5 good reasons to have your period

DaysyUSA
DaysyUSA
Aug 8, 2017 · 4 min read

In a recent New York Times article, titled “How to stop your period,” it was argued that women should avoid having periods entirely by using menstruation suppressing drugs (also known as hormonal contraceptives), for the benefit of their health and well-being. The writer suggested that women only chose not to stop their periods because they are “conditioned to believe that a monthly period is a sign of good health.”

This is a peculiar statement, because having a period every month actually is a sign of good health, a fact noted last year by the American Committee for Obstetricians and Gynecologists, who recommended that our periods be viewed as “the fifth vital sign” of women’s health. And the sheer number of prescriptions given for hormonal contraceptives suggests that women are more likely “conditioned” to believe that periods are unnecessary and unhealthy. Those that chose not to take these prescriptions probably do so because they’ve experienced the adverse effects that suppressing your menstruation, and your menstrual cycle, can cause.

The bleed women experience when using hormonal contraceptives is a “withdrawal bleed” and not a physiological period, which is why it can be called “unnecessary.” This was, after all, a manufacturing decision made by early birth control researchers who wanted to mimic the normal menstrual cycle to increase the number of women willing to take the pill. However, a physiological period is different, and has many benefits for women’s health and well-being.

Here are a few of the good reasons to have a real period:

1. Research from the Center of Ovulation and Menstrual Cycle Research (one of the few institutions dedicated to learning more about women’s cycles) has discovered that experiencing monthly menstruation, along with regular ovulation, is vital for maintaining longterm bone health (avoiding osteoporosis), breast health (avoiding breast cancer), and heart health (avoiding heart disease and heart attacks). These issues happen to be some of the biggest killers of women.

2. Again, ACOG recommends you view your menstrual cycle as “the fifth vital sign” of health alongside blood pressure, pulse rate and all those things your doctor checks on every time you make a visit. The regularity of your menstrual cycle, if you do get a real period, what that period looks like, and any symptoms you have can reveal if you may be suffering from common issues like thyroid disorder or PCOS. It can also show when you are experiencing a hormonal imbalance or vitamin deficiency. Observing the menstrual cycle from your teens (as ACOG advised) helps to get early diagnosis and, as such, establish an early treatment protocol. Tracking your menstrual cycle with technology like Daysy has many benefits, and not just for if/when you want to get pregnant.

3. Taking hormonal contraceptives and suppressing your period masks underlying health issues that can cause infertility and health problems. Stopping your period for years can mean you don’t discover the problem until you’re ready to get pregnant, only to then discover you cannot get pregnant. Hormonal contraceptives don’t exactly treat reproductive health problems, although they can help with managing the symptoms. This means, when you stop using hormonal birth control, your reproductive health problems will simply return or you will find you have a health issue you didn’t know about.

4. There is little to no research on the long term impact of suppressing menstruation with hormonal contraceptives for decades at a time. This is partly because they were not originally designed for this function and partly because science badly needs a feminist awakening. Few studies track women across their lifetimes to understand the potential health issues associated with stopping your periods completely longterm. This is particularly a problem when it comes to newer methods like the hormonal IUD, patch, and ring, as there are yet fewer studies available. The “research” you may have heard that suggests periods are somehow unhealthy or “unnatural” is based on assumptions made about women’s health pre-science and pre-society (that is, women of the Paleolithic era) who, it’s assumed, had fewer periods because they were more often pregnant and breastfeeding (and dying very young, of course). There is no evidence to support this theorizing.

5. The period is just one part of your menstrual cycle and its inextricably linked to the fluctuation of hormones and ovulation. When you stop your period, you also stop the creation of hormones by your body (hormonal contraceptives provide a synthetic hormone replacement). You suppress ovulation, too. The position of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research (again, one of the few organizations dedicated to research on women’s reproductive health) is that “menstruation is not a disease” and therefore should not be medicated as though it were a disease. If menstruation is irregular, periods are painful, PMS is a problem, or other symptoms are present, there are methods that get to the root cause to truly treat and resolve the issue.

Daysy fertility tracker is hormone-free, hassle-free, and 99.3% effective for planning or preventing pregnancy. Available globally.

Originally published at usa.daysy.me.

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