Sunday, September 18, 2011

Lupron

So I refused Lupron after my diagnosis, even after my doctor tried pretty hard to convince me otherwise. In his defense, he was worried about the possibility of having children. I didn't want children then, and we don't want them now. He warned that the longer I wait to try my chances of conception decrease exponentially, but I'm okay with that. I won't finish my doctorate for at least 2 more years anyway, so even if we wanted them it would be on the back burner.

So after the surgical follow-up/convince Whit to take Lupron meeting, I did some research on Lupron. And I didn't like what I saw. There were pages and pages of threads full of women, some as young as 16 some as old as 50 who had taken Lupron injections. Why any doctor would want a 16 year old (or the parents would allow it for that matter) to take Lupron is beyond me. In a nutshell, Lupron puts a woman's body into 'false menopause', except all of the symptoms are there. Hot flashes, weight gain, and yes - osteoporosis. In fact, many doctors require periodic bone density scans in conjunction with Lupron.

I think the Osteoporosis is what did it for me. I'm well aware than human beings are more likely to verbalize negative opinions than positive ones, but when the risk of bone deterioration is so great that bone density scans are necessary, I'm not going down that road.

Now if you've had a positive experience with Lupron, please - let me know! Leave a comment! Go onto all of those forums and tell women! But the side-effects were so much scarier than the disease for me that I wasn't willing to take the risk.