another dumb question?

I need to ask these sort of dumb questions. because your answers may help me figure out whats wrong. Ok I seem to burn when i have a discharge. It isnt much either. The days i do not burn, theres no discharge. Ok heres my question? Is vulvodynia so sensitive, that my own discharge is bothering my v skin? If no doctor will do a culture for yeast, then how do i tell IF its a yeast or vulvodynia? I have no itch. Plus , am on One diflucan per week. so i would think the yeast must be kept down. so this must be vulvodynia?
Started with antibiotic= a yeast, then never went away.14 months now. I have good days and bad. I get an irritated clitoris, i get redness, burn. And just like the other posters, it all starts after the morning pee. It can even feel like needles pricking after i pee. Or it will get more aggrevated after a poop. sorry to be so graphic. What a NIGHTMARE! what do you all think? anyone have all these symptoms? cindy

Hi Cindy

I think vulvodynia basically just means any pain in the vulva, that can't really be explained by anything else, so even if your symptoms were unique (which they're not) you might still have it.
As far as I know there is no way of knowing if you have some kind of infection unless you get tested by a doctor, but if you have already been on antibiotics then I would think it's unlikely.

To me it sounds like you need a doctor, who will help you sort out what your problem actually is. In my experience it can be very hard to find one. I am on my fourth gyno now and I lost count of the doctors. But if you can't find one there's a way to try to work with the one that you already have. I think I was way to nice to my first couple of doctors. Most likely you will know more about this than he does, so if you think you need a yeast-test then you need to demand a yeast-test! I think sometimes we (and the doctors too) forget that there are there because they are supposed to help us, not the other way around.

I hope you get the diagnosis you need.

Mette

What Mette says is absolutely right, you need to ask for a swab to be taken and tested and make sure it gets done. I asked for a swab to be cultured after a few months and it didn't show anything but it needed doing so I was adamant about it. If you don't feel you can ask your current Dr go to a GUM clinic and get them to take swabs as that's what they do.

Some women are bothered by discharge, personally I don't have enough discharge and tend to be very dry. It doesn't necessarily mean there's anything going on with the discharge though it could just be it's irritating inflamed skin, same with pee. You can also have a urine sample cultured (I insisted on that too) to make sure but I suspect they won't show anything. Some women get small tears in the vulva skin with V and both pee and discharge would bother those so protect the skin with vaseline or zinc and castor oil cream and see if that helps you. Also pain after peeing or passing stools could be pelvic floor related so don't forget to get that checked out too.

So far i have asked three doctors! THREE. One was a big bucks gyno. They said NO. And were real rude. So I got rid of him. The next doctor said."yeast is hard to culture for" no cindy. He said it was easier to put a patient on diflucan and see how they respond. The third was a female , and i asked her if she could look under the microscope for yeast. She said she could, but wasnt going to do it. I am so frustrated. I have a real brainy girlfriend who is a microbilogist. She is mad too, because she cant help me, if no one will culture for a yeast.One way or another. But then i was thinking, even if they did and the test and it came back negative, i would NOT believe them.
It could be pelvic floor too. I am really a spine mess. So much so, that i do the chiro 3 times a week. No one can fix me because i was so injured, will never be right. So if it were pelvic floor, they couldnt fix it either. if going to a chiro doesnt keep my hip aligned(3 times a week for ten years) i doubt any PT in MAINE could help. My spine case is way over all the docs heads around here. I'm thinking of picking up that book on pelvic floor. Oh and getting that calcium citrate too. Well i will have to think about it. maybe call around. My girlfriend and i were laughing, maybe they dont have microscopes or labs, or maybe these doctors have bad eyes and cant see? thanks for helping! i appreciate anyones thoughts on it! cindy