MIRENA COIL

[veryaggitated]

Hello maybe someone can shed some light on my situation. Had the mirena fitted beginning sept seemed all fine and dandy to start with however in the last month my face and everywhere has broken out in acne, my moods are unbearable, i look ill all the time and i have gained a stone(since sept), i get metallic taste in mouth alot and have been becoming more and more depressed. Saying all this i am being treated for post natal depression which was going well until recently and have had my meds upped last week because of low mood. Could this be the coil causing these problems?? Can i take it out myself can't get appointment foe 2 weeks??

[auntyspan]

Hello

Poor you! I am having my Mirena coil out on Thursday as my skin is terrible and I'm moody and I've got really fat!!! AND I've lost my libido....

Can you go to your Family Planning Clinic? They should be able to do it?

HTH

[Loreleimeerfrau]

Hi
I can only say that the Mirena coil made my life a nightmare. I had it in for 3 years and by the end I was a wreck. I had horrendous depression and mood swings - no sex drive whatsoever - felt like I had a black cloud hanging over me all the time.
Had the Mirena out a couple of months ago and now I feel great.
My husband says that I am a different person and he feels like he has the old me back.
I wouldn't try to remove coil yourself - could lead to nasty infection etc.
Incidentally I went on the mini pill as soon as I had coil out - maybe this also contributed.
Good luck.
Christine

[twelveyeargap]

Hello. I had Mirena for 3 years with no problems. However I had in previous years taken anti-depressents for about 18 months. I don't know which meds you're on, but SSRIs (such as Prozac) are known to give a metallic taste in the mouth. They can also change the metabolism, so could explain the weight gain and even the acne.

Do some googling of your symptoms and the name of your meds - you might come up with something.

I wouldn't write off the mirena just yet. Remember that the amount of hormone released from it into your body is a drop in the ocean compared the "chemical content" of your anti-depression drugs. It could be that you need to change those. I found that different brands affected me differently, just as poeple find one type of contraceptive pill suits them, but others don't.

I hope you feel better soon.

[twinklingstar]

Glad to hear your view, twelveyeargap - I remember seeing a thread some time ago and everyone on it seemed to have bad side effects with the Mirena. That made me very nervous about agreeing to it, but it's the first line of treatment that the hospital wanted to try to sort out my nightmare AF problems. If this doesn't work, then it's surgery.

It is early days for me with this so far and I am eager to hear others' experiences with it, the good and the bad please!

[fortyplus]

Do you want any more children?
If not then endometrial ablation would sort you out once and for all - it only takes 5 mins and is usually done under local anaesthetic. If you're interested Google 'Novasure'.

[twinklingstar]

fortyplus - no more babies for me now, and endometrial ablation would be the next thing they'd try if Mirena did not work for me. I found having a hysteroscopy (not under GA) and was about all I could bear in terms of discomfort, being told that endometrial ablation was rather worse 'but we'll give you pain killers' made me cringe. (GA to be avoided because of other health issues.)

Really want the Mirena to be my answer, and hopefully it will be when the inital few months are past.

[twelveyeargap]

I think people who have had dodgy experiences are more likely to notice these threads and post. I think I took about 3-4 months to settle down with the Mirena and I have two girlfriends who have used it and both took about 6 months.

Personally, I think it's worth the wait, as you can just forget about it for the 4.5 years after that. Depends I'm sure on just how bad your side-effects are.

[twinklingstar]

Thanks, twelveyeargap - I think that you make a valid point about those with dodgy experiences being more likely to post. The thread I referred to (sorry, don't know how to find it again atm) was full of horror stories. Then I discovered a friend of mine was chuffed to bits with the Mirena because she has no periods at all with it.

Did you get any PMT type symptoms, btw?

[BuffysMum]

Hi I still get light bleeding every month and I've had it in for 16 months!!!!!!!!!!! I'm moody, depressed etc but as I've had depression to a great or lesser extent for years it's hard to know whether it is a factor or not. I am scraping the bottom of the barrel for contraceptive options and AF problems so I feel a bit trapped into keeping it on balance it is heaven not worrying about getting pregnant and light bleeding is also fab compared to not leaving the house for 4 days everytime and getting anaemic but I too wish I knew if it was making my depression worse. HTH

[twinklingstar]

BuffysMum - thanks for posting your experience. Only time will tell how successful this will be for me, but I totally understand your comment about being afraid to leave the house for your worst AF days and the anaemia that easily happens as a result. As you rightly say, it is a matter of weighing up the pros and cons and going with what is best for us accordingly.

[fortyplus]

twinklingstar - I'm going to have endometrial ablation & cervical ablation at the same time. Apparently 73% of Novasure procedures are carried out under LA.
Only 13% of women experience unwanted side effects - the worst of which are cramping pains like period pain for 2 days afterward. Then you get a discharge for up to 6 weeks 'as with any burn' I was told.
Apparently most women go home after an hour - some even go straight back to work!
I'm waiting for the Consultant's sec to phone me this morning to make the appt - he's away for the whole of Feb so it will be March at the earliest.
I'll post when I've had it done and let you know what it was like.

[fortyplus]

Sec just called me and I'm booked in for 16th March but she did say that he recommends having GA.

[twinklingstar]

fortyplus, 'cause your consultant knows that it is a very unpleasant procedure when not done under GA, I imagine. When the appointment letter came for my hysteroscopy, it said to arrange transport home, as I would not feel up to driving afterwards, and they were absolutely right. Going straight back to work after it? certainly not for me though it depends what the work is. I would plan a feet-up kind of recovery for at least the rest of the day, if at all possible. As well as a treat of some sort (someone else cooking tea?) for being brave

It will be worth it, to be relieved of your symptoms. Will look out for you posting after the procedure to know how you got on!

[fortyplus]

Thanks for that. I had a hysteroscopy, too, and he removed a lot of polyps at the same time (bleeurgh!)
I had that done under GA so I automatically wasn't allowed to drive for 48 hours.
I must admit I was a bit surprised when I Googled Novasure and found out that so many are done under LA. In my case the previous procedure took about an hour and I didn't suffer any ill effects apart from feeling very tired for a couple of days and having a bit of a sore throat from the anaesthetist's tube down my throat.
So as this is only supposed to take 5-10 mins I've no qualms about having GA again - and it means I can claim a day's sick leave, which I'm not allowed to do for a minor op under LA. How silly is that?

[ellenrose]

I had my Mirena removed a couple of weeks ago and I feel so much better.

My moods were unbearable, sex drive was non existent and over Christmas I genuinely thought I was losing the plot.

Whilst I am always cautious about reading and posting negative stuff particularly when it is not always proven as a side effect, I felt so much better having read other threads a while ago and realised that it wasn't just me.

Each to their own and it clearly works really well for some and not for others. I had the Mirena because fibroids were causing almost constant bleeding but I have decided that I will put up with that and feel like myself again.

I hope you find the right solution for you.

[twinklingstar]

Hi fortyplus and Ellenrose - found a link to the other Mirena coil thread that is hundreds of posts long and goes back to 2002 - only read part way, but there are a lot of posts saying similar things about weight gain (groan..........) mood swings (oh no........) and pmt symptoms such as breast tenderness. Only had this 7 weeks but had already noticed these effects, though hopefully if they get no worse and I can find an effective way to lose weight, it would be worth it in the symptom trade off, IYKWIM.

It may well be that all the negative reports are coming from the 30% of women who find the Mirena is not the answer for them and that people are more likely to protest about their side-effects than there are happy users stating their delight with it.

However, it is the repeated refrain (well up to as far as I got with reading the mammoth thread) that the medical profession don't seem to acknowledge any link. But all these experiences are happening to Mirena users - yet it is definitely being pushed as the miracle answer (which for some it may be, and I hope it turns out in time that I'm one of those chuffed-to-bits users.)