Hi,
My name is Christina and I live in Sacramento, California. I am a 32yr old, married mother of 5. We have 3 boys and 2 girls. My husband and I were surprised with our 5th child quite a bit as our oldest son was only 9 at the time. 5 kids under 9 was enough to tell us we were done having kids. I had decided to have the Essure procedure done as I had a friend that had done it and she was completely fine. Figured it was safe since I knew someone that had actually done it and was ok. In June of 2013 I had the procedure done. I immediately had ‘cramping’ like pain and was bleeding everyday. When i say everyday, i mean every single day without one day off. I would email my dr to let her know that I was full on bleeding as if I was on my menstrual cycle and was advised that it would eventually stop. After checking in every week and a half to let her know that the bleeding had never stopped nor was the pain going away she decided to see me. She made sure that the Essure was still in place and everything regarding the procedure was fine. She decided to put me on hormone pills and i was told that the hormone pills would stop the bleeding and cramping. I started taking the hormone pills but that never helped. It didn’t stop the bleeding nor the pain. The pain was so severe that most days i couldn’t work or even take care of my kids. Besides the bleeding and pain, the hormone pills were now making me feel crazy. I was depressed and would constantly cry about nothing. I would be helping my kids with homework and would just start crying for no reason. I literally felt crazy. My dr put me on a different hormone pill. We did this again a third time after discovery that nothing was helping. Fast forward to December of 2013. I have been bleeding now for 6 months straight without a single day off. Also the cramping has not gone away. My Dr is still telling me that the pain and bleeding will eventually go away. I decide to get a second opinion and this Dr tells me that I need to have a hysterectomy. A hysterectomy is the only way to stop the bleeding and will also take the pain away. I jump on this because by this time I just can’t miss anymore work because of the constant pain and feel that this is the only option I have at this point. I have surgery in February, 2014 and the bleeding stopped but the pain did not. Instead of cramping pain I now have a sharp, knife stabbing pain on my left side. I deal with it everyday. After many ultrasounds, blood tests, MRI, I am now being told what I am experiencing is ‘chronic pain’. It has been 9 months since my surgery and I still have this pain. They can’t tell me if and when this pain will go away and I just pretty much have to deal with it.
I shared the local news story that was featured by FOX40 on my Facebook account because I’m hoping that anyone that is looking into Essure might not go through with it.
Thanks for letting me share.