When my mind is racing, to the point where I can feel nothing else but the tension and the buzzing across my forehead, I know that one of three things will calm me down; a drink, a chat or a blog post. Preferably all three in one. Sometimes, like tonight, that chat is with myself but I find that chats between Lizi, myself and I always lead to some interesting thoughts. And where else to start but where every girl's mind should be on Halloween - birth control pills/injections for men, yikes!
Now this is something I've seen news and 'news' articles floating around the web about since...oof, at least since I started using social media. So say 8 years ago, or at least this was the first time I'd heard of the idea. And as a slightly overweight, spotty and angsty fourteen-year-old you see such things and think "Yes!! There is justice in the world!", then you suddenly forget about it as you're distracted by somebody who sits behind you in your Physics class sending you a chicken on Farmville (admit it, you've had similar moments). Yet years later, in your twenties - older and a little wiser at least -, your braces finally off and you've wrecked your teeth from too many drunken attempts at drinking from a glass without a straw instead of sucking your thumb... You see it again. Almost at the point of completion... And it's still "a long way off" in case men get sad.
Yes, after one too many: cat-calls, unsolicited dick pics, gropes, sexual assaults, threats of violence, unwanted opinions, put-downs, manipulations; something which could potentially delayed and forgotten about in case it could be bad for men.
Story. Of. Every. Woman's. Fucking. Life.
As the possibility of birth control for men has grown closer and closer - the risks and side effects sensationalised, a potential release date, it makes me wonder: given the excessive side effects given to birth control for those of us with a uterus, if it were to be developed today, would something with so many detrimental side effects would they be approved for use? Or like in the case of the pill would the side effects be listed but the extent of them be swept under the rug? When women taking progesterone-based birth control are 34% more likely to be prescribed antidepressants, and these statistics only recently having been published, it beggars belief that they would be approved today. That's not even starting on the excessive physical side effects.
This has led to a lot of angry women, understandably. Many women have shouted back, saying that it's now time for men to bare the brunt of these side effects that we have for decades too. And I agree with them too, I really do. Given the state of my mental health it's gotten me thinking, for the past seven years I've been pumped full of synthetic hormones in some way or another (both pills, the injection, mirena coil). What are they actually doing to my mind and body? I've gotten an appointment booked with my GP and will be running it past my CPN (psychiatric nurse) to see whether switching to something non-hormonal, such as a copper coil, could potentially do me some good. It's not fair that women should be more or less expected to fill themselves full of synthetic hormones to avoid the 'punishment' of getting pregnant if they should dare want to have sex.
I was put on these hormones at a time when my body was still developing, when I was still trying to figure out who I was. The pill was meant to be a solution to try and calm me down, help me handle my periods better at a time when everything was still settling down and finding its feet. And it terrifies me that after years of trial and error that I may not know myself without synthetic hormones, it really fucking scares me. But it's gotten me thinking, and anybody who knows me knows that it physically pains me to write this, what about the men? Sorry, excuse me while I vomit and berate myself for even typing that but hear me out. While suicide rates for women have increased in the past few years, they are still three times higher for men. Do we really want to see this increase? And keep in mind the horrific state of mental health services at the minute.
I'm looking at a solution to this in the same way I explain socialism to people. It's not about fighting to all be on the same, shitty minimum wage that nobody can survive on; it's about fighting for a decent living wage for everybody. In this case I don't want more men to be put at risk of mental and physical health issues, I want to see a fuck-off-massive improvement in current hormonal contraception for women. Make sure that the pill, the coil, implants, what have you, all come with the lowest risk possible for women's mental and physical health before we start saying everyone should suffer the same.
Now, shock-horror, as you've probably guessed by now I'm not a doctor. But I'm somebody with a uterus who is pretty scared of the idea of more side effects from my birth control. And somebody who enjoys having sex and not having children. And I would really like to be able to continue having sex and not getting pregnant while not being at risk of uterus perforation, hair loss and all kinds of cysts. Is this really too much to ask?
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