Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
An eye-opening book that reveals crucial information every woman taking hormonal birth control should know. The birth control pill has revolutionized women's lives in ways that were hard to imagine even 50 years ago. But in this groundbreaking book a psychologist on the forefront of research on women and health pulls the curtain back on how it has changed us - and the world around us - in ways we are only just beginning to understand.
When we change what our sex hormones do - as when we're on any hormonal contraceptive - we change the version of ourselves the brain creates. This means that the pill changes who we are. For instance women on the pill do not have a working stress response. This sounds great (no stress ) but it can adversely affect memory and learning. It may also impact systems in ways that ultimately increase women's risk for autoimmune disorders, Alzheimer's Disease, depression, and suicide. Women on the pill are also attracted to different kinds of mates. This may inadvertently create a genetic mismatch, causing relationship problems once women go off the pill, and make it more difficult for them to become pregnant when they decide to start a family. And when women change, men change. This means that the reach of pill extends beyond women's own bodies, having a startling impact on society and the world.
Ultimately this book is a rally cry for women to have full access to information regarding what is going on in their bodies and for better science to show them the way to better decisions.
Synopsis
An eye-opening book that reveals crucial information every woman taking hormonal birth control should know This groundbreaking book sheds light on how birth control affects women--and the world around them--in ways we are only just beginning to understand. By allowing women to control their fertility, the birth control pill has revolutionized women's lives. Women are going to college, graduating, and entering the workforce in greater numbers than they ever have in the past, and there's good reason to believe that the birth control pill has a lot to do with this. But there's a lot more to the pill than meets the eye.
Although women go on the pill for a small handful of effects (pregnancy prevention and clearer skin, yay ), women's sex hormones aren't that simple. Sex hormones impact the activities of billions of cells in the body at once, many of which are in the brain; they influence sex, attraction, stress, hunger, eating patterns, emotion regulation, friendships, aggression, mood, learning, and more. This means that when you change what women's sex hormones do, you change women. And there's no bigger deal than that. For instance, women on the pill have a dampened cortisol spike in response to stress. While this sounds great (no stress ), it can have negative implications for learning, memory, and mood. Additionally, because the pill influences who women on it are attracted to, going off of it may inadvertently change their relationships, being on the pill may inadvertently change women's relationships once they go off it. Sometimes these changes are for the better . . . but other times, they're for the worse. By changing women, the pill also has the ability to have cascading effects on everything and everyone that a woman encounters. This means that the reach of the pill extends far beyond women's own bodies, having a major impact on society and the world.
This paradigm-shattering book provides an even-handed, science-based understanding of who women are, both on and off the pill. It will change the way that women think about their hormones and how they view themselves. It also serves as a rallying cry for women to demand more information from science about how their bodies and brains work and to advocate for better research. This book will help women make more informed decisions about their health, whether they're on the pill or off of it.