When the doctor told me that Essure was a minimally invasive procedure that had less recovery time and risk than tubal ligation, I was sold. I had my Essure implants placed in 2009 and have had pain, excessive bleeding, depression, and weight gain since.
I’ve often had problems in the past with discomfort from earrings, but it never occurred to me that I might have a reaction to nickel until now. I wish I had been tested before the procedure.
When I went in for my three month hysterosalpingogram, the results showed that the coils were not blocking one of my tubes so I had to go in for a tubal ligation. An Essure rep was present through that entire procedure to ‘document’ everything that happened.
A few months later, my periods started getting heavier and more painful. I contacted the doctor who assured me it had nothing to do with the coils. I went back several times and asked to have them removed due to the constant cramping, breakthrough bleeding, heavy periods, weight gain, fogginess, fatigue, skin rashes and hives, and depression; but my symptoms were dismissed. The doctors explained that my ‘getting older and having 3 children’ was what was causing all of my symptoms. I’ve seen doctor after doctor who refused to acknowledge that my symptoms could be due to a sensitivity to the coils inside me.
I have two periods per month now. What I call my ‘normal’ period, which happens mid-cycle and is what I would consider normal bleeding, and then two weeks later I have my heavy period, where I have to deal with large clots, changing tampons every hour, bleeding on my sheets at night because my super pad ultimately fails. Horrible PMS accompanies both ‘periods’.
I’ve now been on birth control for the past three months in an attempt to control my abnormal bleeding without any success.
I finally found a doctor that is going to perform a hysterectomy. I cannot wait to be ‘normal’ again.