Do fibroids show up on an ultrasound? odd story...

[organicpapayamama]

(sorry mods if this is in the wrong place)
Im asking because of something that happened in a past pregnancy. I had no history of fibroids ever. When I got pregnant with my first I had many ultrasounds up until 20 weeks when we got the fatal diagnoses that my daughter could not live due to a NTD. I had both regular ultrasounds and a level 2 ultrasound and no one mentioned anything about fibroids and I didnt see anything that looked like one in the ultrasounds. After I was induced to give birth to my daughter, and after about 4 weeks of postpartum bleeding I passed something. Something that my dr couldnt even tell me what it was for sure. But it honestly looked like a large fetus, still early on that looked like jumbo shrimp. It was the same size (roughly the size of a silver dollar so it was pretty big) and it was very fleshy. I saved it and took it to my OBs office and they were shocked at how big it was. And no one knew exactly what it was and they passed it off as being a fibroid that had come loose. Though she did say that when they are not sure as to what something is they always say its a fibroid, which didnt sit well with me. I guess I will never really know what *it* was. There was no way I was pregnant again as my DH at the time and I had not dtd since many months before. Not only does the doctors guess not leave me confident with answers but I figured with a "fibroid" of that size it would have shown up on the ultrasound.

So I guess what I am asking is:
1. is it possible its a fibroid that came loose on its own?
2. is it possible to have something so big inside me that would not have been detected by ultrasound?
3. could it have infact maybe been a retained twin that died earlier in the pregnancy that wasnt reabsorbed?
4. Anyone else have a similar story with passing something like that?

[Loving1]

Before I became pg. I had 2 occasions where I passed a large tissuey, bloody mass & I will never forget either of them.

The first time I had taken a depo shot months earlier & was having a terrible time with the constant bleeding. About 7 months after the shot, I was on a road trip & I had to pull to the side of the road because I was having contraction like pains that ended with me passing a large bloody mass. I couldn't have been pg because I wasn't active.


The second time was years later, by which time I had been diagnosed with several fibroids. I had a lot of stabbing abdominal pains & passed a large, tisuey, bloody mass about the size of a tennis ball. I went to the hospital and all they saw were the fibroids and my dinner churning. I didn't want to have the fibroid removal surgery, but that was 1 of the incidents that pushed me over to doing it.

But to answer your question, yes - fibroids do show up on the ultrasound. Most of mine have been removed, but I have 1 small one left that the maternal fetal specialists point out when they're showing me everything, but they don't make any notes on my chart about it.

[kittywitty]

I don't know what it was-did they not send it to pathology?

As for u/s detecting a fibroid...mine did not. I was not pregnant during the u/s there was just a mass they couldn't figure out. The u/s was inconclusive and they thought it looked like I had a bicornuate uterus (I did not). It was only the MRI that showed it for sure.

[organicpapayamama]

Originally Posted by Loving1

Before I became pg. I had 2 occasions where I passed a large tissuey, bloody mass & I will never forget either of them.

The first time I had taken a depo shot months earlier & was having a terrible time with the constant bleeding. About 7 months after the shot, I was on a road trip & I had to pull to the side of the road because I was having contraction like pains that ended with me passing a large bloody mass. I couldn't have been pg because I wasn't active.


The second time was years later, by which time I had been diagnosed with several fibroids. I had a lot of stabbing abdominal pains & passed a large, tisuey, bloody mass about the size of a tennis ball. I went to the hospital and all they saw were the fibroids and my dinner churning. I didn't want to have the fibroid removal surgery, but that was 1 of the incidents that pushed me over to doing it.

But to answer your question, yes - fibroids do show up on the ultrasound. Most of mine have been removed, but I have 1 small one left that the maternal fetal specialists point out when they're showing me everything, but they don't make any notes on my chart about it.

wow thats quite the story. When I passed my *thing* I was not bleeding anymore. My postpartum bleeding probably ended 5 days before or so. There was no blood on this tissue either. It was all fleshy and pinkish and I had no pain whatsoever. The only indication that I knew something was happening was when it was coming down the birth canal and I ran to the bathroom.

Originally Posted by kittywitty

I don't know what it was-did they not send it to pathology?

As for u/s detecting a fibroid...mine did not. I was not pregnant during the u/s there was just a mass they couldn't figure out. The u/s was inconclusive and they thought it looked like I had a bicornuate uterus (I did not). It was only the MRI that showed it for sure.

Im not sure if they sent it to pathology. I know I had the OB and a few nurses looked at it and the OB said she dissected it to see if it would give any answers and it was inconclusive.

[lunarlady]

With this pregnancy, they did an early u/s (8 weeks) and it showed a fibroid, which they said is very normal and so common that they frequently don't even make a note of it. They only made a note because I was having bleeding and they thought it might be related to that. At my 20 week u/s the tech didn't mention it, and it is not in the chart notes, so I'm guessing that either they wern't looking for it, or that fibroids are so common that they don't bother to even make a note of it when doing u/s.