Birth Control pills and stop birth

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Birth Control

Birth control hormones in pills, skin patches, or vaginal rings give you a regular dose of estrogen and progestin. This controls your body's menstrual cycles and prevents pregnancy. It also helps relieve heavy menstrual bleeding, pain, and sometimes premenstrual mood problems and bloating. In the perimenopausal years before menopause, hormone levels go up and down a lot. Using birth control hormones can help with hot flashes, sleep problems, and mood.

Birth control pills

Birth control pills, also called oral contraceptives, come in packs. The most common type has 3 weeks of hormone pills. Some packs have sugar pills for the fourth week, and some do not. During that fourth non-hormone week, you have your menstrual period. After the fourth week (28 days), you start a new pack. For Seasonique and Seasonale, you take 12 weeks of hormone pills followed by 1 week of low-estrogen or no-hormone pills. On this schedule, you have four periods a year. If your doctor prescribes an unlabeled use for other birth control pills, you can also have four periods a year. You take the active hormone pills continuously for 12 weeks, followed by 1 week of sugar pills. You then start a new pack of pills. If you have breakthrough bleeding during the 3 months, your doctor will prescribe extra estrogen. Lybrel comes in 4-week packs of hormone pills, which you take every day of the year. On this schedule, you have no periods.

Birth control skin patch

The birth control patch is a patch [about 1.75 in. (4 cm) square] that sticks firmly on your skin. You can wear it on your lower abdomen, buttocks, or upper arm. Each patch releases estrogen and progestin through your skin for 7 days. Over a 4-week period, you use one patch each week for 3 weeks, and then no patch for 1 week. During this week, you have your menstrual period.

Birth control vaginal ring (CVR)

The vaginal ring is small [about 2 in. (5 cm) in diameter], flexible, and colorless. It releases a continuous low dose of hormones into the vagina to prevent pregnancy for that month. You insert the vaginal ring yourself and leave it in place for 3 weeks. This gives you continuous birth control for the month. On the first day of the fourth week, you remove the ring and usually have a menstrual period. The exact position of the ring in the vagina is not critical for it to work.

Why It Is Used

Birth control hormones are commonly used to:

Prevent pregnancy : Birth control hormones prevent pregnancy in three ways. They stop the ovaries from releasing an egg each month (ovulation). They also thicken the mucus in the cervix. This makes it hard for sperm to travel into the uterus. And birth control hormones change the lining of the uterus, which makes it harder for a fertilized egg to attach to it.
Control menstrual periods : Taking estrogen and progestin on a schedule keeps your menstrual periods on a schedule. You can schedule your periods to be every month, every few months, or not at all. This can relieve you of problems that flare with every menstrual cycle, like endometriosis or painful ovarian cysts.
Lighten menstrual bleeding : Normally, the uterus builds up a new lining every month, which then sheds away. This shedding is your menstrual bleeding. Taking hormones keeps the lining from getting very thick, so bleeding is lighter.
Help relieve menstrual pain : Birth control hormones lower your level of prostaglandins, which are one cause of menstrual pain.
Help relieve perimenopausal problems : In the years leading up to menopause, a woman's hormone levels are unpredictable. Taking birth control hormones helps keep hormones even. This can help relieve hot flashes, sleep problems, and depression for many perimenopausal women

Do not use birth control

Uncontrolled high blood pressure (hypertension)
Liver disease
History of blood clots
History of stroke
History of migraine headaches with aura
Diabetes with complications
History of breast cancer (estrogen stimulates certain types of breast cancer)
Breast-feeding in the 6 months after childbirth
Long-term bed rest after a major surgery

Diseases :