My Birth Control Story

MY BIRTH CONTROL STORY 
I came across this Substack research today called 'The Birth Control Testimonies.' (see below) and boy did it hit me hard. Wow, everything I had been surmising for decades just got proven in the cold hard light of good science.

I’m one of those women who went on the pill in the mid 70s, and so 4 things resonated personally for me with this article/research:
Infertility, Blood sugar issues, Candida and Destroyed partner-choice.  Oh and let’s not forget Depression. Decades and Decades of it.

In my early 30s, whilst in a lovely committed partnership, I went off the pill to protect my health. I didn't know then that it may have caused my blood sugar issues and infertility, I just thought it was a good idea now I was in a committed relationship.

Pretty immediately, I became overtly turned off him. Not disgusted, just incredibly uninterested.... couldn't even look him in the eyes. And he was a lovely man who suffered hugely from this.
As did I.  Heartbreaking!!
It broke us up. And I have not been in a functioning relationship since (now mid 60s).  My hormones seemed to stay disrupted re partner choice.

Apparently this is one of the findings of this research. The pill disrupts the woman's hormones, which negatively effects her capacity to choose partners. Whilst she is on the pill, she chooses a certain type of partner, and once she is off it - with different hormones flooding her system - she looses all sexual interest, or even gets overtly turned off. 

Around the same time,  I also had a huge ovarian cyst that appeared soon after stopping the pill. That meant 24 hour pain for months and unable to have sex with my relatively new partner. (It took awhile for the sexual disinterest to become obvious.)  Luckily I took no notice of the doctors, and found a way to heal it for myself.

​I was never able to have children but never knew why until I started researching a few years go. So due to Big Pharma, I have missed out on all the support and companionship of partnership and family.

I also had chronic candida and chronic low blood sugar issues... maybe another consequence?

​So yes, this little pill has had huge consequences for my life. So good to see this research coming into the mainstream... makes me feel not so crazy and alone.

The One-Minute Elevator Explanation
The birth control pill works by delivering synthetic hormones that trick your brain into thinking you’re already past ovulation, preventing pregnancy by stopping egg release. But here’s what most people don’t know: those same hormones that prevent pregnancy also influence every system in your body, from your brain to your immune system. The pill changes who you’re attracted to—women on the pill prefer less masculine, more provider-type partners and may not be able to smell genetic compatibility. It can reduce sexual desire by suppressing testosterone, alter your stress response system like someone with PTSD, and increase depression risk especially in teenagers.

Partner Selection Fundamentally Changes The pill alters women’s partner preferences at the deepest levels, changing attraction to physical features, voices, and crucially, scents that signal genetic compatibility. Women on the pill prefer less masculine partners and may choose men with incompatible immune genes, potentially affecting fertility and offspring health. These altered preferences can cause relationship crisis when women discontinue the pill and find themselves no longer attracted to partners chosen while on hormones, contributing to a pattern where pill-choosing women initiate divorce more frequently.

REFERENCES
Research article - The Birth Control Testimonies. 
More research - This is your brain on birth control: how the Pill changes everything (2023)

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