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“The world jumped into focus and everything looked suddenly bright and fresh and clean, as it does on an early morning with the sun on the trees, and there was newness everywhere, a feeling that I had been away a long time in a dark place and was now returning home to sunlight.”

A month ago, finally acting on the countless discussions about birth control I’ve had with small groups of women over the years, I got a hormonal IUD. It was a no-brainer, the perfect birth control: a long-lasting, tiny dose of hormones that more often than not stops your period entirely. I was set until 2020!

About two and a half weeks later, long after the mild cramps had subsided, I very rationally, very calmly realized that I had never loved J. The only possible way forward, it seemed clear, was for me to move out of the apartment we’ve shared since 2010. I was scared about the giant changes this would bring about, but even moving to a tiny sublet in an unfamiliar neighborhood, even explaining the breakup to all our friends, even never hosting a dinner party in an apartment of my own ever again, seemed preferable to continuing to live with this sudden stranger.

This quiet, internal freaking out continued for about a week; I spent a lot of time taking long walks that gave me no pleasure, just to avoid being at home. At the end of that week I did three things:

I remembered something that my older sister S pointed out to me when I became very depressed and quit my job in 2012, which was that people in a healthy headspace don’t feel numb when they make giant life decisions.
I googled “mirena IUD depression” and found dozens of stories from women who felt like I did and worse.
I described how I was feeling, first to J, in the dark after we’d gone to bed because I couldn’t bring myself to say it while sitting at the dinner table, and then to S and JBA, via email.

As you might imagine, talking about it helped. This from JBA’s reply, in particular, really helped:

I think it is a tempting thing for people like you and me (and… many people we know), people who live largely in our heads, to form a conclusion after much careful analysis about how the body should be or should be treated and then just sort of impose it? I feel the body should be a more equal partner in this process. I’m not sure if this even makes sense.

It made beautiful sense to me. My body did not like the IUD, and so the IUD had to go. Which it did, a week later.

There’s a lot to be said here about how doctors don’t do enough to describe the possible side effects and outcomes of various types of birth control to their patients, to empower them to choose whether or not a chosen method is working – truly working for their lives, not just doing its pharmacological job. My doctor, when I described how I was feeling, asked first if I’d had a particularly stressful month and if I wanted to wait another few weeks to see if it would “even out” before saying it seemed like I was “very sensitive to hormones.” I guess I’m thankful that at least she didn’t offer me antidepressants as a fix, as has happened to plenty of other women. And although this shouldn’t need saying, I have nothing against birth control in general, or Mirena in particular – it just didn’t work for me.

But what I want to talk about instead is what the past 72 hours have felt like: the half-life of that tiny dose of hormones, it turns out, is very short, and feeling the color seep back into my life has been breathtaking. This morning I woke up thrilled to feel J’s limbs touching mine; he walked in the door a few minutes ago and I was so happy to kiss him hello.

It’s about more than just my relationship, though – I spent hours after work today walking circles around lower Manhattan, thankful that I was alive to see all these beautiful rooftops and beautiful dudes in skinny jeans and beautiful trees in the tiny beautiful parks. I was walking for a second time past Jackson Square in the West Village when a scene from The Chosen dropped into my head: Reuven Malter has just been discharged from the hospital after an eye accident. “There was newness everywhere, a feeling that I had been away a long time in a dark place and was now returning home to sunlight.” It’s very good to be back.

Posted May 7, 2015 at 8:59pm in birth control iud things that are very personal these feelings are not my feelings barrier methods! || home