NuvaRing, bleeding, and onot

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October 23, 2016

Question

Thank you for providing an amazing resource that helps me and others out so much.
I have been using the nuvaring for almost a year, consecutively for about 3 months at a time (until I stain). I have never had a problem. Somehow, I threw things off this past cycle, and I stained on my mikvah night. This staining turned into full breakthrough bleeding. I tried keeping the ring in for a week, but the bleeding was heavy and wasn't stopping so I took it out and gave it a week break.
These are my questions:
1) Does the start of the breakthrough bleeding count for onah calculations as a new period?
2) Because I use the nuvaring consecutively, I was instructed not to keep the 30 day or monthly onah. Only the interval onah. How does this breaktrhough bleeding affect this? I don't know what dates to keep.
3) When I stained at the mikvah it was less than a gris so I immersed. We consulted a rav who did not tell my husband that we should not have relations. I wasn't sure what to do as I was staining lightly and it was shabbos so I couldn't consult the website (I know you usually recommend waiting 24 hours). Anyway, I waited about 6-8 hours and it seemed I wasn't staining anymore, so we had relations. I told my husband not to look at ANYTHING! However, he didn't listen and checked himself after. However, he found no staining. I did see staining on fresh colored underwear I put on after relations but it was not within 15 seconds. Do I have to be concerned about any of the halachas of worrying about bleeding after relations?
4) The staining turned into heavier staining the next day. I did not completely saturate a liner until the following night but it was heavy enough during the day that I would personally consider it as too heavy to just be staining. If I have to keep track of the date I started staining/getting my period, I would like to start with the earlier time, not the time that I actually soaked the liner. Is that ok?

Answer

1) This episode of bleeding does count as a period for onah calculations.
2) Your exemption from the usual onot is based on the fact that you generally don't bleed for the three months the NuvaRing is inserted. This time, you began bleeding much earlier, so you do need to observe the usual onot perishah. These include the Hebrew date (yom hachodesh), the thirtieth day (onah beinonit), and the interval day (haflagah), which is calculated based on the interval from your previous period until this recent episode of bleeding. In addition, you should observe your usual three-month interval, based on the interval between your previous two periods, but counting from this recent episode.
3) You do not need to be concerned about the halachot of bleeding after relations, since the stain you saw was on colored underwear and was found more than 15 seconds after relations.
4) You should calculate your onot based on the daytime onah on which you began to consider the bleeding "too heavy to just be staining."
If this recurs, you might want to check in with your physician about why it may be happening and whether you should change your schedule with the NuvaRing.
Please feel free to get back to us with any further questions.

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