Scheduled for surgery for a vaginal cyst. Thinking about postponing. Looking for tips.

Hello.

I have a surgery scheduled on thursday this week (in three days). My mom has taken the day off to accompany me. I didn't ask her to and personally it doesn't comfort me that she's there really. She's very critical and has anger issues.

I feel that the surgery is unnecessary and that I have been set up to have it just because the gynecologist who referred me didn't have all the background information that I have. I feel that if they knew about it, I wouldn't have been referred to or set up for surgery.

I haven't been able to pass this information on to the hospital. It's extremely difficult for patients to be heard in the medical system in Norway.

The doctor at the hospital has been clear with me on the phone that she doesn't think it's likely that the cyst is the cause of my symptoms, but that they can't rule it out completely. In my chart though she didn't write the thing she said about it 'possibly being a cause', but instead only wrote that; 'I have informed the patient that it's unlikely that this procedure will remove her symptoms. Patient wants to go ahead with the procedure'.

I think it gives the impression that I pushed to get this done, which isn't the case. In the mean time they have seemingly written off their responsibility of helping me finding a more likely cause of my symptoms, which is what I would have preferred that they focused on. What they have done is just listened to one or two of my symptoms, not the rest, not taken a thorough history, found one thing that was abnormal but that has an extremely low likelihood of being the cause of my symptoms and decided to treat that anyway, just to do something. In the meantime I'm waiting 6 months for the surgery, which they have to do under general anesthesia because it's 'standard protocol' at their hospital, without getting investigations for any other possible cause.

I'm worried if I cancel that I won't get any more help, that I have to go through the procedure, just to not cause the doctors to dislike me and not want to help me.

I have significant symptoms and I'm not a doctor, but given the background information that I have and that I haven't been able to pass on to the gynecologist, I think it's very unlikely that the cyst is causing my symptoms. I have other diagnosis that I think are more likely to be causing the issue and I think there are many other steps that are more relevant to take than to remove the cyst.

The main issues are; My cyst is very small. Symptomatic gartner duct cysts are usually 2-3 times or more larger than mine. When these cysts are symptomatic, they usually cause entirely different symptoms than what I have. The third thing is that I've known about the cyst for three years and in that time it has not grown. MRI has shown that it has the exact same size now as before. The last thing is that my symptoms come with my period mainly and the cyst is not known to vary in size in relation to the cycle.

In addition to that I also feel that it's unnecessary with general anesthesia for that kind of procedure. I think that because I've already done the same procedure (drainage of a vaginal cyst that I have) without any type of medication or local anestethic. I've gotten the impression that they put me up for general anesthesia because they thought I was anxious and it was 'standard protocol' at their clinic , meaning that they do most procedures under general anesthesia.

Currently I have some type of infection, possibly sinusitis,the cold or a mild flu. My inflammation markers are high (CRP 52) and I've had a sore throat and slight pressure in the head, maybe a little clogged nose. Very mild symptoms really, didn't expect CRP to be that high.

It's generally the best to not do general anesthesia while one has a respiratory tract infection or has just recently (within the last two weeks) had it. Given that I feel that the procedure is unnecessary and that the anesthesia is also unnecessary, I really don't feel like putting myself myself in a situation where there will be more risks associated with the anesthesia and procedure.

I feel that I'm being pushed by the hospital to not postpone the procedure because it 'causes problems for them', which I understand, but I feel that they are pushing a bit too much. Particularly if one is sick with an infection one should be able to postpone.

My parents are also pushing me to do the procedure. I think my mom knows somebody who has had a gynecological cyst removed. Her case was different, she had very typical pain and there was an acute risk for a complication, so she had to remove the ovarian cyst quickly. My mom is very easily influenced by these kind of personal stories and doesn't have a lot of medical knowledge. She's very manipulative, so what she thinks, my dad will end up thinking too.

Even if I didn't ask my mom to cancel the day at work I still feel bad for her if I postpone, as well as feeling bad for the hospital.

I am quite certain that it's 'the best' to wait a little longer to do it, like wait until the CRP has gone down and a week or so after that, but it's also true that I have frequent infections, so I might catch another one. I catch less infections in the summer and spring.

I think that the only reason I have for going through with this now is guilt and fear that I won't get help to look for other causes if I don't. I feel like those aren't the right motivations to do an elective surgery. At the end of the day it's my body and I'm the own taking the risks associated with the procedure and anesthesia.

The only symptom I've had that fits with symptoms the cyst can give is period pain, but my period pain got better with birth control and has really been diagnosed as related to endometriosis, although that diagnosis wasn't certain. I've had period pain for 14 years and it's actually better/less than usual now, so I definitely don't feel like that's something to prioritize at this time. The symptoms that caused me to go the gynecologist now are symptoms resembling pressure or irritation of the pudendal nerve (neurologist told me this). I get recurrent attacks of numbness, like when your foot falls asleep ,approximately in the area that the pudendal nerve on the left side gives sensation to. At the same time I also got sexual dysfunction. My periods also became lighther and longer for some reasons (like just spotting or a very light bleeding for 14 days instead of my usual heavy bleeding for 7-10 days). I've had that for almost seven month. The symptoms have recently gotten worse, meaning that I have gotten a lot more attacks of numbness.

Do you have any input on this or tips for me?

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