I have been blessed by 5 beautiful children. I concieved our 4th child while I was on traditional birth control. He was born with a congenital heart defect along with other medical complications. My husband and I knew we were done having children as our hearts couldn’t handle going through the stress of the NICU and surgery after surgery for our son. As my husband and I were discussing out options for birth control I was on a different form of oral contraceptive and we were using condoms. Just as my husband and I made the decison that we were going to go permanent birth control, I even had a consult in with my doctor’s for the next week, I discovered that I was pregnant with our youngest daughter. My husband and I were completely caught off guard by her pregnance but we embraced it and faced the challenge of having a medically challenged child at home and then to have a newborn on the way.
After the birth of my daughter we talked with my doctor and discussed the Essure. He told me that I would be a great candidate for it. I was healthy, 100% sure that we were done having children. He told me that the risks are minimal recovery time was fast and it was done in office and I could go home the same day. It sounded just what I needed. It was perfect in my eyes.
Before having the Essure done my cycles were NORMAL. I mean you could set your watch down to the minute that I was going to start my period. I had very minimal cramping, only needed to take an occasional Tylenol. If there was such a thing as perfect periods and cycles I had them. I mean, like I said I have 5 kids, whose birthdates all fall on the 10th of their month of birth. So how much more regular could one person be. Like my doctor said I was basically the perfect candidate for this.
I went in late November of 2011 to have my Essure done. The surgery was a success. I was pretty much back to my normal self by the next day. As my body got back into the swing of my cycles I noticed something was different about them. I was bleeding heavier, clots where bigger and I wasn’t feeling the greatest. Now this was only happening with my periods in the beginning. As time passed I noticed that my energy was draining and I was dragging more. I was hurting in places that I have never hurt before, like my lower back and my left side.
Over the past year it became insane at how I felt. Now remember I do have a medically fragile son who was dealing with his own issues so my issues were put on the back burner. I attributed my decrease in energy and depressed feeling to my son. My son passed away on March 17th, 2013. Just before my son’s passing I noticed that my periods were starting to act weird. They were now coming very irregular. I was having 2 a month or a month of not having one at all. When I would have one my pain was getting a lot worse to the point that no medication that I took was helping with the pain. My bleeding was becoming so heavy that I was soaking a pad with in a half an hour. I even had a bleeding episode that lasted 24 hours and I felt like I was bleeding out. I almost asked my husband to take me to the hospital. My clots where now becoming larger then the quarter that they tell you to watch for and I was having a lot of them.
I went back to my doctor to explain what was going on. My doctor recommended me to have the ablation done as that will take away the uterine lining and therefore would slow down the bleeding if not take it all away. Again he told me that recovery was minimal. My pain afterwards should not be as bad if not gone since I won’t have a reason to cramp anymore.
Let me tell you that didn’t help anything at all. It only made it worse. I have now been in constant pain for the past 5 weeks and have to take heavy pain medications just to deal with daily routines. My back is killing me. I have been in a constant state of cramping with episodes of excrutiating stabbing pains in my left side, right were my left fallopian tube is. I have been feeling horrible all around. My husband has even made comments like ‘you look pale’, ‘you’re not feeling good are you?’. He could read it on my face that I am just in misery.
I am now scheduled to have a total hysterectomy done to remove both fallopian tubes, uterus, and my left ovary. I would not wish the Essure on my worst enemy cause if it wasn’t for the Essure I wouldn’t be in this pain and I could enjoy my kids instead of sitting on the couch with a heating pad to my back and praying for the pain to be gone.
I don’t recommend the Essure at all and am telling all my friends and family and any other female willing to listen to not get it done.