> The birth control pill has been life-changing for generations of women. It has allowed us to dream bigger and achieve more than even the most optimistic feminist would have ever dared imagine possible 60 years ago. Freeing women from the possibility of an unintended pregnancy has removed a powerful storm cloud that was perpetually present for our college-bound grandmothers and great-grandmothers. It allowed women – for the very first time in history – to plan. Well damn, these wonder drugs sound... terrible! > Life causes stress. Our stress response is the way that our body copes with and manages the stress created by our crazy, overscheduled lives. The specifics of the stress response differ a little bit depending on what’s stressing us out (e.g., pressing deadline versus wildebeest stampede), but there are a few common ingredients that operate across pretty much all of them. One these ingredients is release of the stress hormone cortisol. Cortisol’s job is to dump fat and sugar into the bloodstream to allow for quick escape from danger, regulate inflammatory activity in preparation for injury, and potentiate brain cell activity to allow us to learnfrom our stressful experiences. Each of these activities is integral to our ability to adaptively respond to stress, so much so that we see it in virtually all healthy, functioning living organisms. Makes you wonder how much of what is accepted as the nature of a woman is due to this drug.