Don't Accept His Proposal Until You're Off Birth Control—You Might Be Choosing The Wrong Husband

My college boyfriend and I had broken up the year before, and ever since that breakup, I had been going out with guys who weren’t technically my “type,” or so I thought. Since starting birth control in high school to treat (depending on who you ask) polycystic ovarian syndrome, I had been into nerdy, quiet, Dickensian-looking men who were serious to a fault. Post-birth control, I was more attracted to muscular and bearded lumberjack-looking jovial types. The dichotomy made no sense to me whatsoever.

That was, until I found Dr. Hill’s research and delved into the science behind how artificial hormones dictate who we’re attracted to. But this kind of determination has an evolutionary impact far beyond who we’re attracted to: It can govern who we end up with and even if we’re genetically compatible with the person we intend to start a family with. This means you might not want to accept a marriage proposal until you’re off birth control – you may be choosing the wrong husband.

Birth Control Affects More Than We Think

Women take birth control for all manner of reasons – contraception, acne, hormonal imbalances, heavy periods, or for mere convenience. But whether they’re told upfront or not, most women eventually discover from firsthand experience that birth control affects a whole lot more than just turning off your reproductive functions. You might suffer from mineral depletion, mood swings, low libido, weight gain, migraines, crippling depression, or even all of these side effects. As it turns out, taking artificial hormones, sometimes for years on end, wreaks havoc on our entire body and doesn’t just target what we’re using it for.

Our brain is no exception. The human brain is a complex, fascinating thing, but it also operates on functions, signals, and messaging. Your brain sends signals to you about what you like and don’t like in a mate, seeking to make only the most biologically compatible match for you, especially if you’re a woman of childbearing age. When we’re on birth control, those hormones heavily skew and impact that ability to distinguish what’s compatible and what isn’t.

Most women are easily able to pinpoint what they’re attracted to. Maybe it’s athletic types, burly types, intellectual guys – whatever it may be, if you’re on birth control, your brain is “under the influence” while making that decision for you. When you’re naturally cycling and not on birth control, estrogen increases steadily as your cycle progresses, and as it does so, you become more attracted to partners with the opposite sex hormone – in this case, testosterone, or what Dr. Hill calls “square jaws, deep voices, and swagger.” This is by design, because opposite sex hormones have the best biological chance of producing healthy offspring.

But when your estrogen is quashed by artificial hormones, that natural inclination to be attracted to testosterone is gone, and you might become attracted to estrogen markers, or at least men with less traditional markers of testosterone. This isn’t ideal because you might be drawn to a mate with more similar genetic markers to your own, which don’t provide your children with the best biological framework.

He Might Be a Good Guy, but Wrong for You

Just because you met your boyfriend on birth control doesn’t mean he’s entirely wrong for you. But biologically, your decision-making on birth control and more specifically your brain likely isn’t operating on the most optimum level it could be, which affects your future. Just because he doesn’t look like the Brawny paper towel man doesn’t mean he’s a bad guy. But as many women know, he could be wrong for you.

Picking who we marry is as serious a decision as they come. It affects the trajectory of our entire lives, where we live and what we do for work, and the children we may have. That isn’t a decision to be made lightly, but if it’s made on birth control, we might already be setting ourselves up to fail. Psychologist Rachel Herz refers to this as “picking your cousins as marriage partners.” Yikes.

It’s not our fault that our attraction is skewed. Most women on hormonal birth control aren’t as informed as they could be, and that’s probably on purpose. If every woman was aware of what she could potentially be facing before she made the decision to take birth control, the pharmaceutical industry as we know it would take a devastating blow.

We should all do our best with the information we do have, and in this case, that might mean reevaluating the relationship. If you do feel significantly different about your man off birth control compared to when you were on it, that isn’t something to ignore. Our bodies are constantly trying to send us signals, whether we pay attention to them or not.

Dating vs Marriage

Dating and marriage are obviously different, though we tend to treat them as if they’re interchangeable. Marriage is seen as an outdated institution or unnecessary for two individuals who really love one another – but they’ll still cohabitate, join finances, and be “married” in almost every other aspect without the ceremony or license. 

But the two aren’t the same, and one has more serious connotations than the other. Marriage, ideally, is for the rest of your life once you make the commitment, and going into marriage with the mindset that divorce is always on the table – just in case – is setting yourself up to fail from the outset. This is why it’s absolutely crucial to be confident and assured that the man opposite you is the one you want to spend the rest of your life with.

It might sound severe or even nonsensical to quit birth control before you get married in order to assess how attracted you are to your man, but considering what we know about attraction on birth control, it’s good sense and even practical. Hormonal birth control guides women to pair themselves with more genetically similar men as opposed to genetically dissimilar, who are actually more compatible with them biologically. One study from Psychological Science found that women who were with genetically similar men were less likely to be sexually satisfied by their mate and more likely to cheat. 

No woman who truly and selflessly cares for her man goes into marriage intending to be unfaithful to him. But quitting birth control after marriage and finding yourself less attracted to your husband can lead any woman to question her sex life, whether or not she wants to bring children into the relationship, and the strength of a relationship where there is no passion. Knowing this, it makes more sense why extramarital affairs and divorce are as prevalent as they are today. 

Doing the due diligence before you get married can save everyone involved, at best, discomfort and, at worst, potentially avoidable pain and heartache. No matter how unwieldy these kinds of conversations or breakups can be, it’s always preferable to break up with a boyfriend than a husband – and always better to be alone rather than marry the wrong person for you.

Closing Thoughts

He might look good on paper. He might even be a great guy. But all of these objective qualifiers don’t automatically mean you have to say yes to someone you might not be attracted to after you tie the knot. How hard will it be to start a family, raise kids, or even maintain a marriage if you don’t feel any lasting physical attraction for the other person? Perish the thought.

Every woman deserves to feel passionate, all-consuming love for their man, but when there are outside influences affecting how we see things, it’s better to know sooner rather than later how we’re impacted – and not to do anything we can’t undo should our perception change.

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