Pain After Tubes Tied: A Symptom of Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome?
Women come from all over the world to Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center for reversing tied tubes – or more correctly put in medical terms, to have a tubal anastomosis. The majority of our patients desire sterilization reversal so they may naturally conceive more children. Many others, however, have ligation reversals to feel more complete again and/or to alleviate symptoms that have occurred after their surgical sterilization procedure. These patients report new physical and psychological symptoms after undergoing tubal ligation - symptoms that have been described as Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome (PTLS).
Symptoms of Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome
There are many symptoms attributable to PTLS. The most predominant symptoms are:
• Menstrual pattern changes
• Painful periods
• Hot flashes
• Irritability
• Mood swings
• Insomnia
• Decreased sex drive
• Anxiety
• Depression
• Memory changes
Does PTLS really exist?
The existence of Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome has been very controversial within the medical community. Early medical studies suggested that some sterilized women (women who had their tubes tied) had abrupt changes in bodily symptoms after their surgical procedures. These physical and mental changes were called Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome.
PTLS has been widely talked about by both women and medical professionals. Currently, PTLS information, advice, and ‘expert’ commentary saturate the internet. Conspiracy theories are prominent. Some people even believe sterilization is being forced upon women and there is a conspiracy, or lack of serious medical counseling, regarding the symptoms of PTLS.
More recent medical research has demonstrated that women do have changes in their menstrual patterns after tubal ligation; however, these changes are not as dramatic or as widespread as have been suggested in the past.
Observations from the Tubal Reversal Center
The tubal ligation reversal experts at Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center provide sterilization reversal to a large number of women from across the world. We also counsel and treat a substantial number of women who attribute their worsening menstrual patterns to their tubal ligation procedures. These patients report a multitude of PTLS symptoms.
We like for our patients to be well-informed. Since women seeking relief of PTLS represent an increasing percentage of the patient population we care for, we would like to dedicate a series of informative blog articles discussing the concept of PTLS. More specifically, we would like to discuss the common medical reasons for new symptoms noticed after tubal ligation, current understanding about PTLS, and common psychological conditions which can mimic PTLS.
This is article first of a fourteen part series. Our second article in this series is Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome: Past and Present.
Readers can also view patient submitted stories about their menstrual symptoms, reasons for reversing tubal ligation, and outcomes after reversal reversal surgery. Each patient’s story is listed below:
Meet Momzilla
Meet Andrea
Meet Rebecca
Meet Praybelieving
Meet Katherine
We invite readers to join the Tubal Reversal Message Board to discuss and share their personal experiences with tubal ligation. Feel free to contribute to our PTLS forum dedicated to patients who have personal insight into worsening symptoms after undergoing tubal ligation.
Editorial Comment
The decision to add a series of articles about Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome on the Tubal Reversal Blog was prompted by requests and suggestions of many of our tubal reversal patients. Most doctors have been taught that no such entity as PTLS exists, much to the exasperation of women who are suffering from symptoms that began after a tubal sterilization. This series of blog articles will allow individuals to report about their personal experiences and case histories. Then, articles from the medical literature will be reviewed and discussed. Hopefully, this approach will help explain the discrepancy between what individual women have experienced and what medical doctors think about this complex subject. I encourage both patients and medical professionals to contribute their insights and opinions to this important series of articles.
Gary S. Berger, MD
Medical Director
Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center
September 8th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
What a wonderful opportunity for women suffering from menstrual and body changes following tubal ligation to find community and support. This documentation should provide ligitmacy to women with these symptoms. Thanks Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center for taking the lead in this area of women’s health.
September 8th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
I am very pleased that CHTRC is bringing attention to this very important issue facing so many women. It is obviously misunderstood and its existence flat out denied by many physicians. We need better information and more informed choices for women out there prior to their tubal ligation surgeries.
September 9th, 2008 at 4:43 am
PTLS is very real to the ladies who suffer from it. Thank you to Drs Berger and Monteith for listening and caring.
September 9th, 2008 at 6:28 am
Excellent choice of blogs! Now is the time to be one’s own patient advocate. This type of detailed information can only help!
September 9th, 2008 at 10:06 am
I think anytime women are driven to take money from their savings, to alleviate a terrible host of symptoms, the medical community needs to take notice!
Many women on the message boards have traveled a great distance to self-pay for a procedure to restore their bodies and have no desire for more children. To me, this is very telling.
I know with my PTLS, I was offered hormonal therapy, pain meds, ablation and hysterectomy to deal with the symptoms that began shortly after my TL. Since I knew intellectually and in my heart that the new collection of symptoms were a result of the TL. I had nothing but good female/reproductive health all my life until after the TL.
I tell every woman with whom the topic arises, to think twice about TL for many reasons. In lives that are often changing, one change we don’t need is self inflicted health problems. In addition, the life changes and heart changes can also drastically change ones ideas about permanent sterilization.
It’s a terrible place to be to be suffering month in and month out, be told it’s not from something you KNOW it is from, and to feel like you are no longer fully a woman as a stranger in your own body.
Thank you for this article! I look forward to the series, and when the day comes that physicians must disclose potential side effects to all women seeking sterilization.
September 10th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
We hope to hear from many of our patients who have told us about their PTLS symptoms and then success after tubal reversal surgery! This would be great for other women who are experiencing the same problems.
September 10th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
What wonderful infromation for the many women out there that are having these types of symptoms. There are so many women out there that are going through similar situations and hopefully this will give them hope and a means of support. This will let them know that they are not alone.
September 10th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
It will also be interesting to hear from the medical community regarding their feelings on PTLS. I hope they will get involved in this important discussion and offer hope and support to the women who suffer from these debilitating symptoms.
September 12th, 2008 at 2:00 pm
Often patients with some or many of these symptoms, sometime after their tubal ligation, have reported feeling depressed to their doctor. Without the discussion of the possibility of PTLS, patients have been told that their depression or report of other symptoms is “all in their head” and are either treated for depression or not. The rest of their symptoms still exist with no resolve. I’m glad that there is support and regard for these patients’ difficulties here at Chapel Hill Tubal Reversal Center. I hope the women who have experienced these symptoms will write to us about them. Maybe they can be helped.
September 15th, 2008 at 12:24 pm
[...] we introduced the topic of Post Tubal Ligation Syndrome (PTLS) as a suspected cause of problems that can occur after a tubal ligation. Women who experience [...]
October 6th, 2008 at 10:59 am
hi im 28 yrs of age and had my tubal 4yrs ago and ever since then i have never been the same and have distroyed my marriage and feel like im always not me i lost the will to be with my husband and i get moody and have lots of pain when my monthly visitor comes and get head aches like crazy also 6months after having my tubal i have been diagnosed with anxiety attacks i wish i new this was going to happen cause i regreat every day of my life on making this decission i wish that thier was info out thier to let us now what also may happen after having a tubal
October 14th, 2008 at 9:51 am
I’ve had my tubes tied approximately 15 years ago - which I sadly regret because I would love to have a baby now but am hesitant to do the reversal.Ssince then I experience abdominal pains during intercourse to the point that I don’t even want to anymore, which is not fair to my husband. I never thought this would happen and wished that I was told about it.
October 17th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
i had my tubes tide in 1998 and i have experinced these same syptoms. i believed the Drs. i have seen think i am crazy. i tell them what i am going through and they say it’s fine. but i know it’s not. so it is nice to see i am not the only one. and what i am going through has a name
October 18th, 2008 at 11:53 am
I had clips put on my fallopian tubes when i was 21 years old. I was told then they were the easiest to reverse. After 20 years of intense monthly pain and all doctors telling me I am imagining things,and crazy, I can assure you all, the ligation is incredibly uncomfortable for some women indefinitely. I also feel the tubal has led to an over accentuated empty nest depression, as I was young enough to have more babies when my body screamed for them. I wish I never did it.
October 18th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
I had my tubes tied 11 years ago and from the first month on my menes have increasingly heavy and more painful. I am recently remarried and trying to explain the painful sexual experience is very difficult. I was on the verge of begging for a hysterectomy until I looked into having a tubal reversal so I could get pregnant again. The side effects I have experienced are exactly those of PTLS. The doctors forget to tell you about these kind of side effects.
October 22nd, 2008 at 10:37 am
Yes, I feel the same way…I’ve never had any bad pain when my cycle came on before the TL, and now it’s so bad I have to miss work the first day it comes on. I have no desire for sex anymore, my podido is very low. I have terrible headaches, and I addressed all my symtoms to my doctor..I even asked him could it be from the TL and he said no! I’m glad I found Dr. Berger, I will be doing the reversal next month, I can’t wait!
October 26th, 2008 at 1:11 am
I am 29 yrs old and had my tubal ligation about 2 and a half years ago and I am regretting it. I do not want more kids but do want a reversal. I get headaches all the time, I am becoming increasingly moody before and after my period. I never got cysts on my ovaries before my TL and didn’t have painful periods but since my TL I get cysts on my ovaries monthly and have long painful periods. I cannot loose weight and I have been put on depression medication which I have never had to be on before and I have been through a lot in my life. I get angry with my kids over little things and feel like I don’t have my patience anymore. I hate this but can’t afford the reversal and don’t have insurance. When I tell the Dr’s my problems they put me on birth control but it makes it 3 times as bad. I was on the yaz pill and broke out more and got cysts on my ovaries and my monthly period three times this month. I don’t know what to do I can’t live like this anymore I hate being in pain monthly.
October 30th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
I had my tubes tied on aug 1st of this year. I had a c-section and then after my daughter was born they tied them, The few things i have noticed is weight gain, fatigue, cramping now and then and some headaches. i thought three out of the four was because it was my fourth and im not sleeping as well and such things when a new baby arrives. But i went back to the doc today for a really bad cold and they did my weight and low and behold im gaining weight. im so upset because the only time i gain weight is when im pregnant.i have always lost weight and it stays gone. Now the doc told me that because i had my tubes tied i might gain weight. i asked him why my OB didnt tell me this he said he didnt know. I dont eat a whole lot and yet im gaining. im so depressed about this.
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:51 pm
I am saving to get the TR and have another baby. I had my TL 15 years ago. I just stumbled across this blog about PTLS. I am shocked I have had so many problems since I had my TL. I thought I was going crazy; no one believed me, I was in my mid 20’s and the Dr. wanted to give me a hysterectomy. They said I was in early stages of menopause - at 22! The pain from my periods is unreal. I would scream in pain,and vomit for hours. I have lost jobs, and missed out on life. The Dr. put me on birth control pills. it does help with the cramps and make my cycle shorter, but the headaches, crying, and mood swings are still full force. I was scared to get my tubes reversed because I was afraid to stop taking birth control pills and bring back all the painful periods. But now after reading all of this, I have even more reason to have the operation. Thank you all for sharing your stories.