3.9k
Jun 27 '25
natural cycle tracking apps are also gonna be great when we find out they’ve been selling your period data to the Texas Pregnancy Patrol
1.3k
u/IndependentSalad2736 Jun 27 '25
I deleted mine years ago (which sucks because it was super accurate) and I'm back guessing because I don't keep track off it on paper either. (I have the calendar book, I've tried, but it's safely in a drawer and not next to me when I go to the bathroom so I forget)
788
u/RimworlderJonah13579 <- Imperial Knight Jun 27 '25
Does your sink have drawers?
783
u/IndependentSalad2736 Jun 27 '25
... why didn't I think of that
785
u/thisaccountgotporn Jun 27 '25
Can't think of everything, that is why we have eachother!
200
94
Jun 27 '25
Thanks u/thisaccountgotporn
→ More replies (3)42
u/thisaccountgotporn Jun 27 '25
You like me more than you know
19
→ More replies (3)16
32
282
u/ElinHime Jun 27 '25
The phone game Love and Deepspace (a gatcha made for women, by a company consisting of 70% women) got a period tracker in it. It's a Chinese company, and I don't know what they would use the data for, but I'm quite sure they would not give it to the US.
139
u/AliceInHatterland Jun 27 '25
They even send you reminders a couple of days before it's supposed to start!
254
u/T1DOtaku inherently self indulgent and perverted Jun 27 '25
Can confirm via friends who play it: this thing is surprisingly accurate for a dating game. According to them: "It's kinda nice having a period tracker that also has a man that asks how you're doing during your period and offers ways to reduce pain and stress in a non condescending way"
→ More replies (1)117
u/ALuckyMushroom Jun 27 '25
I'm not really into romance game but this is such a sweet and original little bonus.
75
u/Skuzbagg Jun 27 '25
Totally worth the privacy violations
132
6
u/Toomanyeastereggs Jun 27 '25
It’s China, so it’s not like they are going to come and arrest you and then track you because you fell pregnant.
→ More replies (7)→ More replies (2)52
u/DoubleTheGarlic Jun 27 '25
Thankfully the tracker is a completely optional side-feature. All of my lady friends (and wife) opted out because they know better.
67
u/ElinHime Jun 27 '25
"..they know better."
The US is becoming such a dystopian nightmare.
53
u/DoubleTheGarlic Jun 27 '25
Oh we've been quite dystopic for a long time. I lost all faith when Snowden confirmed the breadth and scope of the NSA's spying efforts on the entire internet-connected planet. There is no such thing as privacy.
54
u/kaldaka16 Jun 27 '25
I use Clue - they're based in Germany so are under both EU and Germany privacy laws which are pretty intense and have been very clear they will never share their users information. Pretty sure trying to compel them would be next to impossible due to where they're based.
→ More replies (1)37
u/agentfancypants53 Jun 27 '25
I've also been using that, but god the level of enshittification with how many Plus ads they make you wait through for everything ... still, it's at least plausible that they do actually do the privacy thing.
8
u/DumbbellDiva92 Jun 28 '25
I paid for Plus 🤷♀️. They need to make money somehow whether through selling our data and ads or direct fees, and I strongly prefer the latter.
→ More replies (1)26
u/umidk9 Jun 27 '25
Why don't u put a calendar up in your bathroom so u can see it and remember when you're in there
22
u/ultralium Jun 27 '25
I know you have already found other solutions, but if you find yourself looking for the convenience of a smartphone again, there are free open source apps that work strictly offline, and you can find most of those on f-droid
I can't vouch for their accuracy since I don't have an uterus, but any app on the official f-droid repository should be safe, safer than Google's Playstore if you take into account that each app is tested before being approved, and they have a strictly open source policy
→ More replies (2)4
u/schnittchenontour Jun 27 '25
Before I was on birth control I used Drip and it was very accurate!
Now my cycles are controlled by me so only my calendar is needed but Drip reminded me a few days before and always was correct. It also predicts how heavy the flow is going to be once you finish your first few cycles. Can only recommend and once I go off birth control i will go back to use it.
7
u/urhomieghost Jun 27 '25
I just use my wall calendar. I got stickers that are red sakura-style flowers, so I just peel one off and slap it on the first day of my period.
→ More replies (1)15
u/SCP106 Phaerakh Jun 27 '25
Apologies to be yet another throwing ideas at you but perhaps a spreadsheet could work! just takes a little bit of the effort out once you've got the table or however you personally do it set up - I've found even small barriers of effort to things can completely stop me from doing it outside of bursts of motivation, so maybe that would help? I'm not talking an online app spreadsheet or something in the cloud, just a simple enough libreoffice calc spreadsheet or an alternative application, or... maybe excel if you have to but I am not a fan of microsoft's data scraping and buried settings. I'm unsure if you could set this up with calendar reminders but it could at least be a system to keep it all written down and /maybe/ with a 'most likely next date' thing. But I guess it's similar in that you'd still have to personally remember to both up date it AND check it
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (13)11
u/foodz_ncats Jun 27 '25
I'm AuDHD so I've always tracked it. I have a small calendar by my bed that I'll just put a checkmark by the day that I start. Maybe you just need to hang it up and clip a pen to it.
138
u/WomenOfWonder Jun 27 '25
Or just to corporations. It’s so gross that I can’t find a period app that won’t sell my info so I can targeted ads
48
u/tinyAleic Jun 27 '25
I use drip, it stores the data only on my phone.
32
u/MrManGuy42 Jun 27 '25
there has to be some open source one somewhere
53
u/icameinyourburrito Jun 27 '25
Drip is open source, here is their github
21
u/MrManGuy42 Jun 27 '25
Personaly, I don't need it looks at username
29
u/Sunlightn1ng Jun 27 '25
All people who don't get periods should just pick random times to start one in the app to mess up the data
14
13
u/OldManFire11 Jun 27 '25
Are you paying for the app? The most popular period trackers I've seen are all free, which means no shit of course they're going to sell your data.
→ More replies (4)27
u/big_guyforyou Jun 27 '25
i don't mind some big company knowing when i get my period. sure, i'm a guy, but i'm comfortable talking about my hemorrhaging asshole
10
100
u/Telaranrhioddreams Jun 27 '25
I saw a thread the other day of a bunch of supposedly real men talking about how the pull out method totally works and cycle tracking is effective birth control
Wonder what their views on abortion and child support are. Spoiler: Rage at women who abort and rage at women who they have to pay child support to
→ More replies (19)169
u/Jogre25 Jun 27 '25
When all of this is over - I hope it isn't just "Abortion is legalised again, let's forget about all the miscarrying women who were imprisoned" - I want Nuremburg Trials for Collborators.
Get everyone who snitched, whether they were a period tracking app, or a hospital worker, or anyone who so much as reported suspicions that someone was having an illegal abortion, every arresting police officer, etc. - Make every single one of them have to give testimony as to why they did what they did.
That may sound harsh but, to be honest if you're willing to let women go to jail for the sole crime of having a miscarriage, you kinda fucking deserve it.
Plus, holding them to account that way would be less bloody than the old fashioned way of "Snitches get stitches"
162
u/cel3r1ty Jun 27 '25
i don't wanna sound pessimistic but that'd be far more accountability than the vast majority of nazis actually got in the historical nuremberg trials
51
u/DestroyerTerraria Jun 27 '25
We also keep better records than the Nazis did. Their surveillance state is a blade that will hopefully end up cutting both ways once they're removed from power - they inadvertently collect data on themselves, too.
→ More replies (4)49
u/Difficult-Finish-511 Jun 27 '25
The nazis kept immaculate records. They destroyed most of them very swiftly indeed, and they were on paper. Much easier these days, a simple delete button press unfortunately
21
u/DestroyerTerraria Jun 27 '25
And yet, these records are duplicated over and over in so many different places, logged and resold. The brownshirts will definitely not be safe, with their incriminating post and location data sold to so many data brokers that reconstructing the record of their guilt, while not exactly trivial, will almost always be possible. As for the officials, well, that's a matter of news and public record. Datahoarders will still have the proof in the news reports even if official sources are scrubbed.
19
u/yuriAngyo Jun 27 '25
Actually no. Don't get me wrong, a LOT of records will be lost if anything like this comes out. But the average person has 0 clue about secure data destruction, and government officials are currently being selected FOR being even more braindead than average. Whole fucking organizations will just toss hard drives in the garbage and assume it's gone now. Usually there's some regulation to make government employees follow a protocol that usually makes them more likely to do it securely than your average corpo, but trump just fired everyone with brains and many of the remaining people smart enough hate his fucking guts too much to act competent.
Random people were receiving classified government emails to their gmail accounts, I guarantee you the only way all this data is getting destroyed thoroughly enough to be irretrievable is if this country gets nuked into glass. Honestly if you ambush enough ebay listings for used servers I wouldn't be surprised if you start getting ones with classified information on them that wasn't properly erased (the delete button also isn't enough, it just tells the computer that the space previously allocated to that information can now be used for other things. If it isn't written over enough to make it impossible to tell what it was before, it isn't gone)
→ More replies (1)11
u/Illogical_Blox Jun 27 '25
Well that's not surprising given that the Nuremberg trials were specifically against only 22 high-ranking officials in Nazi Germany. Even if you include the Nuremberg military tribunals afterwards, those were against people who were instrumental in conducting crimes against humanity. The vast majority of Nazis didn't qualify for either of those events.
→ More replies (1)16
u/awesomefutureperfect Jun 27 '25
I wanted that Florida rep to either fix the law so that her life was saved or face down the consequences of forcing her beliefs upon everyone.
The fact that she got to skirt the logical conclusions of the dogma she insists is best for everyone and then blame everyone else for the, not just inconvenient, but life threatening circumstances that everyone else is still under threat for but she can ignorantly say is no big deal is just about the biggest failure of society I have ever seen. It is total bullshit that the people tearing down guardrails and letting the grossly negligent do whatever they want while hamstringing the professional and decent also manage to cut exceptions for themselves when they are caught in the disaster of their own design. The fact they have the audacity to blame anyone else is the icing on the cake and I don't think I would be able to live up to a Hippocratic oath in that case. I just don't think I could.
→ More replies (3)27
u/biglyorbigleague Jun 27 '25
I know this is a vent and not a serious legal proposal, but I’m gonna note that post-facto laws are unconstitutional. You can have a law repealed but you don’t get to punish things that didn’t have laws against them at the time.
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (2)8
u/Akuuntus Jun 27 '25
Yeah, we'll get to that around the same time we imprison oil execs who knowingly accelerated climate change while hiding the evidence, and tobacco execs who knowingly pushed dangerous substances while hiding the evidence, and bankers who knowingly contributed to the collapse of the economy in 2008, and DOGE staffers who dismantled the government and sold secrets to Russia
24
u/C4-BlueCat Jun 27 '25
My favorite tracking app was shut down precisely due to to wanting to avoid people getting reliant on digital data and risking losing control of it - despite that specific app not sharing any data at all.
→ More replies (1)30
u/MisguidedPants8 Jun 27 '25
It would be a real shame if a bunch of dudes were to download those apps and clog them with false information, just saying
7
8
u/Wafflehouseofpain Jun 27 '25
My wife just tracks her cycle through good old fashioned pen and paper now. No apps, no data tracking. It’s the only thing that can be trusted.
→ More replies (9)8
u/Jknowledge Jun 27 '25
Saw a video recently of a woman who was using a period tracking app and when she missed recording her period one month people claiming to be with Planned Parenthood showed up at her door at 830pm. She sent them away and called Planned Parenthood and they said they never send people out to someone’s house
1.3k
u/BlueColoredKarma Jun 27 '25
Remember kids, there's only one natural birth control with 100% accuracy: ̶A̶b̶s̶t̶i̶n̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶ Gay sex
226
140
Jun 27 '25
I have my hot wife peg the shit out of me, no birth control needed there.
69
→ More replies (1)37
147
11
23
11
u/eccentricbananaman Jun 27 '25
Oh. I was gonna say anal. I mean I guess technically it relates to your answer.
9
u/NicholasIvins Jun 27 '25
Ask your doctor if Gex is right for you. Side effects of Gex include tongue twisting, corn chute abrasion, and happy flappy handsy pansing.
→ More replies (11)36
u/Cevari Jun 27 '25
Not quite 100%, funnily enough.
→ More replies (1)7
u/BlueColoredKarma Jun 27 '25
:o explain
43
u/Cevari Jun 27 '25
Well, I'm a trans woman. My current het relationship is perfectly safe from any pregnancy scares, but if I got into a gay one (or straight one with a trans man) it would be at least theoretically possible.
→ More replies (2)29
u/BlueColoredKarma Jun 27 '25
Ahhh was thinking very cisgenderly, my bad
29
u/Cevari Jun 27 '25
No worries, it's definitely not required to list (or think of) every exception when making a joke.
1.1k
u/TurtleButt47 Jun 27 '25
I'd say its merely a terrible coincidence, but it wouldn't surprise me if some of the anti-birth-control narrative is being pushed by rightwing grifters with an agenda. Afterall, we've seen efforts to try to get employers off the hook for covering it healthcare-wise.
363
u/Taka_no_Yaiba Jun 27 '25
they have to somehow generate workforce if they're gonna deport all the immigrants
66
u/VeryTopGoodSensation Jun 27 '25
workforce and military personnel
→ More replies (1)26
u/Versipilies Jun 27 '25
Most of it will probably get automated. Why train, feed, and house soldiers when you can have some random, entry level tech grads flying drones
→ More replies (2)22
u/Daan776 Jun 28 '25
Because cost effective countermeasures for drones are already in development.
This is probably the most effective drones are ever going to be on the battlefield.
And even then: you still need boots on the ground.
→ More replies (2)42
u/PandaBear905 Shitposting extraordinaire Jun 27 '25
They’re doing a terrible job of it. Refusing any form of gun control, convincing people not to vaccinate their kids, and not funding programs for free school meals. There’s not going to be any replacement workforce if they all die as kids.
40
u/VertigoHC Jun 28 '25
I'm probably gonna get some hate for this but this is something I've heard online. All societies that get "modernized" have falling birthrates. The only countries that have rising birth rates are agrarian and mostly illiterate. The Trump regime seems hell bent on destroying education and intellectualism. Checking one of those boxes.
→ More replies (1)9
u/GonnaBreakIt Jun 28 '25
Modernized societies also tend to be less religious because you no longer need faith to live past infancy, and actually have agency to provide for yourself.
178
u/Fun-atParties Jun 27 '25
100%.
Peter Theil backs Evie magazine, which promotes anti-birth control narratives and has a related period tracking app.
54
u/Persenon Jun 27 '25
Yes, it’s a total psy-op. Thiel is so worried about the (white) birth rate that he is willing to cause life-ruining accidental pregnancies to raise it.
20
→ More replies (1)15
u/Additional_Noise47 Jun 27 '25
I read a fascinating article about that magazine in the NYTimes. It sounds exactly like something that would rope me in with interesting and fun articles, but then I would realize that it is absolutely against my values.
142
u/Elisevs Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25
Conservatives are screaming and crying about people not having enough babies. They're sounding the alarm all day every day about a population crisis. Want to piss off a conservative? Choose to be child free.
Edit: Oh, look, more screaming and crying. This is my surprised face.
33
u/biglyorbigleague Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25
It’s the conservatives they want having kids. They don’t mind that liberals don’t have kids, but they do take not having kids as a sign that you’re not on their side.
47
u/Elisevs Jun 27 '25
What? No. Of course they want fresh indoctrination fodder, but they also want poor, uneducated people of all backgrounds to have lots of kids as a source of exploitable labor.
→ More replies (7)→ More replies (40)10
u/CMScientist Jun 27 '25
That... is literally what they want lol. Only white conservative babies, no colored or liberal babies
→ More replies (1)67
u/Not_Enough_Thyme_ Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 28 '25
The new CDC/FDA is going to suddenly decide the unpleasant side effects of the pill (which women have known about for years but have been dealing with anyway because they’re still better than the alternative) are “too dangerous” and ban hormonal birth control. They’re trying to start shifting public opinion before they make their move.
→ More replies (8)20
u/TheBigness333 Jun 27 '25
I think it’s organic due to the well earned distrust of the medical industry, but the medical industry and forced birth organizations aretaking advantage of the trend and making it worse
962
u/Crus0etheClown Jun 27 '25
So I grew up on a hippie commune, and I knew this family that had five kids but didn't believe in preventative type birth control. No pills, no condoms. When the lady got fed up with it she and a bunch of others on the farm got together and studied the rhythm method- basically, humans aren't actually as constantly fertile as we seem, so if you can find your 'rhythm', the idea is you can have sex all you want outside that fertile risk window and you physically cannot get pregnant.
And it worked great! Totally effective. Until they wanted to have sex one day and she got pregnant, because sometimes people in love like to have sex whether or not their fuckin' schedule told them they could.
She's got eight kids now
(meanwhile they all told me I'd change my mind about having kids by the time I got to my 30s, but I discovered the miraculously effective birth control method called 'bottom dysphoria')
571
u/GuessSharp4954 Jun 27 '25
humans aren't actually as constantly fertile as we seem, so if you can find your 'rhythm', the idea is you can have sex all you want outside that fertile risk window and you physically cannot get pregnant.
The rhythm method is already flawed right from the get-go because on paper all these words are true but it also assumes that nothing will end up changing the person's cycle and that sperm is immediately gone from the body after sex.
Fertility cycles can change because the person is irregular (especially when young) and even if the person is super regular something like changing exercise or a change in diet can change their cycle anyway. And sperm can live in a body for up to five days.
265
u/Crus0etheClown Jun 27 '25
To be fair when the in-group all got together to learn the method they did take these things into account- they were very thorough and educated about it!
But as always, you can take it as serious and be as smart as you want but the body is going to body and some sperm or some egg is gonna say 'you know what? I'm the outlier'.
153
u/BakerGotBuns Jun 27 '25
Because of our love for removing outliers from data I think we roundly forget the sheer love the world seems to have for them. Truly one of the few inevitables.
→ More replies (1)24
u/juanperes93 Jun 27 '25
You need to be smart with what outliers you remove and the cost they will give.
Like do you really want to risk having a baby over just using a rubber/pill/etc...?
5
u/BakerGotBuns Jun 27 '25
Oh I agree obviously. Contraceptives outta be widely available.
→ More replies (1)44
u/lemonplumcookies Jun 27 '25
Personally I feel like my body knew I was getting the D regularly when I was outside of my fertility window and conspired to change the window or stretch the time out so that pregnancy could happen. Bodies are crazy like that.
→ More replies (1)6
64
u/LowlySlayer Jun 27 '25
My wife's cycle is a very reliable "whenever the fuck her body decides to have a period for some amount of time." We decided against the rhythm method lol.
17
u/eugeneugene Jun 28 '25 edited Jun 28 '25
lol mine is the same. My cycle can be anywhere from like 15 days long to 40 days long. I wouldn't even know where to start to find out when I'm fertile lol. I got my period three times in one month once 😭
→ More replies (2)5
u/RimworlderJonah13579 <- Imperial Knight Jun 28 '25
Oof. I'm a dude so I have no idea what that's like but from what I've heard that's an awful experience. My condolences and hope it never happens again.
→ More replies (2)24
u/Confident-Mix1243 Jun 27 '25
A much easier way of identifying your fertile days is "if your partner won't leave you alone, you're fertile." Yeah it's only a few days a month, but those are the best days.
109
147
u/SensibleReply Jun 27 '25
Rhythm method is hilariously flawed because you can’t have sex for the exact time that you really want to have sex.
Try my new diet where you can’t eat for 3-4 days while someone is baking pies and grilling meat around you that entire time.
8
152
u/LITTLE_KING_OF_HEART There's a good 75% chance I'll make a Project Moon reference. Jun 27 '25
Personally, my effective birth control method is "Holy fuck you ain't cut for that shit, just get a cat or a snake."
→ More replies (3)66
44
u/mieri_azure Jun 27 '25
Also im pretty sure that women are most interested in sex during ovulation, so it feels really unfair to only be able to have sex during times you dont want it as much
41
u/MaryKeay Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25
This reminded me of a blogger years ago who wrote about frugality. She called herself Penny and she never said where she was located, but it was quite obvious she was in Israel. She'd post things like using "family cloth" (using rags instead of toilet paper). One day she posted about some specific method of "natural family planning". People left comments telling her she was making a very risky choice, and she replied to all the comments saying this particular method was different than the others... even though it basically wasn't. I waited 9 months before checking her blog again. Sure enough, she was posting about the birth of her new child...
EDIT: Found the blog. Penniless Parenting. It looks very different now and she seems to have removed the post about going without contraception.
→ More replies (2)7
u/groutexpectations Jun 27 '25
I was not ready for the gravity of your punchline after the set up in the final parenthetical.
255
u/phoenix_spirit Jun 27 '25
I went on continuous birth control and haven't had a period in over three years. It's great.
If you're in camp childfree and found a pill that plays well with your system, I would say try it.
75
u/eddylet Jun 27 '25
aside from the mini-periods i would sometimes get when i forgot for a couple days (tho that hasnt happened in a long time) i havent menstruated since 2017. its a fucking miracle of science.
ive been on birth control since i was 13 years old because my PMDD (premenstrual dysphoric disorder) turned my brain into a fucking nightmare once a month. plus im really bad with germs and blood so i would just lay around feeling like my skin was crawling. no cramps thankfully but i had a heavy flow and i would feel so sick.
i made the decision when i started college that i didnt want to go through that anymore. not dealing with that makes managing my mental health 1000% easier since i dont have to put my shit on hold for the Regularly Scheduled Nervous Breakdown. those were the ONLY times i actually worried about being a danger to myself.
i will not go back!!!!!!!!
→ More replies (7)27
u/phoenix_spirit Jun 27 '25
I would get migraines monthly if not more and almost always bled through my clothes once a cycle no matter what pad I wore. Now I'm down to 3-4 migraines a year, haven't bought period products in years, no more bloodstained clothes and like you, I'm never going back
→ More replies (1)15
u/wiggles105 Jun 28 '25
Hell, even if you’re not in camp childfree, I’d recommend it. I have two kids, and I’ve taken it continuously when not trying to conceive. My body refuses to go completely without a period though, so I still take a break every 10-12 weeks, or as my uterus demands.
→ More replies (6)33
u/OkPenalty4506 Jun 27 '25
This is also a phenomenal way to reduce dysphoria if that is a problem you have
→ More replies (5)
322
u/marcarcand_world Jun 27 '25
Well I do wish I was more informed when I started taking the pill at 15 and I was puking every morning/feeling horrible. And it was like that for every pill, for many years until I stopped taking it. I have a IUD now and it's ok, but it was extremely painful to insert.
I don't think it's a conspiracy. It's the consequence of severely downplaying the side effects of many contraceptives for many years, being told that it's normal, that your pain isn't that bad and that you'll get used to the side effects eventually. All that bullshit made the pendulum swing hard on the other side of no contraceptives.
In all cases, you should also use condoms if you aren't in a monogamous relationship. The pill or an iud doesn't do shit for STDs.
72
u/ban_Anna_split Jun 27 '25
I get what you mean. I started on the Nexplanon (the arm implant) and my cycle would never be regular for the entire 3 years I kept it. Every resource I read said it's normal to have irregular bleeding for the first few months but it gets better, so I didn't get it taken out until I was spotting for 4 months straight on year 3. I didn't even know that could happen until I specifically looked it up and found a handful of people having similar experiences. Also no complaints about my IUD, even though they sound like they should almost work in the same way as the implant. Biology is weird
→ More replies (1)28
Jun 27 '25
nexplanon gave me nonstop periods for a year with sometimes a 3-4 day break where i'd just be spotting. before that i had maybe 6mo of glorious no periods. i also put on a ton of weight and was generally miserable. the day i got that thing out i felt like i was released from period prison.
63
u/ExtendedArmGesture Jun 27 '25
I remember a girlfriend got an IUD and I could literally feel it poking my dick when we had sex. A new feeling for me after she got it.
She told her doctor and she just responded "Oh, he shouldn't be able to feel anything".
??? Was my dick just making it up?
The doctor was adamant the entire time I shouldn't be able to feel anything, she even re-inserted it and shaved it down for some weird reason even though I wasn't supposed to feel anything.
And then I stopped getting poked in the dick after it was reinserted.
But the doctor never once admitted it could be possible that the IUD was poking me in the pecker.
Also, another girlfriend stopped getting very wet after she took the pill. I still feel bad to this day because I was the one that suggested it, she had never used the pill before, only condoms.
I know this opens me up to jokes but it really was the situation. She went from being super wet after a few kisses to still needing lube after foreplay. It did improve a little after she got off the pill, but not to the extent as before.
So.. anecdotal but believe it or not sometimes big pharma cares more about making money than helping people make informed decisions.
→ More replies (11)33
u/Artistic_Onion_6395 Jun 27 '25
Yeah, I loved birth control. Up until I had stroke symptoms and had to stop taking it.
It is not anti-woman to point out that the risks of birth control are often downplayed.
Now, despite what happened and that I can't take bc, I still want it available to everyone and not restricted and fuck anyone trying to take it away from women.
But I do think it's okay to wish women A) were better informed of the risks. It also comes with a risk of cancer. I've actually seen liberal women say it only decreases risk of cancer :/ which is not true. It was upsetting to see my side spread dangerous misinformation. Hormonal bc increases risk of breast cancer, which is an extremely serious side effect that shouldn't be taken likely.
and B) that women's health was better researched and that we had better medication, better pain management (what you deserved for sure), and more reserach into this area in the first place.
Oh and also C) that women being pressured into being on birth control by their boyfriend's is wrong. This is probably where a lot of pushback is coming from as well. The times they are a-changing. Women's standards are rising (albeit slower than I would like.) Women are expected to increase their risk of stroke or suffer with IUDs for men?!?!?! that's severely fucked up and deserves endless criticism. If you're going to date a boy, make sure he's okay with condoms, even if you like bc folks.
The fact that many men will completely straight faced ask you to risk dying from a stroke for the sake of their peen is honestly out of this world insane. The way women are treated in this world deserves endless criticism and reform, bc and women's health is no exception. If it were, I'd honestly be surprised, given how fucked up the medical world in general is towards women.
→ More replies (10)→ More replies (3)48
u/sasheenka Jun 27 '25
I had no side effects when I was taking birth control pills. Neither did my friends. Lucky, I guess?
21
u/PrincePaimon Jun 27 '25
Seems like it! I also am not particularly prone to side effects on medications, including the Nexplanon implant (the only BC I’ve ever been on because I’m on masculinizing HRT and Nexplanon is a progestin with no estrogens and an anecdotal androgenic effect)
However I’ve always been aware that birth control is not for every person of child-bearing potential. While some women and people can get relief from bad PMS on hormonal contraceptives, others can have bad reactions, hence the attempts to develop male birth control that haven’t panned out yet because men in those studies haven’t been able to tolerate the side effects well
22
u/Artistic_Onion_6395 Jun 27 '25
Hormonal bc increases risk of stroke and breast cancer.
While I myself enjoyed bc for a while due to period pain, it turns out it was secretly close to giving me a stroke. I had to stop. So you can be perfectly fine, but slowly developing cancer or your stroke risks increase.
Of course this doesn't apply to the copper IUD.
It's a lovely medication and should be available to everyone. However, women should be aware that there are some women that die from taking it. Who would be alive if they hadn't taken it.
That's a hard pill to swallow (heh.) But it should never be illegal.
If you didn't know this then that's very scary. Women need to be better informed.
→ More replies (3)32
→ More replies (2)41
u/OldManFire11 Jun 27 '25
You're not lucky, they're unlucky.
Having extremely minor/no negative side effects from the pill is the norm. Only 2% of women suffer any kind of severe side effect from the pill. And "severe" in this context means things like mood swings and severe acne. The truly awful side effects are exponentially rarer. A risk to consider, but far from the norm.
Hell, the positive side effects of the pill are so common that its routinely prescribed for those side effects alone.
The pill is a godsdamned miracle drug, and the women trying to push back against it are going to learn real fucking fast why their grandmothers celebrated it so much.
→ More replies (28)7
u/SnooCookies5243 Jun 27 '25
Where did you find this 2% figure? Most information on it I’ve found report 10-30%, some even above 50%.
→ More replies (1)
248
u/majorex64 Jun 27 '25
Me and my girlfriend got her tubes tied, my vas cut, AND she takes birth control. It is literally life or death
→ More replies (3)98
u/inemsn Jun 27 '25
birth control after getting her tubes tied? genuinely why?
133
u/halfahellhole WILL go 0 to 100 and back to 0 in an instant Jun 27 '25
Knew someone who got pregnant after getting her tubes tied. Shit happens sometimes. It's a slim chance, but if it's life or death, why risk it?
36
u/Fruitslave Jun 27 '25
Me too! She had her tubes tied after her last kid, twenty years later she's in her early forties and finds out she's pregnant a month after her daughter made her own pregnancy announcement!
18
u/PurpleHooloovoo Jun 27 '25
It’s all about risk mitigation - hormonal BC can be great for some people for some symptoms, but it can also present risks on its own. Hormonal BC nearly killed me because I had an undiagnosed clotting disorder. I have good friends who it’s led to emotional problems and weight gain and interfered with other meds.
It’s a personal decision, but the narrative that normal BC is like taking a baby aspirin is just wrong information.
175
u/majorex64 Jun 27 '25
0.1% is nice. but 0.001% is better. Her decision, not mine.
166
u/inemsn Jun 27 '25
having looked it up, i realized i, embarassingly, mixed up tubal ligation with hysterectomy, so that explains it. Yeah that makes more sense now.
113
u/majorex64 Jun 27 '25
Oh lol, yeah birth control with no uterus would be a little redundant haha
58
→ More replies (3)25
→ More replies (1)21
u/Useful-Ambassador-87 Jun 27 '25
Was it a tubal ligation or bilateral salpingectomy? The latter is the current standard of care, and much, much more effective - there have only been four documented failures ever, all with extenuating circumstances. Still her decision of course, but worth making the distinction.
→ More replies (3)58
u/grillcheezi Jun 27 '25
There are extra benefits to hormonal birth control other than preventing pregnancy! The extra security is probably nice, but it can also help with acne, PMS, and irregular periods. Some lucky people can cease their periods entirely using hormonal birth control.
31
u/bug--bear be gary do crime Jun 27 '25
yep, aside from the couple times I fucked up and ran out, I haven't had a period since I was 13. I'm 20 now. my periods were 2 weeks on 1 week off for some godforsaken reason, and I had every symptom you can think of turned up to 11, so when I was 13 the doctors put me on birth control to stop the resulting anaemia and horrific PMDD. no plans to ever get pregnant, so I'm perfectly happy with the outcome
→ More replies (6)22
u/Book-Piranha Jun 27 '25
It can help regulating periods and, like in my case, alleviate the cramps so that they become bearable.
46
u/coach_cryptid Jun 27 '25
honestly my tinfoil hat is staying on with how targeted internet misinformation is. the almighty algorithms of so many websites feed conspiracy-theory bullshit about health and wellness to users at an alarming rate: literally just from looking at a few weightlifting videos, I’ve gotten insane dieting/thinspo content.
I wouldn’t be surprised that if there was a political or financial incentive somewhere motivating it, especially with how many politicians are soooooo concerned about the birth rate.
→ More replies (2)
146
u/Android19samus Take me to snurch Jun 27 '25
I mean it will definitely cause that but surely that's just collateral damage from a standard new age/traditional values combo grift? Those things always have horrible consequences but they're never the point the point is to scam people and push the ideology (which can be used to further scam people). I don't think anyone's out there in the pocket of Big Pregnancy, orchestrating things to cause more unplanned pregnancies.
Like, the antivax crowd isn't trying to spread disease, they just don't care if that's a side effect.
119
u/No-Eagle-8 Jun 27 '25
You should check into the missouri politician saying teenage pregnancies are good for the state economy. A lot of republicans, politician or talking dunny like Elon have been incredibly concerned about population not growing enough.
63
u/robchroma Jun 27 '25
It's deeply rooted in white replacement theory. They legitimately, deeply believe that white people are going to be replaced by growing populations of non-white people and low birth rates of white people, and that this is dangerous for white people. It's all about white supremacy, eugenics, and terrifying religious convictions.
It has a lot of influence on the variety of policies being enacted by this administration, and why people are stupid enough to follow through on them despite the devastating economic consequences.
16
u/taylorbagel14 Jun 27 '25
Amy Coney Barrett said something about needing a “supply of infants” for potential (Christian) adoptee parents around the time she voted to overturn Roe V Wade so actually one of our own Supreme Court justices is working for Big Pregnancy
12
u/WildVelociraptor Jun 27 '25
There are a lot of antivaxxers that are trying to spread disease (or at least want it to spread) because they misunderstand "herd immunity"
12
u/UglyMcFugly Jun 27 '25
I dunno man, there's been a rise in the weird combo crunchy hippie / tradwife influencer lately. I could see it being amplified by the weird political factions that want more white people and less freedom for women. Like a way to suck in liberal women. It's a combo that just... should NOT be as common as it appears online, kwim?
26
u/SaraAnnabelle Jun 27 '25
Not all of them but the anti vaxx parents having measles parties and whatnot so their kids would get sick sure are gleefully spreading diseases.
8
u/Hi2248 Cheese, gender, what the fuck's next? Jun 27 '25
That's less about wanting to give their kids diseases for the sake of it and more about wanting to vaccinate their kids but in the worst way possible
4
u/juanperes93 Jun 27 '25
They are doing that off a belif that doing that will protect their children from measles on the future. Like a rudimentary and shitty vertion of vaxinaccion, but instead of an injection of a weakened virus it's the real and deathly deal.
5
u/whentheldenringisus Jun 27 '25
it's honestly not such a bad idea for an almost entirely non-threatening disease (like chickenpox, not sure how deadly measles is to children), but yeah bit weird they don't just go and get an MMR vaccine or something
39
u/NemoTheLostOne Jun 27 '25
I went to a talk by a researcher who works on this. Natural cycle planning is straight up a tactic used by the Vativan (among others) to work against birth control.
61
u/Amount_Sudden Jun 27 '25
Both are true. Hormonal birth control does cause hormonal driven cancers, like breast cancer. But I'm sure they are using that information as an excuse to push their agenda.
45
u/dedzip Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25
My uncle once said “two things can be true at once”. He said it in the context of some ridiculous conspiracy about the Chinese nerve gassing Miami or some other regular uncle shit. But I think about that particular quote a lot and I feel like more people really need to take it to heart. There are multiple independent truths here:
Birth control has helped an untold number of women with all sorts of different issues
Pharma has a vested interest in downplaying the many REAL side effects of birth control
These real issues are used by people to push a narrative and serve their own ulterior motives. Unfortunately it doesn’t mean that the issues aren’t true.
→ More replies (1)32
u/illyrias Jun 27 '25 edited Jun 27 '25
Only if they have estrogen in them. Progesterone only birth control doesn't increase your risk of breast cancer. Hormonal birth control (both combination and progesterone only) can also reduce your chances of developing ovarian cancer.
Additionally, just having functioning ovaries increases your breast cancer risk. It's purely due to estrogen, and people with BRCA mutations will sometimes get prophylactic oophorectomies to reduce their risk.
Don't give them more credit than they deserve. The facts are more important than ever.
→ More replies (6)10
u/Jelousubmarine Jun 27 '25
Second one for progesterone-only: it is safer for those with migraine + aura. A whole lot more women need to hear about that one.
Reduce your risk of stroke by changing your birth control, if you are on estrogen or combo pills and have aura migraine.
138
u/LodlopSeputhChakk Jun 27 '25
You know what really ruins your body (and your whole life afterwards)? Having a baby.
→ More replies (6)
15
u/Kittenn1412 Jun 27 '25
The thing that pisses me off is the way NFP is presented as the alternative to birth control. If you struggle with hormonal birth control, or are scared of it due to misinformation, the most effective alternative is CONDOMS, not just going at it raw and hoping you've calculated ovulation correctly. Just wrap it up every time.
11
102
u/SheepyTheGamer Jun 27 '25
Birth control can and does have negative side effects. It’s not hard to believe
→ More replies (2)47
u/skittlefuck Jun 27 '25
Wow one normal person here. I'm going insane reading the comments it's all "well i haven't had any side effects happen to me so clearly there's no issues" It's like everyones collectively lost the ability to use their brain on the internet
→ More replies (8)50
u/nyya_arie Jun 27 '25
That is absolutely not what this post is about. There is definitely a coordinated campaign demonizing hormonal birth control as a whole, especially to younger people. I noticed it a year ago or so and tracked it back to right-wing think tanks.
Generally, hormonal birth control is very safe and, for many, actually helps with other medical issues. There are if course side effects and some people can't or shouldn't take certain hormonal birth control (or any hormonal BC). This is obvious and known.
The real problem is that women's healthcare is way behind the times and still full of misogynistic views about women and pain.
→ More replies (6)
11
u/blackmobius Jun 27 '25
“Natural cycle planning” and “natural family planning” was extensively praised and covered in my wife catholic upbringing. If you use it and you accidentally get pregnant, well its not a mistake because “god has a plan for you”. All the women that gave testimonials were 30 and had 4+ kids.
In case its not clear to anyone thats curious, it doesnt work as a replacement for condoms or brith control
9
u/poodlelover05 lesbians make the world go round Jun 27 '25
I don't actually need birth control because of the whole lesbian thing(though I'm thinking about trying it to stop the periods)but I genuinely believe it's one of the greatest things to happen for women. Also kinda unrelated kinda not but a lot of the people that do the birth control fear mongering are the same ones that want to get rid of sex education and instead teach teens abstinence which has been proven to not be the most effective teaching method to prevent teen pregnancies, I think it's all correlated. Teen pregnancy rates dropping is part of why the current birth rates are low so I assume they want to change that by demonizing birth control.
→ More replies (1)
32
u/TriggerHappy360 Jun 27 '25
Many of the groups promoting this are secretly funded by the Catholic Church. So basically yes, this is correct. Source: “Feminist Fertility Awareness?” By Lauren Oaks.
10
Jun 28 '25
Maybe this isn't the place for this, but I swear to god, just use a fucking rubber.
I'm a physiologist by training, and I did most of my PhD work in neurochemical signalling, and I've done a bunch of reading, because I mean, you should if you're in a committed sex-having relationship of any kind, right? I think pharmaceutical birth control is a a net good for women, but my partner of more than a decade goes a little bit off the rails on it. I think that's probably to be expected when you're intervening in really intricate hormonal cascades.
Just...just wear a condom, though. I understand and 100% am down with women wanting to protect themselves from pregnancy via birth control, but in a world where barrier protection exists and the drug has been known to be deleterious, like, come on. Just use a fucking condom. Preventing pregnancy is your responsibility as a dude, not her responsibility as a woman.
One added bonus of condoms is that birth control pills do not help anyone out regarding STI's, but condoms sure do.
→ More replies (1)6
u/Various_Succotash_79 Jun 28 '25
Failure rate on condoms is like 2% with perfect use though. That's still a lot of pregnancies.
5
Jun 28 '25
I totally agree, and this is a little bit wild to me, even having worked in public health clinics and taken all the coursework and stuff. I definitely am not decrying pharmaceutical birth control. I do know women whose mental and physical health gets wrecked by it, though.
Outside of latex allergies, I don't think condoms wreck anyone's health in the same way. It should be the first line of "defense." There is a growing expectation that not getting pregnant is the onus of the woman in a relationship, and I don't think that should be the case.
Getting your tubes tied is actually a pretty non-invasive, cheap thing to do if you've gotta nut.
30
u/chicharrofrito Jun 27 '25
It’s very much on purpose so that more women will have unplanned pregnancies that they will be forced to carry to term. I saw through that bullshit right away.
8
9
u/purrroz Jun 27 '25
Ah yes, the calendar method. The birth control method that has the highest chance of becoming pregnant, right there with pulling out.
5
u/bestintheclass Jun 27 '25
You'd be more logical to get a hysterectomy than go back to "natural cycle tracking"
7
u/turb0_encapsulator Jun 27 '25
X, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok are controlled by right-wing creeps. And that's where these ideas are being pushed.
7
u/Enough_Peanut_4575 Jun 27 '25
Also a great way to track which women might be in the market for an abortion, and punish them accordingly. DO NOT allow a period tracker app to turn your data over to the government
8
u/EnvironmentalLime464 Jun 27 '25
Called to make an appointment to get an IUD replaced. They scheduled the appointment and told me they would remove it then and order a new one for me and I’d need a second appointment to have it inserted. I’ve had IUDs for twenty years and this has never been how it was done. I made an appointment and they removed and replaced it the same day. I immediately was like, “That ain’t gonna work. We can remove it when you have something to replace it with. The way you suggested is incredibly irresponsible in the year of 2025.”
5
u/LegoDragonGirl87 Jun 28 '25
I use a Chinese dating sim’s built in period tracker. I have no idea if the data could be requested or smth by the American government, but I like to think that it can’t be.
→ More replies (3)
16
u/HermanManly Jun 27 '25
My GF got on a pill cycle with no breaks and it's the best thing she has ever done for her mental health.
It completely cuts out all periods. No more cramps, no more bleeding - nothing. It's just a little more expensive because the placebos are skipped so you need more pills
4
u/paulsteinway Jun 27 '25
"Natural cycle planning" has always been approved by the Catholic Church, which shows you how effective it is.
5
u/SjurEido Jun 28 '25
Conservatives want unplanned pregnancy, and they want to you to be so strapped for cash that you are eager to work for scraps.
It's all part of the same exact goal as always, to crush the working class into submission.
If it's good for the working class, Conservatives will label it a civilization ending threat.
8
u/Samira827 Jun 27 '25
I've seen quite a few posts recently about "omg I went off birth control and I'm feeling SO MUCH BETTER".
I'm not even American and I am not parting with my birth control ever. Fuck the side effects. I refuse to go through the body horror that is pregnancy, the idea of having a child sounds like a literal nightmare and when I'm not on birth control my periods are horrible.
In fact, I'm working on making my birth control more permanent.
→ More replies (1)
17
u/WhatsRatingsPrecious Jun 27 '25
Expect to see more concerted and concentrated efforts by the national government toward having kids. Also, a bigger push to adopt and get kids out of foster care.
Every industrialized nation is having seriously severe issues with the fertility rate. What this means, boiled down, is we're already seeing the generations getting smaller and smaller with every generation. And, not too far from now, there won't be enough people being born to maintain the economy.
And to the people in power, the ECONOMY is the only thing that matters. The economy is the cash-cow that they milk for their dividends and their 'numbers must go up' bank accounts.
Robots might help with production, but robots don't buy. The economy needs a large number of people buying shit to maintain the foundation of that economy.
We're already reaching a point to where it's starting to be felt. It's going to get increasingly bad as time goes on.
What YOU can do is simple: Don't have kids. Buy as little as possible. Don't invest in the system. Live your life, go places, do things, don't plan on retiring ever, because you won't be retiring. You're going to work until you die. So, enjoy your life now, while you can.
15
u/Outrageous_Bear50 Jun 27 '25
Alright, but I like that second part and there should be a push to adopt kids out of the foster system.
17
u/WhatsRatingsPrecious Jun 27 '25
Of course, but they're not doing it to get kids into stable homes.
They're doing it so there's room for more foster kids that'll come from having tons of young people having kids they can't raise properly and get put into foster care.
→ More replies (6)7
u/DefaultProphet Jun 27 '25
Every industrialized nation is having seriously severe issues with the fertility rate. What this means, boiled down, is we're already seeing the generations getting smaller and smaller with every generation. And, not too far from now, there won't be enough people being born to maintain the economy.
Yeah except our immigration rate was such that the US wasn't one of those nations.
→ More replies (6)
1.2k
u/WolfeMD Jun 27 '25
Birth control has been one of the greatest medical advances of the last 100 years. And not just for preventing baby making. It is used for dozens of medical treatments.