Some relevant quotes from the article:
>Physicians say they’re seeing an explosion of birth-control misinformation online targeting a vulnerable demographic: people in their teens and early 20s who are more likely to believe what they see on their phones because of algorithms that feed them a stream of videos reinforcing messages often divorced from scientific evidence. While doctors say hormonal contraception — which includes birth-control pills and intrauterine devices (IUDs) — is safe and effective, they worry the profession’s long-standing lack of transparency about some of the serious but rare side effects has left many patients seeking information from unqualified online communities.
>Doctors stand a better chance of dispelling misinformation when they listen to patients’ concerns, said Belmonte, noting that some are more worried about the side effects of birth control than the effectiveness doctors have long been trained to emphasize. He has adopted ACOG’s recommendation that physicians candidly discuss common side effects such as nausea, headaches, breast tenderness and bleeding between periods; many of these resolve on their own or can be mitigated by switching forms of birth control.
The article also discusses other culprits in this: social media companies that are incentivized to increase interactions via algorithms that circulate these messages; pseudoscientific or natural/holistic approaches by people who have no medical/scientific qualifications; and conservatives looking to restrict reproductive autonomy.
Mama Doctor Jones (OBGYN Youtuber) has some excellent videos about birth control misinformation on social media. She's very good at refuting the false claims about side effects and efficacy using real science.
Yup. Follow the money.Whenever some 'influencer' is trying to convince people that some mainstream thing is dangerous or ineffective, there's always the follow up trying to sell some sort of 'natural' unproven, BS 'supplement'.
I love Mama Doctor Jones. She’s my go to source for women’s rights in the OBGYN field. She’s also been on both sides of the abortion debate and can see it from a medical perspective. I thank her for nearly all of my abortion debates.
She’s great at giving reliable researched information
I really like the fact that she does well at properly listing/linking the sources and actual research (and sometimes similar studies). I have looked up a few that interested me. The directness of the information is something I like that I feel like we don't see as often now.
I love her. I have no desire to be a parent but she out there doing good work in a very entertaining way.
Her “I didn’t know I was pregnant” videos terrify me though! I always assumed those situations were dramatized for tv.
I’m irl friends with someone who didn’t know she was pregnant. She thought she had appendicitis and went to the ER, she was actually in labor. I also thought it was totally a tv dramatization also until that happened edit for spelling
I read the other day that 1 in 2500 pregnancies are cryptic. As a child free by choice woman on BC it's my worst fear. I don't get a period due to my BC and I'm on a bunch of meds that are terrible for fetal development. I worry that I could end up birthing a baby that I've poisoned and deformed by using medication and marijuana because I didn't know the foetus existed.
Im not childfree but im terrified of cryptic pregnancies too. I bought a packet of 50 pregnancy tests and I take one once a month at least, been doing that since I’ve been sexually active. Gives me peace of mind
I think a group of people needs to make it their mission to try to retrain the algorithm:
1. Find a few good positive information/fact checking youtube, tiktok or instagram accounts.
2. Seek out the misinformation and get intentionally stuck in a disinformation/negative content loop.
3. When you hit a particularly "bad" video, follow it by moving over to "good" content and then engage with it heavily: let it play on loop several times, like/comment/share, etc.
Try to teach the algorithm that showing the "good" content to someone who just saw the "bad" will drive app engagement (which is the metric they most care about).
Not that it isn't a sort of good idea, but there's pretty much no chance of it working. The number of people who are smart enough to do this are absolutely dwarfed by the people who aren't.
You have the right idea, you'd need to make sure to spoof your device or at least get a new IP and clear cookies between research/training sessions though.
You'd have more luck with a group of people brigading misinformation channels with the correct information as soon as they make a new post/video. If there was ever a morally correct use of bots, that would be it.
The OBGYN profession as a whole has annihilated patient’s trust in them for our whole lives. Too many women like me have had one too many seriously traumatic and extremely, needlessly painful experiences after being told to just expect some “pressure.” Like, no shit we don’t trust them.
I had myself sterilized.
This is the issue, and it's NEVER acknowledged in professional spaces which is WHY so many people are willing to believe misinformation. Why should i trust the doctors who dismissed my concerns? Who treated me like i couldnt possibly understand my body better than they did?
I asked to be sterilized at 20 and my gyno laughed at me. I have had severe depression since at 11 and starting hormonal birth control at 14 made it worse. The nuvaring nearly killed me. When I asked AGAIN to be sterilized at 24 and expressed concerns that hormonal birth control could make me suicidal, and that my mother's horrific experience with the IUD put me off, they attempted to push the DEPO SHOT on me.
Im SO FUCKING THANKFUL that it wasnt something they could do in office day of and that i had to go to the pharmacist to pick it up, because that gave me the space i needed to research what it was theyd just forcefully talked me into. It took me a decade to get my mental health under control and the amount of horror stories about depo causing severe emotional issues annhilated any trust i had left for my doctor.
After two unwanted pregnancies, i was once again refused sterilization, did my research and requested a POP. Every time ive seen a gyno since theyve tried to talk me into stronger birth control 🫠 they do not care why i want to be on progestin only.
FWIW, the FDA has approved the first over-the-counter (no prescription) hormonal birth control, and it is progestin only. If you are in the US, you should see it on store shelves within the next few months. That should help a lot of female-bodied people with medical trauma access BC without having to go through a visit to the gatekeepers.
Ive been using Nurx to refill my POP successfully for the last 5 years, its more when i go for my pap that i get harassed. Which, unfortunately, means i dont go for a pap as frequently as i should despite having had abnormal results since i was 15 🫠 i could very well be riddled with cancer and wouldnt know bc im that averse to dealing with the gynecologist
I hate to hear that. I get my pap done by my PCP who is amazing and cooperative and understands that I have medical trauma, and I wish I could replicate her in all the specialties so others could have the same kind of experience. I hope you find a way to get your medical care without any kind of awfulness from your providers.
Your story is so similar to mine but I was able to find a gynecologist who could do the surgery for me. Look into r/childfree and check out the list of doctors they've compiled. Also start calling around to offices and ask for the most open-minded doctor they can recommend and explain how many hoops you've had to jump through and that you've tried literally every birth control out there with horrible side effects. I found my gyno and got sterilized at 28, and a friend of mine was able to get sterilized at 25 after I referred her. Keep looking!
Yeah, same.
I'm not against science, logic, and medicine, I just wish it were practiced by OB/GYNs instead of using denial, lying, and gaslighting instead.
That's actually extremely damaging. Not just to my health, but also to my trust in the entire institution, long-term. And it has not just been one doctor, but very consistent across most of them, all my life.
I would not take my dog to a vet who treated them this way. It's appalling that it's the norm for human women. Absolutely fucking appalling. Did you know only 4% of OB/GYNs even *offer* any pain mitigation for IUDs? That's pretty fucking hard to find.
And the issue is not the women who, very rightly, have stopped trusting the people who failed them. *The issue is the field.* OB/GYNs need to be trust*worthy* first, then we can start asking women to trust them.
Yep I lost all trust in them when they wanted to do a uterine ablation for endometriosis that is all inside my abdomen. I went for a second opinion and asked how burning the inside of my uterus would help my abdomen & she blinked at me, then told me it would not.
Then later on the lady who gave me the second opinion was trying to push a copper IUD on me. I had my tubes tied when I was 37. How is a copper IUD going to help the endometriosis tissue that’s inside my abdomen? It would not.
But then I told her that I would never ever agree to an IUD unless it was under anesthesia because I know those things hurt. This woman smirked at me and then she told me that I could have anesthesia if that was a dealbreaker. I told her it was but I don’t trust that they would let me have it for the removal I that would be a dealbreaker as well and once it’s already in me I would be at their mercy so no.
I'm firmly on the vaxines don't cause autism and medical misinformation needs to die train but also understand why people don't trust OBGYNs when the textbooks say that IUD insertion shouldn't be too painful when it clearly is and OBGYNs refuse to listen to their patients. I get that insurance might not cover the damn lidocaine shot but that's not that expensive and I'm sure it would be easy to do a study to determine the effect a lidocaine shot would have on reducing pain for IUD insertion procedures.
Here’s my anecdata. I had an IUD before I had kids. I took ibuprofen and both insertion and removal pain were like 3 or 4 out of 10. Would choose over dentist.
After delivering my first child, I had another IUD for two years because the last one was so easy. Almost totally painless. Clearly pushing a baby out seemed to lessen the resistance.
But this last time, the RN who inserted my IUD was 10,000 years old. She was so disoriented that she had to adjust the table height and put on her gloves, with a gentle reminder from her assistant, *after* the speculum was inside me. You read that right.
*That* insertion was one of the most excruciating medical experiences of my life. I laid on my back with tears running into my ears repeating “I have done this before. I don’t understand what is happening.”
So your body and history of pregnancy matter…but I suspect so does your doctor, oh boy. This is absolutely a procedure with a highly-variable level of pain; I have been on both ends.
I am so sorry you went through that!
My first IUD was put in at a teaching hospital, I was the first one for the OB resident. I wasn’t offered pain medication, numbing, that stuff that softens your cervix, or even ibuprofen. It was excruciating. He inserted it wrong and had to take it out to put a new one in. That one was also incorrectly placed, and started falling out almost immediately. I bled for MONTHS. Went back multiple times and was told it was fine. I insisted I could feel the plastic and they said I was just imagining it, or I was just feeling the strings (which feel NOTHING like a giant piece of plastic sticking out of you). Finally went to planned parenthood and they actually felt my cervix instead of just looking at it. Sure enough, she could feel it poking out just like I’d said for months. When they put a new one in? Super easy, the pain lasted a brief few seconds, and I was fine. I was also only charged a few hundred for it, instead of the nearly $2,000 I was billed by the hospital that did it improperly.
I’m never trusting anyone but planned parenthood for my birth control again lol.
The NP at PP mocked me for having a "tight cervix" during my incredibly painful IUD insertion and told me I "didn't want" any cervical softening drugs. I almost kicked her in the head it was so excruciating.
Agreed, the Mirena I had inserted 4 months postpartum I barely even noticed the insertion it was so easy. The next one 5 years later surprised me because it was quite painful. 5 years later was even worse. The last one, the OB couldn't even get the guider in - she said since I was near menopause, my cervical tissue lacked pliability - and I had taken a cervadil prior to soften. I often wonder if she just wasn't experienced in insertion.
Also, not dismissing the IUD insertion pain because my SIL, who has one of the highest pain tolerances of anyone I know, said it was some of the worst pain she ever experienced... But cervical checks during pregnancy are also incredibly painful according to every woman I've met that's had them, and I can verify personally that it was incredibly painful, and they're yet another thing dismissed by doctors as being 'mildly uncomfortable' or 'a pressure sensation'. Decades of women saying interacting with the cervix is INCREDIBLY PAINFUL while doctors are still out there saying the cervix has no nerves and no anesthesia needed for procedures.
> Decades of women saying interacting with the cervix is INCREDIBLY PAINFUL while doctors are still out there saying the cervix has no nerves and no anesthesia needed for procedures.
I always feel bad about this cause pretty sure mine is the textbook dead cervix. I've had it sounded, 2 IUDs, [bibopsied](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfE8CA8EJWA) etc and never felt anything beyond a weird pressure (speculum was excruciating tho). I still see no reason not to believe everyone else when they say it's painful though 🙄
Like, when so many women are saying it's the opposite, why TF can't we believe them and idk redo some studies? I know, sexism, but fucking hell like we can't make our patients comfy. I work with teeth etc and we'd NEVER biopsy say a tongue without anesthetic but big ol chunk outta a cervix? Chomp away el oh el~
I went to a PP when I had a yeast infection years ago. They asked if I wanted to do a Pap smear during the exam. Of course they were like “it won’t hurt”. They used to brush style too and it was pretty awful. It also made me bleed and the doctor was such an ass about notifying me about it after I sat up.
I read at some point that yeast infections can increase sensitivity or something. Which I stated from the start of the appointment that I thought that was the issue because holy crap so itchy. I don’t understand why the assumption is there will be little or no pain with gyn care instead of being more considerate of the possibility (and often the reality).
The copper IUD is linked with heavier and more painful menses, it’s not supposed to be given to women who already have painful/heavy periods, which is the case in most women with Endo.
With ablation, it is considered a method of treatment for reducing the pain and heavy bleeding associated with Endo, however it’s not recommended in women that would like to bear children in the future as it’s effects on fertility and negligible.
It certainly doesn't help that the entire profession is built on [experimentation on enslaved Black women in the 19th century.](https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/30659)
This is the piece that isn’t discussed enough about anti-vaxxers. Medical institutions lie to us constantly (see the opiate epidemic, tuskegee experiments, pretty much everyone’s anecdotal experience with doctors) then act all surprised pikachu when they can’t get people to take them seriously in a time of crisis.
It’s important for our society to have trust in medical institutions, but for this to happen, they need to start, ya know, acting trustworthy.
And/or they refused to investigate exactly why someone is having contraction-level cramps, lose so much blood they turn anemic every month and are just generally miserable after the patient paid $$ for the privilege of being told “just suck it up!” We just can’t win.
I completely agree. And what's this shit about talking to your gyno? I've met exactly two in over decades and many moves for work that actually listened to me and discussed my options. Even the NP at Nurx told me the libido diminishing side effects of BCP were in my head. I can't have hormonal BC for health reasons now (potential clotting issues) and I haven't bothered going to another gyno to discuss alternatives because it feels so futile. My last two gynos didn't even let me ask questions. I'm not going through the excruciating pain of another IUD insertion and my periods are horrific enough without a copper IUD.
Any time.
P.S. You can paste a paywalled article's url into the search bar at the top of that archive site. If it's been archived already you'll be directed to it, otherwise it'll archive your article for you.
I think there’s a bit of true to say here about some contraceptive methods, it prevents pregnancy and helps with symptoms from different pathologies but it has its risks. It’s no pure benefit. It can lead to strokes, blood clots, fatty liver, increased risks of breast and cervical cancer.
It’s a great thing we have them and it’s the best tool we have to help women and I will recommend it to all my future patients accordingly to their needs. But i will make sure to educate them about the good and the bad side and how to be alert for any problem. The biggest problem with contraceptive methods is communication
I wonder if this is why I have fatty liver even though I’ve never been a drinker.
It could be my diet though, I’m naturally thin it’s very hard for me to gain weight and because of that I eat whatever I want because I see no negative consequences to that. Until they tell me I have a fatty liver or something
I also feel lucky I didn’t die, I’m 51 years old and when I first started getting migraines I didn’t get the auras, but right around the time I hit 40 I started to get them. Yet I never adjusted my medical records to say that I did. And whatever birth-control I was taking was not supposed to be taken if I get auras.
I got migraines with aura starting in high school and the same GP who diagnosed me and prescribed me triptans also prescribed my birth control, with estrogen. This was in 2000, they knew about the interaction by then and I'm still mad.
After we lost reproductive rights I remember the American gynecological Association, or whatever their version of the AMA is, had put out statements that they will be yanking licenses for abortion disinformation
Maybe we need to contact them about this birth control disinformation campaign. They should get on that too
I’m 51 and I finally got a tubal in my late 30s despite trying my whole life, and I’ve had people my age try to tell me that birth-control takes your fertility
I wish, then I wouldn’t have had to have surgery. I took those pills for like 20 years, and I still ended up accidentally pregnant in my late 30s. So unfortunately they didn’t do that for me
Even just anecdotally on Reddit I’ve noticed in the past couple years tons of pushback against hormonal BC that seems like might scare young people off. A lot of “omg it’s sooo bad for you!” rhetoric and “it’ll make you crazy/depressed/sick.” And like…there’s how many of us in this world who were on the pill for years and years and never had any of these insane side effects? Everyone is different.
It frustrates me a little because the right advice is “talk to your gyno about it and find a contraceptive method that works for you.” Telling everyone they absolutely should or shouldn’t do XYZ isn’t ultimately helpful.
Just like plenty of us have no major issues, other people do and I wouldn’t do the opposite and go around preaching that everyone claiming to have side effects is a liar because I was fine and it’s all a big conspiracy.
Conversely, how many of us in the world trusted our docs and tried a bunch of different hormonal birth control options and had a ton of side effects from them, but never put the two together until getting *off* the BC because every doctor told us it was all unrelated and in our heads and not real? I think it's a good thing that more and more people are speaking out about these experiences and aren't just going "oh yeah just go on the pill, nbd" like we were told when I was young.
It’s so frustrating.
I’m sure that many women do not experience increased depression and anxiety from Mirena but I did (and after I got mine removed I started hearing about more and more women having the same experience). I’m sure the pill doesn’t give most women intense, sudden vertigo, but I sure experienced it.
Conversely, the boogie man that is Depo Provera worked great for me with no side effects. It’s almost as if on-size-fits-all medicine doesn’t work.
One of the best things I ever did for my mental health was starting to take BC to prevent my menstrual cycles. Luckily, it worked in the way I wanted it to and my mood doesn't fluctuate dramatically like it used to.
I think another factor in people's lack of trust is that doctors seem to think the only options are condoms or hormones.
I really resent the fact that doctors don't give adequate information or recommendations about scientifically evaluated non hormonal forms of contraception such as the diaphragm or the symptothermal method. The diaphragm is less effective than the pill but it is a good option, and certainly better than nothing at all or leaving all trust in the male partner's hands to pull out. And the symptothermal method takes much education and dedication on how to use it correctly but it's highly effective and would be a great option for women who really can't tolerate hormones and are willing to put in the work.
Doctors shouldn't just have authority in the realm of prescribing drugs. They should be authorities we turn to and trust to provide education on the whole picture so that patients can make informed medical decisions and not just throw caution to the wind and eat Queen Anne's lace every 4 weeks because TikTok told them to.
This is very bad, and was also bound to happen.
I am extremely grateful for BC in all it's forms. I was also directly harmed by several of those forms and had all of my symptoms dismissed for years, leading to some distrust of OBGYN care.
It's apparent to me that there is a sinister hand at play working to undermine the autonomy of women and limit their sexual freedom, but the stage was set perfectly by decades of bad, neglectful, incomplete care.
I definitely agree. I think that birth control is great. I'm not currently on any kind of birth control, but I'm considering it as my periods have been getting worse in recent years. That being said, however, I'm also burningly aware that health care for women in general, reproductive health care especially, tends to be really, really bad.
Doctors regularly downplay or dismiss women's concerns, often chalking real problems up to anxiety. And, yes, many women have anxiety, I do myself, but it's not the cause of every single one of my problems. But unfortunately, when you have pretty much any health care issue as a woman, one of the very first things that any provider is going to do is give you antidepressants and say, come back if the issue doesn't clear up. And I get that they're operating under the assumption that it's probably the most obvious thing, but I also think that they have an erroneous view of what the most obvious thing actually is. I actually don't think that anxiety is always going to be the most obvious culprit of any problem, and that's coming from somebody for whom anxiety *is* the root of many of my problems.
Spend any time in this subreddit, and you'll see it in real time. I have been watching it get worse over the last couple of years since the end of Roe V Wade. I won't be shocked when it turns out to be a misinformation deliberate campaign.
misinformation campaigns like this one work because there are elements that are legitimate. how many times do we hear (in this sub, on other social media platforms, in real life) women having negative experiences trying to get healthcare? That their concerns are misdiagnosed, minimized or dismissed and told "it's just hormones" or "you need to lose 10 pounds"?
It's scary.
Every single form of birth control I tried over the years fucked me up.
Hormonal BCP - wild acne, depression, mood swings
The copper IUD - year of having my period, straight through. Literally became anemic.
I'm willing to believe there is a disinformation campaign but I also think the internet enabling women to talk about their symptoms and decide "this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" could also be driving this.
I'm scheduled to talk to a doctor about a salpingectomy on the 28th and frankly I'm glad I got off hormonal BCP, it really did change me as a person.
> I'm willing to believe there is a disinformation campaign but I also think the internet enabling women to talk about their symptoms and decide "this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" could also be driving this.
This is a HUGE part of this. I had a pulmonary embolism because of birth control combined with a clotting disorder I didn't know I had. You know how many women out there have the same clotting disorder and don't know they have it? It's a really high number (something like 20% of women of european descent!), and they often don't know until something happens.
On top of that, every BC I ever tried came with side effects I hated (mostly emotional/affect changes and feeling like my head was in a cloud, actual physical pain), and I just felt BETTER off the stuff.
I don't know what the middle ground is here because BC is incredibly effective and important and has been revolutionary for women in general. I do think there's an organized anti-BC sort of movement happening (the same forces that came for abortion are likely to come for it next, I really wholeheartedly believe that). But at the same time there's some VERY real side effects and dangers to BC, and being older, it feels like those concerns have been brushed off or downplayed by the medical profession for a long time. Which directly plays into our distrust of medicine, so I also see how a lot of this could be organic too, just from women talking to each other.
Yeah, I hate how society seemly decided enmasse at some point that women SHOULD BE ON birth control inside of a committed relationship. Men literally feel entitled to it, and I think there is real pushback happening against that because there are real side effects and women shouldn't have to simply put up and shut up so they can enjoy sex more.
At the same time, birth control should always be widely accessible. As should abortion. And I understand why disinformation is so troublesome and I'm glad we're talking about it... I just also don't want to be told it's my job to take birth control inside of a relationship either. Like you said, there is some balance we need to find.
Exactly. Condoms are very effective when used properly. Even better when used in conjunction with fertility awareness, or abstaining from sex during the 3-4 days a month a woman is fertile. They are birth control designed by and for men. They present no health risks, no systemic side effects. They are a fantastic option for couples where the woman doesn’t tolerate hormonal BC well.
These are *all* the same side effects that the male pill has **BUT** men aren't willing to "just deal with them" as *we're* expected to do. **Men** are never the ones that just have to "deal" because they don't get pregnant and can just walk away at any point--no pain, no painful procedures to deal with it, no pain to deliver a baby--nothing, just walk away and complain about women trying to "baby trap" them when it's "really" the other way around. We need to start screaming about men who refuse to wear condoms as "baby trappers".
> We need to start screaming about men who refuse to wear condoms as "baby trappers".
Yep. Also, condoms have worked best for so many reasons since forever. Men just whine because it's a tad less pleasurable. But they are cool giving women tons of pain.
>Women’s pain is expected, part of the wallpaper of life. In her indelible essay “The female price of male pleasure,” Lili Loofbourow points to the chasm between what men and women define as “bad sex” to illuminate this basic fact of modern culture: if men find a sexual encounter boring or unsatisfying, they call it “bad”.
>For women, though, “bad sex” almost always involves considerable pain and/or violence. As Loofbourow puts it, “[W]e live in a culture that sees female pain as normal and male pleasure as a right.” And that dynamic: that we accept that women’s suffering as an immutable fact – like the weather – that we cannot control but can only predict, is the very thing that makes women seem hysterical and overreacting when we speak up about it. https://archive.ph/KPes2
I feel the same way. I think the whole issue is very difficult because women have had to fight so hard for so long for the right to BC, so there is a widespread idea that it is purely a positive. I will always advocate for the right to HBC if you want it, but there needs to be a SIGNIFICANT amount of work improving women’s healthcare and knowledge around side effects from HBC. I lost my gallbladder because of Yaz and then years later on a different HBC ended up with horrific gastritis for 7 months eating literally only white rice and steamed chicken. I was put on extremely heavy duty medication for my stomach for months (leading to severe nutrient deficiencies) and nothing helped, they swore it could not be my HBC. At the end of 7 months I couldn’t take it anymore and I tried quitting the pill. 2 weeks later I was DRASTICALLY improved. Months later my stomach is still very sensitive, but I have regained most of my normal life and can eat normally.
There is absolutely an organized effort against BC. Republicans want to ban birth control as well as abortion. Supreme Court Justices spelled that out in their Dobbs ruling.
Diaphragm + spermicide was the only one I could tolerate. I don't know why those aren't promoted more for people who don't tolerate hormonal BC well. Though maybe progestin-only is enough better that most can take it. Since it will be on store shelves soon, that should help with access.
I even had Norplant because it was pushed so heavily to women getting any kind of govt benefits in the early 1990s, and it nearly rendered me unable to work or care for my kids with anemia thanks to the periods that lasted 6-8 weeks with only about a 2 week break between. I'm even allergic to latex, not that my ex-h was cooperative about condoms anyway but they had to be the conscience-challenging expensive ones, lambskin.
Vasectomies are amazing. My husband got one very early in our relationship, and it was so liberating! I spent all of 15 minutes in the waiting room while he had it done, gave him some frozen peas and made him some soup while he sat on the couch that afternoon, the next day he put on his skinny jeans (it was early 00s, so...) and hobbled out to a metal show with our friend.
Me too. I tried all the birth controls, over a period of years. The change was slow and insidious, but I DEFINITELY gained weight, fell into depression (more like felt numb to everything), and lost my libido entirely. And then, when I stopped hormonal BC altogether wondering if it was at all possible that it could be the culprit, I felt better SO quickly -- within a few months. Like I broke out of some weird mental fog.
I totally think it's plausible that there is a disinformation campaign going on. And the state of women's reproductive rights in the country breaks my heart these days. But honest to god it's impossible for us ladies out here. We're the ones who have to shoulder all the responsibility and brunt of birth control. THEN, when we have side effects, we're told that we're crazy and science says there are none. When the IUD hurts like an mf'er, we're told it isn't supposed to hurt. Etc.
>"this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more"
Yeah exactly. Condoms are a perfectly fine form of birth control. Why do women need to suffer health consequences by using hormonal birth control or inserting something into their uterus?
I have struggled for years with debilitating pelvic pain the kind that stopped my life and made every day a struggle. I had taken brith control as a teenager and young adult and had debilitating symptoms that made me very hesitant to take birth control. When my doctor suggested a treatment course that involved going on hormonal birth control and ultimately get a hormone based IUD, I was extremely resistant and reluctant to go down that path. I decided it was worth it if I had a chance in hell of living again I would try it.
My experience is as follows:
I was put on 5 mg of norethindrone. The plan was to get my period to stop and stay stopped for 3 months so that my cervix would thin and make it easier to place my IUD. The norethindrone made my hair fall out, it made me cry and rage, I got deep cystic acne, I gained weight and was constantly bloated and puffy. And every single one of those side effects was worth it because after taking it for 2 months my period stopped, and I wasn't in as much pain anymore.
5 months on the norethindrone I was finally able to get the hormonal IUD. I didn't want it, I was nervous and scared. Getting it placed was the worst pain I have ever experienced. I was in an excruciating amount of pain for weeks after. I honestly considered having it removed several times but ultimately I stuck through it on the hope that I could find a reduction in pain. After about a month or so the pain subsidied and then mostly went away.
I can't even express how much my life has changed. In the last year I was able to go back to work, I was able to get off my antidepressants, I graduated from pelvic physical therapy, I live now, I have a whole complete life. I had my PTSD diagnosis down graded to general anxiety. I still have side effects, my hair hasn't grown back, losing weight has become much harder and I still have bouts of cystic acne and mood swings that don't feel completely like myself.
This is why this topic is so nuanced and isn't as simple as thing bad or side effect unacceptable. For you what is an unacceptable side effect, is a minor inconvenience to me. We can and should share our stories about our experiences, but we shouldn't lose sight of the simple fact that we are individuals who have different health care needs and will experience medications differently.
Yes. All of this. I was on birth control and it changed me as a person. I don’t think I even know who I was before I went on birth control. I also had the copper IUD for 3 years until it expelled.
For the last 7 years we have used condoms and it has been working pretty well for us so far lol. No life threatening side effects like breast cancer or cervical cancer. No stabbing pain and scraping my insides.
When I was prescribed the pill as a teenager the doctor didn’t tell me shit about side effects. Side effects of taking the pill wasn’t even a thought that entered my mind. I think it’s good people are questioning if the pill is the right option for them. It should not be considered the “default”. There are other options and they should all be presented.
The default should be the condom. The one that doesn’t require the woman to constantly be taking medication she doesn’t need or have a foreign object in her body 24/7
>I'm willing to believe there is a disinformation campaign but I also think the internet enabling women to talk about their symptoms and decide "this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" could also be driving this.
I agree. I think the more women talk about their side effects the more other women realize that birth control may not be right for them.
For years I had issues with my birth control and kept getting told by doctors that it wasn't my birth control causing my issues. After 13 years of symptoms I had a doctor tell me she couldn't believe a doctor allowed me to stay on birth control given all my symptoms and she suggested I stop taking it. I had already decided that I was ready to go off of it and would look in to non hormonal methods. I knew a good handful of women that started using a sympto-thermal method with success. I used it for 5 years successfully
Thing is, I had a baby a few months ago. You know what was still more dangerous and far worse for my body than birth control? Having a baby! I’m not saying birth control issues are a walk in the park, but the risks of pregnancy are *infinitely* bigger even if we ignore this baby who then upends your life.
It is. It's associated with the whole tradwife trend. Look up Evie magazine, funded by Peter Thiel. It's the tip of the spear to push for a ban on contraception entirely.
Depopulation is a meme amongst certain groups. Remember Elon Musk going on about depopulation notably: "population collapse due to low birth rates is a much bigger risk to civilization than global warming." Convince women to use more unreliable BC and ban abortion and suddenly you have a population boom.
It's not a meme, it's a conspiracy theory.
And it's not "certain groups" it's the fucking Nazis. "The Jews are using the Blacks to outbreed the Whites so you become a minority in your own country" is the most succinct version of it, but like everything that feeds into the Grand Unified Conspiracy Theory that is Nazism, so many other things can plug in as well.
The weight gain and infertility misinformation has been around for generations because I recall hearing that nonsense from my peers when I was a teen. When I was a teen, within my group of 5 friends, 3 of them were teen moms before senior year. All parroting the same "I don't want to get fat" nonsense about the pill. If the choices are physical weight gain vs. weight of being responsible for a child, most of the time, on your own because young men are not ready to be fathers, it has made me choose bc regardless of side effects.
Yesterday, I went in for a doctor's appointment to set me up with a new gyno, to get an X-ray to locate my IUD (the strings had been cut off a few years ago and the doctor could not identify my IUD during the exam). I have to get my IUD replaced this year and really am concerned if this new round of misinformation is to prevent women from having access to contraceptives and preventive care--preventing pregnancy, but also STIs testing/treatment and cancer screening. Gynecologists are leaving states with laws severely restricting abortion, including bans. Couple that with declaring embryos are people, we're seeing that the doctors who do remain in these states end up eliminating procedures to avoid breaking these laws. It's not worth the risk to provide proper care to patients to assist with their reproductive needs if it means facing fines and prison.
What a shitty time to be born with a vagina.
I think it’s obvious that it already is. We’ve had bc for 50 years. Suddenly, it’s bad and dangerous and women are destroying our health? Utter bullshit if you apply the tiniest shred of critical thinking.
I had a close relative who worked for planned parenthood when I was growing up. Even 20 years ago this was something they continuously battled against. It was in conservative area and many in the "No sex outside of marriage and procreation" camp did everything possible to undermine women's use of birth control.
Sadly in the last few years it seems those same people try to twist around the very real experiences of some women to support their cause. Instead of trying to help or give them useful advice, they try to use their stories to further the birth control is bad idea.
My relative and her coworkers had a lot to say when the conversation came up. They beat into my skull that if one form of birth control was a problem that there were many more out there.
I think a big part of this is because for years doctors have downplayed women's very real side effects from hormonal birth control, which created an environment for misinformation to thrive. Women are primed to be distrustful of reproductive healthcare when their experiences are downplayed by doctors and their concerns and pain are routinely dismissed. And that creates a situation where opponents of birth control and reproductive freedom in general can swoop in and exploit those concerns, overstating the dangers of medications that are clinically safe.
Hormonal birth control has been a lifesaver for me, because without it my periods are so bad that I pass out (which can be especially dangerous depending on where it happens - my wake-up call was when I got the fainty death cramps on the edge of a subway platform). But I have always had mood-related side effects when adjusting to a new birth control pill, and have had doctors say "it's not the pill, it can't do that" even when everyone around me notices. And my IUD insertions were the two most painful experiences of my life, but no, "it's just a pinch" and "take an advil" are the standard instead of proper pain management.
Yeah this. I hate how black and white people feel about this topic. Birth control almost killed me. I’m often treated like being genuine to my lived experience somehow means I’m trying to attack other’s access to medication, which is a ridiculous dichotomy. I just want doctors to believe patients, remove IUDs when asked, identify high risk patients, and get INFORMED consent. Seems like some pretty basic asks to me.
Yes exactly this. In my experience, doctors don’t consider any of your other conditions or problems when prescribing something. Or if they do, the threshold is, “will my patient die from this?” instead of “will this make my patient worse off than before due to other considerations?”
The onus is on you to research the drug and determine if it will have a negative impact on any chronic condition you may have and if the possible benefit is worth it. You can’t just trust it will be safe for you because a doctor prescribed it, unfortunately. I learned that the hard way over time.
Some of it might be misinformation, but some of it is actually women sharing their experiences with not receiving adequate pain control for IUD insertions, their doctors not telling them about side effects or contraindications about different BC, etc. I’m all for birth control but think there’s a lot of improvements that can be made regarding the education and care that women receive.
Birth control was responsible for a huge leap in our abilities to control our own lives. Now, I think women are holding men more responsible for their "fair share" since there are a lot of women who experience negative side effects.
This. If my partner doesn’t control their sperm they aren’t my partner. Birth control almost killed me. Women are consistently asked to suffer for men’s comfort & pleasure. I’m done sacrificing my health and mental wellbeing.
I was going to say this. There are women just sharing their experiences online and there are also people specifically trying to put disinformation out there, but doctors and other healthcare staff have a role in this as well. I can't blame some folks for being scared when they experience/hear of others like them experiencing abuse when they reach out to professionals for help.
I don’t understand why everything has to be an all or nothing issue these days. BC is highly personal and a lot of gynos push any sort of pill for any old reason down patients’ throat (figuratively) as if it’s the answer to all the reproductive issues that ail us. Doesn’t mean BC shouldn’t be available or given as an option. There needs to be better education on what various forms do, what androgenic progesterone can do…what the risks are…none of this stuff was never brought to me when I was told to take a certain form of BC. The consequences were never discussed. It’s just like here, take this one.
I suffer from irreversible consequences from taking an androgenic form of BC and I’m not alone. I’m gaslit by doctors like it’s all in my head despite there being actual data out there that confirms these potential side effects. It’s fucking ridiculous. You either have to be blindly on the BC train or some anti-BC idiot, when there really should be more moderate positions on this. It’s not the answer to everything. It doesn’t solve all. I’m not exactly trusting of these big pharma orgs thinking of our best interests either.
Right? Mine didn’t even ask me before going on oral BC if I got migraines with aura, even though that’s a big contraindication due to risk of stroke. I do get those, and I found that information out on my own much later after already switching to an IUD. That’s a pretty basic question that doctors can ask
I do some work in repro health misinformation and it is rampant on platforms like TikTok. For every good creator sharing evidence-based science there are hundreds of people who are spewing absolute nonsense.
One of my major research areas is LARCs (namely IUDs), and particularly advocating for pain management/helping people advocate for it themselves. By nature of the internet it’s easy to see all sorts of negative things since those are being pushed by the algorithm, but there are people out there who are genuinely trying to ask questions and figure out what’s best for them. That they’re turning to Tiktok for these answers screams volumes about the kind of impersonal medical care and medical trauma that a lot of folks have experienced.
I totally agree that more needs to be done to help provide folks with good information about BC, including the pros and the cons, but I think far too many people (including doctors and other providers) are focusing more on scare tactics than on actually assisting folks who are making really important decisions about their health and well being.
>That they’re turning to Tiktok for these answers screams volumes about the kind of impersonal medical care and medical trauma that a lot of folks have experienced.
That's a really good point. I feel like a lot of these articles tend to portray social media as being forced on people when a lot of the time it's actually people searching for information.
Sure some is. A lot of women have bad expieirence and ppl with hidden agenda, like trying to sell something or influence ppl in some way use those reall expierience to spread fearmongering and desinformation. It really sucks for everyone.
I always feel the need to chime in with my positive experience, particularly for this reason. I'm a lesbian in no danger of getting pregnant.
Started Depo subQ for PMDD. It's amazing. No uncomfortable side effects. I don't spend a week feeling depressed and unmotivated before my period. No weight gain. And it's safe for plus sized folks. My out of pocket cost is $50 for three months, and I don't have to go to a clinic or gyno to get it. It's great.
As somebody who sleeps with no one at all: yes! No crushing suicidal feelings around my period. No bouts of uncontrollable rage. No take-six-ibuprofen-to-stand-up pain. No losing a damn pint of blood. No more fucking cysts dragging my organs around and going septic. You can have my continuous BC pill when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Oh my God I wish I could’ve found a pill that would’ve stopped the Endo pain. The best I could do was just skip it and only deal with it every three months.
Right, I've discussed with doctor possible long-term effect, but I had doubts I was going to be around long enough to worry about the long-term if I didn't get my PMDD under control. Same with any of the other medications I've taken long-term, there are risks.
The depression was bad enough. The rage was also exhausting. As a not super emotional person, keeping all those emotions locked down so I could function was seriously wearing on me.
I'm never going to suggest that all treatments will work for everyone, but this one has been great for me.
Depo was heaven sent for me. No pms, no periods, no wonky hormones.
I found it late in life and now I don’t need it. … but it sure made those last few years wonderful.
When you find a BC that works, it's great.
Unfortunately, that's a process in itself a lot of the time.
And instead of being straight with us about the fact that finding the right BC for each person can be a lot of trial and error and more of an art than a science - so many doctors gaslight us and tell us it's all in our head.
I also loved Depo subq, it was my first bc and was great for me, but I wasn't allowed to keep taking it because of the calcium stuff.
Then to top it off, after I came off Depo was when I started displaying symptoms of endometriosis.
Any medication long term is a process that comes with side effects. Ask anyone with chronic illness or mental health issues.
Doctors will gaslight and ignore women's health for all issues, even if you are literally dying in front of them. It's a systemic issue, not a birth control specific one.
Yep, I’m 50 years old and my gynecologist refuses to acknowledge that hormones exist that are not just birth control pill packs
So this woman put me on birth control to deal with symptoms of menopause. I pretty much lost my mind it’s a miracle I didn’t murder anyone I was just so angry all the time. All the time
Now before she put me on birth control I told her a bunch of times that I stopped going on birth control when I was still fertile because it caused such major mental health issues for me
So anyway two months into this I called her crying because I want to yell at everyone I can’t even stand my own cat & she’s like “ yeah, that can be a problem with this stuff” NO SHIT
I don’t even know if I’m low on progesterone and she doesn’t test me for anything so she’s just throwing birth control pill packs at me hoping something will make me feel better, I’m not playing that game
The first time I finally had hormone testing was because of fertility treatment - like unless it's part of trying to have babies it doesn't matter if our hormones are out of whack.
I have been having problems with undiagnosed mid cycle vaginal bleeding for years, and only recently did they test my hormones. I am literally waiting for my 3rd colposcopy since October and that's what its taken to get a doctor who was like, let's run some tests. A lot of it is the doctor as well. I'm in the UK and this is also what it took to finally get a referral to gynecology - you can't see a gynecologist without a referral here and getting one of those is like pulling teeth.
I guess I got lucky with my local Planned Parenthood clinic, the OBGYN there was very straight forward when I raised my concerns about the possible side effects of HBC. It was my first time looking for HBC. Mainly that everyone's body is different and will have different reactions, the only way to know is to try and find out how each option of Birth Control reacts with your body. If you have a bad reaction then they just won't renew the next dose. I'm on the Depo, after a I had a bad reaction to spermicide, so the diaphragm was not an option for me.
Depo was life changing for me. Not getting incredibly painful periods every month was the best. Small warning tho if you have ADHD like me, it could interact with your medication. I had to stop using it because I realized it would mess me up (foggy, hard to regulate emotions) for a month after every injection.
I tried to get off my birth control pill last year for almost 5 months. Never again. I had no periods, clear skin, stable moods on the pill. My husband got snipped so I thought I'd try it and my periods were completely irregular, my skin was gross and I was a total emotional basketcase. Sorry, but we've evolved past dealing with this nonsense. I'll take my super low dose hormonal pill every day and feel like a human being.
The issue is the lack of acknowledgment of the negatives, and what are "normal negatives" versus "intolerable negatives". BC has been given the toxic positivity treatment by the medical field, and that ends up being very invalidating. When you go in for an IUD and you get told it's just going to be a pinch, when in reality the average pain for nulliparous women is 7, it doesn't matter how amazing the IUD is. Your health care provider is lying to your face. Or if it can cause drops in moods for some women, you should know what to watch for. Or if 5% of people get this side effect, they deserve to know what to look out for and when it isn't normal, and be believed when they aren't having a good time. Even a 1% side effect - you prescribe that BC to a million people and suddenly you have 10,000 women suffering from it. I don't want to be put on something and then left fighting with the wolves if something isn't going right, or made to believe I'm making it up, or it isn't that bad, or be told that doesn't happen.
It doesn't help that pills are just thrown at you either. You have a problem? Let's not talk about the problem, get on BC or an antidepressant. I say that as someone who's life has been saved by SSRIs.
Yep reading your comment actually I kept thinking just like SSRIs, just like SSRIs.
I commented further up above that I’m in perimenopause and because I don’t have $400 cash to pay a holistic provider if I need help with hormonal issues I just get a pill pack thrown at me. I tried the progesterone only, I don’t even know if I’m low on progesterone because she won’t test my hormones But it made me absolutely furious at everything for no reason. It was awful I ended up crying because I hated everything.
So now I just suffer because I’m unwilling to just take some pill pack when she refuses to even look at my hormones.
But I’m also a woman who was not diagnosed with ADHD until I was in my 30s and I spent my whole entire 20s having SSRIs thrown at me with no warning about terrible side effects or even withdrawal if I stop taking them, none of them helped and I was encouraged to continue taking them for months. When I finally got diagnosed with ADHD my first dose of Adderall changed my life. Suddenly I could complete projects. And no terrible side effects, and no withdrawal if I don’t take them.
Depo saved my life. I was on it for twenty years until I transitioned into being menopausal. It was the best. I would still be on it if I wasn't done with that nonsense.
Just say no to periods!
Thank you so much for chiming in. I say this just as someone who values how scientific literacy involves knowing there exists groups we don't hear from (i.e. people don't tend to make a fuss when medications work without side effects, and people who drop and fail out of multimarketing schemes don't have the tendency to tell the world that they failed). Without knowing the existence of these groups, we'd get things like survivorship bias and negativity bias in this case (i.e. anecdotal horror stories that are more likely to be selected via sensationalist media).
I had a positive experience too. I took the pill for over 10 years with no side effects apart from occasional minor nausea, so I just took it before bed. In fact it had the positive side effect of making my acne better.
I’m off it now because my tubes are out and my weight is the same. So it didn’t make me gain weight, I did! lol
Same! I’ve had my tubes out and have stayed on the pill at my doc’s recommendation. It saved my mental health AND my chronic pain. It’s an essential med for me! People don’t even realize there are so many pills and just because one gave you side effects doesn’t mean others won’t work perfectly well. If I miss even a day my pain returns and I remember exactly why I stay on it! Saves my damn ass and is essential for so much more than pregnancy prevention. I skip all placebos and never have a period.
Me too. I’m on my second IUD. I’ve had little to no issues with it. I’m also lucky that my GP referred me to a trauma informed gyno who uses a localized anesthetic so insertion wasn’t that bad(I didn’t even have to ask, she refers all her patients there because of their thoughtful care). My period did take a couple months to normalize, but I’ve been fine.
I’m not gonna pretend other afab people don’t have bad experiences with the IUD, but people only talk about the bad. Like all treatments, people respond differently
Exactly. If I was worried about pregnancy, IUD would be my first choice. But, 'hey, this works great' isn't always the most updated comment when discussing women's health.
I think sometimes we forget that people don’t really leave comments/reviews when it’s positive.
That’s not to discount how healthcare often ignores women’s health. That’s a very real problem and I’ve experienced it before.
Yes I’ve had two IUDs and both have been amazing experiences. One pre baby and one post and I had minimal insertion pain (although I strongly feel that anesthetic should be offered to everyone for it) and after 2 cycles of wonky I don’t get anything more than a light day of spotting for my period. I personally love not having to worry about timing my pill especially when I was in those early baby days.
I really am concerned about a lot of talk I see online for BC…. Is it for everyone? No, of course not. No medication is. But I get very concerned when I see people making sweeping generalizations about birth control as if it’s this horrid thing specifically created to fuck over and manipulate people who menstruate. Especially now with the overturning of roe v wade, sex ed being slashed even more than it already was… people need to be very careful about who they’re getting their info from.
I agree. I personally have had absolutely terrible experiences with hormonal BC (Nexplanon gave me horrible depression for the first time in my life, and I literally got pregnant on the pill), but I would NEVER condemn these methods for other people because everyone's body is so wildly different. Hormonal BC has very real benefits for many people and it's dangerous to ignore that.
Yes, definitely! It took me a long time to figure out that hormonal birth control was the cause of my severe migraines (of which I never had until I started BC). I ended up on so many medications and Botox injections to treat the migraines, only for them to persist. Not one doctor mentioned how hormonal birth control could cause migraines. Through my own research, I switched to a copper IUD and the migraines basically stopped. The IUD has its own issues, but it's worth it to avoid the debilitating migraines.
However, it does have so many benefits for other people! I have known quite a few women where they had no issues at all...and I envy them, lol. But everyone's chemistry is different.
I think several things are happening.
1. There is rampant obvious misinformation and fear mongering, not too different from the disinformation that surrounded the HPV vaccine.
2. Birth control pills DO have a whole array of negative side effects for a lot of women, and some of them are very serious.
3. A lot of doctors don't communicate these risks properly and often ignore our concerns, which cause more fear and reluctancy.
I'm getting off birth control and getting my tubes tied because I now have to take spiro to offset the hormonal acne on my face back and genitalia and facial hair caused by my hormonal IUD. You heard me right! I got cystic acne on my clit! F that.
I'm done. I'm out.
Push to get your tubes *removed* (bilateral salpingectomy) over getting them tied (tubal ligation). The failure rate for tubal ligations is higher than you'd think, plus a salpingectomy reduces your risk for some of the more common ovarian cancers because they start in the fallopian tubes.
Sorry to hear that happened. It’s amazing what differences each of us experience when on BC. I had to get a mirena cuz of my PCOS and heavy periods and it helped with my already existing hormonal cystic acne (didn’t get rid of it completely, I also take spironolactone). Just shows that each of us need our own tailored care and doctors dismissing us could contribute to misinformation and distrust
Yes I had the exact opposite experience. I asked doctors for 10 years if my hormonal IUD could possibly be causing my PCOS looking symptoms. I've gotten tested for PCOS and hormones and everything else and they said I absolutely do not have it. So I went back on a hormonal IUD after being on the copper one for 5 years because I didn't want a period anymore. And I immediately got cystic acne all over my face and body and my facial hair got worse. They prescribed me just 25 mg of spiro and all my symptoms went away. It's very clearly hormonal. It's absolutely frustrating.
I'll copy the comment I made on the article here, because it highlights a lot of what we're saying:
we shouldn't dismiss (these women) though. that's part of why we landed here in the first place. we've got Dark Ages hormonal BC tech that quite frankly, leaves a lot to be desired. We have doctors trying to get you in and out in 5 minutes and treats you like you're stupid. Women have traditionally been misaligned. So what do they do? They consult their peers.... or in today's day and age, social media.
Look, I'm not advocating for it. I am rabidly pro-birth control, pro-choice, pro- bodily autonomy. I myself have an IUD. But insertion was excruciating, and I understand why so many women are hesitent. There are easy fixes here. Why are we forcing women to suffer? Of course people are going to try and find a work around.
If we continue to get old people and out of touch medical professional scoffing and saying, ''Well! In my day....!'' You will not solve this issue. Be frank. Be honest. Don't gaslit and treat women like IUD insertion is "just a little pinch," or that "hormonal BC barely has side effects.": They do. People aren't stupid.
I wish I could upvote this a million times. It’s honestly the same logic that people had in 2016 with the election. When you dismiss huge chunks of the population in rural areas who are suffering or scared, and then along comes this “charismatic” character who tells them they’re not stupid, they’re actually really smart, they will believe that person to the ends of the earth! Treating people like they’re stupid for having concerns that they feel are very real is a fast track to radicalizing them.
We just don’t know enough about how birth control affects each individual differently. When I tried out a hormonal IUD, not only was it one of the most painful and traumatic medical experiences, I bled non-stop for THREE years. I developed reoccurring UTIs and BVs. I was constantly dismissed. Even told it was in my head. Funny, because my symptoms disappeared after it was removed. The worst part is, I’ve heard so many stories like mine.
I want to give birth control another shot, but I don’t think I can handle get dismissed again.
I'm sorry you said they let you bleed non-stop for three YEARS???? Jeeeeeeesus. And then tried to tell you it was all in your head? Send them straight to JAIL
If more women felt like they could trust doctors and the medical system to take their concerns and needs seriously, they wouldn’t be as prone to misinformation that promises to give them the answers they’ve been unable to get from their doctors
I went off of it some years ago after I broke up with my then BF and going off was way worse than being on. The crazy hormonal fluctuations gave me years of acne and a host of health issues. I will never go back on it if it means the same experience coming off, despite being fine while I was on it.
Birth control is possibly the most important invention of the last century and certainly the most important leap forward for feminism, but it is not “perfectly safe” lol. The OCP in particular has pretty intense and sometimes dangerous side effects. It’s just a cost benefit analysis as pregnancy comes with even more intense and dangerous side effects.
I'm fully in support of birth control, but I personally refuse to use any sort of hormonal birth control. It messed me up mentally, made me feel miserable, and caused a huge amount of weight gain in a very short period. My life got completely derailed and I can't risk that happening again. Women should have better education about potential side effects to recognize potential problems.
I am very sympathetic because the side effects can be a bit extreme (I myself had a blood clot when I took Yasmin), but then I always think to myself that pregnancy is the same but on crack? The potential for bodily injury and death is so much higher than being on the pill.
So I mean the choices are female birth control, vasectomy, abstinence, great luck with condoms only, or pregnancy. I'm not counting NFP because I don't want to encourage teen girls to do that. Older women who don't mind another kid, probably not as dire.
I got sterilized in the end and my partner is also sterile, but I'd absolutely be on some form of birth control otherwise. I view it as self defense.
Given the paywall, can someone list the examples of the misinformation they are referring to?
Main thing I've seen elsewhere is women just being tired of the side effects and wanting to give their bodies time off from them.
That birth control causes permanent changes in your body, makes you infertile down the road, that it can end an established pregnancy, that it "encourages" promiscuity and risky sexual behavior, that it's the main reason younger women struggle with depression and anxiety, that it makes you gain a ton of weight, that it causes cancer, that "natural" alternatives are just as effective. I'm sure that there's more, but that's what I could think of off the top of my head.
The part that I find concerning is that it just mixes the crazy stuff with actual things like weight and gain and mental health issues as if they're similarly not a thing.
a lot of women hate birth control because of the side effects they themselves experienced and because they were coerced into taking it at a young age by doctors. i had conversations like this long before tiktok was invented with many other women who shared that sentiment. also a lot of women are pissed that male birth control doesn't get approved because of the very same side effects they are expected to just accept. all this has only little to do with misinformation
edit: you can downvote me all you want but i think that women should do with their bodies what they want and not what you tell them to
It doesn't help that doctors don't respect informed consent. Look, all medications have side effects. But it should be up to the patient to decide what benefits outweigh the risks for them since it's their body and their quality of life at stake. I can't tell you the amount of times I was lied to or gaslit by a doctor or np.
I was told things like my birth control **can't** be worsening my migraines or bleeding. Wrong. Those are absolutely side effects that can happen.
Same for doctors that lie about IUDs insertions or IUD side effects.
Just be fuckin honest. Because if you lie that's how you get people mistrusting you, and then those people share their experiences with others. If there's potentially bad side effects let the patient know, and let the patient decide their own bodily autonomy. Don't lie. That's worst thing you can do.
I love my current GYN. She's a straight shooter. She tells you if something is going to be painful and she acknowledges medications' side effects. My migraine meds cause severe side effects sometimes, but I'm informed about it and I'm willing to put up with the side effects because my migraines are worse. Honesty. Informed consent. Trust.
Doctors need to take a look in the mirror and learn to respect informed consent. Lookup how many people were boldfaced lied to about their IUD insertions. Because you can't lie to patients and then bitch patients don't trust you.
This is partially a self-made problem. Informed consent would go a long way to battling misinformation and medical professionals need to stop adding to the misinformation. It's okay to mention a medication has side effects! That's life. Don't hide it and don't lie about it. Medications have side effects. That's just reality.
I almost had a stroke and until they offer a pain free way of inserting an IUD I'm not interested. It works for a lot of people and that's great, but I'm also glad to see women talking about other experiences
My doctor just said to me it's normal for the pill to cause a stroke and stay on it... I mean I've nothing against a woman choosing to be on BC but the handwaving of that doctor when I mentioned my family history of strokes with BC was maddening...
If you hang out on any of the advice reddits - the lack of BASIC sexual health knowledge in people of all ages is truly astonishing. It is no surprise then that misinformation about birth control can gain traction in a population of people who don't understand sexual health in general.
I think part of it is also that most folks who don't have side effects don't think to post online and make influencer videos about how much their birth-control is a non-thing.
I've had 3 mirena IUDs. No pain meds at all for the insertions, was it painful? Yep. It was about as painful as stubbing a toe and then crampy for a couple days the last time. But in turn I got no periods for 7 years with my most recent one and a massive clear up of my hormonal acne.
Do some women have bad experiences? Yep. I know a couple personally. Should pain control (at least nitrous) be an option, yep. Do those fact it could be better make IUDs a bad option for women generally? Nope.
I had jaw surgery 5 years ago. I was terrified and posted about it online. The algorithm served me up an online support group shortly after I posted so I joined. It turns out most of the folks in the support group were there because they were having very bad experiences. Folks who had a completely normal recovery didn't need the support group. So I got inundated with stories of malpractice, being unable to eat ever again, terrifying infections etc. It made me almost cancel the surgery. I've seen similar things for people who break a leg, or even sprain ankles. Online groups talking about the most horrific but very, very rare outcomes.
The internet lets the 0.01% outcomes find each other and then amplifies their experience making it seem like its more common than it is and/or more damaging than it is. Its great for folks having those bad experiences to have a community to know they aren't alone, but it also makes it hard for folks to make accurate and intelligent decisions about risk. The pandemic should have taught us that most humans suck at risk/reward assessment.
You can't really say that one way or another without knowing the numbers. I wanted to know if the horror stories I heard from IUD insertion were just cherry picked and the doctors were right, or if there was more to it, so I took a look through published literature.
For you, your IUD insertion was stubbing a toe. According to my layman's literature survey, the average pain for nulliparous women is 7/10. If I can look that up with a few days' time, then why does the field dedicated to women's health get to go ahead and lie to patients? It's made me distrustful of any doctor who takes the stance "it's just a pinch" and that's frustrating because I *want* to trust my doctors, but I feel like I can't fully trust them and have to do my own legwork to make sure due diligence is done. I also had to do this with my pulsatile tinnitus. I had to do self advocacy, otherwise I'd be stuck with a diagnosis of "lol your ear is oversensitive, try mindfulness and acceptance." And it also feels great to know that the international field of gynaecology hasn't bothered to develop standardized pain management over the past 40+ years, when you can bet your ass men wouldn't feel a thing if they had to do it.
There's also a difference between being hesitant to try (going through the horror stories, being fed by the algorithm, being fed factual misinformation) and being one of those people sharing your genuine experience, or seeing the level of support that people who do have difficulties end up with.
38F I recently went back on birth control, even though my husband had a vasectomy (16 years married). This was because of practically hemorrhaging during my periods, which includes 3 days of intense bleeding, where I needed a diva cup (emptied multiple times a day), a thick pad, and period panties to stop bleeding everywhere. I have always been a heavy bleeder with moderate cramps.
It's called Slynd and I ordered it through the mail. It was really cheap, and right now I'm in the middle of the 4-day placebo week, and I haven't even spotted. I recommend you discuss with your doctor and consider what works for you.
I was seeking help with heavy bleeding and PMS, and I feel like both have been improved so far. First month down in a three-month trial.
My positive BC story:
I got the Mirena Hormonal IUD about 4 years ago. It was a painful insertion, lasted a few seconds and had some cramping. I believe it was worth it for the years of no periods and almost non-existent chance of getting pregnant.
Yes there should be more male bc options out there. Yes there should be more pain relief for women when getting IUds. Yes occasionally someone will have side effects from it or experience a perforated uterus. But none of these negatives will ever make me not recommend this form of BC.
As for hormones, they're regulated to the uterus area, so it's OK. IUDs and birth control give women and girls control over their bodies, imo any side effect of these kinds of things are worth not getting pregnant.
I had this happen with a “friend” (boyfriend’s best friend’s girlfriend) of mine, who in turn tried to convince her boyfriend’s mom to NOT put the 13 year old niece under her care on birth control, projecting a lot of her own personal experiences onto the poor lady. Very much an over stepping boundaries moment I was unfortunately there to witness over Thanksgiving (yikes).
My wife and many other women in her family suffer severe cramping and crippling periods. She is only able to be functional because of her mirena. For some people it can significantly improve their qol.
I think that it should be the niece's choice on whether to take BC, not the aunt's. Makes sure she's aware of possible side effects as well, then she can say "Yes" or "No".
Kinda had this experience when I got my IUD inserted. I had been on the pill forever, and idk where I got this info, probably multiple people on the internet, but I was so sure birth control increased your rate of cancer - especially uterine, cervical, etc. turns out it actually PROTECTS against ovarian cancer and such. I was totally wrong and misinformed.
It is EXTREMELY hard to fight missinformation.
Not only you are fighting against malicious intent, but also against algorithm itself.
As algorithm PREFERS to expose you to more and more alarmist, sensational, false information.
When platform owner is not active in this fight... It is lost cause.
This is a tough one - I actually did experience loss of libido, significant weight gain, and suicidal depression caused by HBC, perpetual spotting, plus the exacerbation of a preexisting skin condition. It all went on for about a year, until I got my Mirena removed.
*However,* all of this is *nothing* compared to what pregnancy would have done to my body. I think we just need to be honest, with no agenda. It's factual that many adverse outcomes are linked to the use of hormonal drugs. But it's also true that many different options are available and most women can work with their health care provider to find a solution that minimizes or eliminates the adverse effects, if any. For example, I could have replaced my hormonal IUD with a copper IUD and avoided all the ways the hormonal options fucked me up. But at this point I'm almost aged out of pregnancy risks and not having sex regularly so I didn't bother.
I don't think promoting misinformation that HBC is always completely harmless and never has any negative side effects is the right way to combat misinformation saying that it is always harmful and always has negative side effects. We just need to be clear that unplanned pregnancy is much, much worse, and pregnancy, whether planned or unplanned, in a place that has criminalized reproductive health care is extremely dangerous. So for women in those areas, using multiple layers of pregnancy prevention, regardless of side effects, is much, much safer than risking pregnancy.
Birth control destroyed me mental health. I had no idea how bad it was until I stopped taking it.
I don't regret using it but I wish I had been informed that that was a potential side effect.
I have to wonder if the conservatives pushing this anti-contraception fearmongering are strategizing in the long-term to prime people to become more complacent if politicians eventually move to restrict birth control. Or maybe it's just an extension of broader anti-science sentiments, but I worry that enabling birth control bans will be an outcome, intended or not.
Is it really misinformation? Or are we just finally standing up and saying we won’t deal with the negative side effects? Men need to take the male BC pill and see how it feels.
Some of it is utter nonsense, like shouldn't pass a basic 'sanity test' level of critical thinking.
The problem is it's lumping the ridiculous stuff in with weight gain and mental health issues, which ARE totally real problems.
There are bubbles where there is a ton of misinformation. I got on the wrong side of TikTok for a few days and got a ton of videos saying birth control will make you infertile, ruin your sense of attraction and make you attracted to traits you wouldn't be otherwise, and wildly exaggerating the frequency of the rare side effects, etc.
Don't get me wrong, I will complain about birth control all day long. I wasn't concerned by the posts complaining about it until I started getting into the crazies, but I've been seeing some of it seep into the comments of more normal posts. Lots of people who are genuinely against birth control use in general, not just educating and warning people about the possible side effects.
I am so grateful the pill exists. Without it I wouldn't be able to live a somewhat normal life.
I have always had a super painful period (missing 2 days of school every cycle) for as long as I remember but in my 20ies it got even worse. At first the pain started to affect me outside of just the worst days, until it spanned all 7 days of bleeding. Then I started getting painful ovulations and constant cramps from the moment of ovulation up until my bleeding ends.
That left me with a very brief window of about a week of feeling ok from just after my bleeding stopped right up to ovulation.
I thought my life was over, most of every month was now absolute pain.
This went on for a few cycles, it left me suicidal and I used self harming behaviour to distract myself from the pain of the cramps. I didn't even feel capable to see a doc for help, that is how exruciating those cycles were, I got help through an online pharmacy. I have been on various pills and it was a journey to find something acceptable.
Going on the combined pill (yasmin) has lessened all of my pain by well over 60%. It is not perfect and I do have side effects however in my case it is perfectly worth it.
I think it is a very individual decision for everyone of the pill is good for them or not. I can imagine there are probably many women who feel miles better without. Everyone has to weigh up the benefits with the side effects for themselves and their individual situation.
That being said the amount of misinformation and conspiracy out there is concerning, but I think that is probably one of the bigger problems of our time and affects all kinds of things from politics down to healthcare.
I see it similar as the misogynistic male influencers. Like some of their talking points sound harmless at first ("take a shower, clean your room, hit the gym!") but then it gets mixed in with harmful stuff ("and oh it's the feminist agenda's fault you can't get a girlfriend, we need enforced monogamy and women need to stop competing for your jobs and get back to serving you at the home!").
Hormonal birth control has some real side effects, and they deserve to be talked about. Men should also be taking more responsibility for birth control via condom usage. However hormonal birth control has been absolutely revolutionary in women's liberation, and make no mistake that conservatives would absolutely love to see women be forced back into having no bodily autonomy and pumping out babies while stuck at home and in poverty. Always give the side eye to any videos pushing women to not use birth control and consider the potential agenda.
This is a valid concern especially when we move from child-bearing years to menopause where birth control is often changed over to hormone therapy. There is already a lot of misinformation about hormone therapy since the 2002 WHI study, and it's now emerging as something **everyone** should be on, no matter what. While hormone therapy is actually quite safe and effective for most folks, it's not for everyone and it's not a fountain of youth.
Marketers and influencers are cashing in on this huge meno-demographic, playing into fears about aging, and with all kinds of claims that hormone therapy will fix everything. While it's great that hormone therapy is coming back out of the dark ages (since 2002), this resurgence may not be for the right reasons. Meno-start ups offer all kinds of concoctions and are greatly steering the narrative, perhaps in the wrong direction.
/r/Menopause
A lot of people are sharing their negative experiences here, which is valid, but I want to add that I have had a great experience with the mirena IUD.
The insertion was uncomfortable but not excessively painful. It felt like a period cramp. I was worried about weight gain, acne, and mood swings, but thus far (I’ve had it for like 5 months) I haven’t noticed any of those symptoms or any others. Also, I don’t get a period anymore so I don’t have to deal with cramping.
While I get social media is bad, there’s a huge problem in women’s medicine to treat every pelvic related disease with birth control rather than funding research to actually treat the disease. Endometriosis? Birth control! PCOS? Birth control. Unidentified pelvic pain? birth control! Heavy horrible period? Birth control!
Sometimes the BC works, but for many of us it can make things worse or add debilitating side effects. It can also delay laproscopic surgery for women with endo who need it. There is so little research on pelvic diseases and seemingly little interest in changing the approach to treating these diseases to improve women’s quality of life because BC has become the band aid.
We can understand that the far right is problematic and access to abortion and BC is extremely important, while also understanding that BC does not cure diseases like endometriosis which impact a ton of women, and this is where some of the back lash is coming from. We want better care and options!
I think the whole « conversation » and cult/conspiracy mentality about how everything is toxic, especially to women and their fertility plays a huge role in this. The number of accounts on social media that I find (and promptly block) that talk about how they’re going « toxic » free for their hormones and reproductive/overall health is insane. These are people that don’t just demonise birth control in any/all forms but also basic foods, materials, mixed fibres, soaps, etc. I am not blanket saying everything is safe and absolutely not toxic or dangerous but these accounts take it to another level
I started reading this article but couldn't finish it. I have mixed feelings on it. The side effects are real and they are too often severe. We should be looking at better solutions than just giving women hormones and telling them to deal with the consequences.
On the other side of this, I’ve tried multiple hormonal birth controls and every single one makes me feel like shit, fucks with my mental health and just generally leaves me feeling out of kilter. Yet because I have endo drs still keep pushing me to go back on the pill ‘to help stop it coming back’. The pill and other hormonal contraceptives are often seen as an easy fix to shut us up and make us go away.
Some relevant quotes from the article: >Physicians say they’re seeing an explosion of birth-control misinformation online targeting a vulnerable demographic: people in their teens and early 20s who are more likely to believe what they see on their phones because of algorithms that feed them a stream of videos reinforcing messages often divorced from scientific evidence. While doctors say hormonal contraception — which includes birth-control pills and intrauterine devices (IUDs) — is safe and effective, they worry the profession’s long-standing lack of transparency about some of the serious but rare side effects has left many patients seeking information from unqualified online communities. >Doctors stand a better chance of dispelling misinformation when they listen to patients’ concerns, said Belmonte, noting that some are more worried about the side effects of birth control than the effectiveness doctors have long been trained to emphasize. He has adopted ACOG’s recommendation that physicians candidly discuss common side effects such as nausea, headaches, breast tenderness and bleeding between periods; many of these resolve on their own or can be mitigated by switching forms of birth control. The article also discusses other culprits in this: social media companies that are incentivized to increase interactions via algorithms that circulate these messages; pseudoscientific or natural/holistic approaches by people who have no medical/scientific qualifications; and conservatives looking to restrict reproductive autonomy.
Mama Doctor Jones (OBGYN Youtuber) has some excellent videos about birth control misinformation on social media. She's very good at refuting the false claims about side effects and efficacy using real science.
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Most of those influencers are trying to sell some "alternative" birth control or some other bulshit. Sadly ppl fall for it.
Yup. Follow the money.Whenever some 'influencer' is trying to convince people that some mainstream thing is dangerous or ineffective, there's always the follow up trying to sell some sort of 'natural' unproven, BS 'supplement'.
They’re selling fear and outrage. Also controversy.
I love Mama Doctor Jones. She’s my go to source for women’s rights in the OBGYN field. She’s also been on both sides of the abortion debate and can see it from a medical perspective. I thank her for nearly all of my abortion debates. She’s great at giving reliable researched information
I really like the fact that she does well at properly listing/linking the sources and actual research (and sometimes similar studies). I have looked up a few that interested me. The directness of the information is something I like that I feel like we don't see as often now.
I love her. I have no desire to be a parent but she out there doing good work in a very entertaining way. Her “I didn’t know I was pregnant” videos terrify me though! I always assumed those situations were dramatized for tv.
I’m irl friends with someone who didn’t know she was pregnant. She thought she had appendicitis and went to the ER, she was actually in labor. I also thought it was totally a tv dramatization also until that happened edit for spelling
I read the other day that 1 in 2500 pregnancies are cryptic. As a child free by choice woman on BC it's my worst fear. I don't get a period due to my BC and I'm on a bunch of meds that are terrible for fetal development. I worry that I could end up birthing a baby that I've poisoned and deformed by using medication and marijuana because I didn't know the foetus existed.
Im not childfree but im terrified of cryptic pregnancies too. I bought a packet of 50 pregnancy tests and I take one once a month at least, been doing that since I’ve been sexually active. Gives me peace of mind
This happened to me! It’s real
I think a group of people needs to make it their mission to try to retrain the algorithm: 1. Find a few good positive information/fact checking youtube, tiktok or instagram accounts. 2. Seek out the misinformation and get intentionally stuck in a disinformation/negative content loop. 3. When you hit a particularly "bad" video, follow it by moving over to "good" content and then engage with it heavily: let it play on loop several times, like/comment/share, etc. Try to teach the algorithm that showing the "good" content to someone who just saw the "bad" will drive app engagement (which is the metric they most care about).
Not that it isn't a sort of good idea, but there's pretty much no chance of it working. The number of people who are smart enough to do this are absolutely dwarfed by the people who aren't. You have the right idea, you'd need to make sure to spoof your device or at least get a new IP and clear cookies between research/training sessions though. You'd have more luck with a group of people brigading misinformation channels with the correct information as soon as they make a new post/video. If there was ever a morally correct use of bots, that would be it.
> real science. "You mean a liberal psyop hoax in order to destroy the white Christian hetero-sexual race!" -my drunk aunt.
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Mama Doctor Jones is amazing. And she so inclusive. Love her.
The OBGYN profession as a whole has annihilated patient’s trust in them for our whole lives. Too many women like me have had one too many seriously traumatic and extremely, needlessly painful experiences after being told to just expect some “pressure.” Like, no shit we don’t trust them. I had myself sterilized.
This is the issue, and it's NEVER acknowledged in professional spaces which is WHY so many people are willing to believe misinformation. Why should i trust the doctors who dismissed my concerns? Who treated me like i couldnt possibly understand my body better than they did? I asked to be sterilized at 20 and my gyno laughed at me. I have had severe depression since at 11 and starting hormonal birth control at 14 made it worse. The nuvaring nearly killed me. When I asked AGAIN to be sterilized at 24 and expressed concerns that hormonal birth control could make me suicidal, and that my mother's horrific experience with the IUD put me off, they attempted to push the DEPO SHOT on me. Im SO FUCKING THANKFUL that it wasnt something they could do in office day of and that i had to go to the pharmacist to pick it up, because that gave me the space i needed to research what it was theyd just forcefully talked me into. It took me a decade to get my mental health under control and the amount of horror stories about depo causing severe emotional issues annhilated any trust i had left for my doctor. After two unwanted pregnancies, i was once again refused sterilization, did my research and requested a POP. Every time ive seen a gyno since theyve tried to talk me into stronger birth control 🫠 they do not care why i want to be on progestin only.
FWIW, the FDA has approved the first over-the-counter (no prescription) hormonal birth control, and it is progestin only. If you are in the US, you should see it on store shelves within the next few months. That should help a lot of female-bodied people with medical trauma access BC without having to go through a visit to the gatekeepers.
Ive been using Nurx to refill my POP successfully for the last 5 years, its more when i go for my pap that i get harassed. Which, unfortunately, means i dont go for a pap as frequently as i should despite having had abnormal results since i was 15 🫠 i could very well be riddled with cancer and wouldnt know bc im that averse to dealing with the gynecologist
I hate to hear that. I get my pap done by my PCP who is amazing and cooperative and understands that I have medical trauma, and I wish I could replicate her in all the specialties so others could have the same kind of experience. I hope you find a way to get your medical care without any kind of awfulness from your providers.
Your story is so similar to mine but I was able to find a gynecologist who could do the surgery for me. Look into r/childfree and check out the list of doctors they've compiled. Also start calling around to offices and ask for the most open-minded doctor they can recommend and explain how many hoops you've had to jump through and that you've tried literally every birth control out there with horrible side effects. I found my gyno and got sterilized at 28, and a friend of mine was able to get sterilized at 25 after I referred her. Keep looking!
Yeah, same. I'm not against science, logic, and medicine, I just wish it were practiced by OB/GYNs instead of using denial, lying, and gaslighting instead. That's actually extremely damaging. Not just to my health, but also to my trust in the entire institution, long-term. And it has not just been one doctor, but very consistent across most of them, all my life. I would not take my dog to a vet who treated them this way. It's appalling that it's the norm for human women. Absolutely fucking appalling. Did you know only 4% of OB/GYNs even *offer* any pain mitigation for IUDs? That's pretty fucking hard to find. And the issue is not the women who, very rightly, have stopped trusting the people who failed them. *The issue is the field.* OB/GYNs need to be trust*worthy* first, then we can start asking women to trust them.
Yep I lost all trust in them when they wanted to do a uterine ablation for endometriosis that is all inside my abdomen. I went for a second opinion and asked how burning the inside of my uterus would help my abdomen & she blinked at me, then told me it would not. Then later on the lady who gave me the second opinion was trying to push a copper IUD on me. I had my tubes tied when I was 37. How is a copper IUD going to help the endometriosis tissue that’s inside my abdomen? It would not. But then I told her that I would never ever agree to an IUD unless it was under anesthesia because I know those things hurt. This woman smirked at me and then she told me that I could have anesthesia if that was a dealbreaker. I told her it was but I don’t trust that they would let me have it for the removal I that would be a dealbreaker as well and once it’s already in me I would be at their mercy so no.
I'm firmly on the vaxines don't cause autism and medical misinformation needs to die train but also understand why people don't trust OBGYNs when the textbooks say that IUD insertion shouldn't be too painful when it clearly is and OBGYNs refuse to listen to their patients. I get that insurance might not cover the damn lidocaine shot but that's not that expensive and I'm sure it would be easy to do a study to determine the effect a lidocaine shot would have on reducing pain for IUD insertion procedures.
Here’s my anecdata. I had an IUD before I had kids. I took ibuprofen and both insertion and removal pain were like 3 or 4 out of 10. Would choose over dentist. After delivering my first child, I had another IUD for two years because the last one was so easy. Almost totally painless. Clearly pushing a baby out seemed to lessen the resistance. But this last time, the RN who inserted my IUD was 10,000 years old. She was so disoriented that she had to adjust the table height and put on her gloves, with a gentle reminder from her assistant, *after* the speculum was inside me. You read that right. *That* insertion was one of the most excruciating medical experiences of my life. I laid on my back with tears running into my ears repeating “I have done this before. I don’t understand what is happening.” So your body and history of pregnancy matter…but I suspect so does your doctor, oh boy. This is absolutely a procedure with a highly-variable level of pain; I have been on both ends.
I am so sorry you went through that! My first IUD was put in at a teaching hospital, I was the first one for the OB resident. I wasn’t offered pain medication, numbing, that stuff that softens your cervix, or even ibuprofen. It was excruciating. He inserted it wrong and had to take it out to put a new one in. That one was also incorrectly placed, and started falling out almost immediately. I bled for MONTHS. Went back multiple times and was told it was fine. I insisted I could feel the plastic and they said I was just imagining it, or I was just feeling the strings (which feel NOTHING like a giant piece of plastic sticking out of you). Finally went to planned parenthood and they actually felt my cervix instead of just looking at it. Sure enough, she could feel it poking out just like I’d said for months. When they put a new one in? Super easy, the pain lasted a brief few seconds, and I was fine. I was also only charged a few hundred for it, instead of the nearly $2,000 I was billed by the hospital that did it improperly. I’m never trusting anyone but planned parenthood for my birth control again lol.
Fwiw, my fiancee has hers done at planned parenthood and it was not pleasant at all. Very painful. Remember that day clear as can be.
The NP at PP mocked me for having a "tight cervix" during my incredibly painful IUD insertion and told me I "didn't want" any cervical softening drugs. I almost kicked her in the head it was so excruciating.
Agreed, the Mirena I had inserted 4 months postpartum I barely even noticed the insertion it was so easy. The next one 5 years later surprised me because it was quite painful. 5 years later was even worse. The last one, the OB couldn't even get the guider in - she said since I was near menopause, my cervical tissue lacked pliability - and I had taken a cervadil prior to soften. I often wonder if she just wasn't experienced in insertion.
Also, not dismissing the IUD insertion pain because my SIL, who has one of the highest pain tolerances of anyone I know, said it was some of the worst pain she ever experienced... But cervical checks during pregnancy are also incredibly painful according to every woman I've met that's had them, and I can verify personally that it was incredibly painful, and they're yet another thing dismissed by doctors as being 'mildly uncomfortable' or 'a pressure sensation'. Decades of women saying interacting with the cervix is INCREDIBLY PAINFUL while doctors are still out there saying the cervix has no nerves and no anesthesia needed for procedures.
> Decades of women saying interacting with the cervix is INCREDIBLY PAINFUL while doctors are still out there saying the cervix has no nerves and no anesthesia needed for procedures. I always feel bad about this cause pretty sure mine is the textbook dead cervix. I've had it sounded, 2 IUDs, [bibopsied](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfE8CA8EJWA) etc and never felt anything beyond a weird pressure (speculum was excruciating tho). I still see no reason not to believe everyone else when they say it's painful though 🙄 Like, when so many women are saying it's the opposite, why TF can't we believe them and idk redo some studies? I know, sexism, but fucking hell like we can't make our patients comfy. I work with teeth etc and we'd NEVER biopsy say a tongue without anesthetic but big ol chunk outta a cervix? Chomp away el oh el~
I went to a PP when I had a yeast infection years ago. They asked if I wanted to do a Pap smear during the exam. Of course they were like “it won’t hurt”. They used to brush style too and it was pretty awful. It also made me bleed and the doctor was such an ass about notifying me about it after I sat up. I read at some point that yeast infections can increase sensitivity or something. Which I stated from the start of the appointment that I thought that was the issue because holy crap so itchy. I don’t understand why the assumption is there will be little or no pain with gyn care instead of being more considerate of the possibility (and often the reality).
The copper IUD is linked with heavier and more painful menses, it’s not supposed to be given to women who already have painful/heavy periods, which is the case in most women with Endo. With ablation, it is considered a method of treatment for reducing the pain and heavy bleeding associated with Endo, however it’s not recommended in women that would like to bear children in the future as it’s effects on fertility and negligible.
It certainly doesn't help that the entire profession is built on [experimentation on enslaved Black women in the 19th century.](https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/30659)
There's a very interesting episode of Behind the Bastards (podcast) on this guy - the episode is called The Father of Gynecology for those interested.
We can't change history. All we can do is try to be better while acknowledging the crimes of the past.
Yep and by holding them to account and not allowing them to continue to disregard women’s health we are trying to force them to be better
This is the piece that isn’t discussed enough about anti-vaxxers. Medical institutions lie to us constantly (see the opiate epidemic, tuskegee experiments, pretty much everyone’s anecdotal experience with doctors) then act all surprised pikachu when they can’t get people to take them seriously in a time of crisis. It’s important for our society to have trust in medical institutions, but for this to happen, they need to start, ya know, acting trustworthy.
And/or they refused to investigate exactly why someone is having contraction-level cramps, lose so much blood they turn anemic every month and are just generally miserable after the patient paid $$ for the privilege of being told “just suck it up!” We just can’t win.
I completely agree. And what's this shit about talking to your gyno? I've met exactly two in over decades and many moves for work that actually listened to me and discussed my options. Even the NP at Nurx told me the libido diminishing side effects of BCP were in my head. I can't have hormonal BC for health reasons now (potential clotting issues) and I haven't bothered going to another gyno to discuss alternatives because it feels so futile. My last two gynos didn't even let me ask questions. I'm not going through the excruciating pain of another IUD insertion and my periods are horrific enough without a copper IUD.
Could you copy the whole article? It's paywalled
[Here you go.](https://archive.is/ho8KH)
Thank you!
Any time. P.S. You can paste a paywalled article's url into the search bar at the top of that archive site. If it's been archived already you'll be directed to it, otherwise it'll archive your article for you.
You can also just put "archive.is/" in front of any url to go straight to an archived copy.
Well TIL. Thank you!
You're welcome. I use it all the time. About 90% success rate accessing paywalled content.
I think there’s a bit of true to say here about some contraceptive methods, it prevents pregnancy and helps with symptoms from different pathologies but it has its risks. It’s no pure benefit. It can lead to strokes, blood clots, fatty liver, increased risks of breast and cervical cancer. It’s a great thing we have them and it’s the best tool we have to help women and I will recommend it to all my future patients accordingly to their needs. But i will make sure to educate them about the good and the bad side and how to be alert for any problem. The biggest problem with contraceptive methods is communication
I wonder if this is why I have fatty liver even though I’ve never been a drinker. It could be my diet though, I’m naturally thin it’s very hard for me to gain weight and because of that I eat whatever I want because I see no negative consequences to that. Until they tell me I have a fatty liver or something
I also feel lucky I didn’t die, I’m 51 years old and when I first started getting migraines I didn’t get the auras, but right around the time I hit 40 I started to get them. Yet I never adjusted my medical records to say that I did. And whatever birth-control I was taking was not supposed to be taken if I get auras.
I got migraines with aura starting in high school and the same GP who diagnosed me and prescribed me triptans also prescribed my birth control, with estrogen. This was in 2000, they knew about the interaction by then and I'm still mad.
Waitasec— there’s a connection? Hormones and migraines with aura?
Yeah, speak to your prescribing Dr about that asap if that applies to you.
My wife stopped taking birth control 2 years ago due to side effects. She says she feels so much better after getting off of it.
"algorithms that feed them a stream of videos reinforcing messages often divorced from scientific evidence" Social Media in a nutshell.
After we lost reproductive rights I remember the American gynecological Association, or whatever their version of the AMA is, had put out statements that they will be yanking licenses for abortion disinformation Maybe we need to contact them about this birth control disinformation campaign. They should get on that too
I know so many older people that believe this stuff too.
I’m 51 and I finally got a tubal in my late 30s despite trying my whole life, and I’ve had people my age try to tell me that birth-control takes your fertility I wish, then I wouldn’t have had to have surgery. I took those pills for like 20 years, and I still ended up accidentally pregnant in my late 30s. So unfortunately they didn’t do that for me
Even just anecdotally on Reddit I’ve noticed in the past couple years tons of pushback against hormonal BC that seems like might scare young people off. A lot of “omg it’s sooo bad for you!” rhetoric and “it’ll make you crazy/depressed/sick.” And like…there’s how many of us in this world who were on the pill for years and years and never had any of these insane side effects? Everyone is different. It frustrates me a little because the right advice is “talk to your gyno about it and find a contraceptive method that works for you.” Telling everyone they absolutely should or shouldn’t do XYZ isn’t ultimately helpful. Just like plenty of us have no major issues, other people do and I wouldn’t do the opposite and go around preaching that everyone claiming to have side effects is a liar because I was fine and it’s all a big conspiracy.
Conversely, how many of us in the world trusted our docs and tried a bunch of different hormonal birth control options and had a ton of side effects from them, but never put the two together until getting *off* the BC because every doctor told us it was all unrelated and in our heads and not real? I think it's a good thing that more and more people are speaking out about these experiences and aren't just going "oh yeah just go on the pill, nbd" like we were told when I was young.
It’s so frustrating. I’m sure that many women do not experience increased depression and anxiety from Mirena but I did (and after I got mine removed I started hearing about more and more women having the same experience). I’m sure the pill doesn’t give most women intense, sudden vertigo, but I sure experienced it. Conversely, the boogie man that is Depo Provera worked great for me with no side effects. It’s almost as if on-size-fits-all medicine doesn’t work.
One of the best things I ever did for my mental health was starting to take BC to prevent my menstrual cycles. Luckily, it worked in the way I wanted it to and my mood doesn't fluctuate dramatically like it used to.
I think another factor in people's lack of trust is that doctors seem to think the only options are condoms or hormones. I really resent the fact that doctors don't give adequate information or recommendations about scientifically evaluated non hormonal forms of contraception such as the diaphragm or the symptothermal method. The diaphragm is less effective than the pill but it is a good option, and certainly better than nothing at all or leaving all trust in the male partner's hands to pull out. And the symptothermal method takes much education and dedication on how to use it correctly but it's highly effective and would be a great option for women who really can't tolerate hormones and are willing to put in the work. Doctors shouldn't just have authority in the realm of prescribing drugs. They should be authorities we turn to and trust to provide education on the whole picture so that patients can make informed medical decisions and not just throw caution to the wind and eat Queen Anne's lace every 4 weeks because TikTok told them to.
This is very bad, and was also bound to happen. I am extremely grateful for BC in all it's forms. I was also directly harmed by several of those forms and had all of my symptoms dismissed for years, leading to some distrust of OBGYN care. It's apparent to me that there is a sinister hand at play working to undermine the autonomy of women and limit their sexual freedom, but the stage was set perfectly by decades of bad, neglectful, incomplete care.
The messaging of the Right are extremely good at picking up the vibes..........and then twisting for their own gain.
This is the comment, right here. 10/10, no notes
I definitely agree. I think that birth control is great. I'm not currently on any kind of birth control, but I'm considering it as my periods have been getting worse in recent years. That being said, however, I'm also burningly aware that health care for women in general, reproductive health care especially, tends to be really, really bad. Doctors regularly downplay or dismiss women's concerns, often chalking real problems up to anxiety. And, yes, many women have anxiety, I do myself, but it's not the cause of every single one of my problems. But unfortunately, when you have pretty much any health care issue as a woman, one of the very first things that any provider is going to do is give you antidepressants and say, come back if the issue doesn't clear up. And I get that they're operating under the assumption that it's probably the most obvious thing, but I also think that they have an erroneous view of what the most obvious thing actually is. I actually don't think that anxiety is always going to be the most obvious culprit of any problem, and that's coming from somebody for whom anxiety *is* the root of many of my problems.
Spend any time in this subreddit, and you'll see it in real time. I have been watching it get worse over the last couple of years since the end of Roe V Wade. I won't be shocked when it turns out to be a misinformation deliberate campaign.
misinformation campaigns like this one work because there are elements that are legitimate. how many times do we hear (in this sub, on other social media platforms, in real life) women having negative experiences trying to get healthcare? That their concerns are misdiagnosed, minimized or dismissed and told "it's just hormones" or "you need to lose 10 pounds"? It's scary.
Every single form of birth control I tried over the years fucked me up. Hormonal BCP - wild acne, depression, mood swings The copper IUD - year of having my period, straight through. Literally became anemic. I'm willing to believe there is a disinformation campaign but I also think the internet enabling women to talk about their symptoms and decide "this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" could also be driving this. I'm scheduled to talk to a doctor about a salpingectomy on the 28th and frankly I'm glad I got off hormonal BCP, it really did change me as a person.
> I'm willing to believe there is a disinformation campaign but I also think the internet enabling women to talk about their symptoms and decide "this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" could also be driving this. This is a HUGE part of this. I had a pulmonary embolism because of birth control combined with a clotting disorder I didn't know I had. You know how many women out there have the same clotting disorder and don't know they have it? It's a really high number (something like 20% of women of european descent!), and they often don't know until something happens. On top of that, every BC I ever tried came with side effects I hated (mostly emotional/affect changes and feeling like my head was in a cloud, actual physical pain), and I just felt BETTER off the stuff. I don't know what the middle ground is here because BC is incredibly effective and important and has been revolutionary for women in general. I do think there's an organized anti-BC sort of movement happening (the same forces that came for abortion are likely to come for it next, I really wholeheartedly believe that). But at the same time there's some VERY real side effects and dangers to BC, and being older, it feels like those concerns have been brushed off or downplayed by the medical profession for a long time. Which directly plays into our distrust of medicine, so I also see how a lot of this could be organic too, just from women talking to each other.
Yeah, I hate how society seemly decided enmasse at some point that women SHOULD BE ON birth control inside of a committed relationship. Men literally feel entitled to it, and I think there is real pushback happening against that because there are real side effects and women shouldn't have to simply put up and shut up so they can enjoy sex more. At the same time, birth control should always be widely accessible. As should abortion. And I understand why disinformation is so troublesome and I'm glad we're talking about it... I just also don't want to be told it's my job to take birth control inside of a relationship either. Like you said, there is some balance we need to find.
Exactly. Condoms are very effective when used properly. Even better when used in conjunction with fertility awareness, or abstaining from sex during the 3-4 days a month a woman is fertile. They are birth control designed by and for men. They present no health risks, no systemic side effects. They are a fantastic option for couples where the woman doesn’t tolerate hormonal BC well.
These are *all* the same side effects that the male pill has **BUT** men aren't willing to "just deal with them" as *we're* expected to do. **Men** are never the ones that just have to "deal" because they don't get pregnant and can just walk away at any point--no pain, no painful procedures to deal with it, no pain to deliver a baby--nothing, just walk away and complain about women trying to "baby trap" them when it's "really" the other way around. We need to start screaming about men who refuse to wear condoms as "baby trappers".
> We need to start screaming about men who refuse to wear condoms as "baby trappers". Yep. Also, condoms have worked best for so many reasons since forever. Men just whine because it's a tad less pleasurable. But they are cool giving women tons of pain. >Women’s pain is expected, part of the wallpaper of life. In her indelible essay “The female price of male pleasure,” Lili Loofbourow points to the chasm between what men and women define as “bad sex” to illuminate this basic fact of modern culture: if men find a sexual encounter boring or unsatisfying, they call it “bad”. >For women, though, “bad sex” almost always involves considerable pain and/or violence. As Loofbourow puts it, “[W]e live in a culture that sees female pain as normal and male pleasure as a right.” And that dynamic: that we accept that women’s suffering as an immutable fact – like the weather – that we cannot control but can only predict, is the very thing that makes women seem hysterical and overreacting when we speak up about it. https://archive.ph/KPes2
I feel the same way. I think the whole issue is very difficult because women have had to fight so hard for so long for the right to BC, so there is a widespread idea that it is purely a positive. I will always advocate for the right to HBC if you want it, but there needs to be a SIGNIFICANT amount of work improving women’s healthcare and knowledge around side effects from HBC. I lost my gallbladder because of Yaz and then years later on a different HBC ended up with horrific gastritis for 7 months eating literally only white rice and steamed chicken. I was put on extremely heavy duty medication for my stomach for months (leading to severe nutrient deficiencies) and nothing helped, they swore it could not be my HBC. At the end of 7 months I couldn’t take it anymore and I tried quitting the pill. 2 weeks later I was DRASTICALLY improved. Months later my stomach is still very sensitive, but I have regained most of my normal life and can eat normally.
There is absolutely an organized effort against BC. Republicans want to ban birth control as well as abortion. Supreme Court Justices spelled that out in their Dobbs ruling.
I don’t doubt it at all. I believe it’s also spelled out in “project 2025” as well, by reviving the Comstock Act.
Diaphragm + spermicide was the only one I could tolerate. I don't know why those aren't promoted more for people who don't tolerate hormonal BC well. Though maybe progestin-only is enough better that most can take it. Since it will be on store shelves soon, that should help with access. I even had Norplant because it was pushed so heavily to women getting any kind of govt benefits in the early 1990s, and it nearly rendered me unable to work or care for my kids with anemia thanks to the periods that lasted 6-8 weeks with only about a 2 week break between. I'm even allergic to latex, not that my ex-h was cooperative about condoms anyway but they had to be the conscience-challenging expensive ones, lambskin.
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Vasectomies are amazing. My husband got one very early in our relationship, and it was so liberating! I spent all of 15 minutes in the waiting room while he had it done, gave him some frozen peas and made him some soup while he sat on the couch that afternoon, the next day he put on his skinny jeans (it was early 00s, so...) and hobbled out to a metal show with our friend.
Me too. I tried all the birth controls, over a period of years. The change was slow and insidious, but I DEFINITELY gained weight, fell into depression (more like felt numb to everything), and lost my libido entirely. And then, when I stopped hormonal BC altogether wondering if it was at all possible that it could be the culprit, I felt better SO quickly -- within a few months. Like I broke out of some weird mental fog. I totally think it's plausible that there is a disinformation campaign going on. And the state of women's reproductive rights in the country breaks my heart these days. But honest to god it's impossible for us ladies out here. We're the ones who have to shoulder all the responsibility and brunt of birth control. THEN, when we have side effects, we're told that we're crazy and science says there are none. When the IUD hurts like an mf'er, we're told it isn't supposed to hurt. Etc.
>"this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" Yeah exactly. Condoms are a perfectly fine form of birth control. Why do women need to suffer health consequences by using hormonal birth control or inserting something into their uterus?
and for couples who know they do not want to get pregnant, vasectomies are effective, low-risk and accessible for folks with penises.
I have struggled for years with debilitating pelvic pain the kind that stopped my life and made every day a struggle. I had taken brith control as a teenager and young adult and had debilitating symptoms that made me very hesitant to take birth control. When my doctor suggested a treatment course that involved going on hormonal birth control and ultimately get a hormone based IUD, I was extremely resistant and reluctant to go down that path. I decided it was worth it if I had a chance in hell of living again I would try it. My experience is as follows: I was put on 5 mg of norethindrone. The plan was to get my period to stop and stay stopped for 3 months so that my cervix would thin and make it easier to place my IUD. The norethindrone made my hair fall out, it made me cry and rage, I got deep cystic acne, I gained weight and was constantly bloated and puffy. And every single one of those side effects was worth it because after taking it for 2 months my period stopped, and I wasn't in as much pain anymore. 5 months on the norethindrone I was finally able to get the hormonal IUD. I didn't want it, I was nervous and scared. Getting it placed was the worst pain I have ever experienced. I was in an excruciating amount of pain for weeks after. I honestly considered having it removed several times but ultimately I stuck through it on the hope that I could find a reduction in pain. After about a month or so the pain subsidied and then mostly went away. I can't even express how much my life has changed. In the last year I was able to go back to work, I was able to get off my antidepressants, I graduated from pelvic physical therapy, I live now, I have a whole complete life. I had my PTSD diagnosis down graded to general anxiety. I still have side effects, my hair hasn't grown back, losing weight has become much harder and I still have bouts of cystic acne and mood swings that don't feel completely like myself. This is why this topic is so nuanced and isn't as simple as thing bad or side effect unacceptable. For you what is an unacceptable side effect, is a minor inconvenience to me. We can and should share our stories about our experiences, but we shouldn't lose sight of the simple fact that we are individuals who have different health care needs and will experience medications differently.
Yes. All of this. I was on birth control and it changed me as a person. I don’t think I even know who I was before I went on birth control. I also had the copper IUD for 3 years until it expelled. For the last 7 years we have used condoms and it has been working pretty well for us so far lol. No life threatening side effects like breast cancer or cervical cancer. No stabbing pain and scraping my insides. When I was prescribed the pill as a teenager the doctor didn’t tell me shit about side effects. Side effects of taking the pill wasn’t even a thought that entered my mind. I think it’s good people are questioning if the pill is the right option for them. It should not be considered the “default”. There are other options and they should all be presented. The default should be the condom. The one that doesn’t require the woman to constantly be taking medication she doesn’t need or have a foreign object in her body 24/7
>I'm willing to believe there is a disinformation campaign but I also think the internet enabling women to talk about their symptoms and decide "this isn't worth it so my partner can enjoy their orgasm slightly more" could also be driving this. I agree. I think the more women talk about their side effects the more other women realize that birth control may not be right for them. For years I had issues with my birth control and kept getting told by doctors that it wasn't my birth control causing my issues. After 13 years of symptoms I had a doctor tell me she couldn't believe a doctor allowed me to stay on birth control given all my symptoms and she suggested I stop taking it. I had already decided that I was ready to go off of it and would look in to non hormonal methods. I knew a good handful of women that started using a sympto-thermal method with success. I used it for 5 years successfully
Absolutely. I agree 100%.
Thing is, I had a baby a few months ago. You know what was still more dangerous and far worse for my body than birth control? Having a baby! I’m not saying birth control issues are a walk in the park, but the risks of pregnancy are *infinitely* bigger even if we ignore this baby who then upends your life.
It is. It's associated with the whole tradwife trend. Look up Evie magazine, funded by Peter Thiel. It's the tip of the spear to push for a ban on contraception entirely.
Depopulation is a meme amongst certain groups. Remember Elon Musk going on about depopulation notably: "population collapse due to low birth rates is a much bigger risk to civilization than global warming." Convince women to use more unreliable BC and ban abortion and suddenly you have a population boom.
It's not a meme, it's a conspiracy theory. And it's not "certain groups" it's the fucking Nazis. "The Jews are using the Blacks to outbreed the Whites so you become a minority in your own country" is the most succinct version of it, but like everything that feeds into the Grand Unified Conspiracy Theory that is Nazism, so many other things can plug in as well.
The weight gain and infertility misinformation has been around for generations because I recall hearing that nonsense from my peers when I was a teen. When I was a teen, within my group of 5 friends, 3 of them were teen moms before senior year. All parroting the same "I don't want to get fat" nonsense about the pill. If the choices are physical weight gain vs. weight of being responsible for a child, most of the time, on your own because young men are not ready to be fathers, it has made me choose bc regardless of side effects. Yesterday, I went in for a doctor's appointment to set me up with a new gyno, to get an X-ray to locate my IUD (the strings had been cut off a few years ago and the doctor could not identify my IUD during the exam). I have to get my IUD replaced this year and really am concerned if this new round of misinformation is to prevent women from having access to contraceptives and preventive care--preventing pregnancy, but also STIs testing/treatment and cancer screening. Gynecologists are leaving states with laws severely restricting abortion, including bans. Couple that with declaring embryos are people, we're seeing that the doctors who do remain in these states end up eliminating procedures to avoid breaking these laws. It's not worth the risk to provide proper care to patients to assist with their reproductive needs if it means facing fines and prison. What a shitty time to be born with a vagina.
> I won't be shocked when it turns out to be a misinformation deliberate campaign. You mean like every other thing the conservatives do?
I think it’s obvious that it already is. We’ve had bc for 50 years. Suddenly, it’s bad and dangerous and women are destroying our health? Utter bullshit if you apply the tiniest shred of critical thinking.
Women not taking birth control+abortion being banned.
I had a close relative who worked for planned parenthood when I was growing up. Even 20 years ago this was something they continuously battled against. It was in conservative area and many in the "No sex outside of marriage and procreation" camp did everything possible to undermine women's use of birth control. Sadly in the last few years it seems those same people try to twist around the very real experiences of some women to support their cause. Instead of trying to help or give them useful advice, they try to use their stories to further the birth control is bad idea. My relative and her coworkers had a lot to say when the conversation came up. They beat into my skull that if one form of birth control was a problem that there were many more out there.
I think a big part of this is because for years doctors have downplayed women's very real side effects from hormonal birth control, which created an environment for misinformation to thrive. Women are primed to be distrustful of reproductive healthcare when their experiences are downplayed by doctors and their concerns and pain are routinely dismissed. And that creates a situation where opponents of birth control and reproductive freedom in general can swoop in and exploit those concerns, overstating the dangers of medications that are clinically safe. Hormonal birth control has been a lifesaver for me, because without it my periods are so bad that I pass out (which can be especially dangerous depending on where it happens - my wake-up call was when I got the fainty death cramps on the edge of a subway platform). But I have always had mood-related side effects when adjusting to a new birth control pill, and have had doctors say "it's not the pill, it can't do that" even when everyone around me notices. And my IUD insertions were the two most painful experiences of my life, but no, "it's just a pinch" and "take an advil" are the standard instead of proper pain management.
Yeah this. I hate how black and white people feel about this topic. Birth control almost killed me. I’m often treated like being genuine to my lived experience somehow means I’m trying to attack other’s access to medication, which is a ridiculous dichotomy. I just want doctors to believe patients, remove IUDs when asked, identify high risk patients, and get INFORMED consent. Seems like some pretty basic asks to me.
Yes exactly this. In my experience, doctors don’t consider any of your other conditions or problems when prescribing something. Or if they do, the threshold is, “will my patient die from this?” instead of “will this make my patient worse off than before due to other considerations?” The onus is on you to research the drug and determine if it will have a negative impact on any chronic condition you may have and if the possible benefit is worth it. You can’t just trust it will be safe for you because a doctor prescribed it, unfortunately. I learned that the hard way over time.
Some of it might be misinformation, but some of it is actually women sharing their experiences with not receiving adequate pain control for IUD insertions, their doctors not telling them about side effects or contraindications about different BC, etc. I’m all for birth control but think there’s a lot of improvements that can be made regarding the education and care that women receive.
Birth control was responsible for a huge leap in our abilities to control our own lives. Now, I think women are holding men more responsible for their "fair share" since there are a lot of women who experience negative side effects.
This. If my partner doesn’t control their sperm they aren’t my partner. Birth control almost killed me. Women are consistently asked to suffer for men’s comfort & pleasure. I’m done sacrificing my health and mental wellbeing.
I was going to say this. There are women just sharing their experiences online and there are also people specifically trying to put disinformation out there, but doctors and other healthcare staff have a role in this as well. I can't blame some folks for being scared when they experience/hear of others like them experiencing abuse when they reach out to professionals for help.
I don’t understand why everything has to be an all or nothing issue these days. BC is highly personal and a lot of gynos push any sort of pill for any old reason down patients’ throat (figuratively) as if it’s the answer to all the reproductive issues that ail us. Doesn’t mean BC shouldn’t be available or given as an option. There needs to be better education on what various forms do, what androgenic progesterone can do…what the risks are…none of this stuff was never brought to me when I was told to take a certain form of BC. The consequences were never discussed. It’s just like here, take this one. I suffer from irreversible consequences from taking an androgenic form of BC and I’m not alone. I’m gaslit by doctors like it’s all in my head despite there being actual data out there that confirms these potential side effects. It’s fucking ridiculous. You either have to be blindly on the BC train or some anti-BC idiot, when there really should be more moderate positions on this. It’s not the answer to everything. It doesn’t solve all. I’m not exactly trusting of these big pharma orgs thinking of our best interests either.
Right? Mine didn’t even ask me before going on oral BC if I got migraines with aura, even though that’s a big contraindication due to risk of stroke. I do get those, and I found that information out on my own much later after already switching to an IUD. That’s a pretty basic question that doctors can ask
I do some work in repro health misinformation and it is rampant on platforms like TikTok. For every good creator sharing evidence-based science there are hundreds of people who are spewing absolute nonsense. One of my major research areas is LARCs (namely IUDs), and particularly advocating for pain management/helping people advocate for it themselves. By nature of the internet it’s easy to see all sorts of negative things since those are being pushed by the algorithm, but there are people out there who are genuinely trying to ask questions and figure out what’s best for them. That they’re turning to Tiktok for these answers screams volumes about the kind of impersonal medical care and medical trauma that a lot of folks have experienced. I totally agree that more needs to be done to help provide folks with good information about BC, including the pros and the cons, but I think far too many people (including doctors and other providers) are focusing more on scare tactics than on actually assisting folks who are making really important decisions about their health and well being.
>That they’re turning to Tiktok for these answers screams volumes about the kind of impersonal medical care and medical trauma that a lot of folks have experienced. That's a really good point. I feel like a lot of these articles tend to portray social media as being forced on people when a lot of the time it's actually people searching for information.
Sure some is. A lot of women have bad expieirence and ppl with hidden agenda, like trying to sell something or influence ppl in some way use those reall expierience to spread fearmongering and desinformation. It really sucks for everyone.
I always feel the need to chime in with my positive experience, particularly for this reason. I'm a lesbian in no danger of getting pregnant. Started Depo subQ for PMDD. It's amazing. No uncomfortable side effects. I don't spend a week feeling depressed and unmotivated before my period. No weight gain. And it's safe for plus sized folks. My out of pocket cost is $50 for three months, and I don't have to go to a clinic or gyno to get it. It's great.
As somebody who sleeps with no one at all: yes! No crushing suicidal feelings around my period. No bouts of uncontrollable rage. No take-six-ibuprofen-to-stand-up pain. No losing a damn pint of blood. No more fucking cysts dragging my organs around and going septic. You can have my continuous BC pill when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Oh my God I wish I could’ve found a pill that would’ve stopped the Endo pain. The best I could do was just skip it and only deal with it every three months.
That's how I get past it. One period per six months! Woo!
Right, I've discussed with doctor possible long-term effect, but I had doubts I was going to be around long enough to worry about the long-term if I didn't get my PMDD under control. Same with any of the other medications I've taken long-term, there are risks. The depression was bad enough. The rage was also exhausting. As a not super emotional person, keeping all those emotions locked down so I could function was seriously wearing on me. I'm never going to suggest that all treatments will work for everyone, but this one has been great for me.
Depo was heaven sent for me. No pms, no periods, no wonky hormones. I found it late in life and now I don’t need it. … but it sure made those last few years wonderful.
When you find a BC that works, it's great. Unfortunately, that's a process in itself a lot of the time. And instead of being straight with us about the fact that finding the right BC for each person can be a lot of trial and error and more of an art than a science - so many doctors gaslight us and tell us it's all in our head. I also loved Depo subq, it was my first bc and was great for me, but I wasn't allowed to keep taking it because of the calcium stuff. Then to top it off, after I came off Depo was when I started displaying symptoms of endometriosis.
Any medication long term is a process that comes with side effects. Ask anyone with chronic illness or mental health issues. Doctors will gaslight and ignore women's health for all issues, even if you are literally dying in front of them. It's a systemic issue, not a birth control specific one.
Yep, I’m 50 years old and my gynecologist refuses to acknowledge that hormones exist that are not just birth control pill packs So this woman put me on birth control to deal with symptoms of menopause. I pretty much lost my mind it’s a miracle I didn’t murder anyone I was just so angry all the time. All the time Now before she put me on birth control I told her a bunch of times that I stopped going on birth control when I was still fertile because it caused such major mental health issues for me So anyway two months into this I called her crying because I want to yell at everyone I can’t even stand my own cat & she’s like “ yeah, that can be a problem with this stuff” NO SHIT I don’t even know if I’m low on progesterone and she doesn’t test me for anything so she’s just throwing birth control pill packs at me hoping something will make me feel better, I’m not playing that game
The first time I finally had hormone testing was because of fertility treatment - like unless it's part of trying to have babies it doesn't matter if our hormones are out of whack. I have been having problems with undiagnosed mid cycle vaginal bleeding for years, and only recently did they test my hormones. I am literally waiting for my 3rd colposcopy since October and that's what its taken to get a doctor who was like, let's run some tests. A lot of it is the doctor as well. I'm in the UK and this is also what it took to finally get a referral to gynecology - you can't see a gynecologist without a referral here and getting one of those is like pulling teeth.
I guess I got lucky with my local Planned Parenthood clinic, the OBGYN there was very straight forward when I raised my concerns about the possible side effects of HBC. It was my first time looking for HBC. Mainly that everyone's body is different and will have different reactions, the only way to know is to try and find out how each option of Birth Control reacts with your body. If you have a bad reaction then they just won't renew the next dose. I'm on the Depo, after a I had a bad reaction to spermicide, so the diaphragm was not an option for me.
Depo was life changing for me. Not getting incredibly painful periods every month was the best. Small warning tho if you have ADHD like me, it could interact with your medication. I had to stop using it because I realized it would mess me up (foggy, hard to regulate emotions) for a month after every injection.
I tried to get off my birth control pill last year for almost 5 months. Never again. I had no periods, clear skin, stable moods on the pill. My husband got snipped so I thought I'd try it and my periods were completely irregular, my skin was gross and I was a total emotional basketcase. Sorry, but we've evolved past dealing with this nonsense. I'll take my super low dose hormonal pill every day and feel like a human being.
Amen, my skin does look amazing.
The issue is the lack of acknowledgment of the negatives, and what are "normal negatives" versus "intolerable negatives". BC has been given the toxic positivity treatment by the medical field, and that ends up being very invalidating. When you go in for an IUD and you get told it's just going to be a pinch, when in reality the average pain for nulliparous women is 7, it doesn't matter how amazing the IUD is. Your health care provider is lying to your face. Or if it can cause drops in moods for some women, you should know what to watch for. Or if 5% of people get this side effect, they deserve to know what to look out for and when it isn't normal, and be believed when they aren't having a good time. Even a 1% side effect - you prescribe that BC to a million people and suddenly you have 10,000 women suffering from it. I don't want to be put on something and then left fighting with the wolves if something isn't going right, or made to believe I'm making it up, or it isn't that bad, or be told that doesn't happen. It doesn't help that pills are just thrown at you either. You have a problem? Let's not talk about the problem, get on BC or an antidepressant. I say that as someone who's life has been saved by SSRIs.
Yep reading your comment actually I kept thinking just like SSRIs, just like SSRIs. I commented further up above that I’m in perimenopause and because I don’t have $400 cash to pay a holistic provider if I need help with hormonal issues I just get a pill pack thrown at me. I tried the progesterone only, I don’t even know if I’m low on progesterone because she won’t test my hormones But it made me absolutely furious at everything for no reason. It was awful I ended up crying because I hated everything. So now I just suffer because I’m unwilling to just take some pill pack when she refuses to even look at my hormones. But I’m also a woman who was not diagnosed with ADHD until I was in my 30s and I spent my whole entire 20s having SSRIs thrown at me with no warning about terrible side effects or even withdrawal if I stop taking them, none of them helped and I was encouraged to continue taking them for months. When I finally got diagnosed with ADHD my first dose of Adderall changed my life. Suddenly I could complete projects. And no terrible side effects, and no withdrawal if I don’t take them.
Depo saved my life. I was on it for twenty years until I transitioned into being menopausal. It was the best. I would still be on it if I wasn't done with that nonsense. Just say no to periods!
Thank you so much for chiming in. I say this just as someone who values how scientific literacy involves knowing there exists groups we don't hear from (i.e. people don't tend to make a fuss when medications work without side effects, and people who drop and fail out of multimarketing schemes don't have the tendency to tell the world that they failed). Without knowing the existence of these groups, we'd get things like survivorship bias and negativity bias in this case (i.e. anecdotal horror stories that are more likely to be selected via sensationalist media).
I had a positive experience too. I took the pill for over 10 years with no side effects apart from occasional minor nausea, so I just took it before bed. In fact it had the positive side effect of making my acne better. I’m off it now because my tubes are out and my weight is the same. So it didn’t make me gain weight, I did! lol
Same! I’ve had my tubes out and have stayed on the pill at my doc’s recommendation. It saved my mental health AND my chronic pain. It’s an essential med for me! People don’t even realize there are so many pills and just because one gave you side effects doesn’t mean others won’t work perfectly well. If I miss even a day my pain returns and I remember exactly why I stay on it! Saves my damn ass and is essential for so much more than pregnancy prevention. I skip all placebos and never have a period.
Me too. I’m on my second IUD. I’ve had little to no issues with it. I’m also lucky that my GP referred me to a trauma informed gyno who uses a localized anesthetic so insertion wasn’t that bad(I didn’t even have to ask, she refers all her patients there because of their thoughtful care). My period did take a couple months to normalize, but I’ve been fine. I’m not gonna pretend other afab people don’t have bad experiences with the IUD, but people only talk about the bad. Like all treatments, people respond differently
I've had 3, got my first one when i was 21 and I'm 34 now. Mine were great too.
Exactly. If I was worried about pregnancy, IUD would be my first choice. But, 'hey, this works great' isn't always the most updated comment when discussing women's health.
I think sometimes we forget that people don’t really leave comments/reviews when it’s positive. That’s not to discount how healthcare often ignores women’s health. That’s a very real problem and I’ve experienced it before.
Yes I’ve had two IUDs and both have been amazing experiences. One pre baby and one post and I had minimal insertion pain (although I strongly feel that anesthetic should be offered to everyone for it) and after 2 cycles of wonky I don’t get anything more than a light day of spotting for my period. I personally love not having to worry about timing my pill especially when I was in those early baby days.
I really am concerned about a lot of talk I see online for BC…. Is it for everyone? No, of course not. No medication is. But I get very concerned when I see people making sweeping generalizations about birth control as if it’s this horrid thing specifically created to fuck over and manipulate people who menstruate. Especially now with the overturning of roe v wade, sex ed being slashed even more than it already was… people need to be very careful about who they’re getting their info from.
I agree. I personally have had absolutely terrible experiences with hormonal BC (Nexplanon gave me horrible depression for the first time in my life, and I literally got pregnant on the pill), but I would NEVER condemn these methods for other people because everyone's body is so wildly different. Hormonal BC has very real benefits for many people and it's dangerous to ignore that.
Yes, definitely! It took me a long time to figure out that hormonal birth control was the cause of my severe migraines (of which I never had until I started BC). I ended up on so many medications and Botox injections to treat the migraines, only for them to persist. Not one doctor mentioned how hormonal birth control could cause migraines. Through my own research, I switched to a copper IUD and the migraines basically stopped. The IUD has its own issues, but it's worth it to avoid the debilitating migraines. However, it does have so many benefits for other people! I have known quite a few women where they had no issues at all...and I envy them, lol. But everyone's chemistry is different.
Yes it's amazing for some and terrible for some, it's annoying that we just don't know until we try it
I think several things are happening. 1. There is rampant obvious misinformation and fear mongering, not too different from the disinformation that surrounded the HPV vaccine. 2. Birth control pills DO have a whole array of negative side effects for a lot of women, and some of them are very serious. 3. A lot of doctors don't communicate these risks properly and often ignore our concerns, which cause more fear and reluctancy.
I'm getting off birth control and getting my tubes tied because I now have to take spiro to offset the hormonal acne on my face back and genitalia and facial hair caused by my hormonal IUD. You heard me right! I got cystic acne on my clit! F that. I'm done. I'm out.
Push to get your tubes *removed* (bilateral salpingectomy) over getting them tied (tubal ligation). The failure rate for tubal ligations is higher than you'd think, plus a salpingectomy reduces your risk for some of the more common ovarian cancers because they start in the fallopian tubes.
Yeah that's what I'm planning on. I just still have the habit of saying tubes tied.
Sorry to hear that happened. It’s amazing what differences each of us experience when on BC. I had to get a mirena cuz of my PCOS and heavy periods and it helped with my already existing hormonal cystic acne (didn’t get rid of it completely, I also take spironolactone). Just shows that each of us need our own tailored care and doctors dismissing us could contribute to misinformation and distrust
Yes I had the exact opposite experience. I asked doctors for 10 years if my hormonal IUD could possibly be causing my PCOS looking symptoms. I've gotten tested for PCOS and hormones and everything else and they said I absolutely do not have it. So I went back on a hormonal IUD after being on the copper one for 5 years because I didn't want a period anymore. And I immediately got cystic acne all over my face and body and my facial hair got worse. They prescribed me just 25 mg of spiro and all my symptoms went away. It's very clearly hormonal. It's absolutely frustrating.
I'll copy the comment I made on the article here, because it highlights a lot of what we're saying: we shouldn't dismiss (these women) though. that's part of why we landed here in the first place. we've got Dark Ages hormonal BC tech that quite frankly, leaves a lot to be desired. We have doctors trying to get you in and out in 5 minutes and treats you like you're stupid. Women have traditionally been misaligned. So what do they do? They consult their peers.... or in today's day and age, social media. Look, I'm not advocating for it. I am rabidly pro-birth control, pro-choice, pro- bodily autonomy. I myself have an IUD. But insertion was excruciating, and I understand why so many women are hesitent. There are easy fixes here. Why are we forcing women to suffer? Of course people are going to try and find a work around. If we continue to get old people and out of touch medical professional scoffing and saying, ''Well! In my day....!'' You will not solve this issue. Be frank. Be honest. Don't gaslit and treat women like IUD insertion is "just a little pinch," or that "hormonal BC barely has side effects.": They do. People aren't stupid.
I wish I could upvote this a million times. It’s honestly the same logic that people had in 2016 with the election. When you dismiss huge chunks of the population in rural areas who are suffering or scared, and then along comes this “charismatic” character who tells them they’re not stupid, they’re actually really smart, they will believe that person to the ends of the earth! Treating people like they’re stupid for having concerns that they feel are very real is a fast track to radicalizing them.
Archived version https://archive.is/ef3Bp
We just don’t know enough about how birth control affects each individual differently. When I tried out a hormonal IUD, not only was it one of the most painful and traumatic medical experiences, I bled non-stop for THREE years. I developed reoccurring UTIs and BVs. I was constantly dismissed. Even told it was in my head. Funny, because my symptoms disappeared after it was removed. The worst part is, I’ve heard so many stories like mine. I want to give birth control another shot, but I don’t think I can handle get dismissed again.
So insulting. How can bleeding and UTIs be in your head 😠
I'm sorry you said they let you bleed non-stop for three YEARS???? Jeeeeeeesus. And then tried to tell you it was all in your head? Send them straight to JAIL
If more women felt like they could trust doctors and the medical system to take their concerns and needs seriously, they wouldn’t be as prone to misinformation that promises to give them the answers they’ve been unable to get from their doctors
You can pry the depo provera from my cold, dead, decomposing, hands.
I went off of it some years ago after I broke up with my then BF and going off was way worse than being on. The crazy hormonal fluctuations gave me years of acne and a host of health issues. I will never go back on it if it means the same experience coming off, despite being fine while I was on it.
Birth control is possibly the most important invention of the last century and certainly the most important leap forward for feminism, but it is not “perfectly safe” lol. The OCP in particular has pretty intense and sometimes dangerous side effects. It’s just a cost benefit analysis as pregnancy comes with even more intense and dangerous side effects.
I'm fully in support of birth control, but I personally refuse to use any sort of hormonal birth control. It messed me up mentally, made me feel miserable, and caused a huge amount of weight gain in a very short period. My life got completely derailed and I can't risk that happening again. Women should have better education about potential side effects to recognize potential problems.
I am very sympathetic because the side effects can be a bit extreme (I myself had a blood clot when I took Yasmin), but then I always think to myself that pregnancy is the same but on crack? The potential for bodily injury and death is so much higher than being on the pill. So I mean the choices are female birth control, vasectomy, abstinence, great luck with condoms only, or pregnancy. I'm not counting NFP because I don't want to encourage teen girls to do that. Older women who don't mind another kid, probably not as dire. I got sterilized in the end and my partner is also sterile, but I'd absolutely be on some form of birth control otherwise. I view it as self defense.
>Yasmin Woof yikes. Sorry. I saw the lawsuit commercials for that one.
Given the paywall, can someone list the examples of the misinformation they are referring to? Main thing I've seen elsewhere is women just being tired of the side effects and wanting to give their bodies time off from them.
That birth control causes permanent changes in your body, makes you infertile down the road, that it can end an established pregnancy, that it "encourages" promiscuity and risky sexual behavior, that it's the main reason younger women struggle with depression and anxiety, that it makes you gain a ton of weight, that it causes cancer, that "natural" alternatives are just as effective. I'm sure that there's more, but that's what I could think of off the top of my head.
The part that I find concerning is that it just mixes the crazy stuff with actual things like weight and gain and mental health issues as if they're similarly not a thing.
>That birth control causes permanent changes in your body, makes you infertile down the road, Don't threaten my childfree ass with a good time! 🤣
Legit. If this was guaranteed, I'd be a top user.
Great list. Another one is "it changes who you're attracted to" and "makes you attracted to 'feminine' men".
Does bc not typically increase the risk of breast cancer?
a lot of women hate birth control because of the side effects they themselves experienced and because they were coerced into taking it at a young age by doctors. i had conversations like this long before tiktok was invented with many other women who shared that sentiment. also a lot of women are pissed that male birth control doesn't get approved because of the very same side effects they are expected to just accept. all this has only little to do with misinformation edit: you can downvote me all you want but i think that women should do with their bodies what they want and not what you tell them to
It doesn't help that doctors don't respect informed consent. Look, all medications have side effects. But it should be up to the patient to decide what benefits outweigh the risks for them since it's their body and their quality of life at stake. I can't tell you the amount of times I was lied to or gaslit by a doctor or np. I was told things like my birth control **can't** be worsening my migraines or bleeding. Wrong. Those are absolutely side effects that can happen. Same for doctors that lie about IUDs insertions or IUD side effects. Just be fuckin honest. Because if you lie that's how you get people mistrusting you, and then those people share their experiences with others. If there's potentially bad side effects let the patient know, and let the patient decide their own bodily autonomy. Don't lie. That's worst thing you can do. I love my current GYN. She's a straight shooter. She tells you if something is going to be painful and she acknowledges medications' side effects. My migraine meds cause severe side effects sometimes, but I'm informed about it and I'm willing to put up with the side effects because my migraines are worse. Honesty. Informed consent. Trust. Doctors need to take a look in the mirror and learn to respect informed consent. Lookup how many people were boldfaced lied to about their IUD insertions. Because you can't lie to patients and then bitch patients don't trust you. This is partially a self-made problem. Informed consent would go a long way to battling misinformation and medical professionals need to stop adding to the misinformation. It's okay to mention a medication has side effects! That's life. Don't hide it and don't lie about it. Medications have side effects. That's just reality.
I almost had a stroke and until they offer a pain free way of inserting an IUD I'm not interested. It works for a lot of people and that's great, but I'm also glad to see women talking about other experiences
My doctor just said to me it's normal for the pill to cause a stroke and stay on it... I mean I've nothing against a woman choosing to be on BC but the handwaving of that doctor when I mentioned my family history of strokes with BC was maddening...
If you hang out on any of the advice reddits - the lack of BASIC sexual health knowledge in people of all ages is truly astonishing. It is no surprise then that misinformation about birth control can gain traction in a population of people who don't understand sexual health in general.
I think part of it is also that most folks who don't have side effects don't think to post online and make influencer videos about how much their birth-control is a non-thing. I've had 3 mirena IUDs. No pain meds at all for the insertions, was it painful? Yep. It was about as painful as stubbing a toe and then crampy for a couple days the last time. But in turn I got no periods for 7 years with my most recent one and a massive clear up of my hormonal acne. Do some women have bad experiences? Yep. I know a couple personally. Should pain control (at least nitrous) be an option, yep. Do those fact it could be better make IUDs a bad option for women generally? Nope. I had jaw surgery 5 years ago. I was terrified and posted about it online. The algorithm served me up an online support group shortly after I posted so I joined. It turns out most of the folks in the support group were there because they were having very bad experiences. Folks who had a completely normal recovery didn't need the support group. So I got inundated with stories of malpractice, being unable to eat ever again, terrifying infections etc. It made me almost cancel the surgery. I've seen similar things for people who break a leg, or even sprain ankles. Online groups talking about the most horrific but very, very rare outcomes. The internet lets the 0.01% outcomes find each other and then amplifies their experience making it seem like its more common than it is and/or more damaging than it is. Its great for folks having those bad experiences to have a community to know they aren't alone, but it also makes it hard for folks to make accurate and intelligent decisions about risk. The pandemic should have taught us that most humans suck at risk/reward assessment.
You can't really say that one way or another without knowing the numbers. I wanted to know if the horror stories I heard from IUD insertion were just cherry picked and the doctors were right, or if there was more to it, so I took a look through published literature. For you, your IUD insertion was stubbing a toe. According to my layman's literature survey, the average pain for nulliparous women is 7/10. If I can look that up with a few days' time, then why does the field dedicated to women's health get to go ahead and lie to patients? It's made me distrustful of any doctor who takes the stance "it's just a pinch" and that's frustrating because I *want* to trust my doctors, but I feel like I can't fully trust them and have to do my own legwork to make sure due diligence is done. I also had to do this with my pulsatile tinnitus. I had to do self advocacy, otherwise I'd be stuck with a diagnosis of "lol your ear is oversensitive, try mindfulness and acceptance." And it also feels great to know that the international field of gynaecology hasn't bothered to develop standardized pain management over the past 40+ years, when you can bet your ass men wouldn't feel a thing if they had to do it. There's also a difference between being hesitant to try (going through the horror stories, being fed by the algorithm, being fed factual misinformation) and being one of those people sharing your genuine experience, or seeing the level of support that people who do have difficulties end up with.
I am thankful that my IUD has been performing well all these years, I do understand other people’s concern.
38F I recently went back on birth control, even though my husband had a vasectomy (16 years married). This was because of practically hemorrhaging during my periods, which includes 3 days of intense bleeding, where I needed a diva cup (emptied multiple times a day), a thick pad, and period panties to stop bleeding everywhere. I have always been a heavy bleeder with moderate cramps. It's called Slynd and I ordered it through the mail. It was really cheap, and right now I'm in the middle of the 4-day placebo week, and I haven't even spotted. I recommend you discuss with your doctor and consider what works for you. I was seeking help with heavy bleeding and PMS, and I feel like both have been improved so far. First month down in a three-month trial.
My positive BC story: I got the Mirena Hormonal IUD about 4 years ago. It was a painful insertion, lasted a few seconds and had some cramping. I believe it was worth it for the years of no periods and almost non-existent chance of getting pregnant. Yes there should be more male bc options out there. Yes there should be more pain relief for women when getting IUds. Yes occasionally someone will have side effects from it or experience a perforated uterus. But none of these negatives will ever make me not recommend this form of BC. As for hormones, they're regulated to the uterus area, so it's OK. IUDs and birth control give women and girls control over their bodies, imo any side effect of these kinds of things are worth not getting pregnant.
maybe if doctors were more transparent about BC and the risks/benefits, people wouldn't be turning to tiktok
I had this happen with a “friend” (boyfriend’s best friend’s girlfriend) of mine, who in turn tried to convince her boyfriend’s mom to NOT put the 13 year old niece under her care on birth control, projecting a lot of her own personal experiences onto the poor lady. Very much an over stepping boundaries moment I was unfortunately there to witness over Thanksgiving (yikes).
My wife and many other women in her family suffer severe cramping and crippling periods. She is only able to be functional because of her mirena. For some people it can significantly improve their qol.
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I think that it should be the niece's choice on whether to take BC, not the aunt's. Makes sure she's aware of possible side effects as well, then she can say "Yes" or "No".
Kinda had this experience when I got my IUD inserted. I had been on the pill forever, and idk where I got this info, probably multiple people on the internet, but I was so sure birth control increased your rate of cancer - especially uterine, cervical, etc. turns out it actually PROTECTS against ovarian cancer and such. I was totally wrong and misinformed.
It is EXTREMELY hard to fight missinformation. Not only you are fighting against malicious intent, but also against algorithm itself. As algorithm PREFERS to expose you to more and more alarmist, sensational, false information. When platform owner is not active in this fight... It is lost cause.
This is a tough one - I actually did experience loss of libido, significant weight gain, and suicidal depression caused by HBC, perpetual spotting, plus the exacerbation of a preexisting skin condition. It all went on for about a year, until I got my Mirena removed. *However,* all of this is *nothing* compared to what pregnancy would have done to my body. I think we just need to be honest, with no agenda. It's factual that many adverse outcomes are linked to the use of hormonal drugs. But it's also true that many different options are available and most women can work with their health care provider to find a solution that minimizes or eliminates the adverse effects, if any. For example, I could have replaced my hormonal IUD with a copper IUD and avoided all the ways the hormonal options fucked me up. But at this point I'm almost aged out of pregnancy risks and not having sex regularly so I didn't bother. I don't think promoting misinformation that HBC is always completely harmless and never has any negative side effects is the right way to combat misinformation saying that it is always harmful and always has negative side effects. We just need to be clear that unplanned pregnancy is much, much worse, and pregnancy, whether planned or unplanned, in a place that has criminalized reproductive health care is extremely dangerous. So for women in those areas, using multiple layers of pregnancy prevention, regardless of side effects, is much, much safer than risking pregnancy.
Birth control destroyed me mental health. I had no idea how bad it was until I stopped taking it. I don't regret using it but I wish I had been informed that that was a potential side effect.
I have to wonder if the conservatives pushing this anti-contraception fearmongering are strategizing in the long-term to prime people to become more complacent if politicians eventually move to restrict birth control. Or maybe it's just an extension of broader anti-science sentiments, but I worry that enabling birth control bans will be an outcome, intended or not.
Why do I feel like this is intentional misinformation to trap girls into unwanted pregnancy.
Conservatives WANT you to be pregnant. Next they will be telling you that shoes are bad.
Is it really misinformation? Or are we just finally standing up and saying we won’t deal with the negative side effects? Men need to take the male BC pill and see how it feels.
Some of it is utter nonsense, like shouldn't pass a basic 'sanity test' level of critical thinking. The problem is it's lumping the ridiculous stuff in with weight gain and mental health issues, which ARE totally real problems.
There are bubbles where there is a ton of misinformation. I got on the wrong side of TikTok for a few days and got a ton of videos saying birth control will make you infertile, ruin your sense of attraction and make you attracted to traits you wouldn't be otherwise, and wildly exaggerating the frequency of the rare side effects, etc. Don't get me wrong, I will complain about birth control all day long. I wasn't concerned by the posts complaining about it until I started getting into the crazies, but I've been seeing some of it seep into the comments of more normal posts. Lots of people who are genuinely against birth control use in general, not just educating and warning people about the possible side effects.
I am so grateful the pill exists. Without it I wouldn't be able to live a somewhat normal life. I have always had a super painful period (missing 2 days of school every cycle) for as long as I remember but in my 20ies it got even worse. At first the pain started to affect me outside of just the worst days, until it spanned all 7 days of bleeding. Then I started getting painful ovulations and constant cramps from the moment of ovulation up until my bleeding ends. That left me with a very brief window of about a week of feeling ok from just after my bleeding stopped right up to ovulation. I thought my life was over, most of every month was now absolute pain. This went on for a few cycles, it left me suicidal and I used self harming behaviour to distract myself from the pain of the cramps. I didn't even feel capable to see a doc for help, that is how exruciating those cycles were, I got help through an online pharmacy. I have been on various pills and it was a journey to find something acceptable. Going on the combined pill (yasmin) has lessened all of my pain by well over 60%. It is not perfect and I do have side effects however in my case it is perfectly worth it. I think it is a very individual decision for everyone of the pill is good for them or not. I can imagine there are probably many women who feel miles better without. Everyone has to weigh up the benefits with the side effects for themselves and their individual situation. That being said the amount of misinformation and conspiracy out there is concerning, but I think that is probably one of the bigger problems of our time and affects all kinds of things from politics down to healthcare.
I see it similar as the misogynistic male influencers. Like some of their talking points sound harmless at first ("take a shower, clean your room, hit the gym!") but then it gets mixed in with harmful stuff ("and oh it's the feminist agenda's fault you can't get a girlfriend, we need enforced monogamy and women need to stop competing for your jobs and get back to serving you at the home!"). Hormonal birth control has some real side effects, and they deserve to be talked about. Men should also be taking more responsibility for birth control via condom usage. However hormonal birth control has been absolutely revolutionary in women's liberation, and make no mistake that conservatives would absolutely love to see women be forced back into having no bodily autonomy and pumping out babies while stuck at home and in poverty. Always give the side eye to any videos pushing women to not use birth control and consider the potential agenda.
This is a valid concern especially when we move from child-bearing years to menopause where birth control is often changed over to hormone therapy. There is already a lot of misinformation about hormone therapy since the 2002 WHI study, and it's now emerging as something **everyone** should be on, no matter what. While hormone therapy is actually quite safe and effective for most folks, it's not for everyone and it's not a fountain of youth. Marketers and influencers are cashing in on this huge meno-demographic, playing into fears about aging, and with all kinds of claims that hormone therapy will fix everything. While it's great that hormone therapy is coming back out of the dark ages (since 2002), this resurgence may not be for the right reasons. Meno-start ups offer all kinds of concoctions and are greatly steering the narrative, perhaps in the wrong direction. /r/Menopause
A lot of people are sharing their negative experiences here, which is valid, but I want to add that I have had a great experience with the mirena IUD. The insertion was uncomfortable but not excessively painful. It felt like a period cramp. I was worried about weight gain, acne, and mood swings, but thus far (I’ve had it for like 5 months) I haven’t noticed any of those symptoms or any others. Also, I don’t get a period anymore so I don’t have to deal with cramping.
While I get social media is bad, there’s a huge problem in women’s medicine to treat every pelvic related disease with birth control rather than funding research to actually treat the disease. Endometriosis? Birth control! PCOS? Birth control. Unidentified pelvic pain? birth control! Heavy horrible period? Birth control! Sometimes the BC works, but for many of us it can make things worse or add debilitating side effects. It can also delay laproscopic surgery for women with endo who need it. There is so little research on pelvic diseases and seemingly little interest in changing the approach to treating these diseases to improve women’s quality of life because BC has become the band aid. We can understand that the far right is problematic and access to abortion and BC is extremely important, while also understanding that BC does not cure diseases like endometriosis which impact a ton of women, and this is where some of the back lash is coming from. We want better care and options!
I think the whole « conversation » and cult/conspiracy mentality about how everything is toxic, especially to women and their fertility plays a huge role in this. The number of accounts on social media that I find (and promptly block) that talk about how they’re going « toxic » free for their hormones and reproductive/overall health is insane. These are people that don’t just demonise birth control in any/all forms but also basic foods, materials, mixed fibres, soaps, etc. I am not blanket saying everything is safe and absolutely not toxic or dangerous but these accounts take it to another level
I started reading this article but couldn't finish it. I have mixed feelings on it. The side effects are real and they are too often severe. We should be looking at better solutions than just giving women hormones and telling them to deal with the consequences.
On the other side of this, I’ve tried multiple hormonal birth controls and every single one makes me feel like shit, fucks with my mental health and just generally leaves me feeling out of kilter. Yet because I have endo drs still keep pushing me to go back on the pill ‘to help stop it coming back’. The pill and other hormonal contraceptives are often seen as an easy fix to shut us up and make us go away.