Red States vs Blue Pills

Anonymous — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:25:05 -0800

Dumb birth control pill question: why don't I need to use a backup method while taking the sugar pills? I started the pill a week ago. The brochure states that if I miss more than two days of the pill, I MUST USE A BACKUP METHOD OF BIRTH CONTROL OR I MIGHT GET PREGNANT (It really is in all caps). But during the "period" week, when you're missing seven days of active pills, no backup method is necessary. Why? What's the difference, especially when I'm supposedly allowed to reschedule the inactive week anyway?

I'm on Ortho-Cyclen, so there's no funny business with varying levels of hormones - all the pills are the same, except Week 4.

What got me wondering about this is that I inadvertently began taking the pill a week before my actual period, because I was spotting and mistook it for Day 1 (my cycle is super irregular, which I'm hoping to correct with the pill). So now, my actual period is here (I'm still taking the active pills), and I was thinking about putting off the sugar pill week for four weeks so I don't have to deal with this again so soon.

But when I take the sugar pills, how is that different from just missing pills? Are they assuming you won't have sex while you're bleeding?

I really, really, really, really, really don't want to get pregnant.

(Anonymous due to the hysterics that would ensue if by some hiccup of the cosmos my mother were to find out that her 27-year-old daughter is having premarital sex.)

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Red States vs Blue Pills