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Vegan Birth Control???
Started
by Lora Kole
on March 12, 2011
All of Alicia's pregnancy postings have me thinking about birth control...I have no plans to start a family but i'm terrified that most Birth Control pills contain pregnant horse uring similair to Menopause pills.
Is all estrogen in medicine supplied by this horse urine??
Does anyone know if any of the typical birth control methods...Nuva Ring, shots, etc. are vegan friendly??
I have found a website called www.thesensualvegan.com which provices vegan condoms.
Anyone have any knowledge about this?!?!
I have a copper IUD. It lasts for ten years, but if you want to get pregnant, then all you have to do is have your doc remove it. No hormones, no nothing. Just a little copper "T" that's inserted by your doctor. It's amazing! I don't have to worry about it, and it doesn't mess with my hormones like all the other methods!
I also recently got a copper IUD, and I LOVE it.
I don't know of any hormonal vegan options for birth control, but I would wager to say that there are none. I've been a vegan for over a year and a half now, but I've never been on birth control until I got my IUD about a month ago. More importantly to me than finding a "vegan" birth control option was that I didn't want to screw with my body's hormones period.
Do your research onf ParaGard. I would recommend it to anyone, not just vegans. Like Dani said, it lasts 10 years, and if and when you're ready to have a baby, you just have your doctor take it out. In the long run, it's even cheaper than buying pills every month. And you don't have to do anything, which is the best part. And it's over 99% effective, moreso than almost all other methods of birth control.
I wanted to add that if you tell your doctor you want an IUD and they bring up Mirena, this is NOT the copper IUD. Mirena is just like the copper IUD except it is full of hormones that it releases into your bloodstream and it only lasts 5 years. This is not what you want if you're looking for something hormone-free.
If you aren't sure about the IUD thing, I used the diaphragm for years and was very happy with it.
You could also try reading Taking Control of Your Fertility. I stopped taking birth control pills long ago because of the whole hormone thing. It took me a long time to decide to try them, I took them for a few years and asked myself - why?, when I had never really wanted to in the first place. TCYF is very well-regarded. There is a long thread on here about birth control, in which many women said they use the method in TCYF, and it is similar to the method Alicia herself used. It requires you to measure two to three signs of your body (you can choose two, but three makes it that much more accurate) so you know when you're ovulating, and when followed correctly is as effective as other methods of birth control. But it depends on how close to your body you want to be and what type of committment you want to make. I hate condoms (though of course I would use them if I were not in a long-term, monogamous relationship), diaphragms, and OCP, and IUDs seriously freak me out because I would have no control over it (not to mention my fear of side effects), but every woman has to find the method that works best for her and her lifestyle. I would only strongly suggest that all women should find a method that is hormone-free.
I am not willing to put hormones in my body and I am not a candidate for an IUD because I am not in a long term monogomous relationship. As IUD users are probably well aware, the IUD makes you wayyy more susceptible to STDs and STIs. Also, I do not use tampson, I use a cup and you can not use the cup and have an IUD at the same time. However, there is a non-hormonal sponge that you can buy OTC that my doctor just reccomended for me. I have not tried it yet but will soon and will let you all know how it works out.
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