Mirena

I believe we are done having children. I have felt this way since after having my second, being happy with two kids, and feeling like I want to give them my full attention and love. I also do not want to spend ten years of my life raising small children. I want to savor them at each phase, and I'm looking forward to them growing into school age, and nurturing them as they enter the phase of childhood that I can actually remember myself. I love my girls so much and feel that our family is complete.

That's the nice way of saying it. Really, in the back of my head, there's a voice that screams, "No WAY am I going through all that again!" This feels very selfish. But... I'm just being honest.

Since our second kid was not a planned pregnancy, we have realized that we need to be pretty careful with birth control. So last summer, after feeling frustrated from repeatedly forgetting to take my pill and not having it line up with my cycle, and being constantly paranoid that I would get pregnant again, I decided to get an IUD. Did some research and decided on the Mirena. My doctor recommended it highly and said that she had many patients who love it. My insurance covered it, and the draw of having lighter periods was a good one too. 

I felt pretty normal (and continue to feel normal most of the time), except that in retrospect, I very rapidly started to gain weight. I have gained about ten pounds since having it inserted, and on my 5'3 frame, this is pretty noticeable to me. Maybe other people don't really see it, but I realize now that this has been a very frustrating year for me in terms of my body image. I have gone up a pants size. Gone up a bra size. Had my rings resized. Gotten bigger t-shirts. The weight is concentrated in strange places (swollen fingers, belly, rib cage and bust), almost like I feel 3 months pregnant all the time, and despite my best efforts to exercise 2-3xs a week (more than I ever have), it is not coming off. I've been watching my carb intake as well. All the things that I've done in the past to remedy weight gain have not helped. 

At my last doctor's appointment, I asked her specifically about weight gain with the Mirena and she told me that since the hormones are more localized, you don't gain weight from it. So I just told myself it must be my metabolism slowing down in my mid-30's, or overeating that is doing it. But when I think back, I don't think my lifestyle has changed at all. If anything, I am more active than ever and I still feel pretty crappy about my body. I remember last summer that I gained weight so rapidly that after having it inserted in July, when going to a friend's pool party in August, I didn't fit my swimsuit and felt incredibly self-conscious that day. I also don't fit any of my performance dresses, and it has made being on stage become a huge fixation for me. I recently tried on a dress that I wore at the GFA Convention in June, and it didn't fit. Just one month before getting the Mirena, I had a very different body. 

I started googling around today and found a Baby Center thread with numerous women writing about this exact experience, despite their doctor telling them that an IUD would not lead to weight gain. They shared so many of the same details - that despite all their efforts to drop the pounds, they couldn't; that their doctor assured them the IUD would not make them gain weight; and that after having it removed many women reported losing 10 pounds in two weeks. I feel pretty disappointed that my doctor, who I trusted so much since she delivered both my babies, would tell me something so misleading, but she is perhaps just going off what the pharma company has told her - and the Mirena website says specifically that their product does not cause weight gain. I've felt like I'm crazy for making a correlation between the Mirena and my weight gain, and frustrated from having to tell myself that it was just my age or lifestyle that was making me feel bloated and swollen. But I think sometimes you have to trust your intuition. And no one knows my body better than I do myself! I'm sure there are many women who do not gain weight from the Mirena, but I am coming to terms with accepting the fact that I am not one of them - and it is affecting me in a more severe way than I would have thought.

I feel frustrated that I brought this upon myself, like it's some kind of strange punishment for not wanting to have more children. Perhaps the want of control over my reproductive system is something that I need to let go of, just a bit. I also have felt that this has been tied up very closely in my desire to have a career - and as a musician, having children was something that definitely affected my practicing (severe back pain trying to play a concert while 7 months pregnant!), traveling (pumping in airport bathrooms is just disgusting), and all else that comes with it. I constantly feel this tension between career and family, as many moms do, but that's a post for another day. 

Until then, I've decided that it's time to trust my instincts, not my doctor or the pharma company. I am leaning towards having her remove it in a few weeks at my annual appointment, even if it is an effective form of birth control. It's so cliche to be caught up with weight loss and I really have bemoaned ever complaining about it. But this whole thing has been very damaging to my self-confidence and been a downer on my general mood. It's time to be truthful with myself and realize what drove me here - the need to control and plan everything in my life, and the general shock of having an unplanned pregnancy, even if she is the greatest thing ever. 

So please, no judgement here - this post is a bit raw, and frustrated, because I feel pretty spoiled and ungrateful complaining about this. I haven't talked about this openly with anyone besides my husband, so I figured posting it on this secret place called the internet would be a good next step. I'm still trying to figure out what I'm supposed to learn from all this. Let me know if you have any wisdom for me.