Can Progesterone Help Reverse the Side Effects of Depo-Provera?

A letter from one of our members …

I had only one Depo-Provera injection in August, 2000 which ran its course through November, 2000.

In November of 2000, I began to have terrible joint pains in my knees which worsened each year. Migraine headaches started along with frequent and irregular periods. Enormous and chronic fatigue took over my life. Sudden hair loss which was noticably on the right side of my head along with thinning hair loss elsewhere simply never reversed itself. Peculiar and painful breast lumps materialized which are still a problem.

These symptoms and a host of other debilitating symptoms which are just too numerous to mention, all curiously manifested after my birth control injection.

Somehow, I didn’t suspect a connection between the Depo-Provera injection and my ill health. Finally, two years after the injection I pieced the puzzle together. Through the internet, I came upon a website whereby a few thousand women were suffering these and other ill effects of this horrible injection.

Since I was 40 years old when I had the Depo-Provera and I am now soon-to-be 43 years old, I’ll never quite know if this injection jumpstarted me into a state of peri-menopause, or if I would have been naturally entering peri-menopause. In any case, I am most definitely suffering from an estrogen-dominance situation and the fatigue and resulting depression is excruciating and unbearable.

Narcissistic as it may sound, this irreversible hair loss which is quite conspicuous on one side of my head is a devastating enough effect for me and has caused me to plummet furthermore into a depression.

I’m curious to learn if progesterone cream would help with a number of these physical symptoms. Could it possibly stop the continuation of hair loss and/or reverse the hair loss I’ve suffered already?

Something tells me that the hair follicles have been destroyed in this one area of my head, but is that even possible? I do know it’s possible with the effects of lupus. Also, I do know that Depo-Provera causes an adrenal gland deficiency and impairs the immune system thereby making one a candidate for autoimmune diseases such as lupus. However, I’ve never gone for a lupus test or a thyroid test.

I have just learned that Depo-Provera can create a situation whereby you mimic all the symptoms of hypothyroidism, but you can still test negative for a thyroid problem, if, your hypothyroidism was a result of the Depo-Provera injection and your T3 receptors are blocked.

My last three years have been a living hell from this birth control injection. It has been so consuming and debilitating that I’ve thought of nothing else day and night. It has single-handedly taken any joy I once had out of my life by making me so unwell that it is impossible to enjoy anything.

I am sorry that this is such a long and unpleasant letter, but I really feel that I am in a dire situation; doctors, quite frankly, seem to be positively ignorant in regards to knowing about the effects of this birth control injection and they certainly don’t know how to treat it. I greatly hope you can be of some assistance and provide me with some helpful information, in general, and with regards to the progesterone cream.

Thankyou,
Valerie Goldschlag

One of our members reaches out to Valerie …

Dear Valerie:

I am a woman 70 who wanted to get off HRT (3) years ago after being on HRT for 22 years. The doctor and I discussed all about that subject and made sure that was My choice. What the doctor did not know is that you can not go off HRT “cold turkey”. Because of that I have had some of the symptoms that you tell us you are having.

Do not ever give up, as you have found out you will have to do your own research. You will leave doctor offices in tears, but always remember you are not crazy and your symptoms are real.

You have already found one of your life savers, Catherine P. Rollins. Now read all of Catherine’s books. I know that you can hardly read some days, but you must!! When you can not read have a family member read to you. But research, research, research. Get Dr. Lee’s books. This is a must. When you start reading Catherine’s and Dr Lee’s books you are half-way home.

You have hundreds of thousands of Sisters out here and I pray many have responded to your plea!

Here is another suggestion … if your friends or neighbors have not experienced hormone problems they have no idea what you are going through. We on the net do!

My experience has been not to talk about what you are going through right now, it will make you feel terrible when you get “well you don’t look sick it is just stress you know what stress can do to you”.

Yes, you are correct, fatigue, depression, adrenal fatigue, and hypothyroidism are what happens to us when we have been tampered with by the medical profession.

God Bless You
Cherie

—————-