every month my gf’s period is a bit late. When it gets close to the time she expects it, she gets really anxious that she’s pregnant. Every time it sparks an argument about contraception. We only use condoms. I am always very careful, and we have had no issues yet. It scares her because it’s completely up to me, so if I mess up she gets pregnant. She insists she gets back on birth control. For most of her teenage years, until 21, she was using Ginet, a birth control and testosterone blocker, prescribed by her doctor to treat acne. It stopped her getting periods. She trusted her doctor who said it was okay. Once I found out (near the start of our relationship, over a year ago) I immediately told her to stop taking it and she did, but now we have this problem of her getting super anxious about pregnancy. She is also on anti-anxiety medication, which she stopped for a bit but is now back on because she has been going through a lot and her anxiety was debilitating. It’s still a big problem, she repeats questions to me over and over to make sure I’m honest about my answer, she checks her drink bottle isn’t leaking in her bag constantly, and is always worried she forgot to lock the car or front door. She is convinced that some form of contraception other than condoms is a necessity, and won’t have any negative effects on her health or the health of any future pregnancy. It seems obvious to me that altering hormones is a bad idea, but she is not convinced and thinks I’m being selfish and not taking her feelings seriously. Clearly nothing I say can convince her, but once she gets her period she stops bringing it up and we go back to normal. How do I stop her worrying so much without caving and letting her doctor make her infertile by modifying her hormones?
>>34150042>letting her doctor make her infertile by modifying her hormones?Brother, you have no clue what you're talking about. Its fucking wild that you're telling your girlfriend to go against physician advice and half a century of medical data because of some shit you read online. Leave the medical advice to the medical professionals.
>>34150084im not sure about this one medication but birth control can cause miscarriages later in life. i wouldnt take that either
>>34150042Kys
>>34150084>you have no clue what you're talking aboutyou're right, I don't. I'm not an endocrinologist, but it doesn't take one to know that blocking testosterone is not a particularly healthy thing to do in general, and not getting periods is not a good sign. Taking nonessential medication without knowing its long term effects because one doctor said it's fine doesn't seem clever>Leave the medical advice to the medical professionalsno, I'd rather think critically about this than blindly trust anyone. I'm fairly certain my gf's anxiety was exacerbated by blocking her testosterone during her development. I might be wrong, but it seems like a reasonable conclusion. And if she's clearly got an anxiety problem, why not try to fix that rather than let it rule a big decision like hormone medication?
>>34150189>it doesn't take one to know that blocking testosterone is not a particularly healthy thing to do in generalIt actually does. If anyone could just use their gut to make medical determinations then it wouldn't take a decade of schooling and residency to become a doctor. Anybody could do it. Again, you have no clue what you're talking about. You're just guessing.>Taking nonessential medication without knowing its long term effects because one doctor said it's fine doesn't seem cleverFirstly, we do know its long term effects. Birth control has been one of the most widely studied and widely prescribed medicines for the better part of 70 years. Secondly, "one doctor" doesn't say birth control is fine. Every major medical institution on the planet says its fine. You're also completely ignoring the other half of the health equation. While there may be risks to using birth control the risks of pregnancy are infinitely greater. More women have had serious health complications and/or death from getting pregnant than birth control by an infinite amount. Sexually active women on birth control statistically have better health outcomes than women who are not on and it isn't even a close comparison. >no, I'd rather think critically about this than blindly trust anyone.But you're not thinking critically. You're thinking "Well, I know nothing about this topic but I FEEL strongly that birth control isn't good so I'm going to go with my uninformed gut opinion instead of medical consensus". That's the opposite of critical thinking.>I might be wrong but it seems like a reasonable conclusion"I feel really strongly about this thing I don't know anything about" isn't reasoning. You've got a serious inability to engage critical thinking, anon. That's fine for you but to pressure your girlfriend to make health decisions based on your uninformed medical hunches is wildly irresponsible.
>>34150098You don't know how to weigh medical risk. Birth control can cause lots of things but so can not taking birth control. You compare the risks and benefits of both options and make decisions based on what works best for you, not read a bunch of shit on the internet and ignore your doctor.
>>34150042>gfs greatest fear is bearing my kidsF
>>34150216>using my gut>guessinglow testosterone has been linked to all sorts of health problems. I am not guessing about that. Not many people would argue that a woman should block her testosterone for her health, this would purely be a method to reduce her anxiety. Which, firstly, is not a good solution because she is anxious about a whole list of things, not just pregnancy, and secondly, the low testosterone likely influenced her anxiety in the first place. We should be very clear that the birth control is a lifestyle decision, not a health decision. Don't bring up pregnancy as a health concern, you know that has nothing to do with this. Otherwise I'd have posed my question as "how do I convince my gf to not care about getting pregnant?".I don't mean to sound defensive, it just seems clear to me that the burden of proof concerning health should be on the side in favour of birth control. You say everyone says it's fine, but how could that convince a skeptic? I want to know precisely why altering hormones in this way doesn't pose a concern to future pregnancies, when clearly there are ways to alter hormones that we know for a fact are very dangerous. I'll have a look for some literature on this, but with how often the science seems to change on what is good for us, I don't see how avoiding nonessential medication is a bad idea
>>34150260What exactly do you know about the effects of birth control pills? I am pretty sure they (can) also help alleviate/avoid pain heavy cramps during periods, among other things. I wouldn't brush it off so easily as "lifestyle decision" and "nonessential".
>>34150285pic related is what my gf was prescribed at 15 by her doctor, without her parents' knowledge, to treat acne. She was also put on accutane, which has permanently worsened her eczema. She does not, and did not, have any symptoms other than acne that would indicate high androgen.she was happy because it stopped her periods. She didn't cycle it with the sugar pill, instead constantly taking the true medication and leaving the sugar pills in the packet. Her doctor allowed this. Her periods have never been bad, just inconvenient.she developed severe anxiety, which her doctor gave her fluoxetine to manage. She's still on that, and can't come off without her anxiety significantly worsening.so to answer your question, whatever this or any other birth control does, she doesn't need it beyond satisfying her anxiety
>>34150336I will add that as well as having no symptoms of high androgen, she also has most symptoms of low androgen
>>34150260>low testosterone has been linked to all sorts of health problems. I am not guessing about that. Not many people would argue that a woman should block her testosterone for her health, this would purely be a method to reduce her anxietyYou're using your gut. You don't know anything about medicine. You don't know anything about the endocrine system. You don't know anything about constitutes "low testosterone" in a woman or why that may even be a bad thing. You have zero medical training nor do you even realize there's like 12 different categories of birth controls that work in all different ways with varying combinations of hormones, dosages and release schedules. Again, you have absolutely no clue what you're talking about.>and secondly, the low testosterone likely influenced her anxiety in the first placeWhich, again, you're basing on absolutely nothing. This is just a guess of yours.>We should be very clear that the birth control is a lifestyle decision, not a health decisionYou're 100% incorrect. >Don't bring up pregnancy as a health concern, you know that has nothing to do with this."Being pregnant isn't a health concern" is probably the most retarded thing I've read on the internet today.>it just seems clear to me that the burden of proof concerning health should be on the side in favour of birth control>You say everyone says it's fine, but how could that convince a skeptic?The medical data conclusively shows that sexually active women on birth control have better outcomes than sexually active women who aren't. This is just statistical reality. The issue is, you want reality to be what you feel it is, not what it actually is. There's nothing I could say to convince someone who ignores empirical data in favor of their gut hunches. You can't reason someone out of a position they did not arrive at through reason. You are, by definition, irrational.
>>34150260>I want to know precisely why altering hormones in this way doesn't pose a concern to future pregnanciesBecause there's no evidence that birth control poses any significant risk of causing infertility in women. None. This is a thing you've made up in your head because you know nothing about this topic.>when clearly there are ways to alter hormones that we know for a fact are very dangerousWhich is another topic you know nothing about. You have no clue what's dangerous or not because you haven't the first clue how the endocrine system even works. >but with how often the science seems to change on what is good for us, I don't see how avoiding nonessential medication is a bad ideaThe grander issue is that you're not a critical thinker. When presented with complicated topics and emperical evidence that contradicts your worldview you're not willing to admit your ignorance. Instead you just make guesses based solely on your intuition and argue about is as if your gut feelings are as valid as the medical consensus of experts who have thousands of years of collective experience studying these topics. You're making a medical determination about what is and isn't essential to another person while having absolutely zero fucking clue what you're talking about. I really hope you don't plan to go into higher education, anon. I don't want to sound too harsh but you're failing levels of prop logic that most people grasp by the 9th/10th grade.
>>34150336I wasn't saying that what her doctor prescribed was or wasn't right. I was contesting your notion that "birth control is a lifestyle decision, not a health decision".
>>34150354>>34150375>>34150382I was trying to be open-minded and consider your position, but you've so far given no evidence to support your position and instead relied entirely on attacking my skepticism with the argument that "all the doctors opinions are actually a complete 180 on your own". You're clearly getting very agitated, and your continuous use of the "lack of critical thinking" and "gut feelings" labels are starting to look a lot like projection. Give me a study to read, otherwise all I'm getting is "don't you know birth control has been used for millions of years by hunter gatherers? It's actually the healthiest thing, you're just willfully ignorant and using gut instinct". You talk about medical data, so give me some. Do you think trusting you is the kind of thing a critical thinker would do?
>>34151013also I never said being pregnant wasn't a health concern, instead I was obviously referring to the fact that she would not be taking birth control to protect her health from pregnancy. She plans on getting pregnant in the future, just not now. The fact that you're focusing on things like this imply that you're arguing in bad faith
>>34151013First off, you were talking to two different people. And I'm the one that simply tried to tell you that taking hormonal birth control pills isn't JUST about avoiding pregnancy, so simply using condoms in their stead won't do, because the other (beneficial) effects it has will not be provided by those. That's all.I admit this is going a bit off-topic, so I'll try to offer some actual advice instead: you said>She trusted her doctor who said it was okay. Once I found out (near the start of our relationship, over a year ago) I immediately told her to stop taking it and she didDid you, at any point, try to get a second opinion on this from another doctor? If not, that should've been the first thing you've done. One of two things can happen:1. The new doctor agrees that the prescription was right, in which case you have to wonder whether the whole medical world is out of touch, or just you2. They agree with you and prescribe some different pill for her, in which case you are vindicated *somewhat*, but the decision wasn't left to some layperson at the end of the day.If you did get a second opinion, what did they say?
>>34150042>every month my gf’s period is a bit late.Sorry, what? If it happens *every* month, that just means her cycle is a day or two longer than average and she's always on time.
>>34150042>Once I found out (near the start of our relationship, over a year ago) I immediately told her to stop taking itWhat gave you that right?
