This registry is a place to share positive or negative side effects of using NuvaRing. If you directly experienced a side effect while using NuvaRing, then we encourage you to enter it here. Please note that entries here are the experiences of individual users, and in no way means that you or anyone else will experience the same side effect, since the same medication affects people in different ways. Please always contact your physician.
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January 27th
2009
3:56 PM
My girlfriend and I just got off NuvaRing. The final straw symptoms were an intense burning pain in and around her vagina, extremely low mood, and for me, an itching blotchy rash on the head of my penis.
-- By hayespeter | Reply | Private Message meThere were problems with the NuvaRing for her from day one. There was the acne and weight gain, as many people have mentioned, as well as a slight but steady rust-colored discharge. One of the main nuisances of the ring was its tendency to trap semen somewhere in the vagina, only to release it sometimes hours later at incredibly inopportune moments. (Sorry if that's disgusting... Anyone else have that happen though?)
During the second month, the symptoms became worse and more numerous: Pain during and after sex, partly caused by unusual dryness, became a frequent problem. Weight gain and acne increased. And then, in the day or two before we took the ring out, both my penis and her vagina took on a smell which I will describe (somewhat esoterically) as being very similar to that of a good brie after the rind turns orange. In a bad way.
There followed lots of burning and irritation, especially for her, and a general itch which she seemed to have all over her body. She said the pain in her vagina was on par with the worst she'd ever had, coupled with an intense low mood. We became 100% convinced at that point that the ring had to go, and immediately after its removal the symptoms began to slowly subside. It's been less than 24 hours so far, and we're both still calling each other to complain about our genitals, but the bright side is: We're off NuvaRing, the symptoms are subsiding, and we'll never have to go through that again.
As a final note, a message to the women on here who were dumped by their boyfriends because of what NuvaRing did to you: Those guys sound pretty much worthless. Good riddance.