What Functions Does Estrogen Play in the Body?
If you’ve taken a high school health class, you probably know the basics of what estrogen is. It’s the female sex hormone, the counterpart to testosterone, the male sex hormone. All human bodies produce some level of estrogen, so men do make estrogen in the same way that women make testosterone, but if you’re biologically female, estrogen is the main chemical that your body will use to keep your reproductive system on track. But what does this hormone actually do in the literal sense? What will happen in your body if your estrogen levels are healthy, and what will happen if they aren’t? To answer that question, let’s take a look at some of the functions of estrogen.
Ovaries
When it comes to the ovaries, the biggest job of estrogen is to stimulate the production of eggs. MIdway between the start of a woman’s period and the start of her next period is ovulation, and this is the time when estrogen levels in the body are highest. The ovaries produce estrogen and use it to stimulate the egg follicles, which are small, fluid-filled sacs inside the ovaries. One (or sometimes more than one) will release an egg to either be fertilized or be released from the body during the period. After ovulation, estrogen levels in the body begin to drop again.
Uterus
Just as estrogen plays a role in helping the ovaries to release an egg during ovulation, it also helps the uterus prepare for the potential fertilization of that egg. The uterine lining, or endometrium, is the tissue that becomes the placenta if a pregnancy occurs and that is shed as blood during a period if a pregnancy doesn’t occur. Estrogen helps to enhance the endometrium during the leadup to ovulation.
Estrogen also has an effect on cervical mucus, a substance produced by the cervix that changes over the course of the menstrual cycle. Estrogen makes the cervical mucus take on a slippery texture similar to egg whites when a woman is most fertile in order to encourage sperm to find their way towards an egg. Many hormonal birth control methods, like the pill or the IUD, use progestin, an artificial form of progesterone, to do the opposite of what estrogen would do and thicken the cervical mucus in order to make it harder for sperm to enter the uterus.
Vagina
Estrogen’s effects are not only noticeable on the internal organs. In the vagina, estrogen helps to maintain the thickness of the vaginal wall and also encourages lubrication. This is a place that many women will start to feel the effects of falling estrogen levels during menopause. Vaginal dryness, thinning, inflammation, or a loss of elasticity are fairly common things for women to experience later in life, but they can be uncomfortable, unpleasant, and have a damaging effect on a woman’s sex life. Hormone treatments can help to alleviate these symptoms!
Breasts
Estrogen is one of the main hormones affecting changes in the breasts. (This is one of the reasons that if you’ve ever taken the birth control pill, you might’ve noticed a change in your cup size.) Estrogen works together with the growth hormone during puberty to encourage breasts to grow, and the rising and falling levels of estrogen during the menstrual cycle can lead to small changes in breast size and increased tenderness or soreness, depending on the person. When nursing a baby, estrogen also steps in to help stop the flow of milk after the baby is weaned.
As you can see, estrogen is a hormone with many purposes in the body, and that means that in order to be healthy and functioning optimally, your body needs to be producing estrogen in the right levels. If you’re experiencing symptoms such as vaginal dryness, breast tenderness, hot flashes, headaches, and irregular periods, an estrogen imbalance may be the culprit. If this is the case, hormone replacement therapy from Renewed Vitality may be able to help you! Contact us here to learn more about what this revolutionary treatment can do for you.
It’s well known that experiencing menopause symptoms can be physically uncomfortable and even painful, but the important mental changes that come with it are less discussed.
For instance, it’s common for people to assume that menopause refers to a sudden stopping point, specifically when a woman has not had a menstrual period for twelve months or even longer. But there are phyical and mental symptoms as menopause approaches that can last for many years.
Not only that, but a lot of women continue to experience those same or different symptoms post-menopausally, making it essential to recognize that menopause isn’t just s single physical or mental event in a woman’s life. Essentially, women don’t just go through a steady, incremental hormonal decline. Rather, there’s usually a period of fluctuating hormone levels that can make it hard to tell how you’re going to feel day-to-day.
Officially called perimenopause, this is the lead-up to menopause and usually begins for women around their early to mid-forties. In this age range, levels of the hormones that are strongly tied to reproductive capability, like estrogen and progesterone, start to reduce. This decrease in can lead to physical and emotional symptoms, including:
- Hot flashes
- Sweating in your sleep
- Mood swings
- Body and joint aches
- Exhaustion
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Mental fogginess
CBT To Help Menopause Symptoms
The great news is that there’s ongoing research on the benefits of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) when applied to patients with menopause symptoms. CBT is a type of psychotherapy that focuses on changing negative thought patterns and behaviors. This type of therapy helps patients become aware of and resistant to their negative thinking, helping them to respond to challenging situations in better ways.
Specifically, researchers have been looking for reliable therapies to mitigate the severity of experiencing menopause. For example, scientists used CBT to treat menopause symptoms, and it proved effective in reducing hot flashes and night sweats. More generally, CBT showed positive outcomes in the treatment of a variety of mental health conditions, like anxiety and depression. Additionally, a new study published in the journal Menopause concluded that 71 women participants found that cognitive therapy may be effective in managing other symptoms of menopause, including sleep disorders and sexual difficulties.
If you or a loved one are experiencing menopause symptoms, CBT may be a great choice for treating them and the negative thoughts surrounding them. In addition to looking for and exploring therapeutic support, you can help yourself with menopause symptoms by practicing the tips below:
Challenge Your Negative Thinking
Trying to better understand how your thinking patterns impact your experience with menopause doesn’t mean your negative symptoms aren’t valid, but it thankfully does give you more control. Consider what are you thinking during a hot flash, a moment of exhaustion, or a sexual experience—and how might negative thinking be worsening things? For instance, are you angry with yourself at having a flash in the first place or worried that people will notice? This could be creating more anxiety than you should have to deal with.
If you’ve found a thought process that you think is negatively impacting your menopause symptoms, you have the power to change it! For example, are you actually noticing that people are judging you negatively for having a hot flash—or is it more likely that people aren’t aware in the first place?
Find Support In Others
Beyond effective therapy, if needed, it could be helpful to connect with other women experiencing similar difficulties. Although symptoms like hot flashes and night sweats are well documented and researched, many people are not as aware of the chronic fatigue, overall feeling of unwellness, and other changes in your mood that can result from menopausal challenges. Connecting with women who are experiencing similar symptoms can help you cope in a more positive way that leaves you feeling more available to be productive and like yourself.
Embrace The Potential For Change
It can seem almost impossible to view menopause as a time for positive development. But even among all of the menopausal challenges a lot of women face, it’s possible to think of menopause as a positive phase in life. Consider that many women see the experience as an opportunity to embark on new professions or practice new creative endeavors. Embracing that life is a temporary thing can be a useful tool toward making the most of it. As our bodies, emotions, and minds change, considering yourself and your well-being as the main focus could open up possibilities for all kinds of positive change.
Are you or a loved one struggling with menopausal symptoms? Hormone replacement therapy at Renewed Vitality could be a great option! At Renewed Vitality, our bioidentical hormones are more efficient and carry fewer adverse health risks than synthetic hormone options. For example, giving yourself a boost of testosterone or estrogen as needed can help you feel healthier and more like yourself. If you’re interested in this treatment, please contact us here to learn more!
It’s almost Mother’s Day, and it’s time for everyone to start planning a wonderful day for the mothers in their life! Whether you’re celebrating your own mom, a grandmother, aunt, sister, wife, or friend, this day is about honoring the special women that you love and showing your thanks for all of the hard work they do. Luckily, the Berks County area is full of restaurants, events, and destinations that will give you the perfect ways to celebrate Mother’s Day with your family and loved ones. From delicious meals to stunning gardens, there’s someone here for everyone! Here are a few ideas for Mother’s Day activities in Berks County that you can check out with the special mom in your life!
Mother’s Day Tea Train
Join the Colebrookdale Railroad Company this Sunday for their traditional Mother’s Day Tea! You and your special lady can enjoy turn-of-the-century splendor as you take in the scenic route of this 100-year-old train. What could be better than combining the beautiful views of the Secret Valley Heritage Area with a sophisticated tea service? This opportunity is not to be skipped, so be sure to reserve your tickets now!
Stouch Tavern
To so many people, Mother’s Day is synonymous with brunch, and restaurants across the country pull out the stops on this day of the year to showcase their best breakfast and lunch specials for hungry families. At Stouch Tavern in Womelsdorf, the brunch menu for Mother’s Day does not disappoint! Get ready to savor baked ham in peach glaze, baked french toast with vanilla cream sauce, cheesy egg bake, chicken in champagne cream sauce, carrot cake, brownies, and more! You won’t want to miss these delicious favorites from one of the oldest establishments in the area.
Jenkins Arboretum & Gardens
If the special woman in your life this year is a flower lover, then take her for a visit to the Jenkins Arboretum and Gardens in Devon. May is the perfect time to really enjoy the beauty of spring, and from asters to azaleas, the botanical gardens here are in bloom and waiting for you! Admission to the gardens is free, making this a great way to relax and unwind on Mother’s Day afternoon and appreciate the season in its peak.
Spring House Tavern
The Spring House Tavern has been a landmark in Spring House, PA since 1719, and their Mother’s Day brunch menu has a little something for everyone. From a prime rib and ham carving station and made-to-order omelets to lobster ravioli and eggs benedict, there’s no end to what you can enjoy here. A menu of specialty cocktails helps to make Mom’s day even more exciting, and homemade desserts add the perfect finishing touch. If this menu is making your mouth water already, don’t wait to make your reservations!
Mary Cross at the Reading Doubletree Hilton
If you have a music lover who’s celebrating this Mother’s Day, Mary Cross performing at the Doubletree Hilton in Reading, PA will be the one thing you want to be sure you see. From 2 pm to 6 pm you can enjoy a fabulous brunch and live music from “soul stylista” Mary Cross. Reserve your tickets for this exclusive concert here and spend the afternoon drinking in the incredible performance with someone you love!
Berks County provides a wide range of great options for Mother’s Day activities, but no matter what you choose to spend your time doing this Mother’s Day, as long as you’re with the people you love, celebrating the women who keep your family functioning, you’ll be sure to have a wonderful time. Happy Mother’s Day from all of us here at Renewed Vitality!
It’s no secret that as you age, sex can start to look different from how it did when you were younger. This is a combination of many different factors, from the shifting mental, emotional, and social influences on your life to physical and chemical changes in your body. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing– it’s natural for your sex drive to change and slow down as you get older, and you can still have a healthy sex life no matter your age. It’s good to know what changes to expect, however, and that if you’re struggling with changes to your sex drive as you age, there are routes you can take to help combat the less-than-enjoyable effects. Here’s a quick breakdown of what the evolution of an adult’s sex drive typically looks like. Remember, everyone is different, so these are not hard and fast milestones so much as generalizations.
20s and 30s
You might assume that both men and women have their highest libidos around the same age, but that’s surprisingly not true! In men, testosterone is high in the 20s, and sex drive is usually high along with it.
For women, libido is a little lower during the 20s but tends to go up in the 30s. Sex drive is a very complicated subject, and scientists haven’t conclusively proven why this happens, but it’s generally assumed that there’s a correlation between the increase of sex drive and the decrease in fertility that happens in the late 20s to 30s. High fertility in your 20s might lead to an evolutionary instinct to be more selective about sex.
Pregnancy
Most women who have children do so sometime in their 20s and 30s, and this has some serious effects of sex drive, not just during the pregnancy, but afterwards as well. It’s common to experience a boost in libido during the second trimester and be disinterested in sex at other times, but this isn’t the case for everyone. Some women experience an unusually high sex drive during pregnancy, or an unusually low one, or they might be anxious about whether it’s safe (the answer is typically yes, but double check with your doctor if you’re nervous). The stress of raising children can also lead to a decrease in sex drive after the baby arrives.
40s
Around the age of 35, testosterone levels in men start to drop, which can cause a decrease in sex drive as well. These changing hormone levels continue into the 40s, and the decrease might be fairly gradual for some men or faster for others.
Women, on the other hand, tend to have fairly high sex drives and active sex lives in their 40s. Some studies indicate that women around this age are more likely to have sex more often and earlier on in a relationship, as well as having more intense fantasies.
50s
For men, sex drive around this age is usually significantly lower than it was earlier in life, although there’s no reason for this to get in the way of a healthy sex life. Erectile dysfunction does become more common in men as they get older, but this actually has less to do with age and more to do with other health problems that become common with age, like obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and high cholesterol. Medications for these conditions and others can also lead to erectile dysfunction, and you should discuss it with your doctor if it’s becoming a problem.
For women, lowered stress levels from environmental factors like the kids moving out or less worry around getting pregnant might lead to an increased interest in sex, but the onset of menopause can throw a bit of a wrench in the works with hormonoal changes leading to things like vaginal dryness, lowered libido, and mood changes or sleep problems. These are also things you should discuss with your doctor.
What Can I Do?
If you’re struggling with the effects of aging on your sex life, hormone replacement therapy might be a great option for you! At Renewed Vitality, our bioidentical hormones are more efficient and have less adverse effects than synthetic hormones, and giving yourself a boost of testosterone or estrogen as needed can help to get you feeling more normal and get your sex life back on track. If you’re interested in this treatment, please contact us here to learn more!
Let’s face it: dating is no cakewalk even when you’re young, but when you get older, it gets more and more difficult. You become busier, your needs and standards become more concrete, and depending on your situation, you might be getting back into the dating game after being out of it for a while. Sometimes, the whole thing might feel like more trouble than it’s worth, but just because dating in your 50s and above isn’t as easy as dating in your 20s, that doesn’t mean that you should simply content yourself to be alone if it isn’t what you really want! Finding and building a happy relationship in your older years is 100% possible, and whether you’re divorced, widowed, getting out of a long relationship or just never dated much to begin with, you can still find love at any age. Dating later in life can look quite a bit different to dating in young adulthood, so here are some tips for dating over 50 that you might find useful!
Don’t Apologize for Your Age
First and foremost, you should never feel like your age is something you have to conceal, be embarrassed about, or explain away. Trying to look or act younger than you are isn’t going to improve the impression you make on people– in fact, it’ll probably seem fake and might put people off. You may feel the urge to airbrush wrinkles out of profile pictures or even lie about your age, but that’s an urge worth resisting.
Age is not something to be ashamed of! You’ve lived a wonderful life, experienced many fun and interesting things, and you still have a long way to go on your journey with more goals to achieve. Don’t be scared to let people see that about you. Confidence and embracing who you are will always be attractive.
Don’t Dwell on Past Relationships
You can tell a lot about someone by the way they talk about their ex. This is both a pointer for you and a tool that you can use to screen potential significant others. Relationships, especially long-standing ones, can be messy, but if a person talks about a past love or spouse with a lot of anger and hatred, especially while you’re still just getting to know them, it’s almost always a red flag, especially if they have more than one story of a relationship turned sour. Remember, if they have one “crazy” ex, it’s probably the ex. If they have multiple crazy exes, it’s probably them that’s the crazy one.
If you have a relationship in your past, try to always talk about your former partner with as much respect and composure as possible, even if things didn’t end on the best of terms. Additionally, although it can be hard, fight the urge to compare your new relationship to a past one. You’re getting to know a new person now, so try to put aside your expectations and meet them with an open mind!
Embrace Technology
If you’ve been out of the dating game a while, getting back into the swing of things can make you feel like you went to sleep and accidentally woke up years in the future. Things have changed a lot in the dating world, and adjusting to it can be tricky. However, once you get over the fear factor, you might find that the rise of technology in dating is actually very useful. Dating apps are a great way to get the ball rolling on meeting people nearby, particularly if you don’t have a lot of time to meet people out and about. There are even apps aimed specifically at older age groups, so don’t be afraid to get in there and give them a try. Don’t be scared to get flirtatious over text either!
Additionally, technology can help with the safety element of dating. Now you can do a quick google search of a potential partner, and it’s always better to find out about that mugshot right from the start than it is to be surprised by it down the line. On most phones today, there’s also a feature that lets you share your geographical location with a contact, which is a good thing to do as a safety precaution before you head out on a date with someone you don’t know that well.
Have Fun!
Take a deep breath and try to relax. Trying to balance your busy life with finding love can be stressful, but remember that dating is supposed to be fun! One of the downsides of dating as a young adult is that the pressure to get married and have a family before you’re “past your prime” is intense. When you date at an older age, one of the main perks is that the pressure is off! You can still date with the intention of getting married, and having a family together isn’t off the table, but you can take things at a relaxed, more casual pace and fall in love with someone in your own time. Feel free to let loose, be playful, and enjoy where the next years of your life are going to take you. Good luck!
Mental wellness and sex are a lot more closely connected than they might seem at first glance. Although they’re incredibly different from person to person, everyone needs to have balance between these two factors. Whether they engage in intimacy with one person, multiple people, or individually, good mental health is tied to a healthy sex life, and a healthy sex life is tied to good mental health. With age, it can be common for sex drive to decrease, which can have unexpected results on a person’s mental wellbeing, so making an effort to keep your sex life active later in life can be very helpful! Here are some of the benefits of a healthy sex life on your mental wellness.
Relationship Benefits
If you’re in a relationship, keeping up with your sex life can do a lot of good things for you and your partner. Physical intimacy encourages communication and bonding between partners, boosts self esteem and self image, and can help lower relational anxiety, or anxiousness around relating to or bonding with other people. Overall, it helps to bring you closer together and make your relationship stronger and happier, which is never a bad thing!
Lowered Stress
Sex offers all the same benefits of exercise, so it has the added side bonus of lowering your stress levels by releasing your body’s feel-good hormones, endorphins and oxytocin. Overall they help you to feel more relaxed and stave off feelings of anxiety and depression.
Improved Mood
Just like your daily mental health walk helps you to feel happier, so does sex! The same hormones that are associated with lowered stress levels, endorphins and oxytocin, as well as serotonin, can help you to feel happier and put some more pep in your step throughout the day.
Better Sleep
A healthy and active sex life will be a big help to your sleep patterns. The brain chemicals released during sex help you to feel relaxed and sleepy, which can help you get a better night’s shut-eye. Poor sleep can be extremely detrimental to your mental health, even just one night and especially if it becomes a chronic problem, so by helping you to sleep better, sex can also better equip you to handle your mental wellness.
Between changes in your sex drive as you age, increased stress, and a busy lifestyle, keeping your sex life active and healthy can start to feel like an afterthought, but the benefits you can get from making it a priority in your life are worth the effort it takes to make time for it. Whether you’re in a committed or casual relationship or you’re single, you can still enjoy all the mental health benefits, not to mention the physical health benefits!
If you’re struggling with sexual issues like low libido, speaking to a professional can make a huge difference. Renewed Vitality in Berks County is the area’s premier facility for hormone replacement therapy (HRT), which can be exceptionally helpful in terms of improving your sex life, especially as you age. We have both male and female patients, and we offer safe, effective treatments to help with hormone imbalances and restore your quality of life. Contact us to learn more about what this treatment can do for you!
Happy National Women’s History Month! It’s March, and that means it’s time to look back and celebrate the accomplishments of incredible women of the past and present who made amazing advances in their field. Medicine was regarded as a man’s profession in many places and times throughout history, but that didn’t stop their female counterparts from making contributions to the medical sciences in spite of the barriers in their way. For instance, Florence Nightingale is the reason that nursing is a profession today, and many of our modern medical sanitary practices can be traced back to her work. There are plenty of other amazing women in medical history to be discussed, so let’s take a look at some of them!
Elizabeth Blackwell
Elizabeth Blackwell was the first woman in America to receive a medical degree. Early in her life, she had an experience in which a friend of hers became very sick and remarked that if she had been able to have a female physician, she might not have suffered so much, and this inspired her to pursue medicine. Blackwell, who began her professional life as a schoolteacher, began applying to medical schools and was turned away almost everywhere she applied, except for Geneva Medical School, which is now the Norton College of Medicine at State University of New York Upstate Medical University. Her admittance there was put to a vote of the all-male student body, with the rule that if even one of them voted no, she would not be admitted. As the story goes, the students assumed it was a joke and unanimously voted to accept her. Blackwell got the last laugh, as she graduated from Geneva Medical School in 1849. Ultimately she went on to found medical schools and infirmaries, organize nurses for the Union during the American Civil War, and publish several books on medicine.
Margaret Higgins Sanger
Margaret Higgins Sanger is one of the pioneers of the field of contraception, which was a dangerous profession during the early 20th century. Her work was so controversial, in fact, that at one point she was forced to flee America and stay in Britain until she knew it was safe to return. She was arrested for opening a birth control clinic in 1916, but was undaunted, and went on to found the American Birth Control League in 1921, which later became Planned Parenthood. In New York City, she organized the first birth control, which was staffed by all-female doctors, and she also organized a clinic in Harlem with an all African-American advisory council. Her work was pivotal in contraception becoming not only legal but socially acceptable in America.
Rebecca Lee Crumpler
Rebecca Lee Crumpler was America’s first female African-American physician, which is especially amazing given that when she attended medical school and was named a Doctor of Medicine, America was in the midst of the Civil War, and Crumpler faced not only sexism but intense racism in opposition to her becoming a physician. After the war, she worked in Richmond, Virginia, caring mostly for poor African-American women and children, which she considered to be excellent missionary work. Eventually she published a book, titled A Book of Medical Discourses, in 1883, which focused mostly on the care of women and children based on what she learned working in Richmond.
Gertrude Elion
Gertrude Elion was an American biochemist and pharmacologist who won a Nobel Prize in 1988 in Physiology or Medicine, an honor she shared with George H. Hitchings and Sir James Black. Their work focused on a principle called rational drug design for the creation of new medicines. Her parents were Eastern European Jewish immigrants, and after she graduated from Hunter College in New York, she had to work as a secretary and teacher and take an unpaid position doing research in a lab, since it was incredibly difficult for women to find paid research jobs at the time. The work she went on to do later in her life would lead to the creation of AZT, one of the first drugs available to treat HIV and AIDS. She also helped create immunosuppressants used for organ transplants, treatments for leukemia and viral herpes, and other lifesaving drugs.
Becky McClure
Last but certainly not least, Becky McClure is an incredible woman in medicine! She helps to change people’s lives with her individualistic approach and cutting-edge hormone replacement therapy. Her work helps both men and women to feel revitalized, active, and healthy. She’s been in healthcare for over 30 years now and has been practicing state of the art pellet therapy for over 10 years, and helping people to take their lives back is her passion. Her work might be able to help you too, so don’t hesitate to contact Renewed Vitality today to learn more!
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to be a major threat to public health, and vaccinations are proving to be incredibly helpful in slowing the spread and the virus and reducing the intensity of the illness in those who do contract it. Although the available vaccines against COVID-19 have all been authorized by the FDA, many people are still concerned about the safety and efficacy of the drug. Some wonder if the vaccine will affect their period and their reproductive health.
As of now, injection site pain, fatigue, and fever are the most common side effects of the Pfizer, Johnson and Johnson, and Moderna vaccines, but changes to the menstrual cycle are not listed as side effects for any of them. However, there have been some women reporting that their periods were disrupted after receiving the vaccine. Dr. Victoria Male, a reproductive specialist at Imperial College London has been calling for further research into the effects of the vaccines on reproductive health, and says that over 30,000 people have reported some change to their period following vaccination. However, she also reports that cycles typically return to normal the next month and that there is no evidence that receiving a COVID-19 vaccination has any negative effects on fertility.
About 213 million Americans are currently fully vaccinated against COVID-19. The 30,000 that Dr. Male reports have experienced menstrual changes make up a comparatively small number. Dr. Male believes that the reason the effects of the vaccine on periods is not currently well-researched is because the percentage of people who experience them is so small. However, she believes that this research is important in order to dispel public fear around the lifesaving vaccine, especially the idea that it will cause infertility.
“Vaccine hesitancy among young women is largely driven by false claims that covid-19 vaccines could harm their chances of future pregnancy,” she writes in an editorial for the BMJ. “Failing to thoroughly investigate reports of menstrual changes after vaccination is likely to fuel these fears.”
Dr. Male hypothesizes that “if there is a connection, it is likely to be a result of the immune response to vaccination rather than a specific vaccine component. Vaccination against human papillomavirus (HPV) has also been associated with menstrual changes. Indeed, the menstrual cycle can be affected by immune activation in response to various stimuli, including viral infection.” Essentially, the correlation between the vaccine and menstrual disruption does not mean that part of the vaccine is having a negative effect on a woman’s cycle. Periods can be skipped or even stop altogether over something as simple as stress, and as the vaccine produces the necessary immune response that helps the body to fight off COVID-19 in the future, it’s possible that the stress of that response on the body could cause a change to your cycle.
This reported side effect of the vaccine is not fully understood at this time, but neither is menstrual health. In an interview to Medical News Today, Dr. Sarah Gray– a general practitioner and women’s health expert based in Cornwall, England– said that “Women’s health has not been a research priority for the last 20 years and there is much we do not know.”
The situation at hand requires further research into both the effects of the COVID-19 vaccine on women’s health and into women’s health in general. The first half of this two-part dilemma is already beginning to be addressed, with a study published in January of 2022 that included nearly 4,000 individuals and turned up that the vaccine has minor effects on the length of the cycle, but that these changes were temporary. Continued research will need to be conducted, but women receiving the vaccine should rest assured that although there is a small chance they will notice temporary changes to their period, the COVID-19 vaccine does not pose a danger to their reproductive health and fertility, and the virus remains a greater threat than the vaccine.
