Often we hear women are being silenced but what happens when we decide to silence ourselves when we should be speaking up. The last year and half have been a nightmare and the one thing we can all agree on is that we would like the world to return to normalcy. We have all been encouraged to roll up our sleeves and take the vaccine but what I find misleading is the fact that a whole spectrum of symptoms and side effects were mentioned but no one ever mentioned that women could bleed or start spotting after being administered the vaccine.
I had my first vaccine dose of pfizer on May 9, 2021, I did not have any major symptoms asides feeling a bit light headed for a couple of hours and the regular arm soreness, I took some pain killers and that was it. To my surprise, a couple of days after I started spotting which gradually became light bleeding. At first, my mind never went to the vaccine and was not quite sure what to make of it. I kept thinking of different scenarios, I had fasted during the Month of Ramadan which ended in May so I thought it could have been a change in my diet or maybe I was not exercising as I used to, not like that has ever happened before but as women a lot contributes to changes in our cycle such as stress, diet and even lack of sleep. I thought I would give it another week, the light bleeding continued so I randomly mentioned it to my friend and she asked if I’d been vaccinated and confirmed she had the same side effect after getting the vaccine. I later looked online to see if there were articles about it or if Pfizer had said something about it. To my surprise, nothing was mentioned and even the articles online were not detailed.
The spotting continued until my next period, I was really hoping that by the time my period was over that would be the end of it and my body would correct itself. Unfortunately, this was not the case as I continued to spot. I eventually went in for my second dose on June 30, 2021, the nurse told me they were out of pfizer but Mordena was available and it was fine to mix it so I reported the side effect I was already having to the nurse administering the vaccine, she mentioned it was her first time hearing of such side effect. I opted for the Mordena vaccine thinking what’s the worse that could happen, I’m already bleeding anyway but I did plead with her to ask other women about it and have it recorded.
Once my arm felt better from my second dose, I called the covid symptoms reporting line to tell them about my side effect, the doctor I spoke to mentioned he had never heard of such and annoyed me further by asking me questions that implied he understood my body better than me, I did give him a bit of a lecture on how he misinterpreted my symptoms. He later said he had read articles about it and finally referred me to a gynaecologist as well as a laboratory for ultrasound and series of blood test. I’m still on the waiting list to see a specialist but the ultrasound and blood tests came out fine.
I’m not discouraging anyone from taking the vaccine. In fact, if it helps I’m pro vaccine and I remember how emotional I felt when I went to get my first shot and saw hundreds of people queuing to get vaccinated, for me that was courage and reiterated how we all wanted to get back to how we lived our lives. Although, It breaks my heart that enough women are not reporting the spotting/bleeding side effect and the few reported are not given the traction it requires. Bleeding or spotting side effect should be taken as seriously as other side effect, also it does have a psychological impact on us as women. I can guarantee you if it were men having the same side effect this would have been addressed immediately.
During this time, the women around me have been extremely supportive and made the annoying experience less stressful. If you are a woman reading this and you have the same side effect from the vaccine please report it to your doctor and I want you to know that you are not alone!
