Not Feeling Normal: The Impact of Birth Control on My Mental Health
By Sasha Bowdidge
Looking back at my 18-year-old self as she sat in the doctor’s chair, I try to remember how she felt. Empowered. Sure. A little bit afraid and worried, but that didn’t matter. Right? After all, I was only there for birth control. Just a harmless little pill that would ensure that I didn’t end up having a baby as a result of my sexual activity.
As the nurse read out the side effects to me, I nodded my head after each one, letting her know that I understood what they meant. I remember thinking, what are the chances? Nausea, clotting, dizziness, stroke. That wouldn’t happen to me.
In the end, I was right. I was lucky in the sense that the pill in its little pink packet that I took at 11 am sharp every day didn’t give me any physical discomfort. The side effects of hormonal birth control are widely known, and despite women being told this when they are prescribed it, so many will still go through with the process. Many other women are told what I was told: “It’s a game of Russian Roulette. It will happen to you, or it won’t.”
There is currently no precise percentage for the number of women who experience negative side effects from the pill, as everybody is different and it is difficult to measure. In the beginning, this fact put me at ease. When I didn’t feel any pain and wasn’t plagued by the feeling of sickness constantly, I took it as a win. Physically, I was fine. But I didn’t even consider the mental side of it.
Because it wasn’t spoken about, I blamed the extreme mental fog and the mood swings that would have me lashing out at the people that I loved and then sobbing right after as me being emotional. I blamed the fatigue on laziness and vitamin deficiencies. I dismissed my rapidly declining mental health as something that just happens to people. I began believing that life was this bleak, this dark, this painful.
For months, I struggled to get out of bed because I was feeling so burnt out and tired of living. Simple activities such as cleaning and brushing my teeth became nearly impossible. I would cry every single day, often for no reason at all. I always kept going back to the echoing words of “you’re just too emotional.” Despite new evidence in 2021 that suggests men are just as emotional as women, that misogynistic mantra kicked me to the curb every time I was down. This was my fault.
Hiding your suffering is always difficult, but even more so when you don’t understand why you’re struggling. I saw my decline as a side effect of myself. Eventually, with the help of the people around me, I finally understood that something needed to change.
The decision to come off birth control was a scary one. Once I realised that it was exacerbating my problems, I just began worrying about what I would be without it. Would I be worse? Was this just who I was?
The minute I stopped taking the pill, I felt the change. Interestingly, typing ‘feeling like a different person on birth control’ into Google brings up a plethora of results from women feeling exactly like me. I stopped feeling as if I was in the biggest slump known to man. I stopped crying. I was more motivated, I felt free, and I could keep stable relationships now that my brain fog and crippling anxiety had dissipated. It was like my life had gone from black and white back to colour.
Birth control, especially the kinds other than the pill such as an IUD or implant, will affect everyone differently. No two experiences will be the same. Despite this, the medical system needs to change the way they promote and disclose the side effects of contraception. I knew the ins and outs of the potential physical side effects thoroughly, yet my nurse didn’t stop to explain the mental side effects in anywhere near as much detail as their physical counterparts.
In an environment where the preservation of mental health is finally being recognised, that kind of action is inexcusable. It was a privilege to have the option to go onto birth control when I wanted, even though I now wish I never did. I can only hope that girls beginning their prescription with birth control are advised more on the mental health effects than I was. We have the right to be crystal clear on what we’re putting in our bodies and just how it will impact them.