Ok so yesterday i wrote about the most important things i experienced but there are other things i wanted to mention too.
I wrote about how I’ve had a few spots but nothing major at all. As for the rest of my skin, from time to time my face felt a bit dirty but it was never greasy and there has definitely been no other changes to my face. My armpits have been itchy and i had to change my deodorant. I tried Bionsen, an aluminium free roll on and the itching went away but occasionally i sweat really bad with it. Well, i say really bad – what i mean is that my armpits got wet and this is bad for me in comparison to normal, ie never having any body odour or sweat unless i do a lot of exercise. Anyway so i switched back to my normal Dove Aloe Vera roll on (which i see is actually also aluminium free) to see if the sweating stopped and it did, but the itching is back. So I’m settling for itching instead of the B.O. The strange thing is that there’s nothing to see – no cracked skin or anything. And i experience similar when i shave my bikini line. Its always itchy when it grows back but not as much as this.
I’ve written in the past about my concern of more scalp showing and I’m convinced that’s true but the photos still don’t really show it. In fact, my current photos appear better than when i started. There’s one area that i think has got a bit worse – where the back of my fringe meets the rest of my hair and I’ll post photos soon. But I also have a fair bit of regrowth! It appears to be over most of the oval shape area where I’m thin and although it seems to be too thin to really cover any scalp, I’m hopeful that it will get thicker.
During this 9 month period i started using Rogaine liquid again instead of Rogaine foam but its been harsh on my scalp so i was alternating between both.
I noticed a difference in my periods once i started taking a quarter of a full dose. That was months 7, 8 and 9 and i do think that there just wasn’t enough active ingredient in that quarter for my body to recognise it so i think that I’ve effectively not been “on the pill” now for 3 months. I have been taking it, but not enough for my body to think so (i think). Normally on Dianette my periods were every 28 days, and i would always come on 4 days after my last pill. They would usually last 6 to 7 days. Here’s how my recent periods have been:
On – 3rd Dec – Off – 9th Dec (6 days)
(17 days later) On – 26th Dec -Off – 2nd Jan (8 days)
(7 days later) On – 9th Jan – Off – 14th Jan (5 days)
(18 days later) On – 2nd Feb – Of – 12th Feb (10 days)
They were no worse than my periods prior to weaning apart from the most recent one lasting a lot longer. I’m hoping the next one will be further apart than the last.
I mentioned about my sex drive being back and this is only a recent thing. It was definitely still lacking 3 months ago so this is another thing that makes me think that i have effectively not taken any BCP for about that time. I am due to have a blood test in two weeks to see how my hormones are doing. Right now all I’m worried about is that I’ve left it long enough for the test to mean anything. Fingers crossed. But the main reason i am having it is to see if there is any reason for my hair loss. When i last had one done around 5 years ago for the same reason, i was on Dianette and the dermatologist said if i had any hormone imbalance it would have been masked by the BCP. I’m not sure why they bothered with the test, but hey ho!
Bellie asked if I’m glad to have come off Dianette this way, rather than stopping suddenly like you would normally. Its hard to say because i don’t know for certain how my body and hair etc would have reacted if i had stopped cold turkey. But i did it this way to minimise the risk of a massive hair fall and i certainly didn’t have that – or not so far anyway so as far as that goes, yes i am glad i did it this way. I’ve not experienced anything major by way of hair fall, acne and periods. My hair is slightly different in density and i did get panicky about it but i don’t think its continued and as i said i have regrowth so its looking positive. But i cant be sure this is it – that its over, that i have nothing else to worry about. It could all go very wrong soon but I’m not sure there’s much chance of that. I will be more confident if my periods become regular soon, and the time frames I’ll be looking at are about 3 months from now, and then 12 months from now. The reason being that I’ve read about people quitting BCP cold turkey and experiencing horrible sheds 3 months after.
Quitting Dianette 