Ladies please help! Unsure what to do mirena vs nosebleeds?

[Mrs-T2014]

Oh where do I start! I feel so fed up. I had mirena fitted dec in surgery really have tried being positive but I am starting to suffer with bad headaches making me feel sick same time evry day tea time into evening .... also suffering with nosebleeds with them which again never suffered from. I keep going hot like hot flushes I am only 29, does anyone know if the mirena could be causing these headcahes and nosebleeds which have started in last 2 weeks. Also I am struggling with my cervix only way I can describe it as though theres an imbalance as I get a horrible brown discharge mid cycle! I have had swabs etc etc all clear benw ith same partner 12 years. Please help at my witts end! Thank you.

[Impatient]

Brown discharge is totally normal please don't worry. It is old menstrual lining that didn't quite all shed in the period before. It looses all the oxygen which is why it turns brown and when you have a boost in hormones at ovulation this is the trigger for finally dislodging that last remaining bit of uterus lining that got stuck where it was a nit longer than it did in the past..

As you get older this happens more and more - it is normal but not something you get told about in biology lessons at school LOL.

It is quite disconcerting at times and looks a lot worse that it actually really is.

If you have a scab on the skin the scab will be darker than the fresh bleed that it previously had. If you leave any blood stained laundry for a while it too goes brown.

Same with blood filled endo cysts, the blood is old loses the oxygen and turns darker brown hence they get called chocolate cysts.

It's better than being called shit brown cysts - but it's the same colours.

If you have gynae issues - and stopping your periods for a few months at a time on the Pill for example then expect you first period after any longer spell of time to be brown rather than red. Clots can be brown too. If you have a mix of brown in red - then that is old lining plus some fresh red blood from the small wounds left behind when it shed.

Nothing to worry about - but quite a shocker when you first encounter it.

It can be more likely to happen younger when you do have endo or fibroids or other such conditions, but it is not exclusive to have anything wrong at all, and can just be part of 'growing old-er'.

You're not the first to ask - we have talked about it many times - just not something that you get told about or warned about in the birds and the bees talks.

Hope that explains what it is and now you can relax about it.

As for headaches they can be the mirena which is just settling down and causing a temporary alteration to your bodily hormones... equally it could be you have a virus - I had one about a month bck which one about a week of really strong headache - it was going round where I work and one after the other we all manged to get the virus. I don't normlly ever get headaches at all (one of the few saving graces in my life) so I can say with certainty it was the flu type virus - it never really manifested itself in to cold though it was threatening to do that. So that could be what you have too.

Nose bleeds are probably connected with the hedaches and an increase in blood pressure in the head putting added pressure on fragile nasal blood vessels which pop and give you a bleed.

If it is viral it will ease off in a week or two.

If it continues ask your GP to check your blood pressure levels and run some tests to see if any other possible causes crop up.

I would try and hold on to that mirena as long as you can. There will be teething troubles while it settles in, twinges aches and tweeks in the tummy, but if you can get through that to the point where it is working and stopping periods WOW what a difference it can make to life.

Hang in there just yet with the mirena. I'm not ruling it out as the cause, but it can settle, equally if it is the virus i just went through then it's a bad'un but will clear up eventually.

[GrittyReads]

Hi,

I just want to second everything that Impatient has said.

I had a mirena late in life. My endo was fairly mild compared to most of you on here, and the pill had controlled it for most of my life, But when I had to stop taking the pill after 50, and then the perimenopause messed things up more, things got much worse: then the mirena saved my life. After it was fitted, I too had brown discharge as well as gradually decreasing 'normal' periods for a few months, and then the periods became just a brown dribble - as Impatient says, it's just older blood.

I also agree about the virus. I've just got over a bug that lasted for 3 weeks, it kept coming and going. Just when I though it was over, it would return. I did have a bad cold phase, but the worst was that my head felt like it was filling with concrete, and my sinuses were blocked and swollen - and I never normally have sinus problems. Also when I was blowing my nose there would be some red blood from damaged nose capillaries - it's common, and in my case [too much info: warning] I think the goo was so thick it stuck and dried and caused more bleeding as well as brownish clumps. When my partner caught the bug from me, he was in a terrible state as his sinuses always bother him - he thought his head would explode.

As Impatient says, try to hang on in there with the mirena, and if the headaches, nose bleeding etc persist for much longer, go to the GP.