12 Months off Birth Control & Periods still irregular!

[Kayl1]

Does anyone have any advice for me?

I was on the pill from the age of 15 (acne) up until I was 26, when I decided I wanted to give the implant in your arm a try. I had that in for 6 months, & for the last 3 of those months, I spotted blood daily. In the end, me & my husband decided we’d try but not try for a baby anyways, so I had it taken out - I was 27, this was last August.

Fast forward to now! I’m 28, it’s been just over 12 months, I haven’t fallen pregnant & my periods are insanely unpredictable, I’ll attach screenshots of my tracker I used to show my varying cycle days.

Should I be concerned? My sister has just accidentally fallen pregnant whilst ON the pill, yet here I am... 😂

Hello, it looks like they are broadly similar, all long cycles (30-40 days) with similar but long bleeds. If you were having a mix of short and long it would be different. Do you take your temperature? Temping is a great way to figure out what is going on and when you're actually ovulating, and from there you can see where the problem is. Your luteal phase should be fairly consistent to within a day. In your follicular phase there are lots of things that can change your cycle length like stress, alcohol, illness etc. With knowing when you're ovulating you know when to DTD to make sure you're timing it right for conception.

After 12 months your GP should refer you for a CD21 test and your DH for a semen analysis. Make sure they know your cycles are long as a CD21 is actually a 7dpo test, so yours should be done later. You haven't mentioned any issues with your period like pain but they do seem long so it might be worth getting checked for an issue like fibroids or endometriosis.

Thanks so much for your in depth reply! I did try temping to begin with, but I kept forgetting & it just kind of petered out! I’ll get back onto recording it for sure.

Some months I get period pains real bad, other months I don’t even notice I’m on! Very weird! I’ll definitely give the docs a call! Thank you!

@Kayl1 I found ovusense great for temping, it's a bit pricy but they almost always have a discount code. It's a little device about the size of a tampon that goes inside and measures your temps overnight and gives you a core body temperature rather than basal body temperature. Makes it easier to remember to do it as you only need to think about it in the evening! Also it confirms when you ovulated, so you can see how long your luteal phase actually is, and gives you a fertile window when to focus your DTD efforts. (Sounds like a sales pitch, it's not, but I did get pregnant using it after nearly 2 years TTC).

It's definitely still worth asking the GP for the initial tests, as much information as you can get is helpful for you. There's a thread on here called 12 months+ TTC which has been a wonderfully supportive group and they can help you decipher your results when you get them

@PlanBea amazing! I’ll check them out for sure! And I’ll have a look at that thread!

Definitely going to call the docs tomorrow too!

Hi,

I came off the pill 2 years ago after being on it for 10 years. My periods were still so irregular and long so I called the docs earlier this year and agreed once lockdown eased to have a blood test. Fast forward a few months I got a blood test which confirmed I had very low haemoglobin levels and iron (so put on tablets) and then referred for an ultrasound. I had an ultrasound at the end of June which showed fibroids. I’ve also been put on Provera to help with the bleeding and iron levels whilst I was for my referral for Gynaecology!

It’s definitely worth a phone call to the doctors imo. Good luck!

@Fluffysocks10 oh that’s so interesting! I’ve suffered with low iron when I was a little younger actually. Hope all is ok with you now! Looking forward to actually calling the docs tomorrow! Didn’t want to feel like I was wasting their time!

I took this this morning y’all... am I crazy or is that a very faint line? Not holding my hopes up, as I am CD41 & it shouldn’t be that faint I’d assume by now.

That's a faint line I can see OP 😊
I was told by the gynaecologist that as long as your periods are within a week of each other they're classed as regular x

@Metallicalover I didn’t think I was going crazy! And wow, didn’t realise that, the 7 day thing!

I just popped to the toilet & wiped & there’s a lot of mucus mixed with some brown blood, so I’m not getting my hopes up, poss just the start of af now!

🤞🤞 it's just a little bit of implantation blood! Xx

@Metallicalover fingers crossed 🤞🏻

I was on the pill for acne for 15 years (pcos) and it took a year for my periods to come back. I paid to see a private endocrinologist as was getting nowhere with my gp or nhs endo. He put me on metformin straight away and soon my periods came back! They became 30 day cycles on the dot and I’m now 5’weeks pregnant!

I think with your acne you may have pcos. Metformin is a wonder drug for sorting out your periods!

@Cafeaulait27 interesting! I’ve got a docs appt 9am Thursday so hoping they give me a blood test!

After that possible faint positive bfp a little further up, I’m on day 2 of small amounts of brown bleeding.