waiting for follow up after d&c, terribly anxious and depressed

[rachelpantera]

I have already posted the whole looooong story about the experience I had going through the d&c, and now after persistently requesting counselling from both my family doctor and obstetrician I am left with zero options. They won't offer me any counselling options and insist I will be fine. I am starting to question whether I should be feeling depressed or not.

I have an appointment with a gynecologist on the 11th(I'd had this appointment booked already in August when I found out I was pregnant) and she's supposed to be doing a follow up internal ultrasound and discussing birth control with me. I have an intolerance to progesterone substitutes/artificial progesterone which is the reason I became pregnant on birth control in the first place, and when I went to the doctor to see if all the tissue I was passing was normal or not, I asked about estrogen based oral contraceptive. He advised me that if I took estrogen based birth control, that my depression would get worse.

I need the security of knowing I chose the right birth control and want to know what questions I should be asking regarding effectiveness and factors that may interfere with it. I've been on birth control since the age of fourteen, and have conceived twice while using it. Unfortunately, one ended in a miscarriage, and the other horrific and unjust. I am so ashamed at the decision I went with and never wish this experience upon anyone. I just want this to disappear from my mind and its become harder knowing if I can't find the right contraceptive then the only option for my fiancee is against everything I ever stood for.

Anyone else have problems with hormonal birth control and its effectiveness?

[fliss02]

Hi rachel, I'm so sorry you're going through this. My sister also conceived twice whilst on the pill. She now uses condoms and they have worked for her for several years. I too have had a d&c following a miscarriage and I felt very depressed indeed following this. I had many suicidal thoughts in the following weeks. So in short, you feeling depressed is a normal and understandable reaction to a terrible experience. It will get easier in time but having the option of talking to a counsellor in the meantime could be very helpful. I'm extremely surprised your GP won't agree to it however the reality is that you would probably be placed on a waiting list anyway. It took me 4-6 weeks to stop feeling depressed after the d&c. I didn't see a counsellor but I did have a couple of hypnotherapy sessions from a friend who is a qualified hypnotherapist. I also spoke to friends about it for hours and hours until finally I didn't want to talk about it anymore (not regularly anyway) and was ready to move on.

Could you and your fiancée just use condoms? Also, how about figuring out when you ovulate and also avoiding sex for a few days at that time.

Finally, I know I can't change the fact that you feel ashamed but I wish I could. We all do things we later regret. You are human. You did what you needed to do at the time. It can't have been easy. Please try not to go on punishing yourself for it. Life can be hard enough as it is without that.