Are Birth Control Pills the Largest Uncontrolled Experiment in Medical History? BY LESLIE CAROL BOTHA
Editor on 
When the birth control pill came on the market in the 60âs it bolstered a feminist revolution giving women new freedoms and the right to control their reproductive health. Somewhere along the way our right to birth control is being used to control our bodies. The pill has been promoted as a safe, easy to take daily medication â now known to cause severe side effects and death.
Holly Grigg-Spall, author of âSweetening the Pill â How We Got Hooked on Hormonal Birth Controlâ will be sharing research and concerns about synthetic hormones on Holy Hormones Honey this Thursday, September 5th at 9 am on VoiceAmerica Health and Wellness and on demand here.
We should all be concerned. By 2015 over 200 million women will be on birth control. How many of us know how this drug works â how many are told about the potential side effects â and how many of us know that it depletes vital nutrients that can cause depression, anxiety, and panic attacks? According to Holly â over 80% of women who pop the pill experience these symptoms over their life time.
Holly Grigg-Spall, author of Sweetening the Pill Or How We Became Hooked on Hormonal Birth Control, Holly is a womenâs health writer and activist whose blog documenting her personal transition off the pill gained international recognition from The BBC, The Washington Post, The Times (UK), and The Independent (UK).
Holly began writing a blog in 2009. When in London, England she had an article published in Easy Living on the side effects of the birth control pill. Her research was prompted by her own experience with Yasmin. After researching the pill Holly realized that after 10 years on synthetic hormone contraception, she needed to come off the pill completely. The blog became a place to document her transition and the steep learning curve that came with that choice.
Holly has contributed to Ms. Magazine’s blog, and she writes regularly for the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research blog re: Cycling. Holly has been interviewed on BBC Radio and now appears on Holy Hormones Honey!
Leslie Carol Botha
Leslie Carol Botha, host of Holy Hormones on the VoiceAmerica Health and Wellness Channel, is a Womenâs Health Educator and Internationally Recognized Expert on Womenâs Hormones and Behaviors. She is the co-author of the highly acclaimed Understanding Your Mind, Mood, and Hormone Cycle, the first in a menstrual health education series that provides women with the education they never received about how their hormone cycle affects not only their minds, and moods, but their personal and professional relationships and their overall health and happiness.
Botha is a member of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research, and an advisory board member for the Cycles Research Institute. In 2006, Botha received the Edward R. Dewey Award for her pioneering research on how womenâs hormonal fluctuations affect their behaviors. The award was bequeathed by the Foundation for the Study of Cycles.
Her research is also featured in The World According to Cycles- How Recurring Forces Can Predict the Future and Change Your Life by Samuel A. Schreiner, Jr., published by Skyhorse Publishing, New York City. Schreiner has noted that Botha is âone of the most prominent twenty-first century natural cycle thinkers.â
Botha has been a radio broadcast journalist for over 30 years. Her message is loud and clear: it is time for women to reclaim their health, and her passion and drive is to provide information to assist women in making informed choices about their health and well-being.
