Hormonal Musings about the Mirena IUD

A friend told me yesterday that with rapid weight loss, the Mirena IUD can become less effective. She thought it was due to the device shifting in the uterus, but I haven't seen a lot of information online about it. What I have seen is a lot of women complaining about a lot of things that I also experience.

Now, I've had three Mirena IUDs. I had one place right after my ten-year-old was born. Five years later, I had it replaced. A year after that, I yanked that sucker when I was suffering from a lot of cramping. Sometime last spring, I had another one placed.

I'm resolute in my desire to not have more children. I would happily have my tubes tied, but the appeal of the Mirena IUD is the lack of periods. I like not having periods! 'Cept...I'm having a lot of periods. Bah. Since surgery, I'm cycling pretty rapidly, and when I'm not on my period, I'm spotting.

This would wear off, I would think. I know with rapid weight loss, they say your hormones are wonky because you store hormones in fat cells. There's more, though. A lot of people online complain about Mirena IUD and hair loss. I have hair loss! I've had it for years. I chalked it up to breastfeeding, to a drug I took for migraines called Topamax, to stress, etc. When I read posts online about weight loss surgery and hair loss, I've wondered, well, does it get worse, or is this already what I'm suffering from?

There's more. I read a lot about women complaining about mid-section bloating and the Mirena IUD. For awhile, I took a prescription water pill because I just felt so damn bloaty. I never noticed much of a difference from the water pills. And women say that their stomach is basically distended with the IUD.

My friend and I were just talking about how I'm losing weight disproportionately: it's very noticeable in my face, neck, chest, breasts, legs, butt...and not so much around my apple-shaped mid-section. Sure, it's changed a lot, but not proportionate to the rest of my weight loss. And sure, it is just my body shape, and I have a lot of weight left to lose.

But isn't it interesting to wonder about how much the continuous hormones might be affecting me? I went through a similar process last summer when I stopped taking antidepressants. I had been off and on them for years, but finally got to a sad, flat state that made me wonder, "how much is me, and how much is the medication?" All these months later, I have to say I'm so delighted I stopped taking them! I feel much, much better.

Ugh, I hate having periods. I know women have endured it, but I am whiny and want to be outside the fray. There's not even anything especially grueling about my cycles. I'm just a baby. But, the good thing about the months that I went without the IUD last year was my cycles evened out and normalized. After a good long six week period, sigh. They think that's what (combined with my every 56-day blood donation) tapped out the iron in my blood, leading me to get all those iron IV infusions.

Anyway. I think I'm going to yank that sucker. Or, as my friend suggested, make an appointment to have a doctor do it. ;) It's a bummer, because that first five year Mirena was SWEET. Since then, it's been downhill.

Also, I'm like the world's worst person for noticing how things I do affect my body. The absolute worst. It took me FOREVER to figure out I was lactose intolerant, and these were some pretty horrible reactions to it. It could well be that an observant person would have notice bloating, mid-section weight gain, hair loss, etc and tied it to the Mirena IUD, oh, I don't know, TEN YEARS AGO.

Or maybe not. I think I'm about to find out.