I removed my own IUD because it took too long to get an appointment

There were strings attached.

A woman is going viral — and igniting a debate on contraceptive safety — on TikTok after claiming she removed her own IUD contraceptive.

Ashley Hartig, 27, said that she and her husband Derek Hartig, who already had two children together, were ready for a third child but didn’t want to wait on her doctor — so she took matters into her own hands, literally.

“I hadn’t spoken to a doctor about taking it out myself, I had an appointment scheduled for two weeks with my gynecologist but that was just for an exam to check the IUD,” said Ashely, who’s racked up 1.3 million followers and more than 44 million likes with @TheHartigFamily videos on TikTok.

“From there they would then book me in to take it out,” the impatient 27-year-old mom from Florida added. “So, it would be around four weeks before it actually came out.”

According to Ashley, both she and her childhood sweetheart Derek initially only wanted two kids: Ryker, 6, and daughter Presley, 3.

However, when the realized they wanted a third, she spent hours on social media looking for other women who had taken out their own intrauterine device or IUD.

The IUD is a small, T-shaped device made of plastic or copper with a string at the end of to help with removal, much like the string on a tampon. A doctor has to insert it by carefully guiding it through the vagina and cervix and then into the uterus.

“It was on mind my every day about taking it out, I had seen videos of other women doing it as well,” Ashley told Caters News. ” “It took a lot of courage, but now I feel empowered and cleansed. I was scrolling TikTok for hours trying to find other women who had done it as well.”

“They were saying how easy it was, so one day when my husband was at work, I just pulled it out,” she continued. “I felt the strings and just pulled it straight out of my cervix. It came out so easily and there was no blood either just a little scar tissue around it.”

The process wasn’t exactly pain-free, however, she admitted while attempting to pull it out she did experience some pain.

“I just had to find some inner strength to do it, even though I had never felt the strings before. I just knew I needed to get a good grip on it,” explained the Florida native. “It took me a few attempts, I stopped trying and then after a few hours I decided to try again and it came out.”

Ashley said it then dawned on her that she might need to seek medical expertise after all.

“It hurt a few times so I had left it and went to pick my son up from school, I called the Planned Parenthood trying to get an emergency appointment but they said they don’t do them and that I needed to go to the hospital,” she said. “I decided to try again a little later on.”

Once the device was removed, Ashely surprised her husband Derek by gifting the IUD to him.

“I handed it to him in a little box, telling him I had got him a gift,” she recalled with a laugh. “He couldn’t believe I had pulled it out myself. He wasn’t expecting it at all, the first thing he asked me was if I’m okay. He kept saying how he just didn’t expect it.”

In a TikTok video, which was posted in late February and has since gained 72,000 views, Ashely proclaimed the process made her feel “empowered. I felt comfortable in my body and I used to not feel that way at all. It took a lot of courage and I feel cleansed.”

Ashley also said she had to explain to her children what she had given to her husband and told them that it was something that “made me not able to have babies.”

Several of the Hartig family’s followers praised her for her bravery.