so i have a large lump in my armpit. went to Docs on Tuesday, was given antibiotics which dont seem to be working (yet....) and are making me feel sick.

The doc says it is an abscess and the pills should help but if not ill have it drained.

does anyone have experience of this? wouldnt it be better to just drain it now? She did say it was pretty deep so she might not be able to but its just getting bigger and bigger.

the pain is so bad i cant sleep at night or do much with the arm during the day.

Any help gratefully received (or sympathy)

to you Rechyl. I can relate; I've had cysts like that before and they can be very painful I can't say that I've had any as deep as yours and I know that you would like some relief NOW, but give those antibiotics a few days to kick in. This summer I struggled with a severe outbreak of my adult acne. It hadn't been that bad in a very, very long time. My doctor prescribed an antibiotic and it took almost a week before I could see a noticeable difference. Same might be for you especially since your cyst is deep.

As far as treatment goes, one thing I found that me helped tremendously was warm/hot compresses. I use a clean washcloth and run really warm water over it, then apply it directly on the cyst. More often than not it would bring it to a head. Not immediately but pretty quickly (a few hours to a day) I could see a whitehead forming. Okay, this piece of advice I probably wouldn't take but I would then proceed to pop or squeeze (everyone says not to but I'm an admitted picker and popper of zits !) it and clean it thoroughly with peroxide.

I do hope you get some relief soon and that you'll notice a difference in the size of the cyst and decrease in pain.

Good luck!

thanks curvy. ill try a warm compress once i can next take painkillers, at the moment i cant face anything touching it, not even my bed shirt

now the antibiotics are making me not want to eat and i have a very bad headache

Hi Rechyl. It sounds like you are in a lot of pain and things aren't getting better. My only advice is to go back to your doctor and tell her exactly what's going on. Maybe she'll be able to drain it; maybe there is an infection forming, but you'll never know unless you get it checked out.