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Anyone have an IUD? (long, demonstrative of the effect PCOS is having on my mental health)From: jodi (anonymous@obgyn.net)Fri, 9 Nov 2001 10:55:29 -0600 (CST)
I have reached the end of my rope with the birth control/PCOS struggle... now I'm sort of hanging at the end of the rope, swinging back and forth, still unable to make a decision. My brain feels that being off BCPs is best, letting the Met do its thing is the way to go... but the truth of the matter is using condoms SUCKS. Enduring the hassle of condoms when there's practically no chance of getting pregnant merely adds insult to injury. I really think my diminished sex drive has a lot to do with all this static in my head related to the birth control debate... My sex life is sooooo much better when I am on BCPs. But I hate thinking about what BCPs might be doing to my body, and I hate how BCPs mess up my moods. My doctor has told me that it's true BCPs make insulin resistance worse, but that that worsening is negligable compared to the state of IR my body is in anyway, and that that worsening will go away once you've been off the BCPs for a while. (I can believe this... I mean, women can have gestational diabetes that goes away after they are no longer preg, and being on BCPs is sorta like being preg...) My doctor has told me that BCPs are good because they put the ovaries at rest, inhibit cyst formation, and so on... and I definitiely like that aspect of it. I'm afraid of the cysts just growing and growing until my ovaries are so tough and thickened I'll need surgery when I decide to get pregnant - who knows, I might need it now? After the "how big are ovaries supposed to be?" question came up, I looked at the results of the sonogram I had last winter and YIKES, my ovaries were twice normal size. And they were described as echogenic - does that mean already thickened and scarified? Oh, if I could only take them out and look at them and see... And oh, of course there are the nice perks of clearer skin and no worsening of facial hair while on BCPs... I can see a lot of reasons to take the pills. The biggest reason really is pure and simple they make my sex life better. My bf says he doesn't mind condoms - it's not that he's pressuring me at all - it's just that having to use them really bothers ME! I really want to believe my doctor that the pill won't make me worse. But then I read of people saying their symptoms got worse going off the pill... and I know that could just be they were getting worse all along because they weren't treating the insulin problem as well as I am... but who knows? Ugh! I wish I could decide. One problem is that I don't like feeling suicidal, which is how I feel on nearly every pill I've tried. The pills that didn't make me suicidal have had the delightful side effects of migraines (quit that one after four days) or no periods (which drove me up the wall. There's nothing so unsettling as a pregnancy "scare" when you have PCOS. You just can't wholeheartedly hope that test is negative because as unready as you are to be a parent at that point, at LEAST you'd know you could be...) My doctor has recommended one last pill a try - Loestrin. I am considering giving it a whirl when I go for my gyne appt. at the end of this month. She also suggested maybe I try an IUD. I was under the impression that you can't have an IUD if you've never had a baby, but maybe I was wrong about that. I don't know. She said IUDs are considered safe now, and it WOULD allow me to see if the met was working and avoid using condoms. It seems so... perfect! But on the other hand, I have such control issues that I think it would drive me crazy having a form of birth control inserted in my body that i couldn't remove. Plus, I think IUDs are pretty expensive... I don't want to plop down 600 dollars for an IUD and decide three weeks later I can't handle it. (Last summer I plopped down 60 dollars for a tounge piercing and went crazy after 4 days because there was this THING lodged in my body I had to deal with now ... I took it out at that point, couldn't deal with it) I am going to ask about an IUD at my gyne. appt. though. Can't hurt... I just wish I could decide. I really feel like I just need to accept at this point that I was not intended to menstruate normally for whatever reason. I don't know why... but I do know that the more I keep stressing about this, the worse it's going to be. The other day, I was walking across campus and these two girls walked perpendicular to the path I was walking, and I heard one say to the other, "I'm so stressed out, my period is a month late!" And I almost spun around and said, "You think YOU have problems?" And it occurred to me how ridiculous I'm being. I have several small papers and one huge paper I am working on this term. I go to a school where it's not uncommon for people to literally spend three days in the computer cluster (they will forgo showering and sleep, guzzle mountain dew, and have pizzas delivered.) Normal sleeping and eating schedules are unheard of here. NORMAL girls aren't having periods like they ought to, and here I have PCOS and am stressed to the gils over both school work and not having periods, and I'm expecting I can have normal periods just by taking glucophage? I feel like a paraplegic whining over not being able to walk through quicksand. Good heavens. I think that at this point even if the BCP does make my body a little sicker, and my brain a little depressed, it will still protect what remains of my sanity. But the IUD option is intriguing nonethessless... so anyone have any epxerience with this one? And before anyone suggests a diaphram, that sounded like a perfect solution last winter. It's just that I have this allergy to spermicide... - jodi
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