.

I stopped taking my birth control pills, and I’m not telling my boyfriend

I guess I just really needed to write this down, to sort out my thoughts and to maybe justify my actions in my own sick way even though I know what I’m doing is so wrong. To clarify, I haven’t taken my pills in two months, I’m currently on my second period. Also, I’m 21, I don’t know if that makes it better or worse, probably neither.

To start off with, I scoured the internet trying to find someone with the same or at least relatively same story as me, so I could try connect with someone on the same level, and maybe it would stick through my thick skull that I should start taking my pills again as soon as my period is over so I don’t run the risk of pregnancy for the third month in a row. I know what you’re probably thinking, “she has no idea what it’s actually like to raise a child” or maybe “she’s so young, and wasting her youth” or more possibly, “what a selfish bitch, conning her boyfriend like that” the last one is probably the only one I agree with.

Firstly, I know exactly what it’s like to still be awake at 4am with a teething child, on the brink of passing out of exhaustion, only to have another child wake up screaming from a nightmare, causing the other kids to wake up and having to put down the teething child screaming and running over to soothe one child while another asks you to get a cup of water for them because they’re too afraid to go in the kitchen at night. Trust me, I could run a day-care centre by myself, I practically already did. I know all of that doesn’t mean it’s okay to trick my boyfriend into thinking we’re having safe sex, but trust me, I’m getting there.

Having all this experience with kids, I think most people declare war on their uterus and faithfully vow to not have a single child until well into their 30s, however it did the complete opposite for me. One time, my brother accidently called me mum, and I cried tears of happiness after putting him back to bed. I might have been 15 at the time, and honestly since then I’ve been obsessed over the idea of having my own little humans. The joy when they take their first steps, when their babbles slowly turn into actual fathomable words, the night you realise it’s been a week since they asked you to tuck them into bed, when you pick them up out of the cot and they see your face they have the biggest smile. All these little (big) things make me so desperate to have my own children, to experience it all from a mother’s point of view.

I knew even before I was sexually active taking birth control would be a challenge for me, so I did the right thing and got the implanon. They can last up to 3 years, so naturally I opted for the longest possible option. However, after just one year, I had it taken out. That whole year I never stopped bleeding and my mood swings were out of this fucking world. To explain it simply, this one time I was washing up some dishes, my then-boyfriend was making himself a sandwich and asked if I wanted him to make me one. I screamed at him, I can’t even remember what I said, but for some reason I was so angry. And then I balled my eyes out crying for a few minutes, then I was hysterically laughing. The poor boy had no idea what to do. I took a 2 month break from birth control on my end, and I told my then-boyfriend, and he completely understood. Once the 2 month break was up, I opted for the shot, which is supposed to be given every 3 months. Shortly after my first shot I became single, and even though the shot had given me loads of trouble, I got the second shot just in case it would eventually work for me. It didn’t.

 The whole time I was on these birth control methods, my insides were screaming. My head was screaming. Give me babies, stop taking these damn hormones and get pregnant! I did a quick google and diagnosed myself as being clucky, and hoped I would soon get over it. It’s been 6 years, and I’m still not over it. I can’t describe the craving of wanting a child this badly. Every pregnant woman I saw, I got upset that I was not. Every family I saw, even on a clearly bad day, I was jealous of. Every friend or relative that had children I tried to avoid because it made me sad I didn’t have what they had. This wasn’t just an every now and then thing, it’s almost every single day. Forcing myself to take those birth controls was torture to me, it just felt so wrong, but I knew I had to do it. My past relationships are what you would definitely call dramatic shipwreck after dramatic shipwreck, and sometimes when describing them, I shock even myself.

So, cut to January this year when my current boyfriend and I had started to want to be ‘active’, I told him I wasn’t on any birth control, and that even if I did start taking the pill that day, it would take 2 weeks to be effective. It took me a long time to decide which birth control to take, I definitely didn’t want to be taking the pill, because it gave me too much power every day, and I would have to decide each and every single day to deny myself that desperate need. Clearly, I’ve caved into my selfish desires, hence writing this in the first damn place. But clearly the implanon and the shot simply didn’t want to agree with me, my only options left were the pill or an IUD of some sorts. I decided I really didn’t want a foreign object put in such a private area and it would be an extreme last resort, and so the pills were the only option left.

At first it was relatively easy to take the pills, yes I wanted children, but I was finally in a healthy relationship and I wanted to be young with him and have fun. Then I realised I had fallen in love, in actual love. I’ve never felt this strongly about someone, it creeps me out sometimes, and trying to think of my life without him was just imagining this vast black nothingness. All of this still doesn’t justify what I’ve chosen to do every day for the past 2 months. Our relationship has grown very quickly, we already live together, we share a car, and we help each other out with petrol bills and all that other crappy adult stuff. Heck, he’s actually proposed to me twice! I only turned him down because the first time I was drunk, and I actually got mad that he had proposed at such a bad time. The second time I was hungover, and once again gave him evil eyes. He admitted both times he asked in the heat of the moment, and that he’s actually glad I said no because he hasn’t even gotten a ring, yet alone asked my family or even told his family about his plans.

But anyway, I got side-tracked. Two months ago I stopped taking my pills, it wasn’t even a conscious decision, and I didn’t even plan it. One morning I just popped the pill into the bin instead of my mouth. Then another day went by, and another, and another, and suddenly I’m on my period. My breasts shrunk a bit, I got a touch of acne, but yet I still didn’t take up the pills again. I downloaded a period tracking app, trusty Clue, logged into it whenever we had sex, keeping tabs on when I was likely to ovulate. And here I am, once again on my period. The second month of being deceitful, and I still don’t know how I fully feel about it.

Yes, I know it’s wrong. Even though we have spoken about raising a family and getting married and building a house, we even talk about what our kids’ names will be, and how we will raise them and what we’ll feed them, it’s still wrong. I’m essentially lying to him every single day I don’t take those stupid pills. I do feel bad for lying, trust me I feel the guilt and the awkward moments the pills are randomly brought into conversation. I also feel as if we would be okay if I did end up pregnant, just typing that feels crazy. We have a rough plan for the next few years, and kids are a few years in the future, and it makes me happy that he even wants kids and that we talk about it at least once a week. I have a vague feeling he wants kids sooner, but he’s scared to admit it not only to me but to himself, and scared of what his family would think of us. Or maybe that’s just me being hopeful and looking far too deeply into things. And I know I might not be as perfect of a mother as I think I might be, but I’m still hopeful that I’d be great, it’s probably one of the only things I’m sure of.

So now, nearing the end, I’m forced to make a conscious decision. I can’t hide behind the false sense of not being fully aware of what I’m doing anymore, because clearly I am. And yet I know I won’t start taking those pills again. I simply don’t want to, and I can’t bring myself to go through the sadness of taking them every day. I know I won’t get pregnant instantly, clearly, otherwise I wouldn’t be wearing a pad and hunching over in agony over cramps. It might take a year, it might be next month, who knows. All I know is that the agony has subsided, but the guilt is rising. I know what the right thing to do is, yet I’m doing the opposite, but I also still think I’m a decent person. Knowingly doing something that is obviously wrong and deceitful may say a lot about someone, namely myself, however I don’t think it completely defines me as a person. For example, people still eat meat, even though they know that animal has been murdered for their pleasure. That doesn’t mean I’m a better person than a meat eater, more I’m knowingly doing something that is wrong, and I don’t have a logical or reasonable answer for why I’m doing it, yet I believe I’m still a good person.

At least now I’m being honest with myself, and maybe one day I’ll own up to my selfish actions. I don’t know what the future holds, part of me hopes it’ll take a few months to get pregnant, another part hopes I’ll start taking the pills again, even if it’s only every second month. In the end, I hope that in a few years I’m still with Alex, and that he still loves me as much as I love him, and maybe we’ll have a house together and I’ll have a full time job being able to support myself. And if I’m the luckiest person in the whole world, we’d have a child together.

crush!jungkook

happy valentine’s day mothafuckas ;)

i love jeon jungkook are u bitches ready

you first met jungkook when you heard the sound of a moving truck beep its way into the driveway next to yours 

now u were always a child of adventure 

ur parents worked a lot so it was basically u at home with ur grandparents and they were the most chill motherfuckers on the face of the planet

and the front door of ur house always seems to be unlocked so u were the poster boy/gal of “adventure is out there!!!”

cue me ugly crying that movie kills m e 

u loved the outdoors and being adventurous 

u were so tomboy and reckless it was hilarious

u drove every single member of ur family insane 

they got called into school one time to u staring at the ground in the principal’s office next to a kid with a missing tooth and bloody nose 

“he tried to hug me” 

to summarize, u loved causing trouble, but have fun in the midst! 

and yes, meeting new ppl!!

and at dinner, u would hear ur grandpops and grandma talking abt the couple moving in next door 

and how they have also have a 6!! year!! old!! son!!

and u could barely keep ur head on the pillow that night bc omg! you can’t wait to have a new friend the same age as u! 

so on that beautiful sunny saturday morning, at exactly 7am sharp, with ur scabby knees, bruised legs, ripped shorts, mismatched socks, run-down light up sneakers, and ur older brother’s hand-me-down power rangers sweatshirt, you marched on over to the driveway to meet your new best friend

and u see a middle aged man and a beautiful woman trying to carry in a couple boxes together and u guessed those were the parents 

and as u were marvelling at how pretty they were, “man, if they look that good, how good does their son loo--”

“MOM, DAD, HELP IM STUCK IN THE SOFA!!” 

u have no idea what came over u but u almost tripped over the tall weeds trying to get into the truck and find the source of the voice 

you went straight to the yellow, flower-y sofa resting in the middle of the truck, with little boy limbs sticking out from under the cushions

u ran up and ripped them away and low and behold, u laid ur eyes on the most beautiful 6 year old there ever was 

and from then on, ur heart decided to plant its FUCKING BOTTOM with jungkook forever

from the first day he met u he literally believed u were the weirdest person he’s ever met 

but without a doubt, you became childhood friends 

like best friends

u saw him naked for the first time when u were 8 and just bursted into his shower at like 8am in the morning 

“Y/N WHAT THE FUCK GET OUT IM NAKED?????”

“omg it’s so smALL?”

he didn’t speak to you for two weeks after that 

your grandparents would always have him over for dinner 

you guys played make believe together and took naps in ur power ranger blanket together 

but it’s also a lot of bullying 

LOTS OF WRESTLING 

taking turns making ugly faces, whoever laughs first has to go and tell ur grandma they pooped their pants and needs help changing it 

“accidentally” slapping each other SUPER hard in the face

“you had a fly on ur cheek sorry!! couldn’t help it!!”

literally the purest and most innocent friendship ever ever ever 

everyday in first grade, when you had reading time, he would be in the seat behind you and fold a tiny little paper plane with a sticky note and throw it at you 

would keep folding them and throwing it at you until you noticed and turned around and yelled at him and got in trouble by your student teacher 

“i hate u jeon jungkook” 

you didn’t really

but it wasn’t until the third or fourth time he kept doing it that you realized there was a message on each of them 

and they weren’t really anything cute

they were just like 

“hey notice me”

“your hair looks greasy from the back” 

“what book are you reading”

“don’t ignore me”

“am i being annoying?”

“yea? good.”

but your favourite was

“i’m glad you’re in my class” 

because he would rarely ever show affection to you because your relationship was made up a lot of the “we don’t need to say anything to know it”, meaning you never needed to straight out express your gratitude to each other for the other to know that you’re appreciated 

main point is you grew up together 

however, after like the fourth grade

you both somehow decided that you were too cool for each other despite the fact that your crush on him was still there 

there was something so mesmerizing about the fact that 

he never truly ever demeaned you as a person??? like yes he was a tease and you guys always did those things to each other

but for a kid, he was always somewhat of a gentleman and would never make fun of you to deliberately hurt your feelings 

unfortunately doe, in middle school, your group of friends completely changed

and although you guys sort of had the same status in school of being popular but very, very laidback, and your groups of friends acquainted with one another, your interactions would be saying hi, making small talk when you were with a handful of other people and smiling at each other as you pass by the halls 

back then, you would walk home together every single day and spend time doing homework in the bedroom of one of you two 

but as the grades went on and the workload increased, you found music and student council and volleyball whereas he found track and basketball and dance

his family went through troubles and he found it difficult to talk to people at times 

and you were so busy with finding a job and saving up for post-secondary that you spent after school with your clubs or in the library studying

timing and interests for you guys were extremely unparalleled and eventually, things just grew apart before high school began 

and oh dear

high school

periods? check. acne? check. hormones? check. grOWTH SPURTS? check.

now, reader, entering high school, you only had one rule: forget. about. jeon. jungkook.

and it wasn’t like he was being a dick or anything to you, you just didn’t find any way that you guys would work out anymore

despite being best friends and literally showering together when you were 7 and your parents are best friends, you just never ever have proper conversations anymore, and things just naturally got awkward

and also life lesson for u guys omg so philosophical what it wasn’t anyone’s fault, you guys just happened to no longer have the same interests or the time to notice each other anymore - people drift apart. it happens. 

and you were so okay with coming to terms with that 

until

“oh my gosh is that jeon jungkook?”

“he... grew muscles?”

“giRL HIS HAIR”

“puberty hit him like a freight train???”

the morning of sophomore year, after a whole first year of properly avoiding him and being absolutely sure that he wasn’t going to get hot (jungkook is juST A LATE BLOOMER OK LEAVE HIM ALONE), you turned your head to the front doors and felt the wind get knocked out of you 

bc walking in with his friends, with the school uniform seemingly perfectly snug and hugging every one of his curves

was jungkook

and for some reason

yes he looked more mature and yes he got fucking MANLIER

but you were instantly reminded of something that clicked in you when you saw that 6 year old boy stuck in the sofa on the very first day he moved in next to you

was it that innocence? was it the charm? was it the hair-swept-away-from-face thing? you diDN’T KNOW 

but girl you were gone again 

and listen 

you dated people in freshman year and guys liked you, but you were never the type to chase or to fawn

you were just different from other girls like you would much rather be the type to be the one playing ball than the one in a miniskirt cheering on the team on the sidelines

that’s just who you are, heck you fucking punched a dude that wanted to hug you and say thank you, broke his nose and chipped his tooth like kk y/n

it was just difficult for you to grasp feelings, truly, but for some reason, this guy has just got you so weak???

and for some other reason, jungkook and the reminder and memories of you guys as kids just hits you like a truck and you’re already head over heels once again

and you go into first period to shake off the thought of him but ofc!!! he’s!!!! in!!!! ur!!! first!! period!!! literature!!! ihml!!!

so you take the seat diagonally in the front of him to make sure you don’t get sidetracked in ur favourite class and drool at him the entire time

oNE DAY

you were taking notes from the board, analyzing and reviewing the literary device and short stories before delving into the actual stuff in literature when you dropped your pencil and leaned down to grab it 

when you saw an arm reach down first 

and hand it to you 

you looked up 

and you guessed it 

biTCH IT WAS JUNGKOOK AND he had such a warm and friendly smile 

and you could barely say anything 

because on one hand you were like oh i’m glad he still remembers who i am??? like ffs? but your other side is like oh my god oh my god oh my god 

so weeks go by and every single day you feel such a burning sensation at the back of ur neck like fufufufuffufufu he’s RIGHT THERE

and jungkook isn’t that type to be extremely boisterous and loud and obnoxious even if he’s hot shit 

so you weren’t worried about him bothering you whatsoever after that like that was a fluke, he was being nice, whatever, it’s done 

a couple weeks go by and you’re starting to feel better now, thinking you’ve got this crush thing under control

until

silent reading time 

you were just assigned a new book by your favourite author! and you couldn’t wait to begin the book reports on these 

so you dove into the world of fire-breathing dragons and mystical knights and creatures beyond reality

when you felt a poke on your neck

and you had no idea what it was? you were so engulfed in the story that you just scratched and left it, not thinking twice

and then you felt it again

it took you a second, but it hit you

and it hit you hard

you turned your head around slowly and your heart was beating so fast

your eyes fall on a small pink sticky note, folded into a plane, dropped on your shoulder

you don’t even DARE LOOKING BAC K AT HIM BC U KNOW UR HANDS AR E SHAKING TOO HARD AND IF YOU SEE HIM YOU MIGHT ACTUALLY DROP DEAD

so you open it, careful to make no noise in the silent classroom

and on the single sticky note it read:

“it’s good to see you again. i’m so so glad you’re in my class.”

you sneak a tiny glance back at the boy behind you, your face flushing with heat and memories 

and from behind his book, he looks up and gives you the tiniest, warmest smile you’ve ever received 

you folded the paper once more and fit it in your pocket and returned to your dragons and knights and witches, all the while smiling like a fool to yourself because maybe, just maybe, you didn’t really drift apart that much at all 

hi guys!! so sorry for the late update, hope you enjoy thisssss:)

also side note: just because it’s valentine’s day (i mean i dont celebrate this) doesnt mean that you need a significant other! buy yourself some hershey’s, make some tea, snuggle up with a teddy bear and a blanket, and switch on some netflix. today is any other day, so don’t demean yourself and your experience with this day because of your status! 

alsoooo don’t wanna get a little preachy but, in this au i kind of hint at the fact that the y/n or reader is someone very tomboyish and doesn’t really seem to find herself chasing after boys. in no way am i trying to vocalize the fact that just because you’re of a certain nature, your personality towards boys reflects that. this is just a fictional work of how one might feel (presumably me lolz) when realizing feelings for someone they truly loved at one point. just because a woman who is normally tougher on the exterior has a sudden soft spot for a boy does not indicate that she’s lost sense of herself or that she succumbs to a boy. just because a woman is a certain way because of a boy that makes her feel different doesn’t mean she is any less of a woman herself. everyone is obligatory to their feelings, and how women choose to express themselves sexually or emotionally to a man they love is their own personal choice as long as they are within consent and are safe. everyone’s decisions and behaviours in love are consensual and their own - that does not demean them as a feminist in any way, shape or form. remember that. 

have fun, y’all, uSE PROTECTION, and i love u!!!

I am the anon who asked about nexplanon. I thought it could trigger you, that's why I didn't go into details. I wanted to know if it stops your period or if you are still bleeding? Hope I've been more clear.

Gonna write out a fuckton of details, putting the important things in bold…and then put a completely bolded TL;DR at the end:

I really appreciate the not wanting to trigger me. I thought maybe that was why you didn’t go into detail. That is really respectful and I really appreciate it, but for future reference for you and anyone: If it is medical, scientific, or for educational purposes and does not reference my parts sexually or treat me or my parts as sexual objects and I still remain male in the eyes of whomever is asking me questions, I don’t mind explicit detail.

I really appreciate that, though.

As for the answer….It’s a little complicated.

This is my replacement nexplanon. I had one for three years prior to this one. I got my replacement one put in on 11/22/2017.

With my FIRST nexplanon…the first three years I had it…I didn’t bleed at all. The one and ONLY time I spotted (did not get a full period and did not get ANY associated symptoms…just simply spotted) was when living with my ex-girlfriend and her husband. My ex had VERY alpha-essque hormones. I spotted tiny, tiny bit when living with Chelle but it was so unnoticeable that I didn’t even have to use a pad.

It is completely normal for anyone with female parts that has nexplanon to actually get a full period (even with all the associated symptoms) for the first few months after insertion… And, IF I UNDERSTOOD MY NURSE RIGHT…..(I may not have, coz I’ve been in a total daze this past week+), it’s even possible for people with the appropriate female parts to have full periods with associated symptoms every month on time for the entirety of their time with nexplanon. But every single person I’ve talked to who has nexplanon said that’s really not a thing and their periods, if they got them AT ALL, went away almost immediately after the first few months.

I have a bleeding/clotting disorder that especially affects my periods (and is also something I have to alert tattoo artists to which is why a lot of my tats come out unfinished). When I got my first period at the age of…maybe 13? I was hospitalized because I clotted so badly and I almost bled out entirely. They suggested I take my uterus out immediately because this wasn’t something that was going to go away and I would need to be on a VERY STRONG BC for the rest of my life that either eliminated bleeding/clotting altogether or made it to where I bled/clotted like a normal person’s period, which would still be awful. ALSO, my periods last approximately 2 weeks, give or take a couple days each time. This is normal for my entire family on my mother’s side…it would put my mom and her mom and their mom before that and all my mom’s sisters out of work and out of school and stuff the entire time every month of their period. They didn’t have it as severe as me because they didn’t have the bleeding/clotting disorder to worry about. But they did have as severe cramping as I had that was as bad, if not worse, than labour pains (spoken from women in my family who have been through it, some multiple times). They DIDN’T have something that I didn’t get until my late teens, early 20′s…and on… until I got my nexplanon. The psychological effects of the period. Every single time I got my period, I would wind up in a hospital the day before I actually got it because of the most extreme and impulsive suicide attempts you can imagine. I have NEVER felt such extreme psychological instability as I have when on my period. It’s like…every single disorder I have gets amplified by a million and they all clash and I’m unable to control anything and suddenly my body and mind act on their own and I’m no longer in control and I black out and wake up in a hospital or while being dragged, kicking and screaming, down the hall by orderlies to the floor with a ward on it. The hallucinations, the BPD symptoms, the other schizo symptoms, the homicidal and suicidal symptoms usually being taken over by suicidal, the self harm urges, the inability to make decisions for myself, the panic attacks while all of this is happening, flashbacks to rapes and being in wards and being trapped and sex training and all sorts of different things that i cant remember, …the list goes on and on. ALL AT ONCE. I just wake up and get FLOODED with all of these things all at once and Killian shuts down and idk what or who takes over but whatever does instantly goes for the most dramatic, impulsive, instantaneous, shocking, grandiose, suicidal gesture you could ever imagine that always seems to be in public (lets break a glass mirror in public with your brass knuckles and slit our wrists and throat open with a huge shard where everyone can see, why don’t we!?) so I mean, you can only imagine how many times I’ve been thrown right on the ground by a cop and cuffed and taken in. This is usually the day BEFORE my period. Also, I starve on my period. I starve naturally coz I’m anorexic…but it takes willpower to starve during non-period times and times when I’m sober..During my period…I can’t eat anything coz I always feel nauseated, my two lower quadrants are always in such intense throbbing or stabbing pain that I’m writhing and screaming despite heating pads and normally a dilaudid or fentanyl drip at the hospital, the thought, smell, and visual effect of food makes me feel….full? Idk how to describe… It’s not nauseated. But it makes me feel so full that I couldn’t force myself to eat even if I wanted to. And since my period lasts a MINIMUM of two weeks, give or take a couple days, I usually end up on IV nutrients, too.

I’m explaining all of this because I’m needing to explain WHY it is so important that I chose nexplanon over…say…The Pill or an IUD or something. I’ve heard that the Depo Provera shot works for people who can’t handle nexplanon and vice versa. Well, when I tried the Depo Provera shot, I wound up having the effects of an anti-depressant on me…in other words, it made me so insatiably suicidal that I ended up in a ward within a couple hours of getting the shot. Depo worked HORRIBLY on me…I didn’t even get to see if it worked for any of my period symptoms coz it had to be flushed from my system entirely coz of the EXTREME psych effects it had on me.

But Nexplanon….Nexplanon was my saving grace.

Coz not only did I literally NEED the bleeding/clotting to stop….But I NEEDED ALMOST ALL of the associated symptoms to stop. I think the only things that weren’t either life threatening or debilitating were mild acne that happened very rarely each period (never really had to deal with acne in my life) and the bloating/water retention. Very specific, certain mood swings associated with periods were something not life threatening or debilitating either. Just…annoying and a total bitch to everyone around me hahahaha. I slayed with my words and popped off on anyone…Yikes. But it wasn’t like my BPD mood swings where 0 to 100 in less than a second on being euphoric and suicidal almost simultaneously.

I explained all of that because I need everyone to realize I chose nexplanon and not anything else because almost everything about my period (the bleeding/clotting AND almost ALL associated symptoms) were life threatening AND debilitating and had almost killed me so many times, it was terrifying. Since my parents obviously did not agree to get my uterus taken out and since I haven’t had the money to get mine surgically removed and donated to a wonderful transgirl (got three of you lovely ladies in mind! you all know who you are!)…I needed a BC medication that was going to stop EVERYTHING. Not just “the period”. But the ENTIRE period. The bleeding/clotting and ALL associated symptoms.

That BC was either Depo Provera shot or Nexplanon. One works, the other doesn’t…it seems to be that way with everyone. I tried Nexplanon first. That worked well. I forget why I tried Depo inbetween but you just read how nearly fatal that was for me…

ANYWAYS…

So this is my second time on it. As I said, It was put in on 11/22/2017. 

The removal and replacement went smoothly and it’s been going smoothly……..until this month.

What I am experiencing is normal for a NORMAL PERSON. A NORMAL PERSON with a NORMAL PERIOD would be okay with these symptoms. Problem being….Idk what symptoms are associated with what because:a) I’m switching my migraine medication to something that causes certain side effects until it levels out in my systemb) I’m having what a normal person would consider a full periodc) Optical and chronic migraines are happening simultaneously and they are debilitating to the point of making me bed-ridden if I don’t take my old migraine med along with this new one (which I’m not supposed to be doing)d) I’m getting a rheumatoid diagnosis and seeing a rheymatologist soon (they’re gonna probably schedule me tomorrow for a week to a month out…month at the longest) for either a lupus or fibro diagnosis, but they’re also going to check for hyperalgesia presenting in the kicked puppy/”flinching disorder” way and there are a FUCKTON of new symptoms I’m experiencing because of whatever this auto-immune disorder or rheumatoid virus (or both) is and my period actually could be happening BECAUSE of all of thise) I added a new exercise regime in when I really haven’t exercised every day and night consistently since I got diagnosed with chronic costochondritis for fear of cardiac arrest, which I fear even more now that I’m on a med that makes it to where I can’t sweat, BUT….exercise is good for joint/muscle disease/virus/pain/etc etc etc…f) I’m under a LOT of stress and pressure regarding so many things but right now it’s primarily school…getting into a pre-med tailored general biology major and a good university to switch to a medical major and pass the MCAT and do a FUCKTON of things simultaneously in order to get into medical school (trust me, you have NO idea how many non-scholastic things you HAVE to do to even be considered an applicant at p much every med uni)… I mean, I’m enrolled in three different colleges right now and I’m taking 6 vet tech related medical classes right now and will be taking 2 general ed classes on campus 45 minutes from here to finish a different degree…so I will have two associates band a bachelors by the time I’m moving on to my doctorate (coz med majors don’t get their masters, we just move from bachelors to doctorate for some reason)g) FAFSA is another time constraint stress that is KILLING ME and scholarships and such….h) Getting into the “back to work” program with disability, trying to find a job, trying to find internships, keeping up with seminars, paperwork stacked a mile high that is all deadline, deadline, DEADLINE…I’m going to a bazillion, million doctors who are all 3+ hours away and a lot of them are turning me away at the end of the visit because they “just don’t know what to do” and “this is above [my] pay-grade” so specialists refer me to other specialists who just refer me RIGHT BACK to those other specialists and then it’s an argument on whose specialty it is because the symptoms are literally from head to foot in me and no one knows what the fuck to do to help until I see a rheumatologist so it’s MORE THAN STRESSFUL driving 6+ hours almost every day of the week to go through extensive medical exams and testing only to be told they can’t help me/don’t know what to do/recommend…….and refer me someplace else….. and also all the hospital visits I’m ending up having to endure… alone… because my roommates are an “every man for themselves” type of roommate situation….i) Being put on a new medication I’ve never tried before, Lyrica, and playing around with the dosage myself and pushing it up to 600mg a day sometimes when I’m prescribed 200mg a day (100/100 day/night) and the max legal dose for my issues is 300mg/day…not to mention I’m not being consistent with it at all…and I was supposed to titrate up from 25mg to 75mg because it can affect my psych issues the first month but I just started on 200mg per day anyways coz I’m an idiot and have a self-medication problem (hence why tons of psychs have discharged me…rightfully so)j) moving in general and getting adjusted to new roommates and a new state and a new city and a new environment in general….k) getting used to a new style of support that I WANT AND NEED OVERALL but can’t handle and don’t need specifically right now when I’m just now getting diagnosed and transitioning through all these things…L) my HRT doc finally cleared me for T after working with her and the HRT board with PPH because it was dangerous with my psych issues….and then all of a sudden all of these physical issues popped up, forcing me not only to change my entire moving plans, living plans, schooling plans, autonomy timeline, Echo timeline, screwed with my financial stability I had going on MAJORLY, a TON of other things….and then ONCE AGAIN…barred me from being eligible for HRT because it isn’t safe anymore and until I get a full, complete workup and diagnosis, as well as find out what medications I’m going to be on and the dosage and they level out in my system and we all see how they’re going to affect me…….HRT is not an option….so I have to wait EVEN LONGER….to transition….M) relations with my parents became more strained than ever lately which is odd because normally being away and being unable to be physically abused makes things better and healthier between us…but suddenly, I’VE become the abusive one…. I’m fucking lashing out at my mother every chance I get and that’s normal for chronic illness diagnosis and stuff but blacking out due to anger is not… and idk where the anger black outs are coming from…and there are other black outs…N) Shit going on with my grandparents that SHOULDN’T be going on as well as with my father that SHOULDNT be going on and only people who truly know my father and me and what has gone on between us and who he really is can comment on this (which those people I can count on one hand), but I hope to god he dies before I can get to him…Jesus fucking christO) ……I can’t go on with specifics anymore, I’m bad with list but SUFFICE IT TO SAY…..

I HAVE A FUCKTON OF STUFF GOING ON SIMULTANEOUSLY AND I’M DOING ABOVE A NEUROTYPICAL LEVEL OF ADULTING EVERY SINGLE DAY. Like….WAY above. Above an able-bodied level of adulting, too! Above a neurotypical, able-bodied person’s adulting workload every day…. Which is scary.

I’m mentioning all that because all of that is apparently stress related. Apparently if there is enough stress in your body, it can release certain hormones. And those hormones, if powerful enough…like…if the stress is powerful enough…can cause a period in people. For people who aren’t on BC, it can cause them to have it at irregular times (ie; having it right after having finally stopped it… having it twice in one month…having it once in 3 months….etc etc etc).

That list is the major things I can think of off the very top of my head that are going on with me at this very moment… It is POSSIBLE that all of that is the cause of me having a normal person’s flow and all associated symptom’s at a normal person’s level.

WHAT I MEAN WHEN I SAY NORMAL PERSON: I mean… A normal flow as in… +NOT going through over one of the biggest maxi pads available every half hour/using a singular biggest maxi pad available maybe every 6-8 hours, +NOT being bed-ridden due to cramps/being able to stand up and walk and walk up and down stairs on my own when I have cramps and be out and about if I NEED to and stand the duration of a shower with cramps, being able to eat if I need to, +having zofran or phenergen work when nauseated, +having actual acne that I clawed to shreds with my nails so it’s very noticeable (I’ve had acne less than 10 times in my entire life so it’s a little distressing to see it on my face coz idk how to deal with it, but I had to claw at it until the convex forms turned concave and started gushing blood…so now it looks like two, big, perfectly round, bright red, blood-coloured spots on my face that I claw open every morning till they bleed and claw at during the day and smother in neosporin during the night), +the clotting is about half the size of my fits and comes out only when I pee/sit on the toilet (normally, the clots are the size of my fits or bigger, which is why a D&C surgery is necessary if it were happening again, but my hands are very small…VERY small…probably smaller than President Tiny Hands…so half the size is not that bad),+Bloating/water retention to where my pants/shirts don’t even fit but my weight hasn’t gone up…but, man, it hurts my soul and my mind so badly that it makes me want to hurt myself for self loathing purposes which I haven’t wanted to do in a long time and kill myself for being obese and hideous despite the fact I know this is temporary.+Mild headaches/NOT MIGRAINES OR HEADACHES THAT HAVE ANY SORT OR LIGHT OR SOUND SENSITIVITY,+NORMAL mood swings that are not akin to BPD or bipolar disorder at all and aren’t bad enough to cause any fights, either with others or with myself,+NO Suicidal thoughts or suicidal ideation…No instantaneous suicide attempts…no insatiable self harm urges,+This may be specific to me, but cravings for weird things like the feel of blood or the smell of the ocean,+Either an entire lack of appetite or a voracious appetite+Putting off adult responsibilities with a NORMAL amount of guilty conscious applied to it and not a “Jesus fucking christ, you’re absolutely useless, ON TOP of being obese and ugly, you really DO need to kill yourself RIGHT NOW because look at all the things you need to do and you’re not, you lazy piece of shit child” but more of a “You’re being lazy lol, but it’s okay…tomorrow is a new day. Fuck it. Fuck being an adult. I am NOT adulting today!”+INTENSE craving for chocolate…ALL the time… Like, not cheap chocolate, either. Like… mandarin orange infused godiva chocolate… All day, every day. Fuck.+Breasts swelling to almost a whole new cup size. Been having a hard time using the normal sized chest binder I use because my breasts swelled or retained water/milk/whatever so much. I don’t think they hit C’s, but my smaller B-cup bras which is what I normally wear to bed didn’t fit. Regular sized B-cups are normally WAY too loose on me to wear to bed and my girls will slip out during the night so I always have to find the tight, little girls training B-cups instead of, like…the ladies. I can fit into an A, but it’s just slightly too tight and a little too uncomfortable, unfortunately. I was an A my whole life until I got on antipsychotics. Hopefully T will bring them down to the smallest A possible and I can go down in my binder size.+Heightened sensitivity to pain and heat

Here’s a lack of symptoms I have entirely despite the fact I have my period that normally accompany MY period which also make this a “normal” person’s period:+No homicidal thoughts/desires/actions (thoughts past the normal)!+No suicidal thoughts/desires/actions (thoughts past the normal)!+No impulse spending to the point of spending the entirety of your money.+No sudden development of bipolar disorder but only for the duration of your period (a psych has confirmed this with me and gone over it with me and why I am bipolar on my period and not BPD and how this can be and how it is similar to a drug induced mental disorder, ie; drug induced schizophrenia, so I’m not just like…pulling this out of the blue, I swear lololol)+An ability to remain calm and level headed during arguments or fights if there even are any and turn things into a debate or a joke/satirical conversation instead of an argument like I normally do+No sudden surge of a loss of interest in things I love (which was hard to do to begin with since I lost everything I loved to depression over the years so this feeling of losing my passions during my periods was very soul crushing)+No getting triggered by noise, like… Being mentally overloaded by noise everywhere. I know there’s a word for this and it’s normally associated with autistic people but I’m blanking coz I’m not autistic and I don’t usually experience this and a cacophony of noise actually soothes me usually, tbh…lol.+No being overly sensitive to other people’s words and actions and no reading into and over-analyzing everything everyone says and does+No extreme panic attacks that are actually mental based and not physically based (I have panic disorder, which means I don’t get any sort of mental symptoms with my panic attacks because panic disorder does not have any association with anxiety or anxiety attacks or panic attacks that are caused by mental stuff… so my panic attacks are always purely physical…during my period, they can be started mentally…which is impossible for me otherwise)+No odd fears popping up that I overcame a long time ago (ie; phone phobia making me have a panic attack if someone calls me and making me unable to answer the phone or call anyone I need to, balloon phobia, needle phobia…actually, you know, I’m still not quite over balloons yet…I thought I overcame it about like…4 or 5 years ago but then my coworkers tied balloons to my car doors as a prank and I had a panic attack and broke down crying and had to have one of them come cut them off for me lolololol…so idk about that one, but you get my examples, right?)+No losing the conscience I have built up over the years and maintained so that I can force myself to stay away from being abusive and neglectful to people I love (ie; gaslighting, manipulation, coercion, pressure, charm, using my unique charisma for evil, threats, homicidal actions, conditioning, etc etc etc…) which comes with being BPD since I cannot feel empathy or sympathy and cannot “put myself in someone else’s shoes” due to ANOTHER disorder so I have made my own conscience and I lose it during my period because it’s made up and I have to be very self aware to keep it in place coz I don’t have a conscience naturally like most people do.+No hallucinations, auditory and/or visual+No catatonic moments+No psychosis, temporary/intermittent or permanent enough to need intervention+No purposefully making a dramatic scene in public in order to elicit a response from professionals and the crowd around me to come try to take me away to a ward so I can fight them+No lying without even realizing I’m doing it or meaning to about REALLY weird things to get attention (The things I lie about without realizing I’m doing it until after I’ve already done it while I’m on my period are INSANE!!!! It can range from something as innocent and benign as like… lying about the weather to a long distance friend…”Yeah, it’s raining outside. So nice.” When it’s fucking sunny as hell and making me miserable??? To something as big and severe as “I have a gun pointed at my head right now. I’m ready to do it. I have nothing left to lose.” Bitch, I can count the number of times I’ve held a gun to my head on one hand and it’s a VERY low number because it’s always been my dad’s gun and I’ve only been honest about holding a gun to my head to like… my ex girlfriend and one of my friends. That’s it. Yet, I have said this line so many times on my period without even realizing it until after I’ve said it and when it’s already been said it’s kind of a *shrug* “Welp…oh well…I guess…Too late to correct it…” sorta thing…So I go with it and just put on a whole act and it feels totally normal when I’m on my period??? My period turns me into a really fucking crazy, manipulative, evil little boy…)+Trying to steal the spotlight from others irl to get attention on me (ie; I can’t think of a real example, so I’m making up one: A coworker blacks out during a shift so they have to call 911…when the paramedics arrive, I go start unloading boxes, using one of those retractable blade thingies to open the boxes, while everyone is watching our pale, actually in distress coworker be loaded onto a gurney… I would go as far as to literally stab myself or slice a VERY deep wound in my hand or even chop the front part pad of a finger off (which I really have done before) just so I can scream (for real coz it hurts and it makes me yelp in surprise) so that everyone will turn their attention onto me and one of the paramedics will grab me and take me with them in the ambulance and I will go to the hospital with them and get all the “Omg are you okay? What happened? Did [x] really happen? Were you really in the hospital? Omg blah blah blah ATTENTION blah blah” as soon as I get back and it will rip ALL the attention away from the coworker who actually deserved it and actually needed…that’s not an actual example, I made that up, but I would not be surprised in the least if I did something like that while on my period if I were working rn and this happened)+Impulse stealing from corporate stores just for the adrenaline rush and to shove it to “the man”+Majority of my life, it was Cry and sob and cry and sob and writhe and pull my hair out and claw at myself and sob with full body shakes because of how much mental pain I was in because suicidal feelings definitely overpowered homicidal, but now and before my original nexplanon was put in 4 years ago…like…the very very very last period I had…Going out and looking for a fight with strangers…a physical fight…that I damn well know I will lose coz I’m a 5′2″ obese boy with absolutely NO muscle… SIMPLY TO GET MY ASS BEAT AND FEEL THOSE ENDORPHINS RUSH AND FEEL THE ADRENALINE PUMP AND THEN DIE OUT (similar to cutting)… Or just go to a bar and get in the most gruesome bar fight ever… Or find a human-like substance… and stab it over and over with a knife and beat it in with brass knuckles… Threaten people with knives… Etc etc etc …. Basically a bunch of homicidal stuff that I experienced the first two days of my period but now it’s gone coz the homicidal definitely overpowers the suicidal now+Such extreme apathy AND lethargy that I could lose whatever job I have at the time, go from a solid 4.0 to failing all my classes, and lose placement and lose progress in absolutely EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING I’m attending/working towards/doing/etc+The extreme apathy and lethargy bleeds into self care, too. No showering, no brushing your teeth, no washing your hands, etc etc etc…

I can’t think of anything else, but there’s probably more…Idk. But Anyways…EVERYTHING ABOVE IS SUPPOSED TO BE MASKED MY NEXPLANON COMPLETELY!

What I am CURRENTLY experiencing…is the first list. The one prior to the one right above this one. Normal bleeding/clotting and a normal level of psychological and other physical symptoms.

However…this has never happened to me before…

During my first three years with my first nexplanon, it took less than the first month for ALL of my symptoms to go away and I didn’t even spot the first month. That’s kinda what it was like up until JUST NOW with the nexplanon. No spotting or associated symptoms or ANYTHING until….literally just a few days ago…Maybe even a week ago now. The bleeding has slowed to the point where I don’t need anything other than a thin pad now. The cramping has slowed to where I don’t need a heating pad all the time. The mood swings are gone… I’ll admit, the first two days I got my period, I wanted to kill myself so badly and I most certainly did self harm. I slit the fuck outta my wrists and was SO CLOSE to going for the 20-minute-kill-zone. But I didn’t. Thank GOD I didn’t do it…Also, the first two days were abnormal for me in the fact that I wanted to eat EVERYTHING. NONSTOP. I was SO HUNGRY. Normally my period makes me so nauseated and makes me want to stay away from food so adamantly that I can’t even force myself to eat to stay alive so, like I said, I usually end up on IV nutrients in the hospital during the second week… My hunger returned to normal level on the third day and then has gone to the forcing myself to eat to stay alive bit now because I’m never hungry and I’m looking at food either makes me feel full or nauseated. Smelling food definitely makes me feel nauseated unless it’s chocolate. Lmaoooo! I am prescribed both phenergen and zofran for different reasons, though, so I just pop some zofran and it normally takes care of it to where I can force myself to eat something to stay alive or to not have a hypoglycemic attack. Coz now if I don’t eat something (even if it’s just a fucking spoonful of peanut butter or a cup of orange juice or a bar of chocolate—listing those 3 things coz they’re the top three best things to bring someone out of hypoglycemic shock) within 24 hours, I will notice my blood sugar bottom out and I will go into hypoglycemic shock and if I don’t immediately take care of it, I need to be hospitalized. Which is why I ALWAYS have chocolate on hand and ALWAYS have orange juice in the house. Don’t always have peanut butter on hand…but I should. I also have chronically low blood pressure and for some reason that affects my blood sugar and how easily it can crash and such? I’m not quit sure how (med student here and I have no idea the physiology of this stuff lol….wow) but I have to pay SUPER SPECIAL ATTENTION to BOTH of those things (blood sugar and blood pressure) during my period…because if my BP bottoms out and I don’t get help, I go into a coma. God forbid it fucking happens while I’m sleeping which…since I take metropolol (migraine med which drops my BP coz it’s a BP med) before bed and go to sleep with ambien which lowers my BP double (ambien and sleeping lowers your BP) AND IF I’M ON MY PERIOD ON TOP OF THAT….my BP will just plummet…and if I’m sleeping, there’s no chance at getting help or found or anything… I’ll just go straight to a coma. Same with hypoglycemia. Which is why I make sure ESPECIALLY ON MY PERIOD to eat something chocolate or peanut butter or both…and drink a bit of orange juice before bed…just in case. Coz being in hypoglycemic shock is scary af…the few times I have been…being TOTALLY helpless like that…totally disoriented… totally at the mercy of whomever finds you…feeling yourself slipping away…. unable to call or move for help…that’s TERRIFYING. Lemme tell you…and MY PERIOD CAN MAKE THAT 20x WORSE. JFC.

So….

Tl;Dr: Yes, I’m bleeding this month… 3 months after getting it put in. I’m having what would be considered a “normal person’s” period with a “normal person’s” symptoms…nothing I’ve ever experienced myself with my own period. So this is a fucking miracle period, but it still sucks and is still terrifying.I chose Nexplanon because no other BC (other than I’ve heard Depo does this for some people?) not only stops the bleeding/clotting COMPLETELY, but also stops ALL associated symptoms, both physical and mental/emotional/psychological. Which…almost ALL (I can’t stress ALL enough; there’s barely any that ARE NOT) symptoms associated with a period have the potential to be fatal to me, including the mental/emotional/psychological ones. So a BC that stopped them all entirely is what I needed since my parents wouldn’t consent to taking my uterus out via surgery which is what doctors recommended over and over and over again and when I became an adult, it was too costly and is STILL too costly. So Nexplanon + the T I’m going to be getting on are a beautiful combination for stopping EVERYTHING.Apparently, it is NORMAL to have a period the first few months on Nexplanon, albeit I did not experience this with my first nexplanon and only experienced true spotting ONCE with my first nexplanon the first 3+ years I had it in when my hormonal alpha female ex-gf got her fullblown period and I was living with her and her husband and sleeping in the same bed as her. I only got spotting. No associated symptoms, physical or psychological.This time around, I am having what would be considered a normal period for a neurotypical person with no uterine problems or vaginal problems or bleeding disorders (I have vaginismus, too, so that factors in somewhere).The bleeding seems to have stopped entirely today, making it last around maybe 5-6 days, which I think is the “normal” time for a “normal” person. 

Most associated symptoms have left. The ones that remain are: Bloating, Breast swelling, Aching/Sore body (but that could be associated with the lupus/fibro/hyperalgesia diagnoses going on with me because the joints are the worst with sore-ness and aching),Mild, spontaneous headaches,Extreme heat sensitivity,Acne (but that could be because I literally clawed both spots open with my nails until they started gushing blood and now I keep clawing them open every morning and all the time throughout the day….so I mean..??? I’ve never dealt with acne. Idk how to deal with it. I’m just putting neosporin on at night.)

I am expecting these things to go away… The headaches, aching/soreness, and heat sensitivity could be associated with other illnesses going on with me that I’ve never dealt with before and don’t know what to expect. But I know damn well the bloating and breast swelling is from this…and I know the acne is from this, as that was confirmed by a doctor (coz I was scared about it being from something else) but I think it just hasn’t gone away because I keep clawing at it and making it bleed. If they don’t go away in a week, I’m gonna let my gyno know and see what she can do/recommends.

The first two days of this were ALMOST as rough, psychologically, as my normal period and the cramps and clotting put me in the hospital and warranted a high dosage morphine shot, 800mg of ibuprofen (and a script for it) and a hydro (and a script for it). 

The ONLY thing I’m worried about recurring other than the cramps and clotting and psychological symptoms is that… I don’t know if the physical black outs are related to my period or if they are related to my auto-immune disorder (lupus/fibro/hyperalgesia) because when I first got diagnosed with a joint-related virus, where they took x-rays that showed a virus of some sort was physically eating away my joints…I was literally blacking out for a couple seconds every 5-15 minutes. That was about a month ago. Now I have almost a full solid diagnosis, but I’ve thrown two new medications into the mix (Lyrica, which I’ve never been on before, and Topamax, which this is my 6th or 7th time being on) and a lot of new things/stressors/lifestyle changes in general… but the other day. ..maybe 3 days ago now? 2? It happened again. Blacking out for very short amounts of time…approximately 10 seconds every 5-15 minutes…but towards the end of the day, I blacked out so badly that I was out for a solid 20 minutes, give or take, and since I blacked out in the kitchen, my head either hit the tile floor or a counter when I went down and since I have a bleeding disorder AND it was head wound, even though it was barely even a surface scratch at all (it’s practically healed now, 2-3 days later), it bled badly enough in those 20 minutes or so that when my roommates came home and found me blacked out in the kitchen, there was a small pool of blood around my forehead. One of them was panicking and had me in his arms and was shouting LEON! LEON! WAKE UP! LEON! OMG ARE YOU OKAY!? WHAT HAPPENED!? CAN YOU HEAR ME!? LEON!!! Meanwhile, he turns to his boyfriend while I’m slowly coming to as he’s shaking me and shouting one of my many nickname’s at me…and he tells his bf to call 911…which is when I snapped out of it (sort of) and used a Scully catchphrase and pushed myself off of my friend and held up an accusatory finger to his boyfriend and was like …quoting that artwork of Scully in the jacket that I love, saying in a very slurred voice “Stand aside! I’m a medical doctor!” Which…lmao. I started giggling. They didn’t get the reference coz they’re not Philes… But I managed to make them understand to please not call 911… That was the last time I blacked out that day…but it was for a solid 20 minutes and I had been blacking out and throwing up all day that day…experiencing both chronic AND optical migraines simultaneously… the clots were bigger than ever and I could feel the flesh being ripped from my uterine wall and slowly oozing out of my vagina. It was the worst feeling. They were almost as big as my fist at this point. And I was so lightheaded and experiencing so much vertigo…but I have been experiencing constant vertigo and lightheadedness since this virus hit me and since we started researching into it and looking into lupus and such.

SO I DO NOT KNOW IF THE BLACKING OUT IS ASSOCIATED AT ALL WITH THE PERIOD….OR IF THE PERIOD IS ASSOCIATED WITH THE LUPUS AND SUCH WHICH IS WHAT THE BLACKING OUT IS ASSOCIATED WITH…OR IF BLACKING OUT IS JUST SEPARATE….

And Idk if this period is a one time thing…or if I’m going to get it again…because, although it is nice to experience a “normal person” version of a period, it’s STILL HELL ON EARTH. It’s nice to know my life is not in danger from a normal body function…it’s still awful and my life is in danger via my psyche and how it affects me psychologically very close to the same as my normal period the first day or two days… Idk if I can overcome it and JUST hurt myself the next time I have it.

But it seems to have…stopped…now? Today?

If it happens again next month at the same level, I’m going in to my gyno to talk about other options or to see if there’s a way to get medicaid or the state to pay to get my uterus surgically removed. The state would have paid when I was 13…sigh. Idk if they will now…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To answer your question simply? Nexplanon is supposed to stop your period and ALL associated symptoms COMPLETELY. However, as you know, every person is different and everyone will react differently. I was bleeding and did get a “normal” level period for about 5-6 days that is not entirely gone, but the bleeding has stopped now. This did not happen the first 3+ years I had my first Nexplanon. But this could be attributed to a fuckton of things going on with me (that I explained above for this reason exactly), personally, and may not have anything to do with the Nexplanon itself. 

I hope that answers everything….Coz I put some thorough af work into all of that. Lmao. But if you (or anyone) needs clarification on anything or has any other questions, Nexplanon is kinda one of my maxed out skill trees that I know a whole bunch about, having had it for over 4 years already and am on my second one now. Lol. Feel free to shoot me an ask!

[edmdma.tumblr.com/ask]

Gonna attempt to tag for triggers coz this was sorta graphic if you’re not really into medical things. Tell if you’d like these kinda posts tagged with something specific.

infinities x wormholes (what’s beyond?)

It’s almost June, eh? And I just decided to write now about this event of my life that happened 3 months ago. Sorry, okay? I thought it would be easy to sit down and write everything that I was feeling right after he left. Apparently, it’s not that easy. One thing’s sure though, I am very excited of what’s more there beyond, now that we’ve finally got to meet each other.

Now that you’re reading this part, it means you’re interested to know more, yeah? I guess, it’ll be perfect to have some story time on how we met and how this relationship all started. If you’re a regular reader, you would know how rocky this had been. Not that it’s worth a drama series kind of rocky road though, it wasn’t just that smooth of a ride. Anyhow, if you came from Instagram and just read my blog for the first time from a link there, welcome to Lifenigma and this is how I met Gravity…

Yes, his name here is Gravity, and if you know his real name then just keep it to yourself. I know it, you know it, that’s enough. But here, he is Gravity. Why the nickname? Because no matter how cliché it may sound he has this kind of pull that kept the broken parts of myself that I fixed in their right places intact and together. And I guess, the most important thing that he does is keeping me grounded. When life knocked me down, I’ve kept myself busy learning, no matter what and how, I fed myself with knowledge and wisdom that I never thought I’d ever learn nor stumble upon if 2013 summer shits didn’t happen. Anyway, because of all these new found knowledge, my confidence also shoot up and thanks to him, there are things that I still learned about being responsible with the power of knowledge that I gained. If I even made sense there. LOL.

Gravity always tell me how lucky he is to have found me but quite frankly, it may not seem that I feel so lucky and thankful that I’ve found him too, but I am since that night I replied to him and continued our conversation up until now that I am writing this. And I’m sure that I’ll always be for the rest of my life.

Okay I won’t take this any longer, here’s how we met and knew each other. If you already know the story, I guess it’s just up to you now if you would still read what I’ll be sharing on here. I’m sure I’ve been so cryptic on my first post about us and how on earth we knew each other, it was all just about how I was feeling because I was starting to like him and all those jazz. Read it here if you want to know how cringey I was then. LMAO. In total, I’ve only posted 3 full blog posts (excluding this one) that’s just talking about Gravity and I. So, how did we really meet?

It’s kind of typical, I think? How would a Filipina get to meet a Canadian other than the stereotypical working in a bar? Meeting them on the internet. Yes, and that’s how we met. Do you know Omegle? If yes, then high five! If not, it’s a website where you can talk to anyone and both of you will be totally strangers. You won’t be able to choose who you would get to talk to because the site will be the one to pick a stranger for you. What you can only do there to control who you would be able to talk to is to put your interests or what topics you would want to talk about that moment then the site will look for a random stranger with the same interests for you. For me, it’s actually a nice site especially if you just want someone to talk to because you can fake your name and every personal shit about yourself if you want to. Best thing? You won’t need an account, so you won’t have a username or some shit like that, all you have to do is go to the site of Omegle and boom you can choose if you want to talk with certain topics you want to talk about or if you want to video chat some stranger, it’s all up to you. I almost forgot, there’s also an option if you just want to talk through pure chat or through a video chat. So that’s where we met.

Now of course you would want to know specifics…

Text or Video? Text. Duh, I was just bored and I wanted someone to talk to that time. He knows this so yeah, no big deal. :P

Interests/Topics I put? Books and Music. What topic did we match? Music.

Did we introduced ourselves ahead with our real name? Nope. Age? Nope. Location? And NOPE.

How long did our conversation on Omegle last? About an hour or so I think. I’m sure though that it’s quite long. And it was my first time to talk to someone with so much sense that we actually lasted so long talking without having to pause and think for another topic or something to make the conversation longer.

First, I don’t think we actually talked about music so much before our main topic got so long that we just clicked, I think? What’s the main topic? Political views, I guess if I can remember it right. LOL. I’ll ask him once he got to read this and if he can remember and it wasn’t our political views then I’ll just edit this part to the right one. Hehe. Second, yes, we didn’t introduce ourselves with our true identity on Omegle. Why? Simple, it’s not safe and after all it was just a past time. And apparently, we were just doing the same thing hence we both didn’t give our true name, age and location to each other. Now if you would ask how we knew we’re both lying to each other with all those things? It was when we were already exchanging our Skype usernames. And that’s how it all started.

Since that night (March 9, 2015), we just continued on talking, sharing different knowledge that we both have to each other. I must say that we aren’t really into the same things, but somehow, day after day, we’re like piecing every puzzle piece together and they fit in just right.

I know you’ll be curious when did he get to see me? It took a whole week for me to do that I think? I was shy, okay? My face was full of acne those times and my hair was growing from my very short bob cut. But yeah, when we started talking on Skype, I already saw his face. He had this luscious long brown hair looking so cute that the people in the house gushed how he looked like Leonardo De Caprio for some reason. Yes, I know, they’re overreacting. LOL. I did tell him though that I never saw him that way. However he was indeed really cute, that’s for sure. I still even have copies of print screens of how he looked like those time.

Okay, let’s move on. Story time is over or this will be a whole novel of just me talking about our early days. Haha.  

So, before Gravity’s arrival I’ve posted 2 full blogs about us after the very first entry. One was when we got back together, and if you want to know more about that, you can read that here. And the most recent was my feelings and whatnot about him finally visiting me and if you want to read about that, you can check it out here. Now, how do I feel that I finally met him in person and spent time with him?

I’m thankful.

That’s how I can only sum it all up unpoetically. You know, it wasn’t just happy. It wasn’t just nerve wracking. It wasn’t just scary. And definitely not an experience I’d ever regret. It was everything that I have expected to feel like because that’s how a normal relationship should go. It wasn’t all rainbows and unicorns, that’s for sure. We argued for a couple of times. But that’s normal. As I said, we’re two different individuals hence we have two different opinions at some point that’s why it needed to be discussed upon. You know, weighing our differences and for me that experience was actually a great thing. During the moment, of course I was nervous, I was scared even at some point but eventually when I already got to tell him my side, everything just goes back to being okay and we’ll be on the same page again. I always say this on Twitter and I think it’s time to say it here now since I’m very sure of it already.

COMMUNICATION is the most important factor of any kind of relationship. And while communicating is a must, we should also know how to APPRECIATE. Even the simplest things like giving compliments or simply giving time and effort to message each other. It really goes a long way. COMMUNICATE and APPRECIATE, for me these are the key ingredients to make a relationship work, especially with Long Distance Relationship. Because I know for a fact how easy it is to think of all the what ifs when you don’t get a message or if your partner feels like getting cold on you, oh God knows how easy it is to just get pissed off and be done on handling those kind of treatments especially for girls when our hormones are fucking with our emotions. I think it’s already a common thing to talk about mood swings of girls when they have their period, but I don’t think it’s been talked enough how girls have these bitches in their heads no matter how much they don’t want them messing in there about paranoia and trust issues. It’s weird and wicked and sad but it’s true that it’s in girl’s nature to just easily think of the worse plausible scenario when things are not going the way they want it to be. And honestly, dealing with those bitches in my head is what has been giving me a hard time on being in a Long Distance Relationship. After Gravity’s visit, it became harder to just brush them off in my head when they started kicking in. Hence, I remind myself every single day how important it is to just communicate with him especially during the times when something is really bothering me. He listens and talks to me about it with what he really thinks of what I told him, and for me, that’s worth loads of appreciation because it means both of you are working things out. Being in a relationship is a two seater ride after all where both of you are the navigators that have to be teaming up to reach the destination you both planned on going.

Did I just sound preachy there? I hope not. But yeah, it would be nice though if I actually made sense with what I just said. I mean, our relationship is not perfect but we’re working it out perfectly in my opinion. It’s always nice to wake up every morning with something to look forward to because you know that there’s so much more and you’ll be there when it’s time. Also it’s a wonderful feeling that the word IF is barely being used anymore because most of them have been replaced to WHEN already. :)

By the way if you are here because of The Right Man Will Love Everything the Wrong Man Walked Away From by Rania Naim via @thoughtcatalog — it is linked on the title, just click on it and you’ll be redirected to its page. Sorry if I let you read my love story and all my probably unwanted opinion about relationships, Long Distance relationships at that. But I do hope you enjoyed what you’ve read though. 

Always remember, love is precious. And being in a relationship may not be easy at times but it’s simple. That’s just for me anyway because that’s what I always say to myself even in terms of living life in general.

An IUD-- what to “expect”

So I am a 20 year old female who has never had children before and I wanted to get on birth control. I did a whole lot of research, went to various GYNs, and weighed my options. I get horrible cramps, like keep you in bed, sweating, light headed, blackout, throw up cramps. In 2016, for the first time ever, my cramps were getting better (but that might also be because I was pumping myself full of tylenol and aleve). I was sick and tired of taking medication that I knew we killing my liver and kidneys, I also wised up and realized a 20-year-old sexually active woman should be on birth control.

After my search for birth control, I realized that an IUD would be my best option. I know I’m forgetful so the pill was out, I also have problems with fibroadenomas and hormones, so anything with estrogen was out. My doctors and I came to the decision that an IUD was best for me. I just had to choose between Mirena, Paraguard or Skyla.

All IUDs are recommended for women who have had a child. as stated before I DO NOT.

Mirena is a small, flexible, T-shaped device that is implanted in the uterus. Mirena uses levonorgesterel– a progestin birth control hormone–and slowly releases a small amount into the uterus over time. Because it releases hormones directly into the uterus, it releases a lower level of hormones into the body than oral contraceptive pills. The IUD slows or stops the movement of the sperm and egg by changing cervical mucus, fallopian tubes and the uterine lining. It takes about 7 days for the hormonal IUD to start working, and it remains effective for 5 to 7 years. Mirena is known to lessen periods to the point that it could completely go away.

My other option was a Paraguard. Paragard is also a type of IUD but it is copper and does not have any hormones. It works because it cuts off sperms access to your eggs. Periods tend to worsen with a Paraguard IUD.

My last choice was Skyla. Like Mirena, Skyla releases progestin into the body. Unlike Mirena it is only good for 3 years. As with Mirena, you might experience some changes in your period, including having no period at all but unlike Mirena, some women experience increased menstrual bleeding and discomfort.

*all of the IUD come with side effects such as ovarian cysts, acne, or breast tenderness, or have abdominal or pelvic pain, allergic reaction and a depressed mood that I encourage you to look upon your own*

Because of my already pre-existing cramps, I decided to go with Mirena. As I stated before IUDs are recommended for women who have had a child, this is due to the fact that the device is implanted in the uterus. If you’ve never had a child before your cervix is pretty much completely shut, there are instances of doctors not being able to insert the IUD because they cannot get the cervix open which is an extremely painful process.

I searched the deeps corners of the internet at 2am the day before my procedure and found all these horror stories of terrible pain and cramping for months at a time (you can look these up on your own but I don’t recommend it). I almost backed out. I asked my friends about their experiences because I figured people only went on the internet to tell the horrible ones, and the anxious person I am I just had to know if the procedure and the recovery was as bad as everyone was saying. This is what they had to say:

“Lmao no lie it was shitty afterwards I was spotting like brown stuff for legit 2 months and was crampy, I lived on aleeve. But now? Bitch. Whos a period? I DONT know her. Cramps? Mood swings? Can’t relate. It’s not bad it hurts a little but it’ll be over really quickly” (mirena)

“The insertion was rough honestly, make sure you have a ride back cuz I thought I could walk back from the health center but I couldnt, it feels like intense period cramping. Then for a while afterwards your body goes through trying to reject it since its a foreign object in your body. So your first period after getting it is going to be terrible Im not gonna lie, i deadass thought I needed an ambulance lol and you're gonna spot on and off for a while until the IUD makes a home in your uterus. I wont lie its rough for the first few months until your body gets used to it so be prepared but honestly its the best thing I did. I got the paraguard so its hormone free. I was on birth control pills for so long and i really didnt react well to the hormones. When it comes to contraception I can 100% say the IUD is your best bet. 7-10 years baby free, you can get it taken out whenever you want. Although I will say, your partners may feel the strings that hang from the IUD from certain angels, but its a minor inconvenience compared to a baby LOL” (paraguard)

“so this is actually funny because I’ve unfortunately had nothing but problems since i’ve gotten the IUD. i first got it in December 2015 and i had the worst cramps of my life for a few weeks after and my period of super long lasting like 2-3 weeks. then i went for my 3 month check up and found out my body was rejecting the IUD so i got another put in and it just got worse. i started having ridiculously heavy periods and there were blood clots coming out. i thought i had uterine fibroids or cysts so i went to get an ultrasound and it turns out my body is rejecting the IUD again so i’m getting it removed monday because i’m just not eligible for it, unfortunately, i’m so upset about it because i really wanted it to work and i have friends that love it and have no complaints and it’s just so convenient cause you literally never worry about being pregnant”

“DONT WORRY! getting an IUD was literally the best decision i’ve made. Tthe forums will totally freak you out. and it’s definitely painful, but it just feels like a really bad period cramp that lasts like 30 seconds. i had cramps for at most two weeks after. and they weren’t constant just occasional. and i had like blood spotting for a little more than a month. of course it’s different for everyone! the forums scared me too but i personally feel it was worth it and i’ve had it for a little over 6 months now.”

Admittedly, even though there was some horror mixed in, this felt REAL. So I decided to go to my appointment. If you asked me now, id say it was a quick process, two sharp burst of pain then you’re done. Im on day 3 and I only had cramps for the first half an hour after but I took a tylenol-codiene leftover from a previous surgery before hand and Ive been taking aleve ever since. But when I got out of the procedure heres what I texted my boyfriend: That was the worst pain I’ve ever experienced in my life. So first they had to measure and dilate my cervix and apparently my cervix is small and short so when they opened it i like yelled cuz that shit hurt and that was the first pain and there was blood so she couldn’t see so it took longer then they went to put it in and before it was like cramping then it ended. But when they put this other thing idk what it was I think it was a way for them to slide the IUD in? That hurt so bad I screamed and tears came to my eyes. She said that should be the worst of it because putting in the IUD shouldn’t hurt more because everything was in place so if I could handle that I could handle the IUD. Then she put it in… I screamed and that shit felt like cramping mixed with a fucking knife and there was bleeding so they had to apply pressure and that shit hurt. So like once they were done it was like a dull constant pain. I laid there for a second and then i got dressed. After i got dressed i started shaking and sweating and i fell on the floor and they had to put me in the chair and took my blood pressure and it spiked. Apparently I went into shock. Im in the car rn the codeine finally kicked in but I’m still nauseous and shaky.”

I can’t remember pain, but I dealt with it, the whole procedure was less than 5 minutes and within a half an hour I was feeling better. My vagina was swollen that night but today its fine. I honestly think it was worth it. If the healing process goes well I’ll be ecstatic. Its only day 3 so I don’t want to get ahead of myself but everyone said that this would be the worst time, for me it feels fine. It might be because Im on pain killers but I didnt expect to be this good. I have little to no pain, some spotting but thats to be expected this first month. Im already happy with my decision and I will keep you updated (obviously much shorter lol) on how the healing process is going! Lemme know if y’all have any questions!