Hair Loss from Mirena IUD: Ways to Promote Regrowth

The Mirena IUD's Side Effect of Hair Loss

The manufacturers of the Mirena IUD will tell you that less than five percent of women will experience hair loss while taking or after taking this form of birth control. The reality is that 1,300 women do a Google search for "hair loss + Mirena IUD" every month. That's at least 15,000 women every year since the Mirena IUD has come out on the birth control market. Are you one of these women who are searching for the link between your hair loss and birth control?

I have been in your shoes, and I am still suffering the repercussions of the Mirena IUD. The actual truth is that the synthetic hormone used in the Mirena IUD wreaks its havoc on your body's natural hormones and therefore your own natural endocrine system. Because of this synthetic hormone, you may either experience hair loss while the IUD is in place or after it is removed. Just look up "telogen efluvium" and its potential causes, and you will see that an abrupt change in hormones can lead to sudden hair loss in females.

Now that we know what's causing it, how do we stop shedding too much hair? How do we grow back what we've lost? Here are some personally proven ways that will help stop your hair loss and promote regrowth.

First Tip: Get Off the Mirena IUD!

The first thing to do if you are experiencing hair loss while on the Mirena IUD is to get it removed! While you will probably need some other form of birth control to replace it, just know that there are other options out there that are more natural and won't displace your body's own natural hormones in order to prevent from getting pregnant. Do your research and choose a form of birth control that does not have levonorgestrel in it.

If in fact you have already had your IUD removed and are now losing your hair, obviously there's not much you can do as far as having the synthetic hormones leave your body. You'll have to wait until your body's own hormonal levels have balanced out and the synthetic hormones have been filtered from your system naturally. It will take time, but in the meantime, there are some things you can do to prevent further hair loss and promote hair growth.

Second Tip: Be Gentle to Your Hair

My first action to prevent further hair loss was to stop or slow down doing whatever seemed to trigger further hair loss. In my case, whenever I dyed or washed my hair, it seemed to fall out even faster. So here's what I did:

1. Stop coloring or treating your hair with chemicals.
2. Do not wash your hair as often. For me, I cut it down to once every three days (you can always put a hat on one of the days or throw your hair up in a ponytail to prevent it from appearing oily).
3. Switch shampoos to a natural shampoo low in chemicals (most commercial shampoo have paragons and sulfates—things you want to avoid). Or make your own homemade natural shampoo from oils, coconut milk, etc.
4. Do not brush your hair as often. This sounds weird, but many of us tend to overbrush our hair on a daily basis, causing further unnecessary shedding.
5. Do not use any ponytail holders that are prone to pulling out your hair. Also, do not put in a ponytail holder so tightly that it will pull out any hair.
6. Do not use a hair dryer, a curling iron, hot curlers, or a flat iron on your hair—or, if you have to, use it as little as possible. The extra heat can cause further damage to your still-healthy locks.

While this may seem like a huge change to some women who are used to over-treating and over-doing their hair, once you realize you are losing hair, you might change your mind and approach hair care in a different light! I know I did!

Third Tip: Watch Your Nutrition and Drink Water

So now that you know what actions to take in order to prevent further hair loss, what can you do to promote hair regrowth?

Here are some of the things that I changed with my daily routine that is proving to aid in hair regrowth.

• Take a prenatal vitamin every day (the B vitamins and folic acid in the vitamins are proven to help with hair growth).
• Drink aloe vera juice. You can blend it into a smoothie or mix it with orange juice in the mornings. The enzymes in aloe vera juice have been used to promote hair growth for years!
• Drink lots of water. Take half of the number of pounds you weight and drink that many ounces of water each day. (This means if you weigh 140 pounds, you should be drinking 70 fluid ounces of water every day. The reason behind this is that your body needs water in order to hydrate itself and to promote circulation to your scalp and elsewhere.)
• Eat leafy greens and other foods high in folic acid.

Other Ways to Prevent Hair Loss and Promote Growth

So once you've realized you have to change the way you care for your hair and your diet, what other ways can be used to promote further hair growth?

Here are some other changes I've made to my life and daily routines.

1. Stop stressing so much over the little things. Stress only causes further hair loss, and we want to keep what hair we have, right?
2. Exercise is important. And I can admit that I don't always follow this rule, but in order to have a healthy head of hair, the rest of our body has to be healthy too!
3. Evaluate how much of your self esteem is wrapped up in your hair. I realized how much of my ego was locked into my hair once I started losing it after I had the doctor remove the Mirena IUD. This caused me to re-evaluate how I felt about myself and really determine other areas of my life that build my self confidence.
4. Do something positive to outweigh the negative thoughts about your hair.When I first started losing my hair and noticed balding spots, my self esteem was very challenged and I felt extremely depressed. But then I realized that there are way worse things to be going through in life than a few thin patches of hair! It made me appreciate what I do have in my life on a higher level. And so now I am making something positive out of the experience by writing about it and helping others who might be experiencing the same thing.

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