DOCTORS told a woman to lose weight after strangers asked her if she was expecting triplets – but it was neither.
Paisley Dylan actually had a six and a half stone ovarian cyst filled with 42 litres of fluid, though she had no idea.
MEDIA WALESPaisley Dylan was wrongly told she was simply overweight for years[/caption]
MEDIA WALESStrangers would stop her in the street and ask if she was expecting triplets[/caption]
She and several GPs wrongly believed she was simply fat.
The now 30-year-old spent most of her 20s worried that people were staring at her.
She also lived with agonising back pain, intensely painful periods, and her stomach was so big she couldn’t even tie her own shoelaces.
But despite losing 3st, the bulge remained just as large as before.
It had grown to the point that a woman asked her if she was pregnant with triplets.
It wasn’t until a scan seven years later that she discovered the truth – that there were two cysts growing inside of her.
Paisley, from Cwmbran, South Wales, told WalesOnline: “I have always had problems with my period – whenever I would go to the GP for that I was always told to lose weight, that will help.
“When my stomach started getting bigger, I blamed it on that.”
It got to the point that Paisley stopped leaving the house.
“Every time I did, people were looking at me,” she said.
“They would ask if I was pregnant. People would come up to me and say: ‘When are you due?’
“I could not tie my own shoelaces. It was embarrassing for me, it was embarrassing for them, it was all around an awkward situation.”
Paisley first visited her GP aged 23 when she noticed her stomach started feeling solid.
She was told it was just fat and she needed to shed some pounds. She did, but nothing changed.
During the first lockdown she went to stay with her parents in Anglesey where she saw a different GP, who again dismissed her as being overweight.
People would come up to me and say: ‘When are you due?’
Paisley Dylan
She then got another misdiagnosis in February 2021 when she was told she had diastasis recti – when your abdominal muscles separate, which usually happens during pregnancy and causes a visible bulge just above or below the belly button.
Paisley exercised and even sought help from a counsellor for binge eating, but quickly realised it wasn’t that either.
A lifestyle coach also helped her complete 15,000 steps a day in January 2022, but that also did nothing.
Her worried parents booked her in for a private scan, where she eventually got some answers.
“When I first walked into the clinic the doctor said straight away, ‘That is not just weight’,” Paisley said.
“My stomach was so big it would not go in the machine properly.”
The scan showed two cysts, one bigger one and a smaller one, and she underwent an operation to drain them in April 2023.
Paisley, who shared her journey on Instagram, said: “It was a relief and not.
“It was a relief that it was not just weight and it could be fixed, but then I was worried why it got so big.
“They said they were going to do the operation through keyhole, and told me it would only take two to three hours, but it took seven.”
She is now thrilled to be living happily and pain free, and to have dropped from a size 30 to 20.
“I can’t believe that everyone finds life this easy,” she added.
MEDIA WALESPaisley actually had a six and a half stone cyst growing inside her – but had no idea[/caption]
MEDIA WALESShe lived with so much pain and embarrassment she hardly left the house at one stage[/caption]
MEDIA WALESPaisley’s cyst contained 42 litres of fluid[/caption]
MEDIA WALESPaisley has now dropped five dress sizes and feels happier than ever[/caption] Read More