Internet Hypochondria

Have you ever gone online to look up something and ended up deciding, after reading off of MAYO or WebMD or somewhere, "Oh man, I must have cancer!" ... Or AIDS. Or MS. Or something else terrible, when really you just have poison ivy.

I'm in that cycle of thinking right now.

After my D&C, Dr. F told me to wait for 2 periods before I got pregnant again. I did this. I used condoms and I charted my fertility every day so that I'd be ready to go after two periods. I know that I wasn't pregnant during that time.

On the first day of my second period, I passed this lump of gray tissue, about 1" wide and 2" long. I felt it slide through and ran to the bathroom to see what it was. Nothing that size could slip past my cervix without me noticing. It was like laying a small egg.

Long story short, I double bagged it and tossed it in the freezer in case it had to be tested later. (You can take the scientist out of the lab, but you can't take the lab out of the scientist.) Then I called my nurse on duty who didn't think it was a big deal, and went on with my life. The lump is still in my freezer, which is both gross and oddly reassuring -- and now none of you ever want to eat at my house again. Sorry t0 ruin it like that.

You know the rest of this story. I got pregnant. I miscarried. I worried about my fertility.

Talking to my midwife reassured me. She says she has seen women through thousands of miscarriages, and that it's common for women to miscarry twice in a row. She recommended waiting three periods before trying again, and if I have a third consecutive miscarriage, taking the trip over to Boston IVF for testing. She'd support testing right now if it would set me at ease, but thinks that, with a healthy daughter, I'll probably be okay next time.

But I am neurotic, and that stupid gray lump is nagging me. Is it related to the D&C? Is it related to the miscarriage? What the heck was it?

Much googling of "passing gray tissue" has turned up only "miscarriage." But "multiple miscarriages" brought me to the Asherman's Syndrome website. Asherman's Syndrome is when you get scarring of the deep endometrium during a D&C or other procedure. It is, according to their sources, way, way more common than I thought. It causes serious problems like miscarriages, still births, and placenta issues like the placenta growing over the cervix or growing into the scars and deep into the walls of the uterus. It's very bad news.

I don't even have the symptoms of AS. I get my periods. They're plenty heavy and plenty long. But after reading words like adhesions, scar tissue, and fibroids, I can't shake this idea that maybe, just maybe, my gray lump was a fibroid. Maybe my uterus is full of them. Maybe this is going to make for even worse problems down the road.

I know how stupid this sounds. I am guilty of ill-informed internet diagnosis. I just wish that I could find one other woman who has passed a gray lump that was not a miscarriage and ask her what happened next.

If you know anybody like this, please send her my way!



UPDATE: I was so nervous I called my old GYN who is no longer an OB. She said it doesn't sound like AS, that with AS I probably wouldn't have gotten pregnant at all because there's not very much uterine lining for implantation. But it might be fibroids, so I should get an ultrasound once my miscarriage is all over. She sounded like this could be a problem, but it probably wasn't the worst-case scenario, so that's something of a relief.