should I get off birth control? I take the pill everyday but I feel like In the future my body will be affected by my continuous use of birth control, I have a bf but I think I’d just stop being intimate, I do not want children and I’m scared if I get off of birth control I’ll accidentally get pregnant if I can’t control myself around my bf. I’m 17 and super stupid lmao so I just want others opinions. I feel like because I’m young i shouldn’t be on such heavy affecting hormones especially in my growing years

There’s a lot of misinformation around birth control and everyone seems to think anything that isn’t ‘natural’ is terrible. BC has been around long enough that there are studies concluding that there aren’t any negative side effects from taking them longer term, it doesn’t cause infertility. I have been on the pill for over 10 years since I was similar age to you and have developed as normal. I wouldn’t say they’re heavy hormones either, they’re ones that you already have in your body. At 17 it’s definitely not worth risking getting pregnant.

okay that makes me feel a lot better ❤️, my birth control has done wonders for me and has made life more bearable. My mom said it could cause uterus cancer or something and it scared me. My mom has never taken birth control though so I should’ve known she would be misinformed about it

@Daisyrange10 I don’t know where she got that but birth control can actually reduce the risk of endometrial cancer, ovarian cancer and colorectal cancer

It can very slightly increase the risk of breast cancer, cervical cancer, blood clots & strokes. Which sounds scary but if you have no close family history of this type of cancer, blood clots or strokes at a young age & you attend your smear tests then it is still completely safe to use BC. I have close family history of strokes in middle age but the risk is still so low & I get blood pressure checked annually, my doctor isn’t worried at all. Pregnancy actually has a much worse risk of blood clots & strokes and yet people do it all the time and are less negative. Plus as @monkeybutt63 said, it can reduce risk of other cancers (especially endometrial if you have PCOS). Ovarian cancer is more dangerous than cervical or breast cancer too.

being on birth control for 5 years straight made me develop pcos and have very f-d up hormones but that’s jus me, depends whether u wanna use condoms or not, some women do not like them

@ems3 It won’t have made you develop it, you’d have had it all along.