Thorn in my Hoo-Ha
...or how I learned to live with my egg
In the Bible, 2 Corinthians 12:7-10, Paul stated:
2 Corinthians 12:7-10 KJV
And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure.
For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.
Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's : for when I am weak, then am I strong.
The Bible does not say what was Paul's "Thorn." Most people assume Paul's "Thorn" was a physical ailment/hurt. Paul prayed to God to cure/remove the physical ailment, but it was not removed.
God told Paul "My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness."
Realizing he was not to be cured of his "Thorn" by God, Paul resigned himself to his "Thorn" and stated:
Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.
I don't consider myself a Paul. God rarely speaks to me. I am just doofus human living each day as best I can. I believe every human experiences a "Thorn" in their side at some time in their life.
Each day for the past 15 years, I have been living with my "Thorn" as best I can. Unfortunately my "Thorn" is in my Hoo-Ha (aka, vagina).
Fifteen years ago (when I was 42 years old) I woke up with a lump on the left side of my Hoo-Ha. It was the size of a grape and it was not painful. My older sister Terry, had just been diagnosed with breast cancer. In a panic (thinking it was cancer) I called my sister's gynecologist to try to get an appointment to have my lump looked at. The receptionist who answered the phone, was snippy, she told me "it was probably a Bartholin's cyst" and she then hung up on me.
Okay. Everyday the medical cartel never ceases to amaze me with their incompetence, inhumanity, and all around failure in curing anyone of any disease.
I looked up Bartholin's cyst on the internet (before it died AC - after Covid).
Per WebMD:
A Bartholin’s cyst, also called a Bartholin’s gland cyst, is a small fluid-filled lump (cyst) that can form on one or both sides of the vaginal opening, where the Bartholin’s glands are. The glands are small, about the size of a pea, but you usually can’t notice them. Their role is to produce lubricating vaginal fluid.
The fluid travels to the vagina through ducts (tubes). Occasionally, one or both Bartholin glands become blocked and cause the fluid to build up, forming a cyst. These cysts are common among people of childbearing age, affecting about 2 of every 10 women.
Bartholin's cysts mostly occur on one side, but some people get them on both sides. They're almost always benign, or not cancer.
You probably won’t need medical treatment if you’re under 40, your cyst isn’t causing problems, and you aren’t showing any signs of an infection. Most Bartholin’s cysts go away on their own, usually within a few weeks. But if you’re uncomfortable, there are a few things you can try at home.
Bartholin's Cyst Home Treatment
Warm compresses. Apply a clean cotton cloth soaked with warm water to the area until the cloth cools.
A sitz bath:
Fill a tub with 3 to 4 inches of clean, warm water (enough to cover your vulva), and gently sit. Repeat this several times a day for 3 or 4 days. The cyst may burst and drain on its own.
Over-the-counter pain relievers. If you are experiencing pain, taking an over-the-counter painkiller as directed may help ease the discomfort.
Well, there you go then. I decided the cyst will probably go away on its own in a few weeks. No biggie.
Fifteen years later the cyst (I now called it my egg) was still there. It never got smaller than a grape, some months it would get as big as an egg then reduce down to grape size, depending on my hormones and when I got my period.
Over the fifteen years, my egg was never really painful, although it did ache and was uncomfortable for months at a time. I didn't really talk to many people about my egg, as who wants to hear about problems with female private parts. I prayed for many years for God to remove the "Thorn from my Hoo-Ha."
I only received silence from God.
My egg remained. It was my Thorn. So I tried not to think about my egg, and I continued on living as best I could.
Yet, every year I still researched the internet for possible cures. To no avail.
When I finally went into menopause almost two years ago at the age of 56 (yah! no more periods!), I noticed my cyst started to slowly get bigger. Since last summer my cyst was the size of a walnut.
Last month during a snowstorm, where I had to shovel almost 18 inches of snow, I noticed that my cyst blew up to the size of a large egg. It started to ache. Uh, oh. I "ass"-umed my cyst had finally become infected (abscessed) after 15 years of living with my "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha."
Off I ran to the dead internet. I had to find a way to burst the cyst before it got too painful. I did not want to go to the emergency room to have it lanced. The idiot that I am, I spent days online reading internet forums about the horrors of abscessed Bartholin's cysts.
Fear reigned supreme on the forums. Most women who had a Bartholin's cyst (infected or not):
assumed it was cancerous and they were going to die.
were treated with disdain when they went to the emergency room with their abscessed painful cyst that would not burst.
were angry that most medical treatments for abscessed Bartholin's cysts (such as lancing, word catheters, marsupializations of the cyst and gland) resulted in extreme pain, scar tissue and usually the cyst eventually came back.
were dissatisfied with the costly/useless medical treatments and were desperate for any home remedy to burst the abscessed cyst to relieve the constant pain.
Ugh.
I found no answers from humans and the more I prayed to God about my curing my "Thorn" the more God was silent.
Ugh.
I decided to try some of the home remedies to get my abscessed Bartholin's cyst to burst on its own. I tried coating my cyst with tea tree oil, calomine lotion, witch hazel, black drawing salve, tumeric, anything to bring my cyst to a head so it would drain.
No luck. Within two weeks my cyst was the size of a lemon and was quite sore (although not a painful as other women experience). I prayed to God for guidance. More silence.
Ugh.
On March 10th, I woke up and panicked as my cyst was getting larger and harder. It just kept growing and growing. I was so desperate, I looked up doctors online in my local area, assuming I would need to go the damn "medical cartel" route. I found no GYN/OB office who specialized in Bartholin's cysts. It all seemed so useless.
I turned my computer off.
I told God I had enough looking for answers to my "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha." I believed the more I messed with my lemon/orange sized egg using various home remedies, the more it was just irritating it.
I had enough obsessing about my "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha." I told God from now on I would just use heating pads and warm sitz baths (with epsom salts) to keep the "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha" from getting any bigger or more painful, as warm heat soothed my lemon/orange sized egg.
Still God was silent.
I told God if he was silent, then I guess I was doing the right thing by using warm heat on the "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha." I figured it would probably take months/perhaps years for my lemon/orange sized egg to hopefully reabsorb and shrink back to its normal walnut/grape size.
I resigned myself to living with the now bigger "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha."
A week later on St. Patrick's Day, as I was working on a jigsaw puzzle with my sister Napoleon, I felt a rush of liquid down by my Hoo-Ha.
Come to find out, my lemon/orange sized egg had begun to weep cyst fluid. My sis, Napoleon was familiar with weeping cysts, as she has had a cyst on her eyelid for decades that weeps fluid periodically.
Nice.
I continued on with the sitz baths and heating pads. Within three days the weeping caused the cyst to shrink to the size of a golf ball.
It is now the 29th of March, Good Friday. One month since my egg blew up.
My egg has been draining regularly for the past ten days. My cyst is now the size of a deflated walnut. I hope it eventually goes back to grape size, although I wish it would disappear altogether, but that is in God's hands. My Bartholin's cyst may fill back up, or it may not. I will continue with what I can do, which is applying heat and sitz baths, the rest is whatever God's will is for the "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha."
Even though God has been silent this past month, I know he has been with my during my freakout regarding my abscessed Bartholin's cyst.
I also had to realize that healing shouldn't always be painful. When Jesus healed people he did not cause more pain during the healing process. Why should our medical system always cause pain when trying to "treat" or "heal?"
The horror stories about what most women go through when trying to get doctors to treat their Bartholin's cysts, turned me off from seeking any help from the medical cartel.
I also had to realize the body can heal, if you give it time.
As soon as I let go and accepted God's will for the "Thorn in my Hoo-Ha" my cyst started to shrink.
Thank you God. I pray your grace will be enough for me to live with the “Thorn in my Hoo-Ha" until it is my time to leave this earth.
Now a little Jesus healing…
They say patience is a virtue. That is certainly what we don't have in this world anymore, especially in regards to anything medical. Maybe God gives thorns to people to increase their patience.
That passage in 2 Cor. 12 is one of my favorites. It might seem like a strange one for a favorite, but for those born with birth defects that interfere with living a "normal" life, it is great encouragement.
I tend to focus upon "...for my strength is made perfect in weakness", because I have been physically weak from birth (endocrine disorder). Paul also writes about weakness and more in 1 Cor. 1, and the purpose for it all.
BOASTING ONLY IN THE LORD
1Cor. 1:26-29 - Brothers and sisters, consider your calling: Not many were wise from a human perspective, not many powerful, not many of noble birth. Instead, God has chosen what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God has chosen what is insignificant and despised in the world—what is viewed as nothing—to bring to nothing what is viewed as something, so that no one may boast in his presence.
I'm not Paul either, but I answer to foolish, weak, insignificant, and despised. And this passage too is encouraging.