hey!! I was told I needed paraguard because of migraines....my question is, do you gain weight on it and how do you like it? I really am scared to gain the weight I tried so hard to lose...I have a lot more to lose also!

Can I butt in? I also had to get a Paragard (8+ months ago) due to migraines with aura. The cramps were initially very bad for the first 3 cycles, but that has settled down. I'm less than thrilled with how much longer my period has gotten, but I'm giving that time, too.

Since there are no hormones in the Paragard, there's no mechanism by which it would cause weight gain. (You'll find plenty of women out there on the internet claiming that it caused weight gain. They're wrong. ) For the first few days after insertion, I had a couple of extra pounds of water weight (probably due to the ibuprofen I was taking, which always causes me to retain water). Went away quickly. I had no difficulty maintaining my previous 43-pound loss, and when I decided this summer to lose 6 pounds, I had no difficulties.

sounds like you figured it out! good luck!

Oh, and MindiV: For what it's worth, I have found over the last year-and-a-half that I lose (or maintain) weight on drastically different calorie levels at different times, even when my workouts are basically the same length and perceived intensity. I suspect that it has to do with my daily activity levels, both conscious (taking extra walks, standing more) and unconscious (fidgeting, puttering around the apartment mindlessly). Sometimes I maintain on 1800 calories, sometimes I need 2400. This might not be the issue for you, but I thought it was worth throwing out there; I imagine that having a baby must cause a lot of changes in your life!

Hope you get it all figured out-- good luck.

just piping in that i also have Paragard and i LOVE it. hormonal birth control makes me nuts and causes weight gain. this is the best BC ive ever been on. i love that its no maintenance for like 10 years.

this has nothing to do with weight loss, LOL, i just love to plug paragard whenever i can because i love it.

Your metabolism may simply be slower now than it used to be, so to lose, you may have to eat significantly fewer calories than it once took to lose weight, and you may find that low-carb helps more than it may have in the past.

It's crazy to me that the calorie intake I routinely (for months and months, not just the first week) would lose 5 to 8 lbs per week, is now a calorie level at which I maintain my weight.

It's still often hard for me to wrap my head around how my metabolism now could be so different from the metabolism I had in my 20's and even 30's, but it just is.

If you're gaining consistently (if you're gaining more than you're losing over the course of a couple months) there's really only one explanation, you're burning less than you're taking in. So that means only two options - finding ways to take in less and/or finding ways to burn more.

It doesn't matter if you used to be able to lose weight on what you're doing now, that just may no longer be true, and there may be no way to get back your old metabolism. There are ways to boost a metabolism, and you can try them - they may help, they may not.

Trial and error really is your ownly option. For myself, I found that I burn more calories on low-carb than on high-carb (there's about a 300 calorie difference. What I lose on 1800 calories of low-carb is equivalent to what I lose on 1500 calories of high-carb.

Now not everyone experiences this differential and even those who do, don't all experience the SAME differential. If you're going to try to compare your low-carb loss to high-carb loss though, don't count the first two weeks of weight loss or weight gain.

You can't "count" this weight because your carb intake will also influence the amount of water weight you carry. The body needs the extra water to process the carbs, and on a low-carb diet much of this water isn't needed, so the the body gets rid of the excess. It can be easy to mistake this for fat gain. Low-carb will always appear to have the advantage if you count this water weight difference as "true" weight loss.

Instead I just don't count the weight gain or loss when transitioning from low-carb to high-carb or vice versa.

If you do experiment with different carb levels, it's also important to remember that you will see more weight fluctuations when you transition back and forth between plans. That's not a bad thing, but you have to be prepared for the gain when you go to higher carb eating and the loss when you switch to lower carb eating.

I find that reducing carbs also reduces my hunger, so that's a bonus.

But even with the low-carb advantage, my metabolism now is still far more sluggish than even ten or fifteen years ago. Sucks, but it is what it is. If I dwell on what I used to be able to eat while losing, it'll only tempt me to quit. I can't compare my losses to anyone else's - not even former versions of myself.

I'm losing so slowly that I really have to look at success as "not gaining," and just keep plugging at ways to cut my calories further without cutting my energy levels to the point I can't exercise. Finding the balance is a challenge.

It might be a good idea to see your doctor and request a full metabolic panel and perhaps a glucose tolerance test to rule out diabetes, insulin resistance, thyroid or other endocrine disorders.

Mine came back with insulin resistance on the cusp of diabetes and low-thryoid (but not low enough that my doctor wants to medicate at this point). Sometimes the knowledge doesn't help you lose faster, it just helps you understand why you can't lose faster.

In the end, it always boils down to trial and error.

I just had blood work done, and my glucose level was too low...but that's nothing new since I lost weight. I know it's probably just my body changing and it won't be as "easy" as it was the first time....I may kick and scream but I'm willing to make the changes necessary

I've thought Bout going to the doctor, but when the creep started in 2011 when I quit birth control I wanted to go - and everyone convinced me that I was insane because I wasn't overweight still. But in 8 months I gained 10 pounds while eating really well and exercising a lot. The only difference: no hormonal pill. My DH is keeping me from stressing too much right now. But I'm giving it a few weeks - 3 max. If I consistently and honestly stick to 1400 calories and work out as often as possible, and I still don't lose or even gain, then to the doctor I go, even if they think I'm nutso.

Kaplods, I've toyed with going low-carb for a while...but I loooove my carbs and have no clue how I'd do it and still eat....well....anything.....it's crazy' I know.....

ya well if your calories were set to lose about 0.5 lb/week you probably just need to step it up like you figured.

id wait a few weeks and not worry!

Paraguard helps with migraines? Interesting. No, it will not make you gain any weight regardless of what you read on the internet. No hormones = no weight gain.

Everyone is different but I only had 2 really bad periods (the first 2) and the rest are still about 7 days, cramps are minimal but I have spotting a few days before TOM. The pre-TOM spotting is my only complaint. I think to myself; get on with it already I don't need a warning. The doc said for most people it makes their periods/cramps much worse so I was bracing myself but it's been fine..I personally like it and it's good for 10 years.

The first few weeks are definitely crampy but that passes.

How long is it?? (If you don't mind me asking)

Sorry, I don't mean to derail the thread just curious.

For years I never gave low-carb diets much consideration at all, because all the ones I tried made me very ill (these carb withdrawal or induction flu symptoms are supposed to disappear after two weeks, but for me they only got worse, to the point I even passed out a couple times). To me, it just confirmed in my mind that low-carb diets were unhealthy and even dangerous.

Then my doctor suggested that I try low-carb, but warned me not to go too low - so I asked, "How low is too low?"

His response? "I have no clue."

At first I thought (sarcastically), "Great help there, Doc," but actually his admission of cluelessness actually turned out to be a tremendous help, because it inspired the realization that I would have to experiment to find a carb-level that helped me lose weight, but didn't make me sick or miserable. Duh! Why had I never considered THAT before.

South Beach was my first attempt, and it worked well until Phase II, so I returned to Phase I and then the weight loss still stopped (and I realized I was eating too many calories, and that I had to count carbs and calories in some way).

I've experimented with a lot of different carb-restricted plans, and I've had partial success with most of them. I still continue to experiment (I have checked out so many low-carb, South Beach, and paleo cookbooks it's mind-boggling - I have over 50 cookbooks on my amazon.com wish list because of those I've found through the library).

My favorite "go to" plan is a reduced-carb exchange plan (pretty much like the "high protein exchange plan" on the frugalabundance website).

http://frugalabundance.com/frugal_fa...food-plans.htm

I ended up tweaking my plan a bit (more veggies and made it more flexible by making some of the exchanges optional (where I can spend these exchanges on starch, fruit, dairy, or protein - so it amounts to carb cycling with some days being higher carb than others).

I'm now at a point that I'm either going to have to lower my calorie limit or increase my exercise (I'm going to try to do both) to get the weight loss moving again (or I'm going to have to cut carbs much more drastically, and I'm not ready to do that. I still want to include some of the healthier higher carb foods and some room for the occasional treat - though I am getting better and better at picking the lower calorie, higher protein, higher fiber choices for my carby foods (the starch, fruit, and veggie exchanges).


Some of my experiments haven't worked out so well (there are carbs I love that I just can't eat without bingeing on them), but for the most part I learned about which carbs I can eat with relative safety (at least from bingeing) and how much I have to restrict carbs to control hunger and make weight loss easier (just the hunger suppression alone is a big help in that area).

im also curious. sorry i keep nosing in but i dont know anyone else with a paragard.

my periods got a lot heavier for the first few months.. maybe even 4 or 5. now theyre about 5 days (which is still longer than they were) and the cramps are about what they used to be.

interested in what others' experiences were?

Don't mind a bit. My periods were about 4-5 days of light to medium bleeding before Paragard. (These were regular periods, btw, not on the Pill or anything; I was off the Pill for 8 months before Paragard.) Now they're 7 days of medium to heavy bleeding, and then another 7 days (or more) of spotting and light bleeding. Like your pre-TOM spotting, novangel, it's the spotting that really irritates me.

I also like that it's good for 10 years. I got mine put in on 2/2/12; I won't forget my removal date: 2/2/22.

Paragard doesn't help with migraines per se. If you have migraines with aura, most doctors don't want you to take any estrogen-based hormones (bc, hormone replacement therapy). It ups your stroke risk. So Paragard is one of the most effective non-estrogen options out there.

There are also progesterone-only options, like Mirena or the minipill. I decided to steer clear of those for a variety of reasons.