We Need to Talk About IUD Insertion and Pain

Post Roe, birth control that lasts up to 12 years could literally save lives. But there's a catch: Getting it can feel like death.

- ASHLEY OERMAN

41% The increase in IUD appointments at Planned Parenthood clinics in the three weeks after Roe fell.

Your work wife. Your sister. All of #IUD TikTok. And anyone else part of one of the loudest whisper networks in the health space. They'll tell you about the pinching, the stabbing, the searing cramps that made them see God. And sure, people like to embellish when recounting horror stories, so it's important to look at hard data too. Like the fact that 78 percent of women found getting an IUD to be moderately or severely painful, according to a study in the Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care. Or that in a recent Cosmopolitan poll, 69 percent of respondents said getting the procedure was "pretty awful, actually."

So here's the big question then, the reason this story is even a story: Why do many (if not most) doctors still tell patients that IUD insertion involves just "some discomfort"?

The answer is as you've already guessed-complicated. Let's start with the procedure itself, which honestly just sounds ouch. First, a doctor will use a tenaculum (move your eyes to the right) on the outside of your nerve-packed cervix, aka the tubelike tissue at the top of your vagina. They'll insert a probe-like ruler through your cervical opening to measure your uterus, then remove the ruler and push through a slightly wider device that deploys the IUD, placing it at the tippy-top of your uterus. Next, they'll withdraw the device, cut the IUD strings (leaving them peeking out of your cervix for when it's time to take this thing out), and remove the tenaculum. The entire process takes about five minutes or less, says Amanda M. Silbermann, MD, medical director of New York University's Langone Obstetrics and Gynecology Associates.