I saw my gynecologist in September and weighed the risks and benefits of starting HRT early. I was 51 then and probably perimenopausal and I say probably because I wear Mirena without periods, with just occasional very mild spotting, so I would not know if my periods became less regular, and I do not have any symptoms associated with perimenopause but age-wise one would expect me to be in perimenopause. So I took into account the pros and cons as they apply to my particular situation and thought that on balance, all things considered, I want it. And we started with the tiny lowest dose of the transdermal patch. I did not need separate progesterone because Mirena provides that already.

I then began having diarrhea and a very bad case of it. I normally have a very well functioning GI tract and it was "out of character". It is not at all a common side effect of estradiol and the gynecologist attributed it to Ozempic I am taking for weight loss and blood glucose control (it allowed me to stop being prediabetic and reverse the weight gain from Zyprexa). Indeed Ozempic comes with a whole panoply of GI side effects including diarrhea, but in my case stopping Estradiol improved the situation and since then I have had occasional diarrhea but it was not as nearly as bad. But it did happen off Estradiol so maybe the gynecologist is right and I should ascribe the side effect to Ozempic.

I am wondering if anybody has been on Estradiol patches and not on Ozempic and still has had diarrhea.

Also a thought that maybe the interaction between Estradiol and Ozempic caused it, but I used the drug interactions checker on Drugs.com and this is not listed.