Hi, I’m just looking for a little comfort & reassurance.
I’m 29, married, with 4 children.
Recently started spotting which turned in to irregular abnormal bleeding, pain during intercourse, bleeding after intercourse and severe lower back pain.
I went to the doctors and they ordered an internal exam and an ultrasound. I went for the internal examination and the doctor took swabs and said that my cervix looks like it has hormonal changes and is quite bumpy in appearance, she also said there is a lot of discharge and gave me a prescription for thrush - I have taken the medication for thrush but the discharge is still just as heavy. The doctor also referred me to the Gynaecologist as URGENT which really worried me. I have severe health anxiety as it is so this sent my mind into overdrive. Anyway, my appointment with the gynaecologist is tomorrow, I don’t know what to expect or anything so I am very nervous.
I had my ultrasound and they also done a transvaginal ultrasound - the results of this was a little confusing to me as all they said was “need to do another scan in 12 weeks as possible degenerative cells and we need to see if there are any changes within the next 12 weeks, however the sonographer didn’t realise my appointment with the gynaecologist was so soon after the ultrasound scan.
I am naturally and understandably worrying a lot but I feel completely in the dark, iv not been gave much information or advice or anything - they didn’t expand on degenerative cells so iv no idea what that is, im presuming the sonography reckons it’s fibroids but thats a guess and iv no idea what to do or expect at the gynaecologist tomorrow. If the gynaecologist does an internal exam and thinks that the lumpy texture on my cervix is anything to worry about, will they do a biopsy tomorrow or will this need to be rescheduled for a later date? Could the gynaecologist recognise cancer if she seen it or can they not identify it by eye?
Thank you so much for reading my post.
Hi NLM13 and welcome to our group.
It’s difficult not to worry when you are having tests and don’t know what’s your symptoms might mean, but especially if you’re suffering with severe health anxiety. Have you mentioned your anxiety to your doctor or are you getting some help with this? It can be very debilitating in itself to suffer with this.
It can be a real worry for you to have a referral marked as urgent, but that just means that you are being seen quicker. Your doctor does not know at this point what’s wrong, so is being thorough in getting you checked over. In conjunction with the ultrasound scans this, is part of the normal process of investigation. The sonographers cant always say much at the time-their job is to report their findings and for a doctor to come to a conclusion along with other tests, so it’s best not to try and guess what they’re thinking. None of us in the group are medical professionals, so can’t say what degenerative cells might mean or why you would need another scan in a few weeks-for me personally it’s not a term I’ve heard before in my own tests.
What happened with me at my first appointment at the gynaecologist was a chat first about the symptoms I was having, and general questions such as if I’d had children or not. I then had an internal examination where he first of all used a hysteroscope, which has a tiny camera where he could look at my womb. He saw something which he described as a “lesion” on my cervix and took some punch biopsies.
So, it depends on what the gynaecologist sees as to whether or not any biopsies might be taken at the time-I should add that none of this was painful for me.
It can be possible for a gynaecologist to see something he believes might be cancer if it is big enough, but the only thing which will confirm it is is cancer is a biopsy. My doctor did not use the word cancer with me at all, because he wanted to have the biopsy results to make a firm diagnosis, and the biopsies need to be sent to a lab and analysed.
I hope that your appointment goes smoothly for you and that you get some answers. I understand that it’s very worrying at this stage not to know anything, but hopefully it won’t be too long before you find out more. Try to remember it’s only cancer when it’s confirmed, and until then you don’t know what, if anything might be the matter.
Please keep in touch and let us know how you get on, and if you need to speak to anyone from the support line, the number is in my signature. This might be helpful for you with your anxiety.
Sarah xx
