I got the essure implants in June of 2010, shortly after giving birth to my son. I have two beautiful children, what more could I ask for right? When I got the procedure the doctor was all about it, it was the best idea, wouldn’t involve surgery, and same day, so I would be home for my kids. I was all for the idea because I have never been cut open and didnt want to start, although I was put under for the procedure at the military hospital I was a patient of at the time. Well, when the procedure was done, I never recieved a card or warned of any adverse side effects. I went in 90 days later to get the verification that my tubes were blocked, and the confirmation was there, no more children. Well, at the time life was great. All my after pregnancy tests came back normal, no issues, I was a healthy, happy, mother of two. In 2012 we moved back to Missouri to be with family since my husband had become disabled in the military. Now, I had graves disease at the age of 17, which in turn the doctor killed off my thyroid with radioactive iodine tabs, so now I take pills daily to correct hypothyroidism. This was normally no issue, even through both pregnancies, they have been able to adjust the meds accordingly. Shortly after moving home, it became difficult for the doctors to get my thyroid leveled out, constantly increasing the dosage just to decrease it months later. I just thought I was out of whack. Then, in the middle of 2013, I started to have heavier periods, filling a super plus tampon withing 2 hours, and cramps which I had never had before, were almost unbearable. That was when I started to question things, but unfortunately life was extremely busy, so I wasn’t able to get into my doctor right away. As time went on, I experienced dizziness, moodiness, joint pain, fatigue, muscle soreness, weight gain, it seemed to just keep going. I finally was able to make my appt, in March of 2014, and the results came back abnormal. I was shocked, to say the least. I was then referred to a gyn for a colposcopy. During that procedure the gyn even stated he could see the abnormal cells and it didn’t look good, he couldnt understand how they had not been found on the pap that followed the birth of my son, or the procedure to implant the essure. When I was called in for my follow up appointment, I was told ‘you have cancer, we dont know how bad yet, but it is cancer.’ Again, I was shocked, my world fell out from underneath me. The doctor still unable to believe it wasn’t seen when they implanted the essure, in his opinion, it had to have been there from the way it looks. I was referred to a specialist and followed up right away. I was then told that it was precancer that he was able to see on the pathology reports, but the slides from the previous biopsy had not been recieved so he couldn’t tell if it was any deeper.
Around the time of the abnormal pap is when I started to look into things. I got curious about what could be causing all of this. I looked up everything I could think of. I looked up in books, google, any thing that might have an answer. I was reaching out to other females, any that may have had the same symptoms. Thats when I started finding all the adverse effects of essure. The weight gain, the pain, the bleeding, I even heard stories where the coils increased the speed of cancer spreading. To say the least, Im horrorified. I have another biopsy this week to see if the cancer is any deeper, then from there possibly a hysterectomy, I’ve actually requested it to get them removed if at all possible, unfortunately they have to do the biopsy first to see if a hysterectomy is safe. At first, I thought these coils were amazing, freedom from having children without a surgery or remembering to take a pill everyday. In the beginning I never thought my problems may be from the essure. Knowledge is power and I wish I would’ve had more of it then like I do now. Everyday I live with cramps and pain of some sort, my time of the month is a nightmare, intercourse with my husband can be painful at times, I’m almost 200 lbs and though I’ve tried I cant lose the weight, I’m always tired, and now I may have cancer. Right now my story has no ending, but I’m looking for the light at the end of the tunnel. We have found the problem, I have found a great doctor with open ears, and I’m on the path to finding my recovery. I hope with everything I have said and gone through, maybe this will help make others aware, maybe I can help one person from making the same choice I did without more research.