Coming Off The Pill: The Final Frontier for Women Pursuing Holistic Health
If you’ve switched to organic food, gone paraben-free on your body products, and are starting to ask yourself how the birth control pill fits into your new health-conscious lifestyle… you aren’t alone. Aside from the pill is making me crazy, the most common reason we hear for women choosing to switch to natural birth control is that the pill no longer fits with their values. For many women, we may not be able to pinpoint the exact way that hormonal birth control doesn’t fit into our value system, we just intuitively sense that something isn’t right. Below we share three ways ditching hormonal birth control can help you feel more aligned with your personal beliefs, health philosophy, or ideals for ecological responsibility.
Live closer to the earth. Increasingly we are realizing that artificially produced compounds don’t belong in our body. There is mounting evidence that the chemicals in our food, water bottles, and even in the makeup we wear are creating toxic buildup in our bodies. This is why we are now making efforts to eat organic, change our body products, and watch our food packaging. When we understand how the pill works we begin to see that there is little difference between these environmental carcinogens and the ones we are voluntarily popping into our mouths every day. The birth control pill is made up of compounds that are designed to mimic your body’s own hormones. The problem is, they are artificial and not identical to the hormones naturally produced in our body. As a result, they wreak havoc by acting like hormones in some ways, but completely missing the mark in other ways. Studies show these artificially synthesized hormones are associated with stroke, depression, and libido changes, to name a few.
Live in sync with the earth. As the environmental movement continues to grow, we are gaining a deeper appreciation for the importance of cycles. We see how the earth has natural cycles and seasons, and how they contribute to the earth’s ability to heal and to grow. We have begun to ask ourselves what the consequences are of stunting those natural rhythms internally. And again, we are right to do so. The birth control pill is like a way of insisting that our bodies perpetually stay in the same season. We are stripped of our natural monthly rhythms – no ovulation, no true period, no fertile days or libido peaks. Not only do we miss out on the beauty and cyclicality of our innate nature, but we do damage to our long-term fertility in the process.
Live in respect for the earth. Lastly, we are becoming conscious of the fact that our choices have ramifications that go well beyond ourselves or even our immediate community. The excess hormones in your body as a result of the pill eventually come out, and when they do, they make their way into the water systems. Here they have been found to have a feminizing effect on nature’s aquatic systems, reducing sperm count in fish, and resulting in procreation challenges for marine life. By choosing not to take hormonal birth control we ensure that our choices – and their consequences - are ours and ours alone.
For more information on coming off the birth control pill, and the natural alternatives available to you, I invite you to download my free report: “5 Fabulous Reasons to Ditch the Pill & Reclaim Your Health, Happiness & Future Fertility.”
References & Suggested Reading
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Kim & Amy Sedgwick love to discuss sex, periods, and all the other things we’re not supposed to talk about. The co-founders of Red Tent Sisters, they’ve been featured in every major Canadian news outlet and have become a trusted resource for people seeking natural (effective!) birth control, a more joyful sex life, and an empowered journey to motherhood.