Why I pay £6.99 a month on contraception and turn down free contraception.

Hey!

This is a stray away from my usual blog posts about saving money. This one is actually about why I spend £6.99 a month on contraception when usually this is something that is free on the NHS. I’ve had over 10 years experience with this so grab a cuppa, this could be a long one kids.

I am not worried about this post looking bias in any way or giving both sides of an argument. This is purely to detail my experience of contraception and the side effects i’ve experienced. Whats right for one isn’t for the other and so you have to do what’s right for you and your body.

I’d been on the combined pill since I was 15 I think and originally went on it because of some symptoms I was having. Mainly I remember having bad skin although looking back now I think that’s probably a usual teenage thing? I used to also really struggle with period pain. To the point where I would be in bed sweating where sometimes it would get too much. Anyway, maybe the doctor thought I was about that age (sexually active – bloody hate that phrase, makes me cringe so hard) and suggested it for me. What did I know? So off I went to collect my prescription and my symptoms did die down and I was much happier with that side of things. I carried on taking my pill and it didn’t cross my mind until I was 19 and kept forgetting to take the damned thing. It played havoc with my periods and so I started looking into other alternatives. I decided I would opt for the hormonal implant as it lasts for 3 years and I don’t have to think about it going forward.

I booked the appointment at my doctors and it was put in with no problems. I had it for a year and in that time I think I spent the majority of that time having a period. It was horrible. The doctor suggested I should take the hormonal pill alongside still having the implant in as it can help get the body into a normal rhythm. I wasn’t happy to do this at all, I just felt like I would be overloading my body with hormones and didn’t see the point in having the implant in if it wasn’t working for me. So after a battle over 3 appointments trying to convince the doctors that I wanted it out (they were very reluctant and kept saying ‘but what if we take this out and you fall pregnant, what will you do then?), I finally was able to make the appointment to have this removed. Honestly, I can totally be trusted with my own body surely?

The removal didn’t entirely go to plan. I went to my usual GP clinic for this and unfortunately, the implant had bent and snapped so she was unable to retrieve the whole thing. She bandaged my arm back up and made me an appointment at the sexual health clinic where they have nurses that are slightly more experienced in this. I was shitting myself thinking they were going to cut my arm open! But the nurses were lovely and Caine came with me. Eventually after around half an hour it was out and I was back to thinking about what other contraception I could use.

I decided because of my experience with the implant, I should go back to the pill because the side effects weren’t as bad as the ones with the implant. I went to the doctors and discussed the Mini Pill and off I went with another prescription. I tried this however same issue, I was a nightmare for remembering to take it. I tried everything, putting it by my toothpaste, by my bed, by the cereal, in my work drawer. Everything and I just kept forgetting to take it. And it was worse this time around with the Mini Pill because it has to be taken at the same time every day. This just wasn’t working… I needed something that was more permanent.

Then I looked into more options and decided I would try the contraceptive injection. I booked the appointment with the doctor to discuss this and she totally reassured me. I explained everything to her about my experiences before and she said because of the different hormones in the injection, my body might respond better and so it was definitely worth a shot. Literally.

So I booked the appointment and had the injection. I was waiting for some kind of side effect as per usual but had nothing. Could it be? This was too good to be true. I got on really well with it, I didn’t have a period once and stayed on it for a year until I had the news about my fertility levels.

A brief of this is that I had a really strong family history of early menopause. I got in touch with the doctor about it as it was something I was concerned with. It wasn’t within my plans to have children however with such a strong history behind me along with other fertility issues, I decided I needed to seek some advice. The doctor was so lovely and got in contact with a specialist who advised that I have an AMH test done.

*AMH only tests if you would be a good candidate for IVF and isn’t an indicator of exact fertility levels. However as there currently wasn’t a test which could measure what I was looking for, the specialist advised this test would be useful as it would give some indication of fertility levels*

This test took weeks to come back and when it did my levels were really low. My doctor put me up against that of a 40 year old woman – I was 23 at the time! Anything between 20-40pmol/l would be considered satisfactory fertility and anything 40pmol/l and over would be considered optimal fertility. My levels were currently sitting at 21pmol/l so it was quite a shock. I don’t know why but when I went to the doctors I honestly just thought they would tell me I was fine and they had found nothing wrong. It was decided I should have the test done again in a year and then see where we were at.

I had the test done the following year and my levels came back at 23pmol/l so slightly higher but only just within the satisfactory category again. I had a chat with the doctor and he advised that if I was planning a family, within the next few years I should rethink being on the contraceptive injection long term. He advised if my levels suddenly dropped and I needed to think about children right away, the injection could take up to a year to come out of my system which would be time wasted in that situation. So again, off I went with another prescription for the pill.

I let the injection run out and then I went back on the combined pill again. I was on this for around 5 months and then I came across this article Why I came off the pill by Krystal Starkey. It was so refreshing to see a normal girl experiencing these issues talking so openly about it. AND experiencing the same things I had! I spent a few days doing a lot of research into natural family planning, making sure it was definitely the right decision. I came across so much research that to be honest I had no idea what I was looking at. I needed to start at the beginning and learn exactly how a woman’s cycle worked because embarrassingly, I had no idea. During all this research I learned a lot of stuff about my body that I didn’t know before. It was a total eye opener. I looked up lots of ways to monitor fertile times, a lot of them just weren’t for me. One was advising how to chart cervical mucus. Ummm I’m good thanks! I came across so many apps whilst looking through all the research, most of which didn’t actually monitor my body in any way, just went from the dates of previous periods and then provided a ‘guestimate’ of when the fertile time would be. Not being funny here, I don’t really want to put my future and the risk of pregnancy in the hands of an app that guesses? Then I came cross Natural Cycles – the only app certified as a contraceptive in the EU.

I did LOADS of research into it and I read loads of articles for and against Natural Cycles. I was struggling to find one that was totally unbiased that just gave the facts. I looked up the failure rates for Natural Cycles and if used correctly, it is just as effective as the pill. Every article I read that was personally written, were from ladies like myself and who had experienced all of the things I had. They all seemed so similar. I thought to myself, why not. Lets give it a go but proceed very cautiously and be careful. Pregnancy is not something I am willing to risk here!

It works based on an algorithm and the user should input their normal temperature every morning. Natural cycles will then use this information to calculate when the woman’s fertile time will be. Simple! During my research I learned that just before ovulation, a woman’s temperature rises and stays high and this is how ovulation is detected.

At start up, it asks questions about what contraception you were on before and for how long. I think this helps it to create a picture of your body and rhythm. It also accounts for irregularities when coming off of contraception. Once you are all set up its time to buy a basal thermometer. Natural cycles sell these and if you go for the yearly payment option, this includes a thermometer. I was slightly stuck for cash at the time (because saving) and also, was dubious about doing this in the first place so I thought, i’ll buy a cheaper thermometer first off from a healthcare website and join the pay monthly plan – see how I go! (side note – you can select ‘plan pregnancy’ or ‘prevent pregnancy’ so it can be used by ladies trying to get pregnant).

So I stopped taking my pill then and there and started to use natural cycles straight away. I measure my temperature every day so long as I haven’t slept 2 hours more or less than usual, am ill or hungover. If I am/have done any of these things, I still measure my temperature but mark it as ‘deviating’ in the app. This then does not get taken into account for that day. Then it calculates whether I am on a green or red day. Because I am set to prevent pregnancy, green days mean go ahead, have a good time 😉 and red days mean use contraception.

After stopping my pill, weeks went by where I was waiting for a period and nothing arrived. I didn’t have a clue where I was in my cycle because my periods were all over the place when I was taking the pill so I had nothing I could reference back to. 5 weeks passed and I started to get uncomfortable. I started to feel really bloated and my stomach ballooned. After 6 weeks I started to get uncomfortable cramps in my stomach and I thought right, this is bound to be it. I was willing my body to just let loose so I could finally get rid of this massive belly and painful cramps but again nothing. The worst was sleeping at night, I couldn’t get comfortable at all so on the 7th week I went to the doctors (feeling like i’d lived at this place by now) and she wasn’t very helpful at all. Didn’t re-assure me of anything and said i’d need to wait 3 months before they would do any investigations. She really gave me the impression I was wasting their time. Which to be honest I felt a little bit like that too but by then I was so uncomfortable I just didn’t know what else to do! I think the stress of all of this just made the whole situation worse and that’s why the period didn’t arrive. I’m such a worryer anyway. I knew it would take a while for everything to get out of my system after 10 years of using it and for my body to start producing its own hormones and regulating itself – jeez id read more than enough of that to last a lifetime. I even researched drinking parsley tea as a way to induce a period! I was actually at my wits end so on a Saturday night reading all about parsley tea, I told myself I would buy some parsley the next morning and went to bed that evening feeling more relaxed knowing I had concocted a plan for myself.

The next morning, low and behold it arrived. 8 weeks after i’d stopped my pill! And it arrived with a vengeance. With a bag of spots to come with it. And the sweats. The pain was something i’d never experienced before so I dosed up on paracetamol and rode it out. It was horrid. But i’d never been so glad to have a period in my life.

Since then I have been measuring my temperature every day and have been pretty much regular. I have noticed some pretty big changes in myself too since coming off of hormonal contraception and starting Natural Cycles. There’s no other way to describe it other than I genuinely just seem a lot happier in myself. This led me to research the link between hormonal contraception and mental health issues. Turns out there’s actually a pretty big link between the two and my situation seems so similar to Krystal Starkey’s. There is evidence though to say that there isn’t a link. It could just be coincidence but I know that I feel much happier. I didn’t even realise I had an issue with this before, I know I struggled with anxiety but I was snappy and uptight all the time. I thought that was just me and my character but turns out since coming off of hormonal contraception i’ve not felt like that at all. I had been on it for just over 10 years, since I was 15! So in my experience I would say the hormonal contraception had a part to play in this. Mine and Caine’s relationship has gotten loads better because of this too which is lovely. Before I felt like I was a horrible person but now I realise, it was the hormones talking.

I’ve also lost quite abit of weight! I don’t weigh myself regularly so I have no idea how much but people have commented that i’ve lost weight recently. I’ve noticed myself too I have to say.

One downside (which isn’t a downside, it’s clearly just how my body works) is that just before ovulation, I seem to get absolute beasty spots. Its crazy! Whilst being on contraception this is something I never struggled with but remember struggling with before. I’ve researched into this too and apparently it’s due to the surge in hormones around this time which makes your skin create more sebum (absolutely disgusting word) and that’s why the spots appear. One thing that can help ‘apparently’ is to cut out dairy. I did see a picture on one of my Insta friends Instagram which was a shot of a book with different skin complaints. I looked at one face and thought, that looks exactly like my skin and the caption was ‘dairy face’. So i’m sure I probably drink way too much than what I should! I’m not going completely overboard here and cutting out all dairy but I do drink quite alot. Cereal, tea and just a glass of it when I felt like it. Probably equated to a pint every day? Maybe even more? So i’ve decided to look into other alternatives. Currently trying them all! So i’ll keep you posted on whether this helps at all and which alternatives I like :).

I’ve been using Natural Cycles for nearly 5 cycles now and am so glad I started. I am so much more informed about my body than I was before and feel so much better knowing that everything is working naturally as it should – without putting artificial hormones into my body. I am not a hipster type of gal but looking back on my experiences with contraception, it’s really made me realise how bad putting hormones into my body was for me. Each to their own and everyone has to do whats right for them but that just didn’t work for me. I just didn’t know another way. Through my experience it felt like doctors were so quick to give me these things and natural methods weren’t even brought up throughout this time.

Since using Natural Cycles I have had an AMH test done again and my levels have increased to 34pmol/l! The research on whether contraception has any effect on AMH levels i’ve found to quite vague. But I think in my case the results speak for themselves. I’ve not changed anything else about my lifestyle so I can only put it down to this.

All that’s left to do now is cash flow some funds from the monthly budget switch to the yearly plan and buy the Natural Cycles thermometer as I am NAAAAT going back to hormones any time soon 🙂

I’d love to hear everyone else’s experiences of contraception, periods and if they use Natural Cycles! Let me know!

So long!