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[Konijntje]

I’m now 14 days in of taking tibolone. I’m still in perimenopause and I’m not sure how long to give it, I already had a bleed 1 week in and I’m thinking I have pms now. Common sense says to at least try for 2 months, but that is pretty long when feeling like this. So, I’m starting this topic to get some motivation to keep at it.

Bit of a back story:
I’m in the Netherlands, I’m 49 (50 next week) and been in peri for at least 5 years. A year ago symptoms really ramped up and I was hardly sleeping, so I went to my GP and started hrt. Unfortunately, I’m progesterone intolerant, I get both physical and psychological side effects, worse are low mood, bad sleep and lower back pain. I tried utrogestan continuously and sequencially twice for multiple months. Vaginally gives me bladder issues. I also tried dydrogesterone (duphaston) and a mirena (4 months, then the back pain got way too bad). I asked my GP if I could try Duavive, but that wasn’t in her guidelines and only registered for post menopause, so she referred me to a gynaecologist. I had the appointment at the beginning of this month and it turned out Duavive was discontinued in the Netherlands in June.
While I was waiting for my appointment, I had done a lot of research myself and had read about tibolone and also progestins that might be better when progesterone intolerant. And besides tibolone, I had some birth control pills on my list. First choice there is Drovelis (estetrol(E4) with drosperinone), other options Qlaira and Zoely (both with estradiol(E2) and dienogest and nomegestrol). Because the gynaecologist had experience with tibolone, she suggested I try that first, however she seemed open to the idea of prescribing the bcp options too.

So, I’m mainly looking for experiences on tibolone, I especially would like to know if anyone had negative mood issues in the beginning and if they went away and turned around to positives? If in perimenopause, if you experienced more bleeding, did this go away afer some time for you? I did read most topics about tibolone I think and I know that it does take some time for tibolone to start working on hot flushes for a lot of people, so I’m hoping those will improve (they came back about a week after switching from lenzetto to tibolone). I also have lower back pain, but not sure if that is because the tibolone triggers bleeds or if it weakens tissue like progesterone does for me. So, curious if anyone else has/had that as a side effect?

I’m also curious if any progesterone intolerant people have had good results with drospirenone, dienogest or nemegestrol? Besides better on mood, the lower back pain is a big issue for me too.

[CLKD]

   I'm sure that this will trigger discussion.

As oestrogen levels drop muscles may become lax = aches and pains. 

There are threads on Tibolone so perhaps do a forum search?  Make notes ;-)

[Konijntje]

Just a quick update: Friday I had a bit of a meltdown, because my mood and physical issues from PMS (or probably PMDD, since I have about all the symptoms) was so bad again. I called the clinic to ask if I could just switch to Drovelis to first try to suppress my cycle enough to be able to function again. I don’t have an answer yet, the dr had said I could reschedule if things didn’t work out, but the earliest opening was somewhere in September, so the receptionist said she was going to send a message. I’ll either get a notice from the pharmacy to get my prescription or a message from the clinic over the next few days.

I might revisit tibolone in a few years, when I’m hopefully post menopausal or closer to menopause and less on this hormonal rollercoaster., since it’s definitely better than progesterone mood wise.

I read all topics about drospirenone on here and I’m hoping it will work for me, since it seems to work for many progesterone intolerant women.