TikTok’s favorite birth control method is more like no birth control at all.
On the Gen-Z-beloved app ― approximately 60% of its users are in their teens and 20s ― “natural” birth control is having a moment: Terms like “birth control natural alternatives” are trending, with wellness influencers encouraging other women to quit birth control and track their fertility cycles naturally (or with apps) and use herbal supplements to avoid getting pregnant.
For the last few years, these TiKTokers ― some of whom bill themselves as “holistic healers” ― have been arguing that hormonal birth control comes with too many risks to be safe to use, from depression, negative changes in gut biome, balding, and even irreversible infertility.
“Birth control is one of the most damaging things you can put in your body,” one video by @theworkoutwitch claims, before outlining all the ways birth control supposedly wreaks havoc on your body’s biological stress response.
“The birth control industry ain’t gonna like the fertility awareness women UPRISING,” another TikToker wrote, while claiming natural methods are 98% effective at preventing pregnancy.
