Bartholin Cyst Recovery Diary #2

I wanted to give a quick update, even though not a ton has technically changed. It’s been about four months (dang!) since my cyst became infected and I had to have it drained, and while the first several weeks were pretty rough, I’m doing much better both mentally and physically.

At my last gyno appointment, I learned that there was a little bit of granulated tissue (essentially an ‘over- healing’ of cells in the area, which leads to raised red patches that can be very painful and sensitive to the touch) where my stitches were, and my gyno applied silver nitrate to help that tissue heal faster. And it did – it helped a lot, and very quickly. Within a few days, the red spot was gone and the tissue was less sensitive to the touch, and within about a week or so, it felt almost completely normal. So that was a huge relief, as it turned out that spot was causing most of my lingering discomfort.

I did have lingering soreness on the whole left side of my vagina and vulva, but by now that is almost entirely gone, and only seems to return if I wear underwear that’s a little too tight or go walking for a long time. Sitz baths have helped a lot with the soreness, and I still do them on a pretty regular schedule (every three days or so). But mostly, on a day-to-day basis, I’m feeling back to normal. So that’s also a huge fucking relief.

I’ve also been dilating (and masturbating! big fist pump! lol) on a semi-regular basis and haven’t had any problems or ill effects, which is very encouraging. I can’t even tell y’all how nervous I was to even allow myself to feel horniness or sexual pleasure for the first time after all of this happened (I was just so scared the cyst would come back immediately)… but it’s been very healing for me, especially mentally. My body finally feels like it belongs to me again.

Dilating was a little nerve-wracking at first, but I was thrilled to find that my pelvic floor didn’t feel much tighter than usual (which was honestly pretty surprising to both me and my gyno), and I was able to work myself back up to my largest dilator after only one session. This means I likely won’t need to see a pelvic floor physical therapist again, which is nice (though I gladly would if I felt I needed it). I also have been making sure to take a sitz bath after every dilating session.

However, I still haven’t had sex yet. I finally felt ready to try it this month, but because I have a big vacation coming up in July, I decided to hold off until that’s over and I’m back home. Sex is often a big trigger for recurring Bartholin cysts, and I just know that if I did have sex and the cyst came right back, it would basically ruin my vacation because I would be so worried about it getting infected again. Still, because sex wasn’t the original trigger for my cyst, I’m hopeful that it won’t come back (*crossing all my fingers and toes*).

If it does come back, though, I fully intend on scheduling the CO2 laser treatment that I had originally planned on doing before all this shit happened. I never want to feel as out of control of my body as I did when this thing got infected and I was forced to get it drained in an urgent care center, without any pain management provided. Never again, man. Never fucking again.

That’s all for now. I hope this post is a little more encouraging for anyone else who might be going through this – just make sure you give yourself the time and space you need to heal, and try not to be too impatient. Obviously I can’t say I’m out of the woods yet, but I’m hopeful that by giving myself and my body so much time (some might say too much time, but what do they fuckin’ know?), only good things will follow. I hope the same for you, too.

If you’d like to keep up with my Bartholin cyst recovery journey, you can see my previous and follow-up posts by clicking this tag.

Header image via Unsplash.