Pregnancy Symptoms or Extreme Anxiety?

[christianswede]

Hello all - I will make this short and sweet. I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder and it is severely heightened right now during this whole COVID-19 mess. SO I am concerned about pregnancy due to the following fact pattern:

1) I take regular birth control, but missed two days this month. I double dosed the next day.

2) My boyfriend and I used the pull out method 7 days ago and 14 days before that (idiots, I know). He did not release inside of me, but we are wary that he didn't pull out fast enough.

3) I have had nausea, feeling full after even a little bit of food, chest pain, and now extremely sensitive nipples.

4) My period is also due in 5 days.

5) I took a pregnancy test - negative.

My question is... Can missing doses of birth control cause heightened PMS/pregnancy symptoms? Is my anxiety making it worse?

I am extremely in tune with my body, so I feel all things very intensely. That being said, my anxiety is known to produce symptoms of other illnesses (e.g. pulmonary embolism, or heart attack), and I can't always tell the difference.

Now I am just concerned for my wellbeing not only mentally, but physically. Any response is great! Thanks in advance.

 

[katrina2017]

@christianswede It's really unlikely that you are pregnant. Anxiety and normal life things can absolutely cause symptoms like that. If you were having pregnancy symptoms, a home test would be positive. But I highly doubt it.

 

[justaconfusedgirl]

@christianswede So much to unpack here girl. Firstly, I too, have generalized anxiety + occasional massive panic attacks. I feel your pain during this sh*t show. :/ it sucks, but we just have to remember that it will pass. It’s a virus, albeit a dangerous virus because we don’t have definite cures at the moment, but it will be okay. Second, I also take birth control. From what I understand, most BC’s prevent ovulation at all. Which means you would have to be off the pill entirely for atleast 1 full cycle in order to begin ovulating again. So since you only missed a couple days and you did the correct thing by doubling the following day, you should be completely safe. (I’ve done the same thing a few times and it freaked me out too, so I did some moderately extensive research to calm my anxiety.) now for the test/s: Different tests have different standards for hcg levels, meaning if you’re super early (low hcg) but you take a test that only picks up higher hcg levels, you may get a false negative. 5 days before a period is relatively early, however, if you took a test such as “first response early response” it should be decently reliable as those are set to lower levels of hcg, which is why it’s able to detect sooner. If you’re still nervous, I would suggest waiting until closer to your period and test again to be sure. Also important to note, taking a BC dose late/ doubling up, can cause your period to be early or late (give or take a couple days) because you’re body was not expecting such a large dose of hormones, therefore it can throw off your cycle just a bit. So please don’t be too concerned if your period is a bit late. I hope this helps calm you a little, hang in there