cramps

My cramps are better and worse now that I have the copper IUD.  Better in that I don't seem to need as much Ibuprofen as I did before.  Worse in that the pain is different, deeper, more cervical than uterine, a bruise held fast by a pin, a clamp on my Fallopian tubes, a nauseating ache that spreads to my ribs.  My new GYN suggested that I get the hormonal IUD instead but based on past experience I am terrified of progestin which sent my depression into a tailspin.

The insertion was terrible.  It went smoothly but the pain was bad.  They said it would be.  It's strange being a woman and realizing that half the population has no idea how it feels once a year or every other year to fit your heels into hard plastic stirrups and spread your legs awkwardly into the position you were trained never to assume since girlhood, hitch your pelvis to the farthest edge of the exam table and lie back on crinkly wax paper with a giant napkin draped over your lap and watch over the slope of white paper between your knees the foreheads and hairlines of strangers who are fishing around in your body.  The napkin makes all the difference.  You can crack jokes and they can laugh and banter back and it's all safe and removed because of the napkin, like they are in another room and it's not your genitals they're looking at, prodding, scraping, while they talk to you, like you are the woman sawn in half on a stage and your bottom half is entirely separate from your top.  In your head you're wondering who signs up for this as a career and hoping you washed well enough and worrying that your labia look weird but knowing you'll never have the courage to ask, while outside you're complaining about the weather.

Getting the IUD hurt.  Having never been pregnant I'd never had much of a reason to think about my cervix but forcing it open to get the little plastic T in was painful.  I felt like I'd been skewered with a hatpin and then punched with cramps.  I sipped air slowly while tears leaked out the corners of my eyes and my hands ached from clenching them hard against the wax paper and the GYN and her assistant told me how well I was doing.

A month later I went back.  Something was wrong.  I don't remember what it was -- some sign you were supposed to watch out for in the first six weeks after insertion.  What I remember is after the exam.  I had gotten dressed and was sitting in the chair next to the door waiting for the GYN to come back.  I was tired.  My relationship was falling apart.  My new job was stressful.  And then the office assistant came in to talk to me.

My white blood cell count was high. It was maybe an infection from the insertion but they wanted to run tests for chlamydia and gonorrhea.  I started to cry.  For a long time I had suspected that my boyfriend was cheating on me.

When the tests came back negative I was almost disappointed.  It would have been simpler if they hadn't.  I was miserable in the relationship but I didn't want that to be the reason I broke up with him.

In the end it was the reason I broke up with him.  Unhappiness is reason enough.  Now he and the infection are both gone, and my cramps are better and worse.