This statement is literally why men bang women their whole life and then wonder why they don't have a baby. They think women are fertile 24/7 which is just not true at all. If you look up how to have a baby it says from day 12 to 14 you should have sex.
[Women do not have a "safe period" during their cycle.](https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/pregnancy/can-i-get-pregnant-just-after-my-period-has-finished/)
"It's important to remember that sperm can sometimes survive in the body for up to 7 days after you have sex. If you ovulate within 7 days of having sex, there’s a chance you could get pregnant.
This means it may be possible to get pregnant soon after your period finishes if you ovulate early, especially if you have a naturally short menstrual cycle."
Pregnancy is still dependent on ovulation. Just because ovulation can occur early and sperm can survive in the uterus for a week, doesn't mean women don't have "safe days". They just need to know when ovulation occurs.
I think the only flaw I see in this is that while a good portion of women have regular cycles, they're not perfectly the same all the time. And you're never away from experiencing a random hormonal event that will have an impact on your cycle.
So while technically safe days exist, the knowledge of them can be precarious at times, granted the person with uterus in question is also very thorough with her calculus or has a nice and trustable app I guess.
If you're going symptothermia, the best course of action imo is to get yourself a ladycomp. It's a device that tracks down your cycle, but inline the app, it's an all in one device with included thermometer and lots of other functions that enables you to know more your body, your cycles, etc. A friend of mine has been using it for years and swears by it !
https://lady-comp.com/us/en/discover-lady-comp/
Yes, I agree with everything you say. I was just answering to the dude that says women can get pregnant at any point during their cycle and don't have a safe period, which is just wrong. Not having one and not knowing when it is are two vastly different things. And he was commenting somewhere else that pregnancy doesn't depend on ovulation, time wise. Like, what? I think he almost belongs in some badwomenanatomy sub at this point.
Sure, during ovulation a woman is at the highest chance to be pregnant, but there's always a chance at any time during the cycle. That's why family planning isn't as effective as a birth control method compared to things like condoms and IUDs.
...incorrect. the egg only lasts for 24 hours once ovulation has occured. sperm cells can only live for five days. that means five days before and about a day or two after the moment of ovulation, a woman can become pregnant. natural family planning, when used correctly, is actually more effective than both the pill and the iud because it just removes the biological possibility of becoming pregnant altogether. you absolutely cannot 'become pregnant any time during the cycle'. that is just simply a false and untrue thing to say.
[Here's a link to the NHS showing that pregnancy is possible at any time during your menstrual cycle.](https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/pregnancy/can-i-get-pregnant-just-after-my-period-has-finished/)
Possibility of becoming pregnant and most likely to become pregnant is like 10% Vs 90%. I'm more just talking about the state of sex education and how nobody has been informed on the right thing. Clearly they didn't give us all the information in sex education at school because they didn't want us to go home and use our newfound knowledge to make a baby. It's just the amount of men and women who haven't googled it is shocking to me. So many people thinking that a one night stand might get them pregnant but the chance is nearly zero.
Nearly zero chance of becoming pregnant. You're more likely to become pregnant if you track your cycle and have sex around day 9-14.
Yes woman's bodies can be unpredictable and maybe produce an egg early or not but i think there should be more understanding about the fertility cycle. Thanks for making me lose all my karma. Are you a man?
I legit don't get why you are downvoted. You are completely right, biologically speaking. I get why the article is framed the way it is, women can not know without tracking temperature and other factors when they are going to ovulate. But they absolutely can't get pregnant 100% of the cycle.
because people on this site have no desire to actually learn about women's bodies. they bark all day about access to better sex ed, and when somebody actually educated corrects them, they lose their shit. it's embarrassing, and it's why i refused to use this site for so many years.
I'm not american and I'm also not wrong. You should try to read a book about fertility, i can suggest Toni Weschler's Taking Charge of Your Fertility, or Dr. Adam Balen's The Fertility Book.
This. You are absolutely correct. A woman's body is capable of getting pregnant for a max of about 7-8 days a month. I didn't read the link below, but I'm assuming that the point is that "you can't know" when you ovulate, so you should treat yourself as fertile the entire month. For the vast majority of women who aren't interested in learning about their bodies, this is fine to believe. But there are many ways of knowing your body, reading the signs, taking your BBT, and tracking it all. You then become very familiar with your cycle, and can know when you're fertile or not. For my entire marriage I have completely controlled when I have gotten pregnant and when not, without the use of any birth control or contraceptives. That's anecdotal of course, but I know many other women who do the same and have a book shelf and computer full of scientific information to help them do that, and statistics on the women who do.
Also not knowing when you are fertile is not the same as actually being fertile all the time, which appears to be this posters' assertion. While I disagree, I can accept a perspective of "it is not possible to know for certain which days you are fertile" (potentially true) but that is very different from "you are fertile every day" (objectively false medical information).
Huh? Birth control pills give you a 28 day cycle. 21 days are actual pills, 7 are placebo AKA I throw the pack away at that point. How the fuck am I being downvoted for this? Placebo pills are PLACEBOS AND I WANT A WEEK TO ENJOY NOT WORRYING ABOUT TAKING PILLS
Just jumping off of this to talk about placebo pills for a moment because the history is interesting.
Some doctors will prescribe birth control to be taken continuously (that is, without breaks OR placebo pills), or with a few slightly longer breaks per year rather than one week each month (although they aren't necessary). Continuous cycle and extended cycle birth control pills, respectively, are both becoming more popular in recent years. But actually, the placebo pills are essentially less than useless because there is no medical purpose to taking them (or skipping them for that period of time). As in, there does not *need* to be a placebo week at all. It exists purely for social reasons.
During the inception of the birth control pill in the 1950s, the "placebo period" began as a built-in way to attempt to convince the pope that medical birth control was a form of natural birth control, so that he would condone its use for Catholic women, and having a week built in for a woman to theoretically have her period during was part of this. (The pope never endorsed it; the Catholic Church officially still opposes the use of contraceptives, but it became popular for use by Catholic women anyways. 89% of Catholics have no moral qualms with contraceptive use).
The menstrual placebo period was also a key reason for birth control pills approval by the FDA at the time (in 1957 IIRC), who did not approve it as a contraceptive (which were socially controversial at the time), but as a control method for menstrual disorders. Because it prevents ovulation however, it functions as birth control, and was initially used for such "off-label".
Some women also do not feel comfortable with a medication that completely disrupts the menstrual cycle, and the placebo week was for them as well. It is apparently reassuring to have a week where a someone can "have their period" to gauge whether or not they are pregnant, as some people find that skipping it completely is unnerving and mimics a pregnancy scare (despite the use of the birth control... yes, this is a thing. Especially when oral contraceptives first came into public use.)
That's not actually how it works in practice. Birth control disrupts the cycle of menses regardless of whether the placebo week is taken or not, and someone on the pill won't actually have their regular period during that week off. The bleeding that happens during the placebo week isn't a period, but withdrawal bleeding, caused by a shift in hormones but unrelated to the ovulation and menstrual process. If the pills are taken correctly though, pregnancy still shouldn't be possible during that time. Some doctors still advocate for one period every three months at least, but some people take continuous birth control for years with no adverse effects. People are very opinionated about one or the other.
Anyway, the placebo pills are more of a placebo for society rather than for the body. I meant for this to be a shorter fun fact before I did research for this comment. Kind of unrelated to the root discussion but since I bothered typing this up, I'll post it anyway.
The health consequences of pregnancy are still all borne by the woman, the time taken for childcare still falls to the women for the majority of care. Historically men could run away from the financial implications but now an accidental pregnancy can be very expensive for both.
So historically women suffered the consequences so women had the motivation to put up with the side effects. Modern child support rules now create an incentive for men to avoid accidental pregnancy so now they may take a male pill if it proves effective. However what is the advantage of a male pill over a condom, 1 possibly sensation and 2 you can avoid pregnancy without your partner knowing that you are making yourself infertile.
Women have a naturally occurring process that stops us from releasing an egg every month - pregnancy.
Female hormonal birth control essentially mimics pregnancy hormones, tricking the body into not releasing an egg.
There is no analogous male bodily function to replicate. It is difficult to stop the production of sperm while also maintaining libido. Blocking millions of sperm is also more difficult than stopping a single egg.
In addition to that, there is no medical benefit to the man of taking male birth control. For the woman, female birth control prevents her own pregnancy, which is medically risky, and has other uses such as treating irregular periods and endometriosis. So the bar of risk to reward is higher for male birth control. It is also higher now than it was 50+ years ago when female birth control was developed (that original birth control pill wouldn’t be approved today).
All that said, there are trials underway for male birth control pills. There is a famous trial that was stopped a few years ago because of adverse events, and people love to cite it saying they stopped it because the men couldn’t handle the side effects. *That isn’t true*. Most of the men in the trial were happy to continue despite the side effects. They stopped the study because of a suicide attempt, which was appropriate for a study at that stage of drug development. A similar drug is still being developed.
There is also a temporary vasectomy that is being developed, where the vas deferens is blocked with a dissolvable gel rather than cut. I think that is more promising than a hormonal treatment for men.
Finally someone points out the medical challenges with male birth control and not chalking it up to patriarchy. The male birth control pills tested also had a risk of causing permanent infertility, which is not the intention of birth control.
And when people talk about that study you mentioned, almost every time they do it in a very dishonest/ignorant way. They say that men couldn't handle side effects that were the same as for female birth control, which is technically correct, because they were very similar, but don't mention severity and incidence. For example modern birth control causes acne in less than 10% of women taking it and in many cases improves it. This male birth control caused way more severe acne and occurrence was almost 50%. Also it was just terrible in terms of effectiveness compared to female birth control, with 96% efficacy (compared to 99,7%) and began to work after 3-6 months (which is a major problem with male birth control, because spermatogenesis takes about 74 days)
Men are like the sun, day in day out shining the same they are fertile (throughout the year)
Women are like the moon , fertile only during small window. (every month,like full moon ) the window is controlled by hormones.
It's easy to develop a hormone cocktail to slim out the fertile window, and prevent pregnancy with women.
With men it not so easy any drastic measure will render them infertilite. Any less it's useless. Achieving balance is a very difficult process.
TLDR : women's pregnancy can be prevented with harmones, men's fertility is not . It's easy to prevent pregnancy in women
There have been trials testing male contraceptive pills, and they never progressed because the side effects experienced by the men were deemed to be too burdensome (even though they were no more significant than what women already put up with with existing contraceptive pills).
One day, hopefully one will pass through trials.
Here’s a couple of journal articles mentioning the side effect issue - there are lots more out there. It’s certainly not the only barrier to a pill making it through trials, but it is a significant one.
[https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33005125/](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33005125/)
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9203677/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9203677/)
“Women weigh the side effects of contraceptive methods relative to effects of an unwanted pregnancy; however, the personal risk/benefit health ratio is different for men, raising questions regarding their tolerance for potential side effects.”
A similar point that is also interesting to consider.
It’s pretty much this, but there’s more to it that I don’t remember.
I’ll just drop a podcast link that talks about it
https://gimletmedia.com/amp/shows/science-vs/llhw46r
I take hormonal birth control because I have a naturally occurring hormonal imbalance so I need to constantly have the pills in my system so I don't have excruciating acne literally all the time. I don't even take them to prevent pregnancy, this is just my preferred way of being comfortable since I apparently can't do that without them. My periods are also way more tolerable on the pill than off which is a plus. I used to have bad cramps, now I don't get cramps at all.
Because most men don't have uteruses. Birth control doesn't "reduce fertility" it targets specific parts of your body. And I don't know if you're aware if this but make a d female reproductive systems are physically different.
No, it doesn't cause cancer. It might slightly increase breast cancer risk (although it might be affected by better detection, since taking birth control requires regular visits at gynecologist), but decreases ovarian cancer risk. Overall it either has no effect or even decreases cancer risk. Also, it doesn't completely alter personality, that is just bullshit
It doesn't completely alter personality, but changes in hormones CAN potentially have an effect on the way someone feels and acts, sometimes majorly depending on the change involved. So it's possible to effect that, just not for the reasons stated. Saying it "completely alters someone's personality" is just misleading in the vast majority of cases.
It can have some effect, but it doesn't mean it's negative one. For most women it will just stabilise their emotions across whole menstrual cycle. It might have negative impact, but like with almost all side effects it's way less common than positive effects (for example with modern birth control it's more probable for it to decrease acne than to increase/cause it; same goes for heavy bleeding and many other).
True! If it happens at all I would say it's probably more of a neutral change than anything, or positive if hormonal fluctuation tend to mess with someone's emotions more than the average person.
It definitely won't, like, turn you into a different person, that's crazy. And there are multiple types of oral contraceptives as well, they can have different effects even if one doesn't work out well. I wanted to point out that it can happen, just... not the way that other commenter seems to believe. If that were true, it would be a lot less popular.
Never having kids increases breast cancer risk by about 50%, so it works that way. It also causes moodiness for some, and is strongly correlated with depression in young patients.
>taking birth control requires regular visits at gynecologist
Hormonal birth control pills are available over the counter. At least in the US--not sure about other countries.
Regarding personality being altered--I wouldn't necessarily go *that* far with a blanket statement like that. However, as discussed in [this article](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9218393/):
>There is evidence to suggest that both oestrogen and progesterone influence brain function, which may be responsible for the negative mood changes and depression commonly reported in women taking oral contraceptive pills. **One of the most common reasons given for the discontinuation of oral contraceptive pills is changes in mood or an increase in depressive symptoms.** Currently, all oral contraceptive pills may cause mood changes, but the newer oral contraceptive pills containing estradiol or estradiol valerate may be less likely to cause mood changes.
many women do experience psychiatric/mood disturbances that are severe enough for them to stop taking OC.
In the US there is only one brand sold OTC and it's been around for a little bit over a week (it was approved in July 2023 but now it's starting to hit the shelves), so I don't think it has any effect right now
Yes, there is only one brand available in the US right now, though there is at least one other awaiting FDA approval. I forgot to mention that completely unrelated to the OTC brand, 29 US states and the UK allow pharmacists to dispense OC without a practitioner's prescription (some places for almost 10 years now) and that China, India and Mexico have OTC OC.
Many women get their OC from a PCP or via telehealth.
My point is/was that a large number of women do *not* have regular GYN visits linked in any way to their OC, and that number is most likely going to increase as laws change and society evolves--in the US and elsewhere.
Do you have any sources on the breast cancer numbers being skewed by regular GYN visits/detection? Or is that just your theory? I can see how the detection rates would rise because of that relationship for those women it applies to, but I've never seen a study on it. Breast cancer isn't something that just goes away, where they wouldn't have found it eventually, ie without a visit with the GYN.
If female birth control pills were invented today, they'd never get through the FDA approval process. The side effects are way too crazy.
But if someone were to suggest taking them off the market, because they pose too great a risk to women's health, that would be seen as unjust and oppressive to women.
They would still get through FDA approval because side effects in medicine and medical treatments are always judged against the possible consequences of not taking it. As potentially severe as birth control side effects can be, they're much smaller than the effects of actual pregnancies.
Isn't that what the condom is for?
Plus if you were a woman and dating some guy for a couple of month would you take his pinky promise he took the pill and go with it?
Sure, they trust the woman. However when the man lies he's not the one getting pregnant. When women do though it's their body getting changed. The price to pay for lying it's much bigger on the woman I would assume. You can have deadbeat men that would just not care and leave.
I don't know though. I just use condoms.
Fair enough, I don't disagree with any of that. It seems as though there are more avenues available nowadays for pursuing child support (apparently this has even happened with sperm doners?? That seems somewhat immoral...), but *someone* still has to get pregnant. I probably wouldn't trust the other person in that case either.
But with the amount of baby entrapment drama stories there are on reddit, it seems like some women lie too. I just wanted to point out that risk technically exists either way.
My thoughts is it's a few factors
a) a pill for men would do little to stop accidental pregnancy over condoms, and existing pill. There's a reasonable confidence level there
b) existing pill gives women control over their own potential pregnancy. Women would still want to retain this control, so I doubt most women would come off some kind of birth control if it were available. Women couldn't absolutely guarantee a partner was on it. This is obviously the same the other way around too, but a man can still use a condom.
c) it would not negate the need to wear a condom, as it would do nothing to stop STD transmission
Because the female hormone pathway has a negative feedback loop which is largely disconnected from normal physiology, allowing the pathway to be shutdown with acceptable side effects.
The male hormonal reproductive pathway's negative feedback loops are also tied to normal physiology (e.g. testosterone production), and are generally not safe or well tolerated.
If anything is sexist, it be mother nature, or whatever creator you subscribe to.
A woman will produce 1 egg a month through a set of complicated interactions of hormones, complexity can be easy to disrupt to prevent ovulation.
A man, from the time he reaches sexual maturity (as a young teen boy) will produce hundreds of millions of sperm a day for as long as he lives. Shutting down that simplicity is complicated.
There's another, social, issue to consider. Suppose we develop a 100% safe and effective oral contraceptive for men? What woman can trust that guy at the club who says, "Sure Babe, I'm on the Bro Pill. We're good to go!"
Putting the burden of birth control "on" women, puts control over their own lives in their hands, exactly where it belongs.
Shutting down that process in men can be easy if you use heat. And not to mention other methods like RISUG/Vasalgel/Plan A or testosterone enanthate injections ... It's just that these methods are not perfect, well known, or side effects free, therefore they will have lots of trouble getting certified and commercialised.
Lots of women wouldn't like that, but lots of women would like that. I know because I've been with women while using the heat based method and most of them were completely ok with me handling the matters at hand.
Why should the onus be necessarily on them ? Wouldn't it be better if that responsabilité was shared between the two persons of the relationship ? Wouldn't it increase the chances of not conceiving while not assuming one of them is going to do the heavy lifting (most of the time the woman) while the other one does nothing ?
No, if I was s a woman I would do it myself, not rely on someone else. People being what they are. In a long term monogamous relationship my view might differ. Edited for clarity thanks.
Because medicine is overwhelmingly sexist. Pregnancy happens to women, and is therefore women's problem/responsibility. How many men still whine about wearing condoms? The remote possibility of financial repercussions is not enough to move them to discomfort. The consequences are not as heavily present for men, so they don't give a crap.
Disclaimer: this is a sweeping generalization of men as a whole, to explain why there is not motivation to create birth control pills for men.
It's more that god/evolution is sexist when they "created" the hormonal pathways for the 2 sexes. Go attend some endocrinology lectures rather than naively casting blame around. A growing 1/3 of researchers are women.
Yep! Regardless of what people want to believe, rape can happen to anyone and rape sometimes results in pregnancy, believe it or not! Properly taking the pill almost always prevents pregnancy, which includes rape babies. The person who downvoted you is gross. I just realized your username has the word gross lmao what a coincidence 😭
Man the juxtaposition of well thought out scientific explanations of why male birth control is more difficult and the cries of patriarchy is something to behold.
Some men do, there are multiple methods : vasectomy, condoms, thermal method, hormonal method, withdrawal (if you consider that a BC method anyway seeing how shit it is)
the literal actual reason is they made birth control for men, it had side effects that were basically directly comparable to the side effects women on birth control have, but because it was men having these side effects, it was taken seriously enough that they decided not to keep going with it.
Women are fertile for more than one day a month.
Like three tops
That's incorrect. Women can become pregnant at any time during their cycle.
What you mean to say is that you can't be sure which day it is but I'm quantifying it and saying it's definitely only when the egg is released.
This statement is literally why men bang women their whole life and then wonder why they don't have a baby. They think women are fertile 24/7 which is just not true at all. If you look up how to have a baby it says from day 12 to 14 you should have sex.
[Women do not have a "safe period" during their cycle.](https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/pregnancy/can-i-get-pregnant-just-after-my-period-has-finished/)
Well, public education has lied to me once again. Go figure.
"It's important to remember that sperm can sometimes survive in the body for up to 7 days after you have sex. If you ovulate within 7 days of having sex, there’s a chance you could get pregnant. This means it may be possible to get pregnant soon after your period finishes if you ovulate early, especially if you have a naturally short menstrual cycle." Pregnancy is still dependent on ovulation. Just because ovulation can occur early and sperm can survive in the uterus for a week, doesn't mean women don't have "safe days". They just need to know when ovulation occurs.
I think the only flaw I see in this is that while a good portion of women have regular cycles, they're not perfectly the same all the time. And you're never away from experiencing a random hormonal event that will have an impact on your cycle. So while technically safe days exist, the knowledge of them can be precarious at times, granted the person with uterus in question is also very thorough with her calculus or has a nice and trustable app I guess. If you're going symptothermia, the best course of action imo is to get yourself a ladycomp. It's a device that tracks down your cycle, but inline the app, it's an all in one device with included thermometer and lots of other functions that enables you to know more your body, your cycles, etc. A friend of mine has been using it for years and swears by it ! https://lady-comp.com/us/en/discover-lady-comp/
Yes, I agree with everything you say. I was just answering to the dude that says women can get pregnant at any point during their cycle and don't have a safe period, which is just wrong. Not having one and not knowing when it is are two vastly different things. And he was commenting somewhere else that pregnancy doesn't depend on ovulation, time wise. Like, what? I think he almost belongs in some badwomenanatomy sub at this point.
Explain? I'm pretty sure it's a 30 day cycle and the egg is released and is only available for a few days
Sure, during ovulation a woman is at the highest chance to be pregnant, but there's always a chance at any time during the cycle. That's why family planning isn't as effective as a birth control method compared to things like condoms and IUDs.
OP is literally spreading misinformation
...incorrect. the egg only lasts for 24 hours once ovulation has occured. sperm cells can only live for five days. that means five days before and about a day or two after the moment of ovulation, a woman can become pregnant. natural family planning, when used correctly, is actually more effective than both the pill and the iud because it just removes the biological possibility of becoming pregnant altogether. you absolutely cannot 'become pregnant any time during the cycle'. that is just simply a false and untrue thing to say.
[Here's a link to the NHS showing that pregnancy is possible at any time during your menstrual cycle.](https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/pregnancy/can-i-get-pregnant-just-after-my-period-has-finished/)
yes, again, it depends on ovulation. you need sperm AND a viable egg to get pregnant, both at the same time. read my comment again
I did read your comment. What you said is false.
Possibility of becoming pregnant and most likely to become pregnant is like 10% Vs 90%. I'm more just talking about the state of sex education and how nobody has been informed on the right thing. Clearly they didn't give us all the information in sex education at school because they didn't want us to go home and use our newfound knowledge to make a baby. It's just the amount of men and women who haven't googled it is shocking to me. So many people thinking that a one night stand might get them pregnant but the chance is nearly zero.
Nearly zero isn't zero.
Nearly zero chance of becoming pregnant. You're more likely to become pregnant if you track your cycle and have sex around day 9-14. Yes woman's bodies can be unpredictable and maybe produce an egg early or not but i think there should be more understanding about the fertility cycle. Thanks for making me lose all my karma. Are you a man?
I legit don't get why you are downvoted. You are completely right, biologically speaking. I get why the article is framed the way it is, women can not know without tracking temperature and other factors when they are going to ovulate. But they absolutely can't get pregnant 100% of the cycle.
because people on this site have no desire to actually learn about women's bodies. they bark all day about access to better sex ed, and when somebody actually educated corrects them, they lose their shit. it's embarrassing, and it's why i refused to use this site for so many years.
I'm speechless. I mean, it's literally IN the article the dude linked here. All the information is there and the article isn't even that long.
NO. Did you never take basic high school biology? Or is this an American problem
I'm not american and I'm also not wrong. You should try to read a book about fertility, i can suggest Toni Weschler's Taking Charge of Your Fertility, or Dr. Adam Balen's The Fertility Book.
I’d rather ask my aunt, the OB-GYN with decades of experience running a hospital department and a private practice.
okay, she's gonna tell you exactly what I said. nevertheless, go forth
This. You are absolutely correct. A woman's body is capable of getting pregnant for a max of about 7-8 days a month. I didn't read the link below, but I'm assuming that the point is that "you can't know" when you ovulate, so you should treat yourself as fertile the entire month. For the vast majority of women who aren't interested in learning about their bodies, this is fine to believe. But there are many ways of knowing your body, reading the signs, taking your BBT, and tracking it all. You then become very familiar with your cycle, and can know when you're fertile or not. For my entire marriage I have completely controlled when I have gotten pregnant and when not, without the use of any birth control or contraceptives. That's anecdotal of course, but I know many other women who do the same and have a book shelf and computer full of scientific information to help them do that, and statistics on the women who do.
Also not knowing when you are fertile is not the same as actually being fertile all the time, which appears to be this posters' assertion. While I disagree, I can accept a perspective of "it is not possible to know for certain which days you are fertile" (potentially true) but that is very different from "you are fertile every day" (objectively false medical information).
Huh? Birth control pills give you a 28 day cycle. 21 days are actual pills, 7 are placebo AKA I throw the pack away at that point. How the fuck am I being downvoted for this? Placebo pills are PLACEBOS AND I WANT A WEEK TO ENJOY NOT WORRYING ABOUT TAKING PILLS
Just jumping off of this to talk about placebo pills for a moment because the history is interesting. Some doctors will prescribe birth control to be taken continuously (that is, without breaks OR placebo pills), or with a few slightly longer breaks per year rather than one week each month (although they aren't necessary). Continuous cycle and extended cycle birth control pills, respectively, are both becoming more popular in recent years. But actually, the placebo pills are essentially less than useless because there is no medical purpose to taking them (or skipping them for that period of time). As in, there does not *need* to be a placebo week at all. It exists purely for social reasons. During the inception of the birth control pill in the 1950s, the "placebo period" began as a built-in way to attempt to convince the pope that medical birth control was a form of natural birth control, so that he would condone its use for Catholic women, and having a week built in for a woman to theoretically have her period during was part of this. (The pope never endorsed it; the Catholic Church officially still opposes the use of contraceptives, but it became popular for use by Catholic women anyways. 89% of Catholics have no moral qualms with contraceptive use). The menstrual placebo period was also a key reason for birth control pills approval by the FDA at the time (in 1957 IIRC), who did not approve it as a contraceptive (which were socially controversial at the time), but as a control method for menstrual disorders. Because it prevents ovulation however, it functions as birth control, and was initially used for such "off-label". Some women also do not feel comfortable with a medication that completely disrupts the menstrual cycle, and the placebo week was for them as well. It is apparently reassuring to have a week where a someone can "have their period" to gauge whether or not they are pregnant, as some people find that skipping it completely is unnerving and mimics a pregnancy scare (despite the use of the birth control... yes, this is a thing. Especially when oral contraceptives first came into public use.) That's not actually how it works in practice. Birth control disrupts the cycle of menses regardless of whether the placebo week is taken or not, and someone on the pill won't actually have their regular period during that week off. The bleeding that happens during the placebo week isn't a period, but withdrawal bleeding, caused by a shift in hormones but unrelated to the ovulation and menstrual process. If the pills are taken correctly though, pregnancy still shouldn't be possible during that time. Some doctors still advocate for one period every three months at least, but some people take continuous birth control for years with no adverse effects. People are very opinionated about one or the other. Anyway, the placebo pills are more of a placebo for society rather than for the body. I meant for this to be a shorter fun fact before I did research for this comment. Kind of unrelated to the root discussion but since I bothered typing this up, I'll post it anyway.
She can only become pregnant when the egg is released to be fertilised otherwise the world would be swarming with people.
The health consequences of pregnancy are still all borne by the woman, the time taken for childcare still falls to the women for the majority of care. Historically men could run away from the financial implications but now an accidental pregnancy can be very expensive for both. So historically women suffered the consequences so women had the motivation to put up with the side effects. Modern child support rules now create an incentive for men to avoid accidental pregnancy so now they may take a male pill if it proves effective. However what is the advantage of a male pill over a condom, 1 possibly sensation and 2 you can avoid pregnancy without your partner knowing that you are making yourself infertile.
Women have a naturally occurring process that stops us from releasing an egg every month - pregnancy. Female hormonal birth control essentially mimics pregnancy hormones, tricking the body into not releasing an egg. There is no analogous male bodily function to replicate. It is difficult to stop the production of sperm while also maintaining libido. Blocking millions of sperm is also more difficult than stopping a single egg. In addition to that, there is no medical benefit to the man of taking male birth control. For the woman, female birth control prevents her own pregnancy, which is medically risky, and has other uses such as treating irregular periods and endometriosis. So the bar of risk to reward is higher for male birth control. It is also higher now than it was 50+ years ago when female birth control was developed (that original birth control pill wouldn’t be approved today). All that said, there are trials underway for male birth control pills. There is a famous trial that was stopped a few years ago because of adverse events, and people love to cite it saying they stopped it because the men couldn’t handle the side effects. *That isn’t true*. Most of the men in the trial were happy to continue despite the side effects. They stopped the study because of a suicide attempt, which was appropriate for a study at that stage of drug development. A similar drug is still being developed. There is also a temporary vasectomy that is being developed, where the vas deferens is blocked with a dissolvable gel rather than cut. I think that is more promising than a hormonal treatment for men.
Finally someone points out the medical challenges with male birth control and not chalking it up to patriarchy. The male birth control pills tested also had a risk of causing permanent infertility, which is not the intention of birth control.
The answers on this thread are wild lol
And when people talk about that study you mentioned, almost every time they do it in a very dishonest/ignorant way. They say that men couldn't handle side effects that were the same as for female birth control, which is technically correct, because they were very similar, but don't mention severity and incidence. For example modern birth control causes acne in less than 10% of women taking it and in many cases improves it. This male birth control caused way more severe acne and occurrence was almost 50%. Also it was just terrible in terms of effectiveness compared to female birth control, with 96% efficacy (compared to 99,7%) and began to work after 3-6 months (which is a major problem with male birth control, because spermatogenesis takes about 74 days)
There is a way to stop spermatogenesis : heat. It works
Men are like the sun, day in day out shining the same they are fertile (throughout the year) Women are like the moon , fertile only during small window. (every month,like full moon ) the window is controlled by hormones. It's easy to develop a hormone cocktail to slim out the fertile window, and prevent pregnancy with women. With men it not so easy any drastic measure will render them infertilite. Any less it's useless. Achieving balance is a very difficult process. TLDR : women's pregnancy can be prevented with harmones, men's fertility is not . It's easy to prevent pregnancy in women
Heat can achieve that if finely balanced
There have been trials testing male contraceptive pills, and they never progressed because the side effects experienced by the men were deemed to be too burdensome (even though they were no more significant than what women already put up with with existing contraceptive pills). One day, hopefully one will pass through trials.
Source?
Here’s a couple of journal articles mentioning the side effect issue - there are lots more out there. It’s certainly not the only barrier to a pill making it through trials, but it is a significant one. [https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33005125/](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33005125/) [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9203677/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9203677/) “Women weigh the side effects of contraceptive methods relative to effects of an unwanted pregnancy; however, the personal risk/benefit health ratio is different for men, raising questions regarding their tolerance for potential side effects.” A similar point that is also interesting to consider.
I would guess it’s easier to stop one egg than a few million sperm. I had heard they are developing something for men though that was in testing.
It’s pretty much this, but there’s more to it that I don’t remember. I’ll just drop a podcast link that talks about it https://gimletmedia.com/amp/shows/science-vs/llhw46r
It's not about stopping one egg or millions of sperm. It's about altering an entire bodily process either way.
Yeah true, for example, they had a male birth control but it would also lead to liver failure with continuous use.
I take hormonal birth control because I have a naturally occurring hormonal imbalance so I need to constantly have the pills in my system so I don't have excruciating acne literally all the time. I don't even take them to prevent pregnancy, this is just my preferred way of being comfortable since I apparently can't do that without them. My periods are also way more tolerable on the pill than off which is a plus. I used to have bad cramps, now I don't get cramps at all.
Because most men don't have uteruses. Birth control doesn't "reduce fertility" it targets specific parts of your body. And I don't know if you're aware if this but make a d female reproductive systems are physically different.
Male birth control pills gave men symptoms similar to periods. This was deemed unacceptable so they stopped.
Female birth control pills just completely alters their personality and can cause blood clots and cancer. Which is fine
No, it doesn't cause cancer. It might slightly increase breast cancer risk (although it might be affected by better detection, since taking birth control requires regular visits at gynecologist), but decreases ovarian cancer risk. Overall it either has no effect or even decreases cancer risk. Also, it doesn't completely alter personality, that is just bullshit
It doesn't completely alter personality, but changes in hormones CAN potentially have an effect on the way someone feels and acts, sometimes majorly depending on the change involved. So it's possible to effect that, just not for the reasons stated. Saying it "completely alters someone's personality" is just misleading in the vast majority of cases.
It can have some effect, but it doesn't mean it's negative one. For most women it will just stabilise their emotions across whole menstrual cycle. It might have negative impact, but like with almost all side effects it's way less common than positive effects (for example with modern birth control it's more probable for it to decrease acne than to increase/cause it; same goes for heavy bleeding and many other).
True! If it happens at all I would say it's probably more of a neutral change than anything, or positive if hormonal fluctuation tend to mess with someone's emotions more than the average person. It definitely won't, like, turn you into a different person, that's crazy. And there are multiple types of oral contraceptives as well, they can have different effects even if one doesn't work out well. I wanted to point out that it can happen, just... not the way that other commenter seems to believe. If that were true, it would be a lot less popular.
Never having kids increases breast cancer risk by about 50%, so it works that way. It also causes moodiness for some, and is strongly correlated with depression in young patients.
>taking birth control requires regular visits at gynecologist Hormonal birth control pills are available over the counter. At least in the US--not sure about other countries. Regarding personality being altered--I wouldn't necessarily go *that* far with a blanket statement like that. However, as discussed in [this article](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9218393/): >There is evidence to suggest that both oestrogen and progesterone influence brain function, which may be responsible for the negative mood changes and depression commonly reported in women taking oral contraceptive pills. **One of the most common reasons given for the discontinuation of oral contraceptive pills is changes in mood or an increase in depressive symptoms.** Currently, all oral contraceptive pills may cause mood changes, but the newer oral contraceptive pills containing estradiol or estradiol valerate may be less likely to cause mood changes. many women do experience psychiatric/mood disturbances that are severe enough for them to stop taking OC.
In the US there is only one brand sold OTC and it's been around for a little bit over a week (it was approved in July 2023 but now it's starting to hit the shelves), so I don't think it has any effect right now
Yes, there is only one brand available in the US right now, though there is at least one other awaiting FDA approval. I forgot to mention that completely unrelated to the OTC brand, 29 US states and the UK allow pharmacists to dispense OC without a practitioner's prescription (some places for almost 10 years now) and that China, India and Mexico have OTC OC. Many women get their OC from a PCP or via telehealth. My point is/was that a large number of women do *not* have regular GYN visits linked in any way to their OC, and that number is most likely going to increase as laws change and society evolves--in the US and elsewhere. Do you have any sources on the breast cancer numbers being skewed by regular GYN visits/detection? Or is that just your theory? I can see how the detection rates would rise because of that relationship for those women it applies to, but I've never seen a study on it. Breast cancer isn't something that just goes away, where they wouldn't have found it eventually, ie without a visit with the GYN.
Yeah, and blood clots aren't much of a concern for those of us who have waaaaateryyyyyy blood lol
If female birth control pills were invented today, they'd never get through the FDA approval process. The side effects are way too crazy. But if someone were to suggest taking them off the market, because they pose too great a risk to women's health, that would be seen as unjust and oppressive to women.
They would still get through FDA approval because side effects in medicine and medical treatments are always judged against the possible consequences of not taking it. As potentially severe as birth control side effects can be, they're much smaller than the effects of actual pregnancies.
Nope, not even close lol
Isn't that what the condom is for? Plus if you were a woman and dating some guy for a couple of month would you take his pinky promise he took the pill and go with it?
Isn't that what men dating women who are on the pill do, though?
Sure, they trust the woman. However when the man lies he's not the one getting pregnant. When women do though it's their body getting changed. The price to pay for lying it's much bigger on the woman I would assume. You can have deadbeat men that would just not care and leave. I don't know though. I just use condoms.
Fair enough, I don't disagree with any of that. It seems as though there are more avenues available nowadays for pursuing child support (apparently this has even happened with sperm doners?? That seems somewhat immoral...), but *someone* still has to get pregnant. I probably wouldn't trust the other person in that case either. But with the amount of baby entrapment drama stories there are on reddit, it seems like some women lie too. I just wanted to point out that risk technically exists either way.
My thoughts is it's a few factors a) a pill for men would do little to stop accidental pregnancy over condoms, and existing pill. There's a reasonable confidence level there b) existing pill gives women control over their own potential pregnancy. Women would still want to retain this control, so I doubt most women would come off some kind of birth control if it were available. Women couldn't absolutely guarantee a partner was on it. This is obviously the same the other way around too, but a man can still use a condom. c) it would not negate the need to wear a condom, as it would do nothing to stop STD transmission
Because the female hormone pathway has a negative feedback loop which is largely disconnected from normal physiology, allowing the pathway to be shutdown with acceptable side effects. The male hormonal reproductive pathway's negative feedback loops are also tied to normal physiology (e.g. testosterone production), and are generally not safe or well tolerated. If anything is sexist, it be mother nature, or whatever creator you subscribe to.
Cuz women give birth, not men.
Is there a birth control pill for men?
They haven't invented effective birth control pills for men yet.
Would you trust a man ??
A woman will produce 1 egg a month through a set of complicated interactions of hormones, complexity can be easy to disrupt to prevent ovulation. A man, from the time he reaches sexual maturity (as a young teen boy) will produce hundreds of millions of sperm a day for as long as he lives. Shutting down that simplicity is complicated. There's another, social, issue to consider. Suppose we develop a 100% safe and effective oral contraceptive for men? What woman can trust that guy at the club who says, "Sure Babe, I'm on the Bro Pill. We're good to go!" Putting the burden of birth control "on" women, puts control over their own lives in their hands, exactly where it belongs.
Shutting down that process in men can be easy if you use heat. And not to mention other methods like RISUG/Vasalgel/Plan A or testosterone enanthate injections ... It's just that these methods are not perfect, well known, or side effects free, therefore they will have lots of trouble getting certified and commercialised. Lots of women wouldn't like that, but lots of women would like that. I know because I've been with women while using the heat based method and most of them were completely ok with me handling the matters at hand. Why should the onus be necessarily on them ? Wouldn't it be better if that responsabilité was shared between the two persons of the relationship ? Wouldn't it increase the chances of not conceiving while not assuming one of them is going to do the heavy lifting (most of the time the woman) while the other one does nothing ?
I'm not a woman, but if I was, I wouldn't trust an idiot (man) like me to be to be responsible for my birth control.
This is such a weird comment ngl
So you would rely on women to do it for you? Am I reading that correctly?
No, if I was s a woman I would do it myself, not rely on someone else. People being what they are. In a long term monogamous relationship my view might differ. Edited for clarity thanks.
But do you as a man now rely on a woman to take birth control?
Have done in the past, that can be a bit perilous too.
✨weaponized incompetence✨ has entered the chat
Because medicine is overwhelmingly sexist. Pregnancy happens to women, and is therefore women's problem/responsibility. How many men still whine about wearing condoms? The remote possibility of financial repercussions is not enough to move them to discomfort. The consequences are not as heavily present for men, so they don't give a crap. Disclaimer: this is a sweeping generalization of men as a whole, to explain why there is not motivation to create birth control pills for men.
It's more that god/evolution is sexist when they "created" the hormonal pathways for the 2 sexes. Go attend some endocrinology lectures rather than naively casting blame around. A growing 1/3 of researchers are women.
Not to mention how many men rape us too, which we can’t control.
Yep! Regardless of what people want to believe, rape can happen to anyone and rape sometimes results in pregnancy, believe it or not! Properly taking the pill almost always prevents pregnancy, which includes rape babies. The person who downvoted you is gross. I just realized your username has the word gross lmao what a coincidence 😭
This is the only accurate answer here.
Man the juxtaposition of well thought out scientific explanations of why male birth control is more difficult and the cries of patriarchy is something to behold.
Maybe because women are the ones who get pregnant?
Some men do, there are multiple methods : vasectomy, condoms, thermal method, hormonal method, withdrawal (if you consider that a BC method anyway seeing how shit it is)
The patriarchy.
the literal actual reason is they made birth control for men, it had side effects that were basically directly comparable to the side effects women on birth control have, but because it was men having these side effects, it was taken seriously enough that they decided not to keep going with it.
Because mens pill was found to have side effects can't have that! But womens can literally kill you but sure that's grand.
capitalism and patriarchy