intimate question....

[pennym]

I've never been diagnosed with PCOS, but have most of the symptoms. I also have a lot of pain during intercourse and was wondering if anyone knew this to be sign of cysts. Sound likely to anyone?

[ReginaW]

I've never been diagnosed with PCOS, but have most of the symptoms. I also have a lot of pain during intercourse and was wondering if anyone knew this to be sign of cysts. Sound likely to anyone?

It can be......or can be PCOS complicated by endometriosis, fibroids, or something else. Maybe a visit to the GYN can help answer that question?

[foxgluvs]

Yes, you may want to have a look at a site called http://www.soulcysters.com/ if you haven't seen it already because they discuss all kinds of things over there to do with PCOS
:)

[pennywisez]

Sex could trigger off some pretty bad cramping pains with me. But not all the time. Usually hurt worse around ovulation time.

[IrishMama]

That was what I kept telling my MALE doctor, and until I went to see the FEMALE nurse practitioner nobody even considered PCOS. When she had asked me a lot of embarrassing questions about what my husband and I had tried and how long I'd had the pain, she scheduled an ultrasound, and guess what? Cysts all over the place. There are other causes of pain during intercourse, of course, but maybe they should check you.

Funny, if things aren't working for a man it's like a dire emergency, (I actually had to deal with a man calling the emergency number for the Dr. I work for because he'd had an episode of impotence) if things aren't working for a woman it's no big deal apparently. I went for over a year reporting pain with intercourse before anyone looked at anything. So be pushy if you have to.

[Shoush]

Its best to get a test because PCOS symptoms can be other things.

[IrishMama]

The other symptoms they generally look for are problems with weight gain that shouldn't be there, blood pressure issues, cholesterol issues, hirsutism (excessive hair growth), some skin issues, etcetera.

In my case, they kept just looking at my weight and telling me "eat less, exercise more" and basically telling me I was lying about what I was eating and how much I was working out, which is depressing. The hair growth they were attributing to post-partum hormone readjustment. They attributed the high cholesterol and blood pressure to my weight. UNTIL they saw the cysts, then my other symptoms were reevaluated. So again I say, make them look at you as a whole person. Generally, what they will do is a glucose tolerance test to see if you're insulin resistant, and an ultrasound to check your ovaries for cysts. Then there can be some other testing to see what the best treatment is going to be. I didn't get that far because I caught pregnant.

[iluvlsu]

More likely that you have fibroids than cysts. Fibroids are usually what are all over, cyst tend to be one or two. If you have a cyst it could cause pain during intercourse as could fibroids.

[misschris]

The "cysts" from PCOS are actually follicles inside the ovaries (the follicles are supposed to burst each month and release the egg, but in PCOS when you don't ovulate, the follicles just remain). They aren't the typical cysts I think of as I've had ovarian cysts on my ovaries, but these, in the ultrasound at least, are much different, and I'm not sure those would cause pain. If you had an ovarian cyst, that COULD cause pain with intercourse, but I always had pain at other times too, not just intercourse. If you have PCOS, painful intercourse is indeed one of the symptoms, and it's called "dyspareunia". Try extra lubrication and see if that helps. But you should get checked out, just in case. Just know that it is definitely a symptom of PCOS.