Habits and Hustle - Episode 449: Dr. Sarah Hill: How Birth Control Changes Your Brain, Dating Choices, and Evolutionary Psychology

Episode Date: May 13, 2025

Is hormonal birth control affecting more than just pregnancy prevention? In this Habits and Hustle podcast episode, I am joined by Dr. Sarah Hill, an evolutionary psychologist and author who explains the surprising ways birth control pills influence women's brains, behavior, and mate selection. We discuss how synthetic hormones alter women's natural cycles, changing partner preferences and affecting emotional responses. We also explore the fascinating science behind mate selection through an evolutionary lens, why men are attracted to women at peak fertility, and how birth control can disrupt the pheromonal cues that influence attraction. Dr. Sarah Hill is an evolutionary psychologist, author, and researcher who earned her Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin working with Dr. David Buss. Her research focuses on understanding behavior and motivation through the lens of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, with particular emphasis on women's psychology, hormones, and sexual motivation.  What We Discuss:  (00:00) Birth Control & Women's Psychological States (04:14) Effects of Birth Control on Emotions (15:26) Relationship Changes After Birth Control (19:22) Hormonal Birth Control and Pheromones (27:05) Partner Preferences and Attraction Triggers (34:43) Modern Dating Challenges and Hormones (39:01) Modern Dating Delays Marriage (42:51) Women's Relationship Choices and Evolution (48:07) Competition, Jealousy, and Marriage Threats (55:27) Divorce, Dating, and Female Friendship (01:04:43) Hormonal Birth Control and Side Effects …and more! Thank you to our sponsors: Therasage: Head over to therasage.com and use code Be Bold for 15% off  TruNiagen: Head over to truniagen.com and use code HUSTLE20 to get $20 off any purchase over $100. Magic Mind: Head over to www.magicmind.com/jen and use code Jen at checkout. Air Doctor: Go to airdoctorpro.com and use promo code HUSTLE for up to $300 off and a 3-year warranty on air purifiers.  Bio.me: Link to daily prebiotic fiber here, code Jennifer20 for 20% off.  Momentous: Shop this link and use code Jen for 20% off   Find more from Jen:  Website: https://www.jennifercohen.com/ Instagram: @therealjencohen   Books: https://www.jennifercohen.com/books Speaking: https://www.jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagement Find more from Dr. Sarah Hill: Website: https://www.sarahehill.com/  Books: https://www.sarahehill.com/your-brain-on-birth-control/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahehillphd/

Hi guys, it's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits and Hustle. Crush it! Can birth control really change who you're attracted to or even who you become? On this episode of Habits and Hustle, I'm joined by Dr. Sarah Hill, who's an evolutionary psychologist and author to explore how hormonal birth control impacts the brain, behavior, and mate choice. We dive into how the pill can alter sexual desire, stress response, emotional sensitivity, and even influence the type of partner you're drawn to. It may even affect your mental health and motivation in ways most women aren't told. So whether you're using birth control or just curious, this is an eye-opening conversation that will change how you think about hormones and your

identity. Before we dive into today's episode, I first want to thank our sponsor, Therisage. Their Tri-Lite panel has become my favorite biohacking thing for healing my body. It's a portable red light panel that I simply cannot live without. I literally bring it with me everywhere I go. And I personally use their red light therapy to help reduce inflammations in places in my body where honestly I have pain. You can use it on a sore back, stomach cramps, shoulder, ankle. Red light therapy is my go-to. Plus, it also has amazing anti

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Okay you guys, this is going to be a goodie. We have Dr. Sarah Hill on the podcast today, who is an evolutionary psychologist. By the way, I want you to tell us what that is, but she is someone who talks all about hormones, the effects of birth control, you wrote a whole book on this, and mating, which is, again, I love all your stuff. So I'm so happy you're here today. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here and I will tell you what an evolutionary psychologist is. Please. So I'm a psychologist and the thing I'm really interested in is trying to study behavior and motivation. So I'm like really interested in why people do things that they do. And the lens that

I use to do my research is that of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. And all that that means is that I use the tools from evolutionary theory to make new predictions about why people do the things that they do and think the things that they think and feel the things that they feel. Yeah. That's it. That's a great summary of what you do. But then you wrote a book about birth control. Yes. of what you do. But then you wrote a book about birth control. But you wrote that book a while ago, but it's been seeming to get a lot of traction recently. Yeah, so I did. So I wrote the book in 2019. It was published in 2019. And I've spent my research career studying women and

trying to understand especially sexual motivation. That has been sort of my bread and butter in research is trying to understand women's motivational states with respect to sexual relationships. And then I went off the birth control pill that I had been on for more than a decade of my life. And when I went off of it, I felt like I woke up. I felt like I went from like a black and white line drawing into this full dimensional colorful reality. And I kept asking myself like, is there something about those hormones that I was on that influenced me? And you know, it's funny because I had published in my research that I had done, you know, throughout my career studying women and women's psychology, published papers about the ways that women's

hormones affect their motivational states and sexual desire and everything else and never even crossed my mind that these synthetic hormones that I was taking were then of course also going to influence the way that my brain worked and the way I felt and the way I experienced things. And so I went to the research literature to see what had been published on birth control pill in women's brains and I I saw that, oh my gosh, you know, there's all this research that's been around for like 30 years that nobody's ever told anything about. And so that's what ultimately led me into that research area to really begin to uncover

what we know and don't know about hormonal birth control in the brain. And as you noted, I did publish this in 2019 and it's really, you know, in lot of ways, it was a little bit before its time because people were really having these conversations yet about birth control. And it's really been in the last two years or so that things have really exploded and women are really interested in trying to better understand, one, what do birth control pills do to their brain

and the way that they experience the world, but then also who are they off of it and trying to better understand the role of their hormones and everything else in the way that they experience the world. So why do you think now or like two years ago, it became such a hashtag worthy topic like hormones, it's become very trendy, It's very big. Like you said, what do you think? What was the like, what was the trajectory that all of a sudden people are really talking about this now? Yeah, that's such a great question. And I've always wondered it myself. I mean, I think

it was a combination of, you know, I think that the pandemic made us all look inward, just in terms of our health and trying to understand our bodies. It gave us a lot more time because we had time on our hands during that time to try to educate ourselves. So I think that there was a little bit of that where people were kind of trying to understand their bodies a little bit more during the pandemic because they were trying to keep themselves healthy in the face of this, you know, unpredictable kind of a virulent threat. But I also think that just as the next generation of women has sort of started to phase out of the reproductive years and younger women have sort of moved into that space, this is a much more savvy population in some ways. Like I'm a Gen Xer and when I was growing up,

if my doctor gave me something, I never thought twice about it. I didn't think about what was in my tampons. You know, I didn't think about anything. I mean, it was just like, okay, this is like what you take and this is what you put in your body. And you know what I mean? And the younger generation of women are suspicious of that.

And they're like, wait a minute, like what is in these tampons? And you know, sure enough, it's a bunch of chemicals. And now there's like labels on there and we know what's in them. And so I think as these women who are a little bit more suspicious of the idea of just put something in your body and shut up little lady, you know, that they're not willing to put up with that. And so I think that these younger generation of women in their quest to try to better understand what's going into their bodies has really begun to do a deep dive and trying to understand

the impact of synthetic hormones and in particular the pill on the way that their bodies sort of experience the world. So let's talk about that because I think this is how I found you because you initially started talking about how our brains are very different and our choices or life choices are very different when we're on birth control versus when we're not on birth control. Can you just talk about some of these major things that change our brains when we're on on synthetic hormones? Yeah, absolutely. So the first thing that we need to do is just orient ourselves to a naturally cycling woman, right? So this is

somebody who's not using hormonal birth control. And let's learn a little bit or talk about a little bit about what their hormones do. If you are a naturally cycling woman, meaning you're not on the pill but you're having cycles, the first day of your cycle is the day you get your period. That's why your doctor is always asking, when was the first day of your last menstrual period? It's because that is the start of your cycle. At that point, your levels of sex hormones are really low. Even though women get a hard time

all the time about being hormonal because they're having that period, that is literally the time in the cycle when our hormones are at their absolute lowest. And when our hormones are really low, that tells our brain that it needs to stimulate our ovaries to begin egg follicle maturation. Our brain tells our ovaries, start working on some eggs. And as those eggs are beginning to develop, that leads to the release of estrogen, right? And as the eggs are maturing and developing and getting ready to ovulate, estrogen levels rise, rise, rise, rise, rise. And so for naturally cycling women during the first two weeks of the cycle, it's characterized

by this nice, beautiful rise in estrogen that corresponds to the period of time in the cycle when sex can lead to conception. So it's not surprising that what we tend to see with research in estrogen is that when estrogen is high and rising, like getting close to ovulation, women experience increases in sexual desire. They feel sexier, they have more sex, they're more likely to have orgasms, they have more energy, they're more attuned they're more likely to have orgasms, they have more energy, they're more attuned to all things related to mating. So they notice men, they can decipher the

scent differences between different types of men, they're queued into testosterone levels in men, and all of these things correspond to this big rise in estrogen that women get right prior to ovulation because this is the time in the cycle when sex can lead to conception, right? And so it's like evolution by natural selection made our brain primed for mating and the ability to sort of distinguish between high and low quality mates at this time when estrogen is high and rising. So then you ovulate and then that empty egg follicle actually becomes a temporary endocrine structure and it starts to release a second sex hormone

called progesterone. Right, so the first two weeks are characterized by this high and rising levels of estrogen, right, that corresponds to the release of the egg, women feeling great and happy and sexy and flirty and noticing men, and then all of a sudden their estrogen levels crash and instead it's replaced by the second sex hormone progesterone which remains relatively elevated for the last two

weeks of the cycle. And during this time women are hungrier, they're sleepier, their energy levels are lower, they tend to be more emotionally a little bit all over the place. In psychology we call it labile, right? It was like when you're kind of moving around a little bit. What's it called? Labile? Labile. Isn't that a fancy word for like being kind of moving around a little bit. What's it called? Labile?

Labile. Isn't that a fancy word for being kind of all over the place? Right, it's scattered. Yeah, a little emotionally sensitive. So for naturally cycling women, you get this nice rise in estrogen, which is characterized by one set of states usually related to sexual desire and attraction. And then you get the second half of the cycle, which is characterized more by emotional sensitivity and tiredness and hungry and all of that stuff. And so this is important to keep in mind because this is what the normal sort of state of affairs is for women.

Now what happens with the birth control pill is all of that gets shut down. Okay. So you take this pill and it tells your brain, do not stimulate your ovaries. ovaries. So your ovaries never start maturing egg follicles, you don't release estrogen, you don't release an egg, which is why you don't get pregnant, you don't release progesterone. Instead, you take this daily synthetic set of hormones, which is comprised of level of the synthetic progesterone, which is called a progestin, and it is what fools the brain into not stimulating the ovaries. And then a relatively low level of estrogen. And so every day women get the same hormonal message. And that hormonal message is relatively high level of synthetic progesterone or progestin, low level

of estrogen. And so this of course creates a state when you're getting the same message repeated every single day, this creates a very different state than that beautiful waxing and waning between sexual desire and feeling sexy and alive and energetic and then feeling a little bit tired and sleepier and hungrier. Instead it makes the same daily hormonal message that is one that tends to be characterized by relatively low levels of sexual desire, low energy levels, more sleepiness, a greater risk of depression, and you don't get those big surges in feeling sexy or sexual desire or any of these other things that we tend to see in naturally cycling women. Instead, you get the same daily hormonal message every day. It creates a very different state. It blunts your emotions in some way.

Yeah, it does. It blunts your emotions in some way. Yeah, it does. It blunts your highs and lows. So because of that, you say we make different choices. So you're saying that we would pick and choose different mates and partners even based on that. Right, we could. So here's what the research tells us. So one of the things that we know about estrogen when it's

moving across the cycle for a naturally cycling woman is that when estrogen levels are high and rising, this is related to an increased preference in cues that are related to, for example, genetic compatibility. So women prefer the scent of genetically compatible men when estrogen levels are high and they're not able to tell the difference between them when they're at low fertility. And so estrogen primes our brain to be more sensitive to these fine-tuned differences between men and women are able to distinguish between genetically compatible and incompatible mates and are more dialed in to those that they're compatible with in a way that they're not at low fertility. We also know that when estrogen is high in the cycle,

that women express a greater preference for facial, vocal, and behavioral masculinity in men, meaning that they prefer men with more masculinized male faces with sort of more social dominance in their personalities. When they're not on the pill. Yeah, when they're not on the pill. So this is all women when they're at that estrogen, high estrogen point in the cycle,

because your brain is primed for mating and evolution by natural selection has shaped our brain to be sensitive to levels of estrogen. And when estrogen is high, it turns up the volume on all things related to being able to decipher between good and maybe less good mates. And it also increases women's attempt, I mean, it just makes them more sexual. They are just like more dialed into their sexuality. So that's with naturally cycling women. When women are on the pill and you're not experiencing this, so you're not getting that big surge in estrogen, you never experience that shift that's going to lead you

to have a greater preference for, for example, masculinized male faces and voices and behaviors. You're not going to get that shift that leads you to be able to tell the difference between men who might be genetically compatible and incompatible based on their scent. You're also not going to be motivated to choose a partner based on sexual attraction because your sexual attraction and just sexual desire tends to be dampened. And so what we tend to see is that when women choose partners when they're using hormonal birth control, they tend to de-emphasize the extent to which they value qualities related to sexual attraction, right? They tend to prefer less masculinized male faces and they tend to prioritize other cues

that have absolutely nothing to do with sex. Like what? So for example, like a man's provisioning ability. So is he going to be a stable financially providing partner? Is this somebody who's going to be somebody that they see as potentially a good father? And obviously these are incredibly important things, right? Most women are choosing long-term mates wouldn't look at that list of characteristics and say, this is a terrible decision, right? It's terrible, but it's going to lead you to something a little bit different, right?

And sometimes- More stable, more secure. Yeah, more stable and more secure. More feminine. Yeah, more feminine. And what's really interesting about this is that when the researchers have done studies where they looked at the divorce rate of women who chose their partners when they're on or off the pill, and women who choose their partners when they're on the pill are less likely to get divorced. But when they do get divorced, they're overwhelmingly the ones who initiate it,

which is also really interesting. Really? Yeah. And so it suggests that it, that it does lead to more relationship stability in some ways because you're sort of choosing based on your head, you know, like not your heart, but that of course comes at a cost. And for some women, what happens when they go off of hormonal birth control and they do start cycling again, and all of a sudden they're going through these periods of estrogen surge, if all of a sudden they don't like what they see or what they smell in some cases, then it leads them to become less

sexually attracted to their partner. And sometimes it can lead to relationship breakups. And so what tends to happen and there's been research that's looked at what happens when we follow couples longitudinally. So over time, when they've gotten together, when the woman was using hormonal birth control and then she discontinues it later on. And what researchers find is that if women chose their partners when they're on the pill, go off the pill, that it does lead to changes in attraction and sexual desire with respect to their partner. But for some women, it gets better. So if they just so happened to choose a partner who had those qualities that they're naturally cycling self-likes, that it's associated with an increased sexual attraction to their partner, more sexual desire, and they have more sex. But for some women, it leads to

the opposite and the women discontinue it and all of a sudden they don't feel attracted to their partner, their sexual attraction to them decreases and then it causes relationship problems. And so essentially what it's doing is it's taking the blinders off. And so some of the time when you take the blinders off, it's kind of like the show on Netflix, like Love is Blind. Yeah, that is. Right. It's like you choose a partner with a little mask on.

The goggles on. Yeah, the goggles on. You have no idea what they look like. And sometimes you pull off the goggles and it works. Sometimes you pull off the goggles and it doesn't work. And that's pretty much what is going on with hormonal birth controls because it's a little bit of a different version of yourself who is choosing that person than who you are once you're off of it.

So how about on the male side? Because if you're picking up, if the females, certain things are dampened, like her sexual libido and her desires and all these other things are like more dampened, what kind of man is attracted to a woman on birth control versus one that's not? That's such a fascinating question. Nobody's asked the question quite as you just asked it. That's a really interesting question and something that I'll totally have to go back to the lab and research. But what they have done is they have looked at the extent to which men desire women who are either using or not using hormonal birth control.

And what research generally finds is that lo and behold, men are more attracted to women when they're naturally cycling, particularly when they're at a high estrogen part in their cycle. And one of the things I talk about in my book is this really brilliant study that was done several years ago now, and that was done at a strip club. They had all of the women who were working there as dancers keeping a diary, and they indicated whether they were using hormonal birth control or not. Then every day they just simply wrote, did they get their period today or not, and how much money did they earn? And so they were able to look at

all of the dancers, their tip earnings over the course of two menstrual cycles. And then they were able to divide the women up based on whether or not they were using or not using hormonal birth control. And what they found was that for women who are naturally cycling, so again, experiencing their own hormones, you get this really sharp increase in tip earnings that are corresponding right around high fertility. So they're earning more money when estrogen is high in the cycle than they are when estrogen is low in the cycle. And these women are out earning the pill takers whose earnings were relatively flat across the cycle. They were out earning them by several

hundred dollars a shift. And so just going to show that even, you know, we don't know what it is about that. Like, was it something about the way the women were moving because they were feeling sexier? Is it something about the way that they smell? Because we also know from research that men prefer the scent of women at high fertility compared to low, suggesting that men can pick up on estrogen levels by scent, which doesn't really make a whole, it's not very surprising because many cells in the body express estrogen. And so we would expect that this would be the case, but men do seem to pick up on the

scent of estrogen. And so it could be that it could be that the women are dressing sexier when they're dating. I mean, we just have no idea exactly what it is, but men seem to be picking up on it and they prefer that. And so those women earn more money than the women who are using hormonal birth control because men are dialed into cues of fertility. And again, evolution by natural selection would have it no other way than for a man to be most turned on by women at times when conception is possible. Because men who had that tendency, they would have passed down a greater number of genes because those are the women that they will be sleeping with.

That is so interesting. Yeah, totally. And like these are a lot of things that you ever would think about, right? No. Like partner choice and all of these things. What is like the percentage of women, do you know, that are on birth control? So I don't know. In different age brackets? In different age brackets. So by far, the most frequent users are women in their young,

like early 20s. You know, like 20 to 30 is like the big age range. 20 to 25 in particular is like really hot. And in some cases, I've seen population estimates as high as like 40% or something that is it's very, very high. And then it falls off. And this is the group of women who's usually most motivated to avoid pregnancy. I mean, a lot of these women are in college or trying to build their careers

or just trying to avoid parenthood for other reasons. What about IUDs? How about that? Yeah, well, so it depends on what IUD you're talking about. But there's two, the copper one. The copper one doesn't have the hormonal effects, right? And so that is definitely one that I would recommend for women who are willing to try it. I know it sounds really scary and barbaric, and so not everybody is like game to want to have that put in.

And doctors are getting better about it. They used to not want to give that to women who hadn't had kids because they're like, oh, you know, yeah, but they're getting over that position, thankfully. But so yeah, that is a non-hormonal option that is obviously incredibly effective. It tends to, besides you do tend to get heavier cramping and bleeding with that. But other than that, it has a very manageable psychological sort of profile of side effects. And so that's one that I like as an alternative to something hormonal. The hormonal IUD also has a lot of these same effects that we've been talking about.

What would be the point of taking an IUD with hormones if you could take one without hormones and get the same effect? I know. No, amen. I have no idea. It's ridiculous. Yeah, no, honestly, I have no idea. And so some people might say, well, you can avoid copper toxicity because it does create an inflammatory experience like down in your cervix to have that there, but it really is minor and most women, it's not anything to worry about. And they've done a lot of safety tests on it. I think that there's a lot of myth around the idea of copper toxicity with that. I've had one my whole life, like 20 years.

I changed it, but every 10 years you change it. Yeah, no, they're great. I mean, yeah, no, that's like, that's definitely my favorite because it does allow you to cycle and experience your normal, you know, state of your amplitude of being. Whereas with the hormonal IUD, it's like most women who are on it, and there's a few funky things about it. So one is that most women who are on it, when they're first on it for like the first year or so. The copper one? No, this is the hormonal one. Oh, the hormonal one.

Yeah, it's like the women don't ovulate, right? So it's like the hormones are released to such an extent that they're telling the brain not to ovulate. And so doctors will tell women like, oh, it's locally acting hormones, which is bullshit because there's no such thing as a locally acting hormone. Hormones go into the bloodstream and they go everywhere that blood travels. And the last I checked, that's everywhere. And that includes the brain. And so the idea that somehow they managed to just circulate down there is like

the biggest bunch of crap. And then doctors... People will do anything and say anything. Well, I know it is... To sell stuff or to like... It's so frustrating because a lot of, you know, I've talked to so many women who've had the experience of feeling like they're totally crazy because their doctor is like, well, you know, I've like, I've been so depressed since I started this and, you know, and, and

unable to even get out of bed because of my depression. I feel like it was this IUD, but the doctor said the hormones act locally. I'm like, that's malpractice. Totally, right? It's just crazy. There's no such thing as a locally acting hormone. Most women are ovulating when they're on it, but then a lot of them about halfway through

the five years that they're on it, a lot of them will start ovulating. So then the hormones are in there, but they're not, the brain is like up to, they're kind of figured out what's going on. And so because the levels are low, they keep it very low. And so the brain is like, all right, these levels aren't very high. And ultimately we'll start stimulating the ovaries to, to ovulate again. The question I've always had is if you are able to protect yourself from pregnancy with the hormonal IUD without suppressing ovulation, so not turning that off, why do you need the hormones in there at all? That's what I just said. It makes no sense. Who in the hell would get an IUD that has hormones? I never understood that. Like the whole purpose of getting an IUD so you don't need hormones. I've heard people get the hormone one because it's plastic and they're like, oh, I don't

want the metal in my body. Okay, fine. But this plastic one clearly doesn't need the damn hormones or else, you know. Exactly. It's basically like, it isn't just like covering your cervix. Well, it's not really covering it, but it is putting something there. And so your body is like, no, thank you. I'm not getting pregnant. That's what I mean. It's basically like a, like a, like a shield or whatever, whatever you call it. Right. Yeah. But what I wanted to ask you, cause it sounds like, how about pheromones?

Where does pheromones fit into this? So pheromones, you know, so pheromones are essentially like, anytime they have a chemical signal that's affecting another organism. So if you smell my estrogen levels, then we call that a pheromone if that influences your behavior. And so with a naturally cycling woman, you do get these kinds of pheromonal effects as I've noted since men, when they smell the scent of ovulating women, it tends

to increase their testosterone levels. So men actually get a little increase in testosterone in response to the scent of ovulation and without knowing what it is, right? They'll smell t-shirts worn by women who are ovulating and they prefer the scent of the ovulating women compared to t-shirts worn by the same women at different phases in the cycle when estrogen is low. And so, yes, so having taken the pill, for example, can disrupt this, right? It can prevent because women aren't in this nice estrogenic state at any point in their cycle, that's going to decrease some of these attraction-related molecules that women might already release otherwise. And it also seems to decrease women's ability to pick up on male pheromonal cues.

We know from research that especially at high fertility when estrogen is high, women are really good at being able to detect metabolites of testosterone. So when men's bodies are breaking down testosterone, it releases different types of compounds that shed in the skin. And women are really good at being able to pick up on it when estrogen is high. Their brain is like, you know, like I smell a man, right? Really? Yes.

And like, it's like, it's attracting to them, right? They're drawn to it. They like that. And for women who are using the pill, no. You know, it's like, everything is shut off. It's just blunted. Yeah. It's just blunted. Yeah, it's just blunted. It's that blindfold from like we've been talking about from that show, Love is Blind.

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Okay. Yeah. And obviously when I answer this question, it's going to have huge error bars around it because there's so much idiosyncrasy in everybody's choice. But just, you know, like there are some things that men and women tend to desire sort of in equal measures. And so like men and women both want a partner who's kind and understanding and a partner who's in good health. And these are things that men and women are both looking for. In ways that men and women on average tend to differ in terms of their partner choice, women, a naturally cycling woman likes to strike a balance between what in the evolutionary

sciences we would call direct and indirect benefits. Direct benefits are all of those things that you get yourself from your partner. So for example, if they are a good provider, that would be a good direct benefit. And that's one that we know that women desire in their partners. We also know that women are interested in a long-term meeting context with partners who exhibit cues related to being a good dad. So somebody who's going to be caring and be able to help care for children. And so those are direct benefits. Anything a woman gets herself. Indirect benefits are essentially good genes, right? So this is where we're looking for qualities that are

related to genetic quality in a partner that we want for our children. And obviously this usually goes on unconsciously, right? These tend to be the qualities that our brain just happens to find really sexy, right? So something like having testosterone related cues. So we like men who have a nice chiseled jaw, broad shoulders, deep voice, a dominant personality. These are cues related to testosterone. And testosterone is what we call a good genes marker simply because men who were able to release high levels of testosterone during development, that indicates that they probably had a high quality immune system because men's

immune systems get traded off with testosterone in a way that men's bodies will not produce high levels of testosterone if they have an immune emergency to deal with. And so the idea here is that only men who are in good health during development are able to release really high levels of testosterone during development because there is this trade-off between immune system functioning and testosterone levels. Right. And so one of the reasons that our brain finds testosterone-related cues sexy in men is because only men who had relatively high functioning immune systems during development were able to release that and form those types of features.

And so, yeah, so that's like one type of a cue. The scent of genetic compatibility, that's another set of sort of genes that we're looking for and we tend to pick this up by way of scent, right? Sort of picking up on some of those cues that somebody might have different immune genes than your own, which are generally the ones that we find most attractive. And for most naturally cycling women, what you see is that when we're choosing a partner, it's generally brokering that trade off. It's like sort of understanding you want the sexy qualities that are going to just really

attract you and make you physically drawn to somebody. But then also as a long-term partner, somebody who's going to be a good provider and be a good parent and so on and so forth. So for naturally cycling women, what you generally see is that there is some sort of trade-off where they're making decisions about this person has to be somebody I'm attracted to, but also has to have these other qualities. And then you find the person who best matches that set of criteria. For women who are using the pill, it seems like all that, what we call indirect benefits, that genetic compatibility and cues of immune system

quality because of testosterone and all that, it seems like all of that just gets shut down. It's just like the light switch goes off. Just goes off. And it's just focusing exclusively on these other partnership qualities, which again, isn't necessarily bad, right? It's just different. It's going to get you a different partner probably than what you would get if you were striking that balance between what, you know, who you're most physically attracted to and then, you know, who's going to be a good partner and, you know, good at provisioning.

And so that's, you know, women, men tend to be, you know, in a sort of natural state of things. Men are also brokering that same balance. But for men, there's a whole lot of emphasis placed on cues related to fertility and what we call reproductive value. Fertility, of course, refers to the probability that a woman will be able to have a child with an act of sex. And we know that for women, fertility peaks at the very young age of about 25 and then starts to decline. And of course, it declines pretty rapidly after a woman's in her late thirties, mid to late thirties. And men, of course, are dialed into cues that have historically been related to fertility because again, over the course of evolutionary time, those men who just so happened to find women most beautiful when they were able to reproduce, they would have

passed down that preference to a lot of sons. Whereas if you have a man whose preference tended to focus on qualities related to older age, they wouldn't have passed down that preference to anybody. Right. Because no, those, yeah. But that doesn't seem to be like, I think, are there very specific things that you can point to in a, that men find attractive beyond just cues of estrogen cycles? Right, right.

No, no, I'm just kidding. In evolution. I'm just kidding. Absolutely not. That's the only thing that matters. Yeah. No, no, absolutely not. No. Yeah. There only thing that matters. No, no, absolutely not. No. Yeah,

there are so many things. I mean, men's partner choices are just as complex as ours in a lot of ways. And what you tend to see is that if men are just choosing like a short-term sexual partner, then it's like looks and all the superficial stuff. Men are choosing a long-term partner in addition to the cues related to fertility. Let me just make sure that that really is important to men's attraction. Whether we like it or not, it's huge. It's huge. Yeah, youth is related to fertility.

Yeah, exactly. It's confounded. Yeah. And so those things tend to play a really important role. But men are also, some of the things that they're most important that they find most important, like when you ask men to rank order, like how important are all these qualities, loyalty, kindness, right? So some of these, you know, other types of qualities. I think that's a load of shit to be honest. I think if they're not attracted to you. Oh yeah, no, 100%. I think after that, that it's loyalty, because I have a lot of guy friends who are in their mid,

let's say in their mid life, like 40s, let's say, even some of them are 50s, never been married, never have a serious girlfriend, and I try to set them up all the time. And I say to them, oh, I have the best girl, she's this, she's pretty, she's successful, she's, you know, she's got a great personality. At the end of the day, they're not interested.

Why? Unless they find her hot, physically. All those other qualities, her success doesn't matter, her confidence doesn't matter, her sense of humor doesn't matter. I think that with men, I'm no evolutionary psychologist, but I would say physical attractiveness

is pretty much paramount. I would completely agree with that. No, I think that it is. But in a lot of ways, I mean, for us, for women, and in particular. Not for women, no. Well, no. So yes and no. So no, I don't think that looks are paramount for women, but I will say that for women,

for us, what attraction is, is a lot more complex than for men. Attraction for men is generally physical attraction based on physical cues. Women's attraction is a lot more complicated, just meaning that it's like for us, physical attraction, in addition to just being based on somebody's physical appearance, is also based on all kinds of things like does this person have a take charge personality? Does this person say the right things? Is this person going to be a good provider? And some of these other cues, I mean, it's like women are the ones who get the ick for a reason.

It's like the ick is essentially like somebody just violated something that impacts our very complex and nuanced version of attraction, which is about more than just physical appearance. But for us, attraction is just as important as it is for men. It's just that what feeds into attraction for women is more complicated than just physical appearance. Okay, that makes sense to me. That makes sense to me. But then why is there such a mating crisis? Like people are not dating anymore. They're not having relationships anymore. Right. Yeah. And you know, that's such an important question because it's like, what is going to happen societally? Yeah. I mean, honestly, and you know, I think that the,

I think the answer is very complicated. I don't, I don't know that I know all the answers. I think that one of the answers is just simply that, you know, we have the ability to regulate our fertility now with birth control. And for most of history, we did not have that ability. And the fact is, there are a lot of people who now are saying, I don't want to have kids and I don't have to have kids, right? And it used to be the case that that was never a possibility, right? It's like if you liked sex, you were going to be a mother, like whether

you wanted them or not. Right. Like the idea of like whether you want kids used to not be a question people could ask. It was about whether or not you wanted to have sex. Right. You know, and so I think, you know, that's one thing, but like, why are people not wanting to have sex? I think that there's a few things happening. One is that I think a hormone or endocrine disruptors have lowered testosterone to an extent that it's making people just less sexually motivated. We know that testosterone is one of the big sexually motivating hormones and that higher

levels are related to more sexual desire, lower levels are linked with less sexual desire. So that's one thing is that we have these endocrine disrupting compounds that are lowering testosterone and I think that's part of the puzzle. Another part of the puzzle is hormonal birth control and we know that hormonal birth control is something that's associated with lower libido, right? So it can really kill women's sexual desire and in a pretty significant way. And so women are feeling less sexually motivated and they're feeling less sexually motivated in part because of the endocrine disruptors because their testosterone also is being lowered and then birth control can lower sexual desire further. So I think that's also part of the picture.

I think another part of the picture is that now we have internet porn available everywhere and I think that men are like, why should I bother to do all of this work and have to jump through all of these hoops for somebody who's less hot than the person that I see on the computer screen? And so I think that men are like not feeling as motivated to do the types of things that they used to have to do in order to get access to sex, just by sort of using a cheap alternative. And so I think that's also part of the picture. Another part of the picture is that birth control has allowed women to achieve more than they've ever achieved in their entire lives. In our entire history as a species, I mean, women are

dominating. I mean, it's like we're getting more college degrees, we're getting more advanced degrees, we're going to law school and medical school at a greater extent than men. And women are hypergamous, meaning that they like to mate up. So they like to be involved in relationships with men who have at least as much education as they have themselves. So women are now in this position where they're looking up to find partners who have the same levels at least of education and career success that they have themselves. And there's just not a lot of men there because women are doing really well, men are kind of like,

eh, I can just look at porn and then I don't have to do all this work and get all these degrees and jump through all these hoops in order to get sexual access because my brain is being tricked into believing I'm getting sexual access by looking at pornography. And then the last one I think is online dating. And I think that what that has created has made it really easy to find partners. And for men who are doing well, so men in this climate who have those really good jobs and have the types of qualities that women are looking for partners, they are now entering the marriage market from the dating market a lot later than they used to.

And so what happens is because men are able to get access to dates, just like it's so easy, you know, it's so easy to find a date when you have a dating app. And so they're not settling down until they're like 40, you know, or like, even 50. 50 is now the new 40. Yeah, that's what they say. That's what the men are trying to tell us. Yes. And so you'll have men who are hanging out in the dating market for a really long time.

And then you have women who go into the marriage market from the dating market earlier, where they're ready to settle down because their fertility is going to decline. And so women then are up here in the marriage market. There's not a lot of men around because they're mostly hanging out in the dating market. And then the women are also looking for people who are at least as educated as themselves. And I mean, it's really causing problems. Well, yeah. And also from the way you described it, what that would tell me is if men are getting married later, right, because they don't have to get married as early. They have this dating app so they can date. And what they're attracted to is more youthful estrogen cycles.

They're going to end up dating younger girls. So the young girls are going to get married to these older men. Because for girls, men who are older can come across as sexy, not old. But for girls, you who are older can come across as sexy, not old. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. But for girls, older women look like older women. Right, yeah, it's like our brain, it's so interesting. Yeah, go ahead.

Oh, no, I was going to say, and then what happens is it's leaving these women who have now been, who've had a lot of success financially, in business, professionally, they're leaving them in the lurch because now there's nowhere for them to go further, right? And what my question is then is why don't those women just go out with a younger guy who's just hot and just do what men used to do for all these years, right? Just do what men do. They're successful men. They want a younger girl.

So then they end up with these girls. Why don't women do that? Right, well, and I think that there are some women doing that. And starting more. Right, and yeah, so I've got two answers to that. So one is that I think that women are starting to do that more, right? So we see like, you know-

But they're not having kids with them. No, they're not having kids with them, No, they're not having kids with them. Right. So like, like, like, like, we're sort of seeing like the, you know, like the rise of the cougar, right? Where you'll see older women dating the, and they're just, you know, they're not serious boyfriends. They're just like, they're just there. Yeah. Play things because the women are like, I have my own money. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It's like, I've got, I've got my, I've got my own money. I don't need a man for that.

I just want to have fun in my own terms. And so then they just take a hot guy that they can parade around and have a good time with. And Godspeed, men have been doing this forever. It's about time. 100%. But it's disrupting the natural flow of evolution and Darwinism, I would say. Well, isn't survival the fittest is all about? Well, it's just really about whatever traits get passed down or the traits that you're going to see. Right? And so all that that means is that like, yeah, the tendency for older women to date younger

men, they're not passing that preference down to anybody, you know, because they're not having any more offspring. But in the manner passing that tendency to want to mate with older women on to anybody either because there's no reproduction going on in that context. And so I don't think that it's really disrupting anything, just because nothing is really changing. Nothing's happening. Yeah, exactly. Nothing's really changing. But I think that there's not as much of that as there is for men because we spend most of our evolutionary history in a context,

living as hunter gatherers. and women were very dependent on men for access to resources. And so like, you know, getting access to food and protection, particularly during pregnancy. And because of that, we have inherited the psychology that is tends to be more coy, right? So we tend to be more sexually cautious relative to men. And we tend to be more oriented toward long-term mating relative to men, just simply because throughout most of our evolutionary history, there was no short-term.

I mean, like if you're a woman engaged in like short-term mating, you could end up with a baby. And so even if you're choosing somebody as just a casual fling, there's this tendency for women to get emotionally enmeshed in those relationships because we're wired that way. Right, we're wired differently. Yeah, we're just wired differently. It's like we faced different adaptive problems throughout our history due to the fact that we're the ones who

get pregnant, right? And because of that, the costs of short-term sex and just being sort of casual willy-nilly are much greater than what they are for men. And so that's led to a divergence within our sexual psychology that tends to make men more oriented toward casual encounters without really developing any sort of strings attached, whereas for women it tends to be a little bit more complicated. So are you guys tired of protein bars that come loaded with calories and sugar? Because I sure am. Most of these bars are 20 grams of protein, but over 350 calories and 20 grams of sugar. And that formula hasn't changed in decades.

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you know, because that doesn't mean obviously there's a lot of people that I think objectively we could say like this person is not the most attractive person we've ever seen in their life and somebody's in love with them and thinks that they're beautiful. So it's like we have to sort of also take that with a grain of salt, sort of understanding the fact that there's, for the most part, there can be somebody for everyone. Right. My mother would always say there's a lid to every pot. I love that.

That's like beautiful. That's perfect. That's right. I heard you say somewhere, I don't remember where, that looks is a number one predictor for women's upward mobility. Yeah. Yeah. How is that for a depressing statistic?

Right. Yeah. They did a study where they were looking at different types of predictors for being able to transcend the social class in which you were born. And in this great meritocratic society that we live in, we would like to think that it would be something like your educational attainment or where you went to school or what you majored in. It might be something like this, but instead what the research found is that the strongest predictor for women for upward social mobility was their physical attractiveness and that

this played a greater role in their ability to transcend their social class of origin than their family's existing socioeconomic status, their education level and their career choice. Wow. Yeah, it's pretty depressing. Isn't that depressing? It is. What's the man's number one predictor for upward mobility? Oh, that's a really great question.

I don't know, but I am willing to bet that it is probably either education. I think it is some combination of education that they get and then their career choice is my guess. Right. Totally different, right? Yeah. Totally different set of, yeah. No, it's not his physical attractiveness. It's definitely not. Exactly. Do you know the other saying, like, if a man wants to be attractive, he stands on his wallet. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I've heard that. But the truth is, I hate to say it, but there's a reason why some of these things, there's a lot of truth in these things, right?

That's why you see a lot of these, a lot of women I see with men who are like, you wouldn't call them attractive by looking at them. They're four foot three, bald, and not that physically attractive. But I tell you, when they have like a hundred million dollars in their bank account, they're very attractive dating the supermodel. Yeah, it's really funny because we did this really cool study where we had men who were kind of average looking. We had them photographed like looking like they were in a couple with women of varying levels of attractiveness. And what do you think as soon as women see kind of an average, you know, kind of, kind of guy with a really beautiful woman, what do they think?

He's rich. Yeah, exactly. And so what we did is we asked people about like different qualities, you know, that these men had. And just based on the virtue of the attractiveness of the women that men are pictured with, women infer all of these different things about what they're like and including the fact that as we see a man with a beautiful woman, who's far more beautiful than he is handsome, there's this general assumption that we tend to assume that he is financially very well off and probably got some other positive qualities as well, but it's really funny. And it's funny because the second you think of that, you think about the female and you think if the girl's really beautiful, you think, oh, well, but it's really funny. And it's funny because the second you think of that, you think about the female and you think if the girl's really beautiful, you think, oh, well, she's a gold digger or all the other connotations,

which then like, because of the survival of the fittest and all that, is there a lot of jealousy with women because it's only a certain amount of that stuff we're talking about, there is a limited amount of great guys that we all want. Like I've done a few podcasts on this where just in terms of just on the dating apps, right?

It's like 1% of the men get 99% of the action, right? Because women want got who are six foot, make over 100,000, all these things, let's just say, where it doesn't leave a very big amount of a lot of men. But there's a lot of women out there. Yes. Right? And women are naturally catty. Yes.

I think that there's an element of that that's very true. Yes. An element or more than one element? Yes. An element or more than one element? Yes. Yes. A multiple elements. Yeah. So, you know, with any resource that's desirable, there's only so many, right? Or also wouldn't be desirable. Supply and demand. It's like there's only so many houses on the water. You know, there's only so many attractive mates. There's only so many top positions in the job. And so they're always going to be an element of competition.

And for women, especially when we're talking about mate related things, one of the primary areas in which they compete is attractiveness. And so here you have women who kind of size each other up, right? And then they can be really terrible to one another when they're trying to compete in the same pool. And I mean, I've found, I remember when I was in my twenties and how much of that there would be, you know, this like, like rivalry and, and that sort of thing. And then like once I was married and had children, like it allowed me to have friendships with women in ways that I hadn't been able to have, you know, when I was in my twenties, because I think that like that people were paired off, kind of took the pressure off of all of that.

They didn't find you to be a threat. Right, exactly. Right? Because you were taken, you were already like, you were dormant in their way. Like you're kind of like, your things were suppressed, right? Right. Yeah, well, no, it's really interesting because I've also, I've been divorced and now I'm married again.

And during that period when I was divorced, I mean, talk about a polarizing event in people's lives. Well, I mean, you know, when you are a person who is with a bunch of married people, right, you live in a community of married people who you spent a lot of time with. And then all of a sudden, you know, you're not a married person, you become very much a threat to everybody. Did they ostracize you? Yeah, there was a lot of that that happened. I kind of got shoved out. I got a little bit of the exit stage left.

So then what happened then? I found my new community. Was your new community all single women? Yeah, it was mostly single women. Was your new community all single women? Yeah, it was mostly single women. And yeah, it was a totally, you know, and it was a really freeing, you know, experience to go through that. It was terrible to lose.

I lost some people that I thought were really good friends. But I think that, you know, it was like on the one hand, I understood it. Yeah. If anyone would, it would be you. Yeah, well, exactly. And so it's like, you know, I didn't, at first I was hurt and angry. And then afterwards I had a little bit of reflection on it. And it's like, you know, I under,

I mean, there's two things going on there. It's like one, you know, you don't want to have this single person and that that's a threat, but it's also a threat to, I mean, marriage is kind of held together by bubble gum and shoelaces. You know what I mean? It's like, it's like a, it like a, it's a hard thing to do.

You know, it's like really hard to do and stay. And so the idea that somebody can just like walk away from it and be okay, because I was, I like walked away and you know, and my ex-husband and I, and in some ways it's even more threatening. He and I are great and like we're great co-parents and we do thanksgivings together and you know, we call it the web of love.

How long have you been married for? 17 years. So I was married a long time. And how old were the kids when you got the divorce? I want to say 12 and nine. Wow. Okay. Yeah. So, yeah. And yeah. So, do it have somebody who we, you know, I walk away from a marriage and I'm okay. And financially I'm fine because I'm, you know, I'm taking care of my business.

And then to be able to get along well with my ex-husband and I feel like that also feels threatening to marriage. Do you know what I mean? Really? Why? Because marriage is hard and horrible sometimes. Yes. And being somebody who's married again, it's like, and we talk about this, my husband was also formerly married. And it's like really hard to be married.

I mean, it's like, sometimes you're just like, this is terrible. Like, this is a really terrible thing. But you persevere. And the idea of like, you know, when you're having one of those moments of marriage being terrible to see people walking away from it and being just fine. I mean, that feels really threatening. Like, oh my gosh, should I be like, like that might be the end. And that is like, you don't want to go down that rabbit hole. Nobody wants to have to sit and think about whether their marriage is a good idea or a bad idea. I mean, it's like, it's a really scary thing. It was

it was a hard thing. I think also it makes people like think to themselves like, like they're jealous a little bit like, I wish I wish I could do that. Why can't I do they're jealous a little bit, like, I wish I could do that. Why can't I do that? Will I be okay? Or they feel trapped because financially they're trapped. There's all these other them issues that you're basically making them have to, you're forcing them to look at. Well, right. And I think that that's the biggest. I think you just hit the nail on the head. I mean, honestly, it's like how many people are in... And my ex-husband and I had a pretty lovely

relationship for the most part. We just kind of grew in different directions. And so, there's a lot of people who are in marriages a lot worse than ours was. And then to... And you're the one who got the divorce. Yes. And so I think that there was a lot of that too. So like I said, studying what I study, I have a lot of compassion for how everybody responded to me.

And it was really hurtful at first, but I do feel compassion and I understand why that happened. Right. And then I was able to find my new community. And so when you're now in the new community and you guys are all single, like you were saying, was there cattiness and jealousy because you're all in the same boat and look like, oh, she's going on a date. Why can't I go on a date?

Was there any of that? No, what's really interesting is no. And so with my really tight group of girlfriends, no, and we actually would trade notes. Like we had a spreadsheet when we were dating. Really? Yes, for us to make sure like, did you go out? And it's like, oh wait, I know I went out with him. No, he's great for you.

And so like we would even set people up on the side chat with people that we would go out with, but they didn't match up on the app or whatever with the other person. I love that because you know what? You're meeting these people and like, yeah, maybe they're not right for you, but you have Sally out there who you'd be great for. Yes. And in fact, one of our pictures that we had was all three of us together, like, because there was three of us that spent most of it.

There was five of us, but there's three of us that were actively dating. And so we had a picture of all three of us. And then it was like, if it doesn't work out with one of us, you're going to have the other two. I love that. It's like a threefer. Yeah. And I think that there's something about, you know, because we were all in our, you know, we were all in our early 40s or late 30s, early 40s when we met. And I think that

there's also something where as you get older, in addition to, you know, just like whether you're partnered or not, it's like, I think there's a really a time that you can appreciate just how amazing female friendship is that I don't think you get when you're in your 20s. Yeah, I think you're right. I think there's a different like, your priorities change, you soften up a little bit, you know, there's other things that happen. How long have you been married to this new husband? Oh my God. Well, we've been together for three years.

We're just recently recently married. Yeah. Oh, congratulations. Thanks. You're welcome. And so he's got kids too? Yes, he does. Yeah.

So we've got a blended family of five kids. Oh, wow. Yeah. No, they know and I say thankfully, but no, really, they're all wonderful. They're older. I mean, so like, you know, the oldest is, you know, about to graduate college. The second oldest is a freshman in college. And then, you know, our youngest are both freshmen in high school.

So it's not like we have all of these, you know, like so much chaos going on in our lives. Right, right, right. But it's interesting because you've like lived all these different stages of life that you can talk on. So then you were on the apps. Yeah, I was. So then you were on the apps. Yeah, I was. So how did you find the apps?

So it's funny because my first exposure to the apps was when I was in graduate school at UT Austin way back in the day. I was like 2001. I was actually writing a research paper on mate preferences. And it was before there were apps, it was like when like match.com was a thing, it was like a website. And so I remember going there and like, you know, I was doing a project looking at what are some of the qualities that men compared to women say that they're looking for in partners. And you know, and then like did a quantification and lo and behold, you know, men were more likely to say they were looking for looks and women were more likely to say they were looking for financial stability or some version of that. And so that was like my very first exposure.

And then, you know, and I was dating my, what ended up being my husband during that. So I wasn't like on the app, you know, on that. But then, you know, I had, because of the work that I do, I mean, I'm very familiar with what everybody is doing with the apps forever and sort of monitoring that because it's like something that I've been really interested in, you know, understanding relationships and sex and dating dynamics. And so looking at the apps, I mean, I wasn't like looking at the apps when I was married, but just having awareness of them and like what they were and what people were doing.

Yes, yes, yes. It was something that I'd always had. It was research. Yeah, I mean, totally. It was like I had my finger on the pulse of it. And then when I got divorced and then when it was like, I'm trying to remember how I found out what all the kids were using. And I think that I had, I feel like I read something, like how wonky is this? I think I read it in like the Wall Street Journal, like what people were using.

And I think that that's how I found like Bumble. Is that what you used? That's what I was on and then Hinge for a little bit. But then yeah, then I ended up dating the person. I mean, I dated a few different guys, but then I ended up in the relationship with my now husband. And so then it's all she wrote. The rest is history. Are you happy now?

Yes, I'm very happy. Okay. Are you happy when you went through the divorce? Yeah. It's hard to say that, right? So yes, it was the right decision. Do I hate it for my kids? Would I prefer for them not to have to visit both of us?

Yeah, I would prefer that. I do. I will say that I think that I think that of anybody that I know who's in a divorce relationship, I think mine is incredibly healthy. And like I said, we like my ex and I, like he came over for Christmas to my husband's house. And I mean, it's just like this is the way that we do things and everybody's cool with it. And I feel like my kids get the experience that we do things. And everybody's cool with it. And I feel like my kids get the experience of being able to see that their parents still love

and care for each other, even though they're not married. And so that's like, I guess on the positive side, but, and I can also tell myself like, I think it's better for my kids to see me flourishing and not feeling, you know, like I'm in a bad spot. And like I said, it wasn't, we didn't fight or anything. I just wasn't happy. And I think, and it showed,

and I was at working all the time, so I didn't wanna be, you know, that was not good. And so, yeah, I guess the answer is that yes, it was the right decision, but it's hard to say like yes about something, because of course it hurt my kids, and that was hard. Yeah, I mean, even if the most amicable divorce is still a divorce for the kids, right? Exactly.

They're going to have to go back and forth to the homes. Yes, exactly. And that's what they do. And would they prefer not to do that? Yes, they would. They would prefer if we were still together. Right. But that being said, they're also like, you know, they're learning some resilience with all of this. And like I said, I think that of anybody I know who's got a divorce set up, I think ours is really a nice one. And I think that the kids have been able to learn a lot from it.

Good answer. Thanks. You're welcome. I think I got sidetracked there because I was so interested in your life. Yeah, let's talk about life. Well, I know that at the beginning, I asked you a question and I think that we kind of like didn't finish it, which was, well, is it the five things that birth control can change or how?

Yeah. It's not just this your partner choice, but there's other things too it does. Yes, yeah. And that's the part that I didn't finish with, sorry. No, that's okay. Do you want me to start it off? Yes.

Okay, so let's talk about some of the things that birth control does besides just influencing potentially partner choice. We also know from research that it affects sexual desire, which I think I alluded to. Yeah, we talked about that one. It really can put women on sexual lockdown in a lot of cases. It increases the risk of developing depression or anxiety. And this is particularly true for younger women. So they've done studies where they look at the risk of developing major depressive disorder based on whether or not you're using

hormonal birth control or not. And what you tend to see is that the risk is increased for everybody of developing one of those types of outcomes from using hormonal birth control, but it's especially great for young women. So women 19 and younger, whose brains are still developing, the risk of developing a major depressive disorder, and the risk of suicide risk attempt and successful suicide attempt are significantly greater for

teens who use hormonal birth control compared to those who do not. There's also now research showing that if you're using hormonal birth control during your teen years, so again 19 and younger, that this is associated with a greater risk of developing major depressive disorder across your lifetime even after you go off the birth control pill because it seems that it's probably influencing brain development. And so the important message here with depression and anxiety is one, if you go on hormonal birth control, keep an eye on yourself, have somebody that you love keep an eye on you. Because the fact is when we're depressed or anxious,

our brain doesn't say like, gosh, you know, I'm depressed or anxious and I bet it's my drugs. Instead, what happens is we think like, God, my life sucks right now. Like my boss hates me, my boyfriend hates me. Like it's like, we feel like all of these things are happening and we feel bad. We don't actually think, gosh, I'm depressed. Right. So it's good. We don't

acknowledge what's really happening. Yeah. No. It's like our brain has no idea. You know. It just makes up stories about what's going on. And so having somebody know that you're going on it so they can keep an eye on you is incredibly important because then they can tell you if you're having a personality change, if you seem low, if you seem off, right? These are things that might can tell you that your birth control might not be working for you in that way. And this is particularly true, as I said, for these young girls. And you know, I think that it's smart to avoid going on hormonal birth control if at all possible until you're 20 or older. I'm just because your brain is going to have most of its development done at that time,

which means that it won't have a long-term lasting impact on you. Um, but if you are going to go on it when you're younger than 20, um, really, really take care and make sure that somebody's keeping an eye on you just because the risk of developing a mental health related side effect is so high and pronounced in this group. So that's another thing that hormonal birth control can do. Another thing that surprises people is that it can actually decrease your ability to put on muscle mass from weight training. And this happens because it keeps your testosterone levels low.

And testosterone plays an important role in terms of prompting the biological cascade that allows you to put on lean muscle mass. And so women who are doing weight training, doing the exact same regimen compared to women who are naturally cycling, they put on significantly less lean muscle mass compared to their naturally cycling counterparts, which is surprising to a lot of people. Well, you know what? It's not that surprising to me because they do say that there's weight gain with being on the pill. And a lot of people don't want to go on the pill.

I was one of them at a very young age, because I was scared of gaining weight. So that makes sense to me, because your testosterone will be suppressed. You won't be, the less lean muscle mass you have, the less calories you're gonna burn, therefore, you know, you won't be burning as much. Yeah, no, for sure.

Yeah, no, for sure. That makes sense to me. Yeah, 100%. And then it also can influence your ability to regulate stress. And this is another one that's really surprising to people. And that is that when you go on hormonal birth control, there's research that finds that it decreases your body's ability to respond in a dynamic way to stress, potentially leaving you less able to be able to regulate your emotional responses to things and also being less able to cope from and learn from stress.

And so there's research that shows, for example, that women who use hormonal birth control, that rather than having a big spike in cortisol that all of us get when we're feeling stressed out, which a lot of people give a bad rap, and cortisol gets kind of a bad rap because it's, you know because if you have it chronic exposure to cortisol, it's not good. But having big bursts of cortisol when we're stressed out is actually very adaptive and it's like part of how our body helps to manage stress and cope with stress. And so like when cortisol gets released, it dumps fat and sugar into the bloodstream so we can make a quick getaway. It primes the birth of new neurons in our hippocampus which is the brain area that helps us learn and

remember things and so it gets us ready to be able to recover from stress, to be able to learn from stress, and to be able to sort of move on with our lives. And research finds that women who are using hormonal birth control that rather than having this nice big response of cortisol in response to stress they have a really flat blunted response to cortisol in response to stress, they have a really flat blunted response to cortisol in response to stress. And this is something that we only tend to see in people who've suffered from PTSD or things like exposure to childhood trauma. They have these blunted cortisol types of responses and you also see this in women who are using hormonal birth control. And it suggests that it

has some sort of dysregulatory pattern within the stress response. And, you know, nobody knows exactly what it is, but what researchers think is going on is that the synthetic progesterone in birth control pills, which is called a progestin, it doesn't perfectly match the progesterone receptor, which is the receptor in the cell that picks up the hormone. And it also gets picked up by other things, including sometimes testosterone and including

sometimes cortisol. And so what researchers think goes on is that these molecules are stimulating cortisol receptors and making the brain think that it's in a state of chronic stress, like chronic uncontrollable stress, and that that's causing the stress response to shut down, which isn't good. It's not good for anybody. It's bad for emotional regulation, it's bad for mental health, and like I said, it's something that we tend to see in people who have PTSD, and so not something that's positive for women who are using hormonal birth control. Wow. So as an adolescent, if you're listening or parents listening, what is an alternative just besides doing what we talked about earlier? Copper IUD.

Besides doing the copper IUD, that's really the best alternative. I mean, yeah, as far as I'm concerned, doing something, especially with a teenager, that's non-hormonal is going to be the way to go. Copper IUD is a good one. I don't recommend the fertility awareness method for teenagers because, you know, it's just the idea of tracking your cycles and only using condom. Like the idea of a teenager trying to do that effectively, it just gives me chills. Right. Just imagine. So, I mean, we just aren't left with a lot of options.

And so one of the big messages from, you know, that I've wanted to really communicate with my book is not like, Oh, you know, birth control pill is evil and all this. Instead, it's we need more options. This is imperfect. Like this is imperfect and we need to have more choices because the fact is, especially for young girls whose brains are developing and are very sensitive to hormones,

like we don't have a lot of good options. No, I mean, at all. But the thing is, that's and that's probably why also you wanted to write this book. I saw it right because it's you had your own you had your own story. Once you got off of birth control, you were a different person. You were making playlists and you were like... Yeah. I was like, yeah, I felt alive and I felt sexy. And I just, yeah, it was like an awakening in a lot of ways. Yeah. I mean, I find that so, like, you don't, that's why I love this conversation with you,

because I never really spoke about the correlation between, we talk a lot about HRT on here, right? Like hormone replacement therapy when you're older, right? But we don't talk about the hormones that we are putting in our bodies at a younger age to suppress, right? Or we only talk about the opposite. Right, yeah. And it's really interesting because, you interesting because people tend to assume that like,

oh, hormone therapy, you must be anti-hormone therapy. And I'm like, no, I think hormones are great. I think that the problem with the birth control pill is that you're not getting exposure to hormones. They're suppressing your hormones. Yeah, you're suppressing them. Hormones are wonderful. They're a wonderful thing. It's a different thing. You're either at a young age or because of birth control, you're suppressing them. But at an older age, you're trying to increase them to balance yourself out. So you don't only do any work on that, right? On the studies of like...

No, I mean, I definitely have awareness of this space. I know about the research in the space, and I can say that there's a lot of women who are being given birth control pills as a way to ease the menopausal transition instead of being given micronized progesterone and estrogen, which I think is terrible just because the synthetic progesterone in birth control pills that progestin isn't biologically identical to progesterone the way that micronized progesterone is. And because of that, you don't get many of the really beautiful benefits that progesterone has for the body, including the release of this really nice neuro steroid called allopregnanolone. And it's something that gets released when progesterone is being broken down in the body. It stimulates these receptors in our brain that are known for making

us feel calm and relaxed. It's really good for us. It promotes neuroplasticity, which means that it makes our brain plastic and malleable and able to respond to things and not freak out. And it's associated with having better mental health and all these other really beautiful things. And women who are using synthetic hormones, this progestin, that because it's made out of testosterone, it's not made out of progesterone. You don't get this beautiful metabolite that has all these wonderful benefits to the brain and benefits to mental health and also benefits to bone health because progesterone and estrogen work together to help to create new osteoblasts in the bone and help to strengthen bones and do all these really nice things. And I think that there's a lot of doctors out there who are just, you know, because

they're comfortable with the birth control pill. They're just like giving women that to try to prevent them from not experiencing the symptoms of the menopausal transition. But the women that aren't getting all the benefits you get from actual hormones. I've never even heard that before. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh my gosh.

Yeah, no, I hear about this. So, you know, of course women reach out to me with their questions. And one of the questions I get a lot is about the use of birth control in menopause and like whether or not, you or not that's recommended and is it the same as using hormone therapy with biologically identical hormones? And the answer is no, because you don't get all those great benefits and it does tend to have this side effect profile that's really unfavorable to women. Wow. Thanks for telling me that. I had no idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow. Well, Sarah, thank you for being on the podcast.

Yeah, thank you for having me. This is so fun. This was so fun. Did I miss anything? Is there anything else we should talk about? I don't think so. I think we talked about things I didn't even think we were going to talk about. I know, your personal life. We talked about your personal life. I know. Thank you for sharing. Yes, of course. I think a lot of people can relate to that too. I think it's real life and it's... I'm somebody that like is very much someone who's interested in like the nitty gritty

of someone. Beyond all this other stuff, I wanted to get to know you as a person. So thanks. Yeah, no, thanks for having me. Where do people find you or more information on what you're doing or your book? Yes, of course. You can find me on all social platforms and I'm at Sarah E. Hill PhD and that's Sarah with an H, so Sarah E. Hill PhD. And my website is sarahehill.com. And my book,

This Is Your Brain on Birth Control is sold everywhere that books are sold. And you can also find my new book that'll be coming out in September called The Period Brain in September. I didn't know that. Thank you guys. Go follow Sarah. She's awesome. Thanks.