I am a 57 yo woman. Trends in birth control come and go. When I was a young woman, barrier methods were much more common. In the decades since, they have fallen out of fashion, as hormonal birth control was found to be more effective. But I have grave reservations about the long-term effects of hormonal birth control and it really bothers me that an entire generation of young women are now using it. There are many things we are still learning about the endocrine system; and I am concerned about what we are going to discover once this generation has been on hormonal BC for two or three decades.

There are good forms of BC that do not involve hormones. The diaphragm. The cervical cap (which used to be available in the US but is no longer. It is still available in Europe. It was my favorite form of BC and I am really pissed that it is no longer available here.) The female condom, which you don't see much at drug stores, but which is available on Amazon. (It should be available everywhere; and the fact that it isn't is another thing that pisses me off.) The Today sponge is another very awesome form of non-hormonal BC. It was on the market; then it was discontinued in the 90s; then it came back on the market (I bought some on Amazon a few years back) and now they are unavailable once again. There are good alternatives to hormonal birth control and THEY ARE BEING KEPT FROM US! This is not okay. We should be protesting about this, along with the repeal of Roe v. Wade.