In my initial research design I had wanted to send out a survey to many more people to widen the pool of research participants and gather a larger body of data to contextualize my findings with the interviewees. I did not do this in time to generate usable data. I created all the questions, but just never created the actual survey to send out to people. I regret not doing this because it limited the findings of this work to the 12 people I interviewed. I also wish that I had created a demographics survey to send to each of the people I interviewed because that also could have given me better background data to contextualize the findings that arose.
Another thing that I felt strongly about in the initial stages of this research was interviewing people who did not identify as women who were using some form of birth control. I should have done better outreach or put limits on how many female identifying people I was going to interview out of the entire group of participants. As I was talking about this research with a friend, they mentioned how gender affirming it can be for some people not to get periods or how some may use birth control as an easily accessible form of hormone therapy if they are in the initial stages of transitioning. These are some of the stories that I know are out there and if I continue this work I would like to make space to hear them.
Possible new directions for this work include interviews with more practitioners of fertility awareness based methods (FABMs), people who teach the FABMs, and doulas and midwives who work with people post-pregnancy. If I ever expand on this work, I would also like to talk with people who have actively been trying to conceive after using whatever their chosen form of birth control has been. Additionally, I would be curious to interview men and other people who do not actively take responsibility for birth control, but benefit from others using it. I love to live in a world where both parties were active participants in the birth control decision making process.
Or at least a place where both parties felt like there was a shared sense of responsibility to prevent pregnancy.
I repeat the words of Sarah Hill: “You are the only data point that matters when it comes to choosing what works best for you” (Hill). Every person, no matter what I know about them, has a powerful life full of unique experiences that have influenced their perspective and experience using birth control. Though humans are all amazingly similar, more so than we may like to admit, we are also incredibly diverse and the pathways within our brains I imagine are far more varied than science has yet to discover. Each of the stories that these women shared with me are representations of how their life has been influenced, impacted, and changed by using their chosen form of birth control.
I am so grateful for Teresa Mares in supporting this work from day one. She taught me how to develop purposeful questions and truly encouraged me to lead from my heart with this research. She also was instrumental in teaching me how to code and put together this entire paper.. I would also like to say thank you to the other folks in the research design class who listened to me talk about this project. It can be really uncomfortable to talk about sex and birth control, but even in the initial design phases everyone was respectful, intrigued, and so gently supportive and that allowed me to dip my toes into the waters oof talking about topics that can sometimes be considered taboo. I am also grateful for the UVM Anthropology department — all of my anthropology classes I took prepared me for this moment and allowed me to confidently ask questions that I may never have dreamt of as possible before. Lastly, I would like to thank Emily Belarmino for teaching me skills for conducting semi-structured interviews. Working with her this summer prepared me to confidently go into this project.
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