Here I am this middle aged woman, picking up birth control pills, feeling like the world is judging me. It is probably more my imagined thoughts than them, perhaps they think nothing of what I'm getting, but to me I feel there is this sign over my head saying: "Woman trying to prevent Pregnancy." And the thought that people think I'm out there with multiple partners etc......
What makes it worse is that every time I go in I say I need to refill my prescription and they ask "which one?" I think next time I'll ask are there more than one? Because as far as I know I only have one prescription. Then they say "Oh...You want your BIRTH CONTROL PILL'S refilled....." I turn all shades of red wondering how many people are out there listening.
I'm sure that like the majority of women out there taking birth control pills, I'm actually not taking them to prevent birth. It's a nice plus, but the real reasons is that with out them my body does not produce hormones correctly.( Although I'm sure they are not helping me produce hormones they are just supplementing what I'm not making.) And then I am thrown into states of depression, and I have the most horrible periods in the world. The pain can be so horrid that I miss work and feel extremely sick. And if you read my last Women's issue blog, I had a period that lasted for over a month. I could never go through that again.
OK if you are a man and you are reading this, I know you can't understand this at all. I live with one who thinks I should embrace this time of month, that time when I'm such a woman. After all the years my husband has lived with me I still can not convince him that the pain is real and it is not a time of the month where I feel anything like a woman or celebrating. (perhaps I'll share more later on that)
I've lived with this pain, and embarrassment pretty much since I was a teenager. And it is hard to watch as our society decides who gets to know what prescription drugs I'm taking. Now that corporations may decided to not pay for these prescriptions..... It just leads me to believe that all people believe that if a woman is taking any type of birth control she is some how not living to the higher standard.
I think we should change the names of birth control pills, they should be named something different. Perhaps they could be called "Hormone regulators, Period regulators, or something else." Because they are used for much more than preventing conception.
In reality I can not have any more children, I'm lucky to have the two I have. If I had listened to the doctors after the birth of my son I would not have two children. But I took a chance (which did not make certain family members happy) and had a second child because I really wanted a daughter. After her birth and all I went through I knew two was all I should have. Not only do these pills keep me balance hormonally they also prevent a high risk pregnancy that could cause myself and a baby to die. I think that the prescriptions we take should be between us and our doctors and not something we have to tell the boss that we work with about.
And some day I hope that women can go to the pharmacy and pick up their prescription and not feel judged. But then again perhaps I'm just being over sensitive.... What do you think?
G.G.
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