What Happens to the Unovulated Follicles?

I should ask the question on what really happens to the follicles that were not triggered for ovulation to my doctor for the “official answer”. Anyhow since I went to the pill this cycle, this question suddenly popped out of nowhere and I started to think…

I was imagining that they will shrink back to normal and then on the next cycle, could potentially be the same ones to grow again. I further imagined that if they stay in the ovaries and have to go through multiple cycles of growth, that they will become “tired and abused follicles”. I continued thinking that with fertility treatments (e.g. Clomid pills or Injectable follicle-stimulating hormones like Follistim), multiple cycles of growing and shrinking is just like going through food diets and/or exercise programs that result to weight loss yo-yo.

So before my imagination ran really wild to scare me to oblivion, I decided it was time to research. Below is the quoted short answer from the Lively Women blog:

“if the egg isn’t fertilized or if it isn’t even released, the same thing happens: it just gets absorbed back into the body.”

Well, this information puts my mind to rest at least for now (as some purists say don’t trust everything you read in the internet!). I can later go to more scholastic researches that are peer-reviewed about what happens to the unovulated follicles. But in the meantime, this will do.