Resuming a Normal Menstrual Cycle

• After discontinuing Depo Provera, it may take up to 14 weeks before you start having normal periods. During this time, you may have lighter or heavier periods or you may skip one or more periods. If you skip periods, you might want to check with your health care professional to make sure you aren't pregnant or that something else isn't causing you to miss periods.
  
  

Loss of Calcium

• Depo Provera causes a loss of calcium in your bones. This risk increases the longer you stay on Depo Provera. Further, it is possible that the calcium that was lost may not be replaced completely. For this reason, it is now being recommended that Depo Provera not be used for longer than two years unless another birth control method is just not suitable for you.
  
  

Increased Risk of Osteoporosis

• Loss of calcium can lead to osteoporosis, a condition whereby the bones become weaker. As a result of this, the bones are more susceptible to fractures, particular those bones that bear weight, such as the hip and thigh bones.
  
  As mentioned above, you will want to stop taking Depo Provera after two years if at all possible. In the meantime, you may want to talk to your health care professional about using calcium supplements to help lower the risk of bone loss and osteoporosis.
  
  

Delayed Fertility

• Once you stop receiving the Depo Provera injection, there is the possibility that fertility will be delayed. It may take from 10 to 18 months before you are able to conceive. The length of time that you were using Depo Provera has no bearing on how long it will take for you to become fertile again.
  
  

Weight Gain

• A side effect of Depo Provera while you are receiving the shot is weight gain. Often much of this weight does not disappear after you stop taking Depo Provera. You will lose some of the weight you gained, approximately three pounds over a two-year period, once you have switched to a form of contraception that has no hormones in it. However, if you switch from Depo Provera to any form of birth control that has hormones in it, you will continue to gain weight, even that weight you may have already lost.