Hey, remember how badly I complained about periods and all that? Remember how I got an IUD so I wouldn't have to think about them anymore? Remember that? Remember the agony and the screaming for a coma so I wouldn't have to deal with the razor blades that I was birthing every month? Yeah?
Two weeks ago, I got that IUD yanked out faster than a daisy salesman at a hockey match.
Let me back up...
"The Stockholm Syndrome is an emotional attachment, a bond of interdependence between captive and captor that develops 'when someone threatens your life, deliberates, and doesn't kill you.'" (Symonds, 1980)
In the last 25 years, I've been held captive by the glorious flowering awesomeness that comes with being a female of the species. You may know it better as "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!! I THINK I'M HEMORRHAGING BRAIN MATTER HOLY GOOOOOOOOOOOOOODDDDD!!!" or simply, "period". It never killed me, and it did pave the way for Lauren, so I guess we can call a truce.
See what I did there? That thing that I've hated my whole post-pubescent life, I am defending and forgiving (please note, however, that you will never catch me uttering "have a happy period".)
After Lauren was born, I requested demanded an IUD, the kind with hormones that erodes the ute lining so nothing could even think of building a summer cottage less the foundation ignite into flames and sink into the deadly swamp. I didn't want a period, I didn't want to see two lines on a pregnancy test (which would immediately be followed by a rich stew of elation, fear, and devastation), and I didn't want to think about cycles.
I forgot about Progestin. That's the stuff that makes hormone-driven IUDs do their thing. It's also the stuff that makes me a living zombie: slackjawed, drooling, balding, and wounded. For two years, I lived in a fog, and my hair fell out in clumps. I had no interest in anything but food, and I suffered cramps every couple weeks along with monster ovulation that mimicked the good old Clomid days. It was a different prison. I finally had enough when the right ovary was so overladen I had to rely on Vicodin for even moderate relief.
So that brings us up to date. IUD, gone. I'm feeling some sense of normalcy for the first time in three years. Because I still do not want pregnancy/miscarriage drama, we are debating the next step in prevention. Taking into account, of course, that there is really no telling when the endometriosis is going to rear it's ugly head again. For now, however, I'm synthetic hormone-free, just like an organic cow. A snarky organic cow. That's me.
Moo.
