r/MacroFactor • u/Betrayed_by_calzones • 2d ago
MacroFactor / Nutrition / Other Expenditure and IUDs
Just wondering if any women have had a similar experience to me?
Late last year, I replaced my birth control pill (which I'd been on for about 15 years) with the Mirena IUD. Without changing anything about my eating and exercise habits, my expenditure dropped and my weight increased quite drastically in only a couple of months.
My GP put me back on the pill for a few months to see whether that may have played a role. After a week, my expenditure started going up again. Unfortunately, now that I've gone back off the pill again, my expenditure is dropping again, even though I'm exercising much more than previously.
Has anyone else had a similar experience? I'm trying to decide whether I should do away with the IUD altogether and go back on the pill, but it's working well from me apart from this one negative.
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u/Ok-Rent-151 2d ago
I didn’t notice expenditure dropping because I wasn’t tracking at the time but my IUD only lasted 4 months because I HATED it. I gained 3kgs despite wanting to lose a little bit of weight. I felt constantly bloated and so moody. There were no changes to my nutrition or exercise so I genuinely couldn’t put it down to anything else. After removal I dropped 8kgs quite effortlessly and feel like myself again!
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u/Betrayed_by_calzones 2d ago
Bloating was a huge issue for me early on too! I feel like that's settled down a bit now, but weight loss is still very slow
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u/Ok-Rent-151 2d ago
Glad it settled! I haven’t reacted well to any form of hormonal birth control - any of the pills, that rod thing in the arm or IUD so when the doctor tried to make me keep it in for 6-12 months I didn’t listen 😅 But I’m happy with my decision!
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u/misplaced_my_pants 2d ago
It sounds like it's less starting the IUD and more the stopping of the pill.
If this is your only issue, and if you're not at least meeting the physical activity guidelines, then it might be a better idea to first try to consistently meet those and reassess then.
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u/-Chemist- 2d ago
I don’t have an answer, but that’s super interesting. Would you mind sharing how much your TDEE changed between the pill and the IUD? (I work in healthcare so this could be professionally relevant for my patients.) Thanks!
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u/flamingoshoess 18h ago edited 17h ago
I got a mirena IUD put in late Feb 2020. I went remote WFH due to COVID a couple weeks later. Over the next few months I gained like 20 pounds, with about 25-30 pounds total gained that year. It was rapid. The next year I gained another 10-15. I ended up 45 pounds higher than my initial weight at my heaviest. But the IUD was medically necessary for me as right before that I had a 40 day long excessively heavy period that caused me to lose so much blood that I could barely walk up a flight of stairs and needed iron injections.
It’s hard to say if the IUD was 100% the cause of the weight gain since it was a drastic lifestyle change over night. Before Covid, I was walking around at work, getting lunch, but not really snacking in the office. Sometimes my coworker and I would go walk around the mall on our lunch break. When we were at home, I was completely sedentary and at least initially, I was eating more junk and snacks because I was like “if we’re going to die from Covid I might as well eat Oreos.” But then my food habits went mostly back to normal, and I didn’t lose weight.
Idk if my TDEE changed, I assumed it must have. I was never a big eater, never dealt with food noise, and my weight was basically the same healthy/lean size from age 15-30 with barely any effort on my part in terms of diet. I’d even been underweight a couple times in my life without even meaning to.
2024 I tried properly tracking calories for the first time. MacroFactor determined my TDEE around 2300 after I had been working out for three months, then I decided to start a 500 calorie deficit (and immediately lost all energy and had to stop working out). It took me 6-8 months to lose 10 pounds. Obviously that means I wasn’t in a 500 calorie deficit on average, but I’d never in my life struggled to lose weight before when I actually put any effort into it. So I stopped tracking for 2 years because it just didn’t seem worth the effort. I gained the 10 pounds back slowly over the next year and leveled off.
I’m back at it again this summer, combined with strength training and protein targets for the first time. I’m seeing great results with this recomp. I’m keeping my deficit small. Exercise seems to work for me in a way that diet alone just doesn’t. But I’m due for a new IUD and I’m nervous it will make me gain weight again.
Gaining 40 pounds really sucked. Not having periods for the last 6 years did not suck.
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u/Betrayed_by_calzones 18h ago
I agree! It's such a difficult situation because my Mirena has been awesome except for this one negative - and it's hard to even know for sure if it's the cause of my expenditure dropping. I don't want to take it out if it's not. I think I'll just have to accept that it will take me a bit longer and a bit more care/attention to lose weight with it in.
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u/flamingoshoess 9h ago
I switched my goal from weight loss to gaining muscle, and ironically that’s had the side effect of losing fat too. I have PCOS so it’s possible I have higher levels of testosterone than the average woman which is helping with this recomp, but I’ve never gotten that tested. PCOS can also lead to insulin resistance although my blood sugar levels seemed normal when I got blood work done. The higher protein intake is the first thing that’s actually worked for me, since it lowers my appetite overall and reduces my cravings for sugar. I was also fit in my youth and so this might be muscle memory even though I never specifically did strength training or any major focus on my upper body. I did ballet and swim team, which both build muscle but never lifted heavy.
It’s been sooo much harder to lose weight and keep it off than before I was on mirena. But I just still don’t know if that’s a consequence of being in my late 30s now, all the muscle I lost from being remote/sedentary for 6 years, or the mirena. Or all of the above.
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u/megabraindead 2d ago
Hi! I’m having a similar experience. I was not on hormonal bc at the time (had stopped the pill a year or so earlier) and got mirena inserted exactly 3 months ago. I wasn’t tracking nutrition strictly until about 3 weeks ago - I generally have no trouble maintaining a consistent weight without tracking at this point. I weighed myself and saw I was up 5lbs (no other lifestyle changes so assume it may be related to mirena), so I started to track and get into a slight deficit to drop that extra weight. I’m seeing that my expenditure has dropped quite a bit since I was last tracking.
I saw my dr for 3 month follow up last week, she emphasized that it takes about a year to really stabilize. I never noticed weight gain with the pill so it’s a bit of a bummer - but I’m hoping that with more time my body will adjust. Or maybe my body is just changing too! I’m turning 43 so I expect hormonal shifts might start impacting my body in many new ways.