Mirena IUD and Candida - Life after the end of the world

About 18 months ago I had the Mirena IUD fitted for 3 months and hated it, had a few stabbing pains in my head and felt generally horrible, unwell and zombified so had it removed. Things seemed to get better for a month or so but then it all spiralled out of control

I started getting incredibly intense head pressure in my sinus region and on the top of my head and was feeling incredibly depressed an anxious. I did endless searches, finding posts by people with intercranial pressure due to the Mirena, people diagnoses with psuedo-tumour cerebri (which is not even a real diagnoses, just a "don't know" from the doctors). After weeks of searching (I originally posted on here thinking it was a mineral deficiency/heavy metal problem) but that didn't solve my problems.

Eventually I twigged it was happening mostly in the evening after meals alcohol. I was also extremely bloated, tired, tinnitus, high BP, random pains all of my body, brain fog, bloodshot eyes, vision problems etc. I also eventually developed OCD (related to the anxiety I was feeling).

I went to the doctors and persuaded him to refer me to an endocrinologist as I was sure this was to do with the Mirena, but in the mean time I carried on searching for my own answers. After a few weeks searching on the internet I realised it was Candida. If you haven't heard of Candida, it is a fungus/yeast that lives inside of us, but only becomes a problem (i.e a yeast infection) if something feeds it and it begins to take over. Lots of things can make Candida a problem, too much sugar/carbs, a weakened immune system, and HORMONES, in particular synthetic hormones used in birth control.

Although I didn't realise it at the time, I have had a low-medium level yeast infection ever since I went on the birth control pill 12 years ago. With an infection already present in my body, all the Mirena did was feed that infection and let it get completely out of control.

The symptoms of candida are many and varied. Some of them you would never normally associate with a yeast infection, which is why it goes undiagnosed for so long. Here are a few symptoms:

http://www.wholeapproach.com/candida/symptoms.php


To get rid of candida you can use a combination of no sugar/low carb diet, natural antifungals, prescription antifungals etc (check out the Candida Support Forum ). If you want to test to see if candida is your problem just try cutting Sugar and high carb food out of your diet for a couple of days. If you start to feel better (or even worse as candida "die off" can sometimes make you feel worse for a while) after a couple of days then you know that's your problem.

I realise some people might have already made the Mirena/Candida connection but I hope this post might help a few people out. I am nearly out of the woods now and am feeling 100 times better than I did immediately post-Mirena. Just shows what can happen when our hormones get out of balance...I will never use hormonal birth control ever again that's for sure!

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