By Melissa G.

My subconscious and I have always been of one mind when it comes to my Birth Control Pills. I take one, every day, every weather, every time. Drunk? I take it. Exhausted or traveling in a different time zone? I take it. Ever since my B.C. pill habit was formed during those first months at nineteen, nary a pill has been missed.

Until recently: I missed three pills in one month. Once I even missed them for two days running.

Please understand that I have loved my pills. They have granted me freedom both mental and physical. I have loved not having to worry about “on the spot” birth control and I have loved being able to clock the start and finish my period to the hour. On top that, I am not yet ready to have children. Why, then, why would I throw my beloved pills out the window?

Because my subconscious mutinied: The minute my husband and I shocked ourselves with the realization that eventually, we wholeheartedly want to start a family, suddenly I found myself forgetting to take my pill.

So what does a slightly (ahem) overweight woman in this situation do? Following the ancient Chinese proverb, she sees crisis as opportunity: She fantasizes that stopping her hormone therapy, a.k.a. The Pill, will result in weight loss. Of course she does! This also fit neatly into my long-term pregnancy plan, which involves (somewhat controversially) losing some weight first.

It’s like this: I need to lose about 50 pounds to be at a super healthy weight, and that is exactly where I want to be when I start a pregnancy. That’s what docs currently recommend, but that’s not how I made the decision. After all, doctors’ advice seems to fluctuate wildly every few years. Did you know that not so long ago they gave newly pregnant women diet pills to help keep them from gaining weight during pregnancy? Or that until 1995 doctors mistakenly thought women breastfed from “pools” of milk in their breasts, a relic theory from the 1870s? Relying purely on the conventional wisdom of the medical establishment seems about as reliable as consulting your neighborhood psychic for prenatal advice.

So instead I turn to my own common sense: If I’m going to be carrying around extra baby weight on my bladder, smooshing my stomach, and straining my back, why would I want that to be on top of 50 lbs of overweight? It may not be in the Journal of the American Medical Association, but I call it the Comfort Factor.

So with all that in mind, I dumped the Pill just over a month ago. We’re using other methods of birth control until we’re physical fit and mentally ready to be “with child.”

Since then, I’ve been watching myself carefully, trying to figure out whether leaving behind the Pill has affected my weight loss (or anything else). Remembering that observation in and of itself can change the outcome, I’m not going to claim that all of these changes are the inevitable result of quitting the pill. These are just my results, and my results in a combination of other life factors. Nevertheless I found them worth sharing (and so did The Flying Trapeze!).

First, the bad stuff: The second night after I went off the pill I woke up in the middle of trying to get my wedding ring off of my finger. I was swollen or bloated in a way I have never been before. Fortunately that was a one time thing. My cramps were also stronger when I got my first “real” period, though nothing a good ibuprofen couldn’t handle. My libido was subject to some super spikes that were really too much fun to be a bad thing. I also sprained my ankle, but I doubt I can blame that on the lack of the pill.

Onto the good stuff. In fact, let’s call it the so-good-I’m-ecstatic stuff: Since dumping the Pill, I no longer have constant nighttime food cravings. I used to feel sad at the end of the day when I knew I had eaten my last food. That’s done.

In fact, my nighttime cravings dried up so completely that the true origin of any other food cravings became obvious. It turns out that I get strong cravings when I have too little sleep. I think I need snacks when what I really need is a nap. Let’s hear it for those Zzzz’s.

Also gone are annoying red bumps I had on my upper arms. I didn’t think they were caused by the B.C., as they showed up after I had been on it for a few years already. All the same they have all disappeared.

I’m very happy with my decision to stop birth control, and curious as to what other changes I am going to notice and experience. I feel that the pill has had a useful place in my life even though I’m enjoying my new feeling of being unaltered. For now the voices in my head are unanimous. My road to health will be Pill-free.

Want to read the second piece in The Flying Trapeze’s series on birth control and pregnancy? Check out Out of Pills, Out of Sync and the introduction.