On “Sweetening the Pill” with Laura Wershler

With just a few days left for the Kickstarter campaign by Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein to raise the funds needed to make their next documentary, Julie spoke with Laura Wershler about many of the topics to be brought into main stream attention about hormonal birth control.

Topic of Conversation: Synthetic Birth Control

“Inspired by the provocative 2013 book Sweetening the Pill: Or How We Got Hooked on Hormonal Birth Control by Holly Grigg-Spall, Sweetening the Pill, the documentary, aims to fairly critique hormonal birth control and raise awareness of non-hormonal alternatives. Lake and Epstein hope to do for birth control what their acclaimed documentary The Business of Being Born did for birth, get us thinking beyond a one-size-fits-all approach. Currently for contraception, that one-size approach is all about synthetic hormones packaged as—what are now being called—modern contraceptive methods.” Read the full article here.

Our Guest: Laura Wershler

Laura Wershler, B.Sc., is a veteran pro-choice sexual and reproductive health advocate and women’s health critic who has worked for or volunteered with Planned-Parenthood-affiliated organizations in Canada since 1986. Ms Wershler wrote the foreword to the book, Sweetening the Pill. Laura graduated with a Certificate in Journalism from Mount Royal University in 2011. She has contributed columns on women’s health to Troymedia.com and blogs regularly for re:Cycling, the blog of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research. Follow her on Twitter @laurawershler

Resources for Further Reading

Body Literacy, “Sweetening the Pill” Book, Cycle Tracking App