What's wrong with taking a little pill?

From the age of 14 and a half to fifteen and a half, I was on birth control pills – Ortho Tri-Cyclen Lo, to be exact. I went off it at fifteen, and recently decided, once again, to put myself on it. It wasn’t too hard to do, because my periods are awful (quite often, I have cramps that basically paralyze me from the abdomen down. I can’t get up, I can’t go get ibuprofen or Midol, even if I can, they don’t usually work… I’ve taken amounts of pills which are considered sever overdose amounts – I’ve downed a bottle of 50 pills in three days), and my friends have witnessed me doubled over on the floor or curled up in a chair with my clammy exterior, and they hate not being to help. I’ve even fainted from the pain, which frightens my teachers, until I tell them that it happens. The unusual thing is, there’s nothing wrong with me. I’ve had tests done, and all they can say is that my body’s working overtime to get done with my period, and that’s why my cramps are so bad, and my fainting happens.

When I was a sophomore, though, it got out that I was on the pill. It basically became the big “rumor” of my class, and the senior class (which was the class my now-ex was in). People started asking me if the ex and I had had a scare, or if I was pregnant (okay, idiots, if I was pregnant, I wouldn’t be taking the pills. Numbskulls)… When I stopped taking them after a year, one of my former friends told everyone that they hadn’t worked and that I was pregnant – when in reality, I stopped because I didn’t want to have an exam. Nine months later (at which time I was with my current boyfriend), the same “friend” told everyone that I had had a miscarriage, and my current boyfriend didn’t want anyone to know that I was once pregnant, so we were keeping it on the down low. You’ve gotta love high school.

Newsflash: I never slept with my ex, and I was never pregnant by him.

Now that I’m a senior, there are at least four girls who have had children, are/were once pregnant, lost the baby, or had an abortion… Not just in my class, but in my group of friends. Within my class, I think the number goes up to ten (in a class of 300ish. Yeah, it’s not that bad, I guess). In the entire school, the number goes up to 20 (those aren’t counting the unconfirmed pregnancies – AKA rumors). Why? Because the social stigma of birth control at my school keeps the girls from getting on it! Instead of risking rumors arising that they’re sleeping around, they’d rather guess and hope. I guess it keeps religion strong, all the praying I’ve heard in the girl’s bathroom – “Please God, let me get my period. Please God…”

Sometimes, it’s not even a rumor that keeps the girls from getting on the big BC – it’s the fact that they don’t want to have to remember to take a pill at a certain time each day. Newsflash, take two: birth control isn’t limited to the Pill anymore. They have the Shot (which is injected through the arm, upper thigh, or abdomen – ouch. Maybe it’s just me, but the only thing I ever want to inject into my tummy is insulin, if I ever need it), the Patch (oh, come on, it looks like a bandaid, seriously), Nuvaring, a IUD (intrauterine device – it looks like a little T in your uterus), the Sponge (which has nothing to do with dabbing around inside there, you actually have to insert it), the Implant (newly reintroduced… And my mom was on these when she got knocked up with me, apparently. Not too trusting of these, personally)… Abstinence, pull-out (which is a common method with my friends, but not reliable, because the guys don’t tend to know when they’re about to ejaculate, or sometimes they just don’t)… There’s diaphrams, cervical caps… Oh yeah, we have more options now than before. And not all of them have to do with timing.

When I walk down the hall and see another girl looking scared, or crying on her boyfriend, and I hear the words “But I’m not ready”… I think to myself that it’s such a shame; these girls chose to play Russian roulette with their wombs…

And lost.

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