How to best use progesterone cream with an IUD...

...is to not use progesterone cream with an IUD.

The helpful effect of progesterone cream lies in its ability to regulate ovulation.

However, when you use a hormonal IUD or the mini-pill, ovulation is often disrupted from the continuous hormonal signal of the progestin.

You can't do two opposite things at the same time. Before you add something helpful, you have to remove the thing that causes the problem in the first place. Otherwise you would just be treating a symptom. You might also find that when you remove the cause of the trouble, you no longer have the need for help.

If you are using an IUD or the mini-pill with only a progestin, it will usually stop you from bleeding or have you bleed irregularly. This can of course be very helpful and necessary in certain situations, but it can also make it difficult to track symptoms to determine if they are cyclical.

Common symptoms with low dose progestin only regimens are migraines, vaginal dryness, low mood, low sex drive, bloating and mood swings. However, symptoms are also related to your age and reproductive stage. When you are closer to perimenopause you are more likely to react negatively from having your ovulation and estrogen production disrupted. 

An exception to this rule is if you have very heavy bleeding and the IUD doesn't fully prevent that. Then you likely still ovulate and bleed regularly. In this case you can use the more concentrated progesterone cream Matriarch 100 during the 12-10 days counting down to your expected period to reduce bleeding.

When you order a Matriarch progesterone cream more detailed usage recommendations will be emailed to you.