S and I were talking last Monday, and we calculated back to when she started having her mood swings and doubts.

It all started 10 days after the Mirena went in.

Does this time frame tally with what you guys have experienced?

sorry for the lapse in posts... i've looked high and low and i think my lab notes were thrown out... i'm extremely disorganized. i will definitely research this though. hcg could be it, but we did so much concerning hcg that it naturally sounds all too familiar. i will try to contact my professor and see if they still have that info.
and the lack of hormones in menopause does account for abandoned attraction, i vividly remember that, notes or not.
also there is a natural "4 year itch", so to speak; which is greatly increased after the birth of a child. basically the first 4 years of a child's life are the most difficult and are most easily managed with 2 parents. when the child is 4 their strong attachment to the parents and "demanding" behaviors lessen and become more independent. at this time a woman starts to naturally look for other men to have children with. this would vary the gene pool and, so to speak, increase her mating success and likelihood of her genes surviving and keep being passed on more generations. this is why it is said that the natural child spacing is 4 years, also because they are typically still nursing to about 3.5 years(another "demanding" behavior in todays society). however, it is all instinctually in us, but often ignored. especially because women don't nurse that long for one, and have children at much more frequent intervals, which by the way wasn't common practice until just recently, well in evolutionary terms... (once people lived too close together and diseases ran rampant people started ignoring what was innate and started having one birth after another because so many babies were dying before 2 years of age, and thus insuring viable offspring... and that is still drilled into our minds today)
sorry, i think i've gotten extremely off topic... i will do some research, i still have all my text books, and i do remember referencing them throughout the lab so i'll get back to all of you asap...
oh, last thing... the pheromones... they definitely do play a large role in subconscious attraction, however i can't remember the specific pheromones during pregnancy or pseudo pregnancy... i will add that to my research list...
sorry if all this takes a bit, my daughter doesn't enjoy quiet time.. :)
oh, DBF... my husband agrees that my "attitude switch" did occur about a week post mirena insertion... sorry if i hijacked the thread

ok, well i haven't found exactly what i'm looking for yet, but this is what i have so far...

human chronic gonodotrophin/hCG... it is the decrease of this hormone during the second trimester that alleviates the morning sickness symptoms. it is also mostly responsible for the extreme highs and lows many women experience during pregnancy, i.e. the extreme anxiety or Depression experienced over the pregnancy (even if it is a planned and wanted pregnancy) or the extreme highs some (fewer) women feel.
i don't think that this has to do with mirena because even in pseudo pregnancies i can't find and cases of hCG actually being produced; however....


luteinizing hormone/LH... LH maintains a pregnancy for the first two weeks, and is then replaced by hCG and are structurally similar and have the similar symptomatic effect on the body. LH is expressed due to an increase in estrogen, and in turn causes an increase in estradiol (the major estrogen hormone produced in the gonads, brain and arterial walls. derived from converted testosterone). LH then triggers ovulation which in turn produces progesterone. LH also provides theca foliculli (which produce testosterone and indirectly produce estrogen) and androgens (general term for all masculine steroid hormones, testosterone included).
LH is secreted by the pituitary gland, but its production and release is controlled by pulses of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) from the hypothalamus. these pulses are controlled by estrogen feedback, therefore typical pulses last 24-48 hours. (LH is also commonly high during and after menopause) when feedback is not received from the gonads (i.e. no estrogen feedback) elevated levels of LH occur from continuous production (also common during menopause).

conclusions: could mirena cause elevated LH levels by blocking the hormone receptors in the feedback loop for estrogen in the hypothalamus as well as receptor sites for other hormones? (yes, in my opinion, but i am no doctor or expert, i just have a biology/chemistry degree) increased LH would produce symptoms such as anxiety, depression, amenorrhea (lack of menstrual cycle), premature menopause, menopause like symptoms and polycystic ovary syndrome.
blocked receptor sites would result in the body producing less of those hormones. insufficient testosterone would cause lack of libido, hair loss, decrease in attention, memory and cognitive functions, osteoporosis, anemia, loss of muscle mass, decrease in appetite, etc. low levels of estrogen mostly affect mood (depression, anxiety) but also lower metabolism (burn less fat), decrease vaginal lubrication and decrease the body's ability to maintain skin and vessels.
basically it can go on and on... if you decrease one hormone, you decrease others all having significant effects on the body.