably should have recognized that something was off, but my high school brain was focused on other things: graduation, auditions for the spring musical, homework assignments, etc. The gynecologist kept asking how I was even walking, my oncologist looked at me like I was a medical marvel, but spoke with deep concern and fragility. It wasn’t until a few nights later when I was able to look at the MRI scan, that I realized what the radiologist meant when he used the term “massive.” I watched my mom point around her laptop screen, to reveal an ovarian cyst that had grown so large it had pushed my organs around to make room for itself as it pressed against my lungs and spine. My mom watched me with great concern, and all I could think to ask was, “How much skinnier do you think I’ll be when we get this thing out of here?” She laughed.

My surgeon called later that night to explain to my parents that the mass was too large to remove laparoscopically and that they would have to make an incision down the entirety of my abdomen to take it out in one piece, to reduce the risk of rupturing it. I listened quietly on the other end of the line without my parents knowing. For the first time since this all started, I cried. I was scared; what if I wasn’t as invincible as I thought? What if it was cancerous? What was I going to look like after this was all said and done?

I had surgery a week later, March 17th, 2017; it was St. Patrick’s Day. I woke up the next morning with only one ovary and fallopian tube, no appendix, and no tumor. My cyst weighed ~15 pounds and looked to be about the size of a newborn baby.

It’s important to listen to your body. Whether you think there’s something seriously wrong, or if you just have questions, you shouldn’t be afraid to ask. I waited far too long to seek help because I thought I could do it all on my own, but the truth is, I should have spoken up. I was afraid the doctors would tell me I was overreacting about period pains, or that I was fat, or that it was simply all in my head. For many women, this is their experience. It’s difficult to be vulnerable and talk about your insecurities, which is why I never said anything to my family, my friends, or my doctor. But I’m not invincible. If you think something is wrong, you should seek help, and more importantly, you should continue to search until you get the help you need.

 

• women’s health