Cast the rod, spoil the child
Uhh, the womb. The vessel of human creation. The incubator of love’s physical manifestation. The first stop of life, and so on and so forth. It can be thanked for transporting the terrestrial to the material, a blob into a human. A HUMAN!!! OMG!!!!
It housed Einstein, Shakespeare, your mother, Ted from accounts, and is responsible for a lot of confused, angry, emotional women every month. But it also created Ryan Gosling….. good job *endearingly pats stomach*.
I was twelve when womanhood smashed me in the face — sorry, I mean, knocked on my door. You can imagine my mortified face, sitting on a primary school toilet. There was terror, there was confusion, there was blood. My conservative mother didn’t warn me about this impending day. I was far too young to be given the celestial keys to creating consciousness. I still found fart jokes hilarious and played marbles. Alas, mother nature’s sublime and organic design was mocking my intelligence. It was the ultimate biological inception, the ability for a child to create within her another child *Inception blast*.
Later that night I told my Asian/mormon mother, which is the sensible thing to do, right? Next minute the whole family is over and we celebrate like it’s a pagan blood party. There’s music, dancing, food and a very confused Kat. Educate your children people! Because finding out that shit randomly is terrifying.
Anyways, back to the uterus. Actually I’m going to call her Ursula — yeah, that sounds prettier. So every month Ursula reminds me of her presence, her biological ticking drumming away. Its powers dormant and silent for a sweet, calm 28 days before it screams FERTILISE THE MAN SOME EGGS!! Followed by a Once We Were Warriors style beating, also known as period pain which leaves me keeled over and bloody #sorrynotsorry.
It is wonderful to be reminded monthly of the potential and power to create life. But on the flip side a curse — being constantly physically and emotionally burdened by its persistence to pursue purpose. If only she had eyes to see the tinder options readily available then maybe she would calm down!
Hormonal mayhem, period pains, panty sacrifices, the words ‘treat yo self’ plastered on the inside of my mind for 5 days solid that leaves me broke, fat and crying at my bank statement every month like clockwork was endurable. However as I got older Ursula’s nagging got worse. It no longer was satisfied with chocolate and bad rom coms. It needed more. It got to a point where I’d stare at babies and cry. I’d look at young mums and think am I ready? Why am I not ready? Will I ever be ready? What is ready? Are you ready first or does the baby make you ready? It’s the chicken or the egg scenario that if you spend too much time contemplating your eggs get old and fry themselves.
This biological knocking seeped into first dates without my awareness, “Do you want kids?” slipped in between asking what wine pairs with a spring roll. It was freaking out the men in my life, it was freaking me out, hell it was freaking out the mums on the tram as I sobbed and yelled “IT’S SO BEAUTIFUL! CAN I SNIFF ITS HEAD!!”
So I got the rod…
For the record, I have always ALWAYS been against any form of contraception. As you can tell by the fact I dedicated a whole paragraph to the magic of a uterus. I feel quite fondly of her role so why would I want her to be unemployed? But I was being unsafe, and I was over the mood swings and crying at babies.
What is the Implanon, or the rod? Well well well, ladies and some of you mortified gentlemen prepare to hear some sci-fi horror shit. The implanon is a flexible plastic rod the size of a matchstick that gets placed under the fat deposits in your upper inner arm (think tuckshop lady arms spot). It works by slowly releasing progestin, a synthetic version of the body’s hormone progesterone. Basically it stops your body releasing eggs and is a Gandalf to sperm yelling “You shall not pass!” With an amazing success rate of over 99% and guaranteed for 3 years it seemed the most effective solution for my lazy forgetful pill taking ass (YEAH!. SCIENCE!).
How they put it in is they inject you with numbing needles which I’m not going to sugar coat things — it feels like a steroid drenched bee is twerking his stinger in your arm trying to impress a flower crown at Coachella. Then this device — ladies please don’t look at it because it’s terrifying — it’s this massive needle that they push into your arm. Think of it like an ear piercing gun. Line it up and push it through. POW! You feel pressure and shock but no pain. Over the next few days there’s bruises, general sensitivity and no sea men aboard the pleasure ship for 3 days to make sure that it’s working.
Unfortunately with artificial hormones there’s a gamble whether our organic selves will accept or deny such fiddling of our great powers. With a biological wager at a 50/50 chance it can be excellent: no period, no problem. You’ll love it and soon start looking at your arm more adoringly then I do in this pic.
Or if you’re the unlucky half, problems such as gain weight and hormonal changes that will make you feel and act like a dark, twisted version of your former self. The latter happened to me for the first few weeks. Let’s just say I became a monster. I’ve never been suicidal or thought in this way but a certain emotional existential dread began to creep in like a sly cat. Feelings like: What is the point of anything if oblivion is certain? Would anyone miss me if I wasn’t around? Trump is president!!!? Ha, but seriously that last one though. I cried a lot too, then suddenly I just snapped. I quit my job, I dumped my boyfriend over text. Yeah that’s right. TEXT *cold hearted bitch”.
I would cry and say I don’t feel myself but forgot what myself felt like. I couldn’t pinpoint what was wrong. It felt like the biggest come down without the high from night before. I just felt off and weird and a bit lost. I just couldn’t get my shit together. I wasn’t sure if this was me or these dark thoughts that had seeped into me.
The first week was the worst. Bad sleep, bad thoughts, up and down. After about two weeks of feeling like I could turn into Chucky or Princess Diana dependant on the baristas frothing skills, I became like an Italian playing charades in bad mergers review mirrors. And then out of nowhere the emotive saturation levels plummeted. My feelings didn’t feel so heightened, as raw, as up and down. I was just chiiiiilllllll all the time Things didn’t really bother me as much. It’s like I went into a silent meditation retreat without having to ever shut up or change my diet. SCORE!
But with that I noticed my eyes didn’t water with joy when I listened to certain songs. I didn’t cry when I thought about my terminally ill dad. Worst of all I found it harder to laugh. I just felt.. I don’t know, stable? I used to be so black and white with a laugh, with my feelings. But now with the same provocation I was dancing in all these shades of grey.
I originally started this post before I had any first hand information regarding the emotional effects of the rod but now? Well, if I can offer you any advice be very aware that BITCH YOU MIGHT GO CRAZY!!
But it will pass and everything is going to be alright. Do your best to be prepared, nurture yourself, and when you get an overwhelming feeling of anxiety or sadness that you can’t quite pinpoint its creation it’s most likely the rod. You’re a woman with natural cycles, biological systems and feelings. With the rod there’s essentially a hormone asking Ursala to be silent and you know how we women get when we’re told to hush when we still have important things to say.
On a side note, I think that men being offered a form of contraception beyond the condom or a vasectomy is win for everyone. A dude can impregnate over 360 women in one year whilst a woman can only get pregnant once a year. Mmmhmmm you heard me 360!. There should be more focus on male contraceptives methods instead of women. AM I RIGHT LADIES? Especially in the age of Tinder, Bumble, etc etc. You’ve met the internet, you know what I’m talking about.
Overall having the rod is the finest decision I’ve made as a clucky woman. My experience after the first few weeks has been amazing. I feel more stable, more safe, no Ursula screaming “MA!! YOU KNOW WHAT THE TIME IS?!” I have had no period pain, or a period since. Sometimes I may get some light spotting to remind me of the bleeding babe I used to be.
So sisters be safe, take care of yourself and if your not sure all I can I say is it worked for me. The only way to find out for yourself is to give it a try. At the end of the day if it’s not for you they can just take it out with no side effects. And if you find yourself being a bit emotionally top heavy don’t make rash decisions that will make you itch later. It’s liberating having control, being able to choose what I do with my body and when things are possible for me. But this is just my experience. You do you boo. Cast the rod so you can spoil the child, with love and readiness When your ready. Whatever or whenever ready means to you.
