“When I woke up after the surgery, I was in a lot of pain but surrounded by family. I felt dead; I couldn’t move freely and it took an incredible amount of effort to even try. My OB came in not long after I awoke and explained that my IUD had perforated my uterus which caused an ectopic pregnancy, an egg that was fertilized in one of my fallopian tubes. The growing pregnancy caused the tube to rupture, and I was bleeding internally for nearly 15 hours.
My doctor went on to explain that I lost between one and a half and two liters of blood—about a third of a person’s total blood volume. He said it was incredible I was still here to tell the tale and had I shown up to the hospital even 30 minutes later, I would have died from losing too much blood. He had to resect my left fallopian tube, leaving me with just the right tube to work with if I ever wanted to get pregnant again.
For two days I lie in recovery even though I felt there was no life left in me. I couldn’t speak out of sheer exhaustion. My doctor finally ordered a blood transfusion and after four bags of donated blood, I started to feel better.
Recovery.
It was a slow recovery and I still feel lasting effects to this day. I have a much harder time regulating my body temperature and the catastrophic event caused a hormonal response from which my thyroid has yet to bounce back.
I don’t share my story to scare people into different forms of birth control. There is no doubt that the popularity of IUDs has increased over the past few years and many women have had success with them. I share my story as an example of the one percent of cases you always hear about on warning labels but never believe will happen to you. It’s imperative to fully and wholly educate ourselves so we can all make the best decisions for our bodies and our health. I share my story so it becomes real, so other women are aware of what can happen, and so women can learn how to advocate for their health.

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