Are Birth Control Pills Recommended

If you don’t use contraception yourself, you might have children or grandchildren who do… If so, please pass this information on. 

Millions of women choose to take hormonal medications every day. In fact, 67% of all females who say that they practice contraception use non-permanent ones, mostly hormonal methods like the pill, patch, implant, injectables and the vaginal ring. Or IUDs and condoms. 

And about one quarter of these women rely on taking birth control pills, though most of them have completely no idea that the pill affects their entire bodies.

The pill increases your risk of breast cancer, it increases your risk of heart attack and stroke, especially if you’re overweight. It can cause headaches and migraines, gallbladder and liver issues like benign tumors. Weight gain, mood changes like depression and anxiety, nausea, crampling, irregular bleeding–the list goes on and on!

This is because these pills contain the very same sorts of synthetic hormones as hormone replacement drugs used by menopausal and post-menopausal women. Some experts say that because of the side-effects of synthetic hormones, women shouldn’t take them at all. Others strongly recommend avoiding birth pills whenever possible.

Here are some of the alternatives:

• Male condoms: With around 98% effectiveness when used right, they’re nearly as effective as the pill.
• Female condoms: These are unfamiliar to many people, yet female condoms are 95% effective and are less likely to tear than condoms for men. It’s a small pouch that fits into the vagina.
• Diaphragms: These thin, soft rubbers mounted on rings should be fitted by a doctor and are 92% to 98% effective at preventing pregnancy. They act as a barrier to sperm.
• Natural family planning/fertility awareness is an all-natural method allowing women to track their natural cycles and identify times of fertility.
• The calendar method relies on avoiding sex during the week when a woman is ovulating. It works best when a woman’s menstrual cycle is very regular. It can be very effective when combined with the temperature and mucus methods.
• The temperature method: This method pinpoints the day of ovulation so sex can be avoided for a few days before and after. You take your temperature as soon as you wake up each morning with a basal thermometer and note it down. Once you have tracked your cycle for a few months it can be very useful. When used with the mucus method it can have a success rate of 98%.
• The mucus method: The amount and texture of vaginal discharge tells you how much estrogen there is in your body. For the first few days after your period, there is often no discharge, but when estrogen starts to rise, there will be a cloudy, tacky mucus down there. Next, as ovulation is near, the discharge will increase in volume and become clear and stringy. Once it has returned to the tacky, cloudy mucus, or there is no discharge at all, it means that ovulation has passed.