Getting off Birth Control Pills

July 19, 2008

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Getting off Birth Control Pills

by Marjorie Greenfield, M.D.
reviewed by Marjorie Greenfield, M.D.

You have taken the Pill for months or maybe years, and now you have made the decision to have a baby. How do you discontinue your pills and get started with this next phase of life?

The usual recommendation is to stop taking the Pill two or three months before you want to start trying to conceive. This allows the hormones contained in birth control pills to leave your system and your natural hormonal cycles to resume. During this time, your periods may be irregular, and you may want to use a barrier method of birth control, such as condoms or spermicide. Also, be sure to start taking a folic acid supplement, just in case you get pregnant a little earlier than you planned (folic acid helps prevent certain birth defects during the first few months of pregnancy).

If you're wondering why another method of birth control is recommended during the few months between discontinuing the Pill and beginning your efforts to conceive, here are several good reasons.

Why wait to conceive?
Since many women's cycles become irregular after they stop taking the Pill, those who are using no method of birth control are never quite sure when or whether they have conceived. In reality, many women don't even ovulate until a month or more after they've finished their last cycle of pills. Women who are used to the extreme regularity of their cycles on the Pill often wonder, Is my period late because I'm pregnant or because my cycles haven't become regular yet? This leads to three potential problems:

If you ovulate quickly after discontinuing your pills and get pregnant, you may not be aware that you've conceived and therefore may still be doing the things you shouldn't, like regularly drinking alcohol, lots of coffee, or caffeinated soda.

If you get pregnant in the first month or two, it won't be clear when you conceived, and your practitioner may have difficulty establishing an accurate due date for you. This problem can be somewhat ameliorated with an early ultrasound but that is an expensive alternative to simply knowing the date of a reliable, regular last period.

If your periods coming off the Pill are irregular, you may start wondering constantly if you are pregnant. This can be immensely frustrating (not to mention expensive if you keep buying home pregnancy tests to check.) Also, you may end up feeling as if you and your partner have been trying to conceive for months, when in reality you've only just had your first off-the-Pill ovulation.

Does getting pregnant soon after being on the Pill have medical risks?
Sometimes when a couple decides to get pregnant, they are raring to go and want to get started right away. If this sounds like you, there's good news--it does not pose a serious medical problem to conceive immediately after discontinuing the Pill. There are no known birth defects caused by birth control pills, whether you are taking pills at the time of conception or have just recently discontinued them. In addition, no risk of miscarriage or any other pregnancy complication has been linked to the Pill. The greatest arguments for delaying pregnancy a couple of months are simply the ones listed above.


RELATED INFORMATION

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Created April 26, 2001
Reviewed August 14, 2004

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