Questioning Your Birth Control- Why am I Using It & How Is it Making me Feel?
Before I write todays post I would like to preface it with the note that I am not anti birth control. I believe that birth control is a personal choice, personal right and has been a blessing for people all over the world. I don’t want anyone to think that I write todays post to discourage or to judge anyone. The topic is something that I have been thinking about because of my own personal history, the fact that I have a young daughter who will not be young forever, and my work with women’s health. So lets dive into my musings…..
Obviously birth control is a huge topic and it can be discussed from many different angles. Today I really wanted to pose a couple different questions. “Why am I using my particular method and how it is making me feel.” Which lends itself to, “Do I actually know how I feel without it.”
In my work with women’s heath I am seeing more and more young women who are exploring going off of birth control for the first time. They have been on it for years and years and are exploring their options. Many were put on it for reasons not related to preventing pregnancy. They may have been put on it as teens who had irregular cycles, painful periods, or skin issues and then found themselves staying on it. They didn’t really question it because, they were eventually using it to actually prevent pregnancy, but also because it became nice to have a scheduled period or not have a period at all. However, when you talk with them about it further some will tell you that when they began using it it some things may have improved but other things may have changed. Their may have be shifts in things like mood, weight, or pain and now later in life they are wondering if other symptoms they have experienced could have a connection. Some may have also been put on it at such a young age they couldn’t actually tell you how it made them feel or weren’t given the opportunity to question it.
I was one of the girls who was put on it very very young because my doctors were just in the camp of we treat irregular periods with the pill and thats that. I actually have a difficult time thinking about it, knowing what I do now about how birth control is working on hormones and how hormones affect your brain and chemistry during a time when my brain was still forming. I worry about who I might have been….maybe that isn’t a legitimate question but I do wonder. I decided to get off of birth control when I was struggling with really bad sleep issues and thought, maybe there is a connection here, but this was 20 some years later. 20 years! It took 20 years for me to question things.
So what is the point of all this? I think my point is two fold.
Point out that -There are other ways to regulate your cycle and address PMS, painful periods, hormonal skin issues, PCOS, fibroids, etc outside of birth control. If you aren’t trying to prevent pregnancy maybe exploring other things like acupuncture, herbal medicine and diet could be healthy options to explore, especially with young girls when their brains and bodies are still developing.
Questioning things is good-Have you ever really considered how your birth control makes you feel physically and mentally? Also why are you using your current method? How it is actually working on your body? There are generally a couple ways its working on the body-physical barrier preventing sperm from entering the uterus, synthetic hormone intervention working on your bodies chemistry and glands, or a low level of chronic inflammation that is toxic to sperm and egg and finally simply timing of intercourse around your fertile time. Is your method aligned with your needs and what you want for your body? Is your partner dictating your method or can this be a discussion you have with them?
I realize that this post is perhaps not as informative as others but I really just wanted to get you thinking and questioning this area of your health. I also wanted to just bring some awareness to the topic and options that are available to women and young girls.
What are your thought?