Vaginal ring vs Implant

I suffer with PMDD, making my periods a very awful time for me due to how depressed I feel. I was on the combined pill before, but found this was worsening my emotions and making me feel horrendous. The ring was an idea my GP suggested, thinking that because the ring is a gradual release, that stays in your body for the duration you don’t wish to bleed, it would affect me less. This is absolutely what’s happened and I’m much happier on the ring. I’ve never had any problems with feeling it, I’ve noticed a few reviews stating they bleed through when taking it back to back and from my experience this is the case with most contraception. I wouldn’t recommend if you want to take back to back as you do bleed through.

I was recommended the ring after suffering with irregular and heavy periods. I would describe myself as suffering PMDD before and now my moods are so much better. It's easy to insert, I never feel it, and easy to keep in (or briefly take out) when having sex. The ring is great and I recommend to everyone I meet.

The first few months weren’t awful, had regular side effects like nausea, anxiety & tiredness. The main function of the ring for me was to skip my periods & for the first 3 months it worked great. On my 4th ring a few days later I started to feel incredibly nauseous (I didn’t vomit) & the day after I started bleeding, I spotted every day for over a month & still spot every other day, I also had had a large sack of my uterus wall come out which is apparently a side effect when your hormones are unstable. My hips, pelvis, back and legs were aching to the point I struggled to walk. I removed the ring & had instant relief. The nuvaring has made it so I physically can’t have sex as it feels like my vagina is on fire as soon as anything’s inserted, when I took the ring out for a few days this went away & came back the second I reinserted it (it’s also irritated my partners penis). I don’t know if I’m just very sensitive down there or my body doesn’t agree with having a foreign body inside but this just simply hasn’t worked for me. It’s also difficult to get in the right position. My boobs have gotten bigger tho atleast but so has my tummy from the awful bloating!! Swapping to the patch today & hoping it works.

All the great wetness I was feeling down there is all gone. I have painful sexual intercourse and I'm sad.

Poor experience. Great at preventing pregnancy however side effects on mental and physical health were not worth it. I chose to prioritise my health and swap to condoms.

Bled constantly for months, then no period for ages, then bleeding again for weeks on end. Really heavy which is abnormal for me. No sex drive, I was really depressed for the nearly 3 years I was on this and I thought that was just me, funnily enough when i came off it I felt so much better and couldn’t believe most my problems were probably being caused by this implant

Extreme weight gain, despite always being a consistent weight and no changes in lifestyle/eating habits. Also I have become increasingly more self conscious and body conscious, so an affect on mental health

Great if you want to have sex and not worry about pregnancy’s however the change in my physical appearance and mood swings have been crazy and I will be getting it removed asap as I can’t go on like this

Some infrequent cramping and bleeding but in general a good experience. Despite a lot of fear and generally being very bad with needles, a very good fitting experience (thank you to the nurse for introducing me to glucose shots that reduced the delayed faint for me!), and very convenient to not have to think about it for a few years. Feeling for it has not been as bad as it sounded, and while you cannot avoid side effects as easily - unlike a pill or patch you can't just stop taking it or take a break - they have not been worse than a usual cycle, and happen less frequently so overall, happy!

Great, less to worry about. But the cramps are brutal as well as the mood swings.

Random bleeding throughout which was frustrating. Partner felt like I seemed happier in general once I came off. Suffered anxiety attacks after coming off the implant (may or may not be related currently unsure)

Great for if you are looking for contraception that you can forget about and prevent periods however it caused lasting weight gain and awful mood such as unreasonable anger which was almost misdiagnosed as a personality disorder until I came off the contraception.

I had 3 implants back to back and really rated them. I felt they personally kept me in a very even emotional space as I didn’t have hormonal cycle mood fluctuations and didn’t experience any persistent low mood on it. My period stopped when I had the implant (which I loved) and had no side effects, which was great as after coming off the implant to conceive found when on no hormones I got terrible headaches and acne around my period which I had forgotten about! On reflection I probably did have slightly worse skin on the implant but not significantly. Around the 2 year mark each time it ‘ran out’ and suddenly there didn’t seem to be enough hormone to stop my periods and had persistent breakthrough bleeding which prompted me to get them changed early each time which resolved the issue. I have since been told you can take ibruprofen for a few days to counter this but have no experience of this. The reason it gets 4 stars not 5 is I really struggled to get it taken out as many health care practitioners are trained in insertion and many less is removal. When I wanted to start a family I was told there would be a 3 month wait for removal which was absolutely unacceptable to me and I ended up getting a family member who is a Dr to cut it out at home as I was so desperate. This lack of bodily autonomy I found very distressing and has put me off getting one again incase there’s a delay removing it, however it was late 2021 so may have been in part due to Covid so have to take that into account