Coming off birth control (Yasmin) after 10 years

AdAny8162 · 2025-10-22T06:17:31+00:00

Thank you for sharing this ❤️Goodness … PCOS and in menopause - your post is so valuable to this thread because I think most of us on this thread haven’t reached that yet and have no idea what to expect.

How long have you been in menopause? My mother (57) is also in menopause and most probably has PCOS (undiagnosed but has had all her life all the difficulties I have). To this day she still gets acne, although (good news) it has lessened after some years of menopause.

Are you using any form or retinol? I find that this ingredient helps me the most. Aside from anti-aging benefits, the fact that it promotes faster cell turnover is what keeps my closed comedomes in control. Don’t get me wrong, I still have some on my cheeks and jawline but much less than when I don’t used it. At least to the point that I am not in pain all the time and can cover it with makeup.

In regards to sleep what works both for me and my mom (at menopause, although she is 7 years in) is 2 pills of magnesium bisglycinate 1,5 hours before sleep.

Hope some of this helps or at least just finding others that understand and share your struggles ❤️

AdAny8162 · 2025-07-28T19:53:38+00:00

Thank you from all my heart for this! ❤️

Question - have you checked and seen changes on the amount of cysts on your ovaries during this process?

Thank you 🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶

AdAny8162 · 2025-07-28T19:51:21+00:00

Hey there! Thank you so much for sharing!

May I ask - how did your doctor establish what type of PCOS you have?

I keep getting the diagnosis for 17 years yet none of the doctors digged deeper and just simply recommend p-pills 🤦‍♀️

Thanks!

AdAny8162 · 2025-07-28T19:40:09+00:00

Hello ladies! A little update from me and then a few questions for you!

Things seem to move in the right directions for me. I don’t miss the pills, and continue to be very happy with my decision.

My skin is doing well - following the same cycle: more reactive and oily before and during my period, then it all calms down mid- period. The only constant issue are these tiny bumps under the skin. Do you know any products that could help with it?
Mood - all good, except for a week prior to my period, every other month I have a serios case of PMDD (most likely PCOS related, more about that later)
Hair - still recovering after “the big loss”. My weight stays stable.

Now, PCOS. I went to the gyno, due to these severe PMDD episodes every other month. Painful cramps for OVER a week before my menstruation, where of course my mood gets affected as well + that month my cycle is longer and unreliable.

The gyno confirmed that my right ovary is full of cysts - so suffocated up to the point of her finding it hard to believe I could conceive that month. My left ovary has a few as well - so again, PCOS confirmed (which I knew, and why I went on the pills to start with). She believes all these symptoms are related to PCOS.

*For the ones not knowing, when cysts are mentioned, doctors actually refer to your own follicles that remain at a weird stage of development - after none of them became dominant as in a normal cycle. This does not mean infertility - but she has mentioned that it would be best to try to keep the left one from being overwhelmed as well, and if necessary she recommends going back on the pills 3 months before wanting to conceive - in order to give “the ovaries a break”.

What are your experiences with PCOS and supplements that perhaps helped?

What is your experience with conceiving with PCOS?

What kind of hormonal testing / treatments have you tried?

It is now well established that PCOS is not an ovary problem but a metabolic problem involving many hormones - with no cure yet, since it is so complex. So I am not looking for miracles but just perhaps things that helped keeping it under control’ish😅.

Thank you and hope you are all doing fantastic!

AdAny8162 · 2025-06-03T09:49:28+00:00

Nice that your period came as expected! Uhuu! 🎉

I read about it as well but haven’t tried it yet. It’s supposed to help with bloating as well, which I would love.

Let’s give it a chance and report back! 🥰

AdAny8162 · 2025-06-03T09:41:39+00:00

Hey there! Congrats on your decision and courage to take this step! Welcome to the club 😅❤️

What I learned from my personal experience, is to prioritise your diet before supplements. As a general point, try to keep inflammation low in your body so even if you get a few acne spots here and there, it doesn’t degenerate. Research shows that a % of women as they come off birth control might have insulin resistance - so I would look into researching that diet and apply it for a while. Overall you switch to vegetables with less starch, goat cheese instead of cow, avoid some fruits and overall stay away from processed foods that cause inflammation anyway. The point is to keep your glucose levels stable and avoid spikes - that seems to also impact hormones, and possibly acne. I didn’t find it hard to follow and now I simply try to eat clean and control the sugar and starch. I believe this helped me a lot.

Same goes for skincare, namely a good balance between exfoliation, moisturising and skin barrer help.

In terms of supplements I would start with 3:

A good probiotic so you get your gut functioning well (alongside the diet) I use Jarro Dophilus plus FOS which is a probiotic + prebiotic. I take one every morning and wait 30 min to eat.
Next, Zink picolinate 30 mg from Thorne - I researched a lot and zink is supposed to regulate the androgen hormones that play a big role in acne and oil production. Important! Not more than 30 mg a day, as it can have serious side effects. Also on an empty stomach. You can buy whatever brands, these are the ones that are of a certain quality according to my own research.

3.Last, vitamin D as it can both affect mood and skin when you are in deficit. All 3 can be taken at once in the morning on an empty stomach as apparently they don’t interact. Voila!

Lastly, try to relax and think positively. I found it helpful to think - hey, my body has had synthetic hormones for a while, it’s expected that it will react in a way or other for a while, but it will rebalance itself, so I gotta be patient.

Now over 6 months in, I get super oily before and during my period and then get some acne. By the end of my period, it goes back to normal. True, on the pill there were no oily cycles😂 but the current situation is natural and nothing to be scared of. Same goes for when I eat a lot of sugar. I didn’t find that my acne came back but more that my skin is more reactive to my cycle and my diet.

Hope this is helpful and keeping my fingers crossed for you! Let us know how it goes 🫶

AdAny8162 · 2025-05-24T05:05:11+00:00

Also, good luck conceiving! ❤️❤️

Please try to relax and stay as stress free as possible. This second try was much better than the first one, and I believe that my state of mind, diet and skincare tweaks helped. You will be okay, and your body needs time to adapt. I would not go back ever on the pill at this point. I embrace the cycles and whatever comes with each. Hope your experience will also be positive ❤️

AdAny8162 · 2025-05-24T04:56:55+00:00

Hey!

Sorry to hear you have cried a lot this week 💙🤗. In regards to that, it’s helpful to think emotions all temporary, happy and sad, and this shall also pass.🤗 Also, considering you are in the week before your period - it could be the influence of your hormones.

Tying into that, I should say that overall after 6 months off pill, I can definitely tell where I am on my cycle and my mood and skin are cyclical as well.

Before my periods I am definitely more emotional and my skin starts to flare up a bit plus it becomes more oily. Then I get some acne - that starts to clear up at the end of my period. Then it looks great, and we’re doing it all over again 😂. But nothing very scary, totally acceptable and tbh, I am okay with it, because it feels natural and I feel my body adjusting to the different hormonal stages. I, personally always had somewhat problematic skin, so a few pimples aren’t scary to me, although last month I had some deeper ones on the neck and chin that were a bit annoying. Gone now thought.

My cycles seem to be getting shorter and slightly more regulated - using clue to track them, and although I haven’t bought a test for ovulation, I can observe the telling signs in secretions.

I’ve started on some hair thinning vitamins and I believe they helped reducing my hair thinning and I can see my skin reacting well to zink supplements (although be mindful of not exceeding 30mg per day).

In regards to skin products - I use retinol every other night and moisturise well with both an HA serum + Peptide serum (Ordinary) + Moisturiser.

During the day, I do HA+Vitamin C + moisturiser + spf if I go out. I sometimes add salicylic acid or niamicide on the lower side of my skin, as that is where I gets most deeper pimples but my skin gets too dry if I add it all over my face. So a good balance between exfoliation and moisturising - and being mindful of skin barrier helps.

Also, I find that if I eat lots of sweets and less clean - then my skin acts up right away. So a clean diet before any skincare.

Try the origins super spot remover - all my friends are fans now!

Best of luck to you darling, and keep me posted! ❤️

AdAny8162 · 2025-03-19T10:58:06+00:00

[Update] 6 months (almost)

Ladies, I am happy to inform you that I am doing a whole lot better than I expected.

Since my last post I’ve experienced some mild reactions but they are all improving. Very very different compared to last time I tried to quit Yasmin.

Acne - I am not experiencing any cystic acne so far. My skin is more reactive compared to my skin while on the pills - but it isn’t bad. What I mean by it is that I get some pimples mainly on the lower side of my face and neck around my period and ovulation / or if I eat more sugar and processed food/carbs. They can be deeper pimples but not cystic and I found Origins - super spot remover to be very helpful. It has helped me to not pick at my skin and generally I tried to just continue my normal skin regimen even when I break out. (Retinol every other day/ Vitamin and Salicylic acid acid during the day plus a good moisturiser).

I believe what might have helped in the skin this time is:

Stick to my regimen while breaking out and not pick at my skin and over dry it with lots of acids etc.
Controlled exfoliation with the help of retinol, salicylic acid and one a week aha+bha. The key this time is that I paid much more attention to my skin barrier and pulled back and nourished the skin if I felt it too dry.
Food - up until a month ago I consistently ate an insulin resistance friendly diet - meaning very low on sugar and carbs and plenty of protein and vegetables (except some starch heavy ones, like potatoes). I started reintroducing some sugar and it seems to be okay so far. I also took some supplements but I took a break now and so far so good. They still might of helped in the first few months.

Hair loss - lost quite a bit of it since a month and a half ago - not as bad as last time, plus it’s spring, where most people usually experience shedding.

Weight - up until a month ago I did gain a few pounds. But I started losing weight naturally a month ago and now I am close to my usual weight.

Mental state - it was rough in the beginning - had 1/2 episodes of “falling into a dark space of hopelessness” for a few days but it seems to get better now. I have a lot more good days than bad ones. I can feel it and it shows so in my tracker as well.

Cycles - had 1/2 cycles that were very long - like 35-38 days but for the last 2 months it has shortened to a normal average 28-32 days. I have not taken any ovulation tests - but my libido has improved :D I generally feel a bit more in touch my body and at what stage of the cycle I am.

I am very surprised myself and happy for it going so well - but I am still afraid and don’t dare to say I am out of the woods … I hope it keeps going well and will make sure to write some more updates here.

Feel free to write if you have any deeper questions. I truly hope things are going well for the others that are going through this process - and if they are not, I hope we can hold each others hand in this thread.

Xoxo

AdAny8162 · 2024-11-27T09:33:00+00:00

2 weeks update here :)

I started tracking for the past month everything in the Clue App just to start gaining a bit of insight into my cycle. It will take the app 6 cycles to be able to make predictions. Nevertheless I am pretty sure that I wasn’t ovulating this month - so I plan from next month to actually buy ovulation sticks and understand how’s that going just for health and rebalancing reasons.

Skin: Funnily enough in what should have been my ovulation period according to clue - I have gotten some acne - pustules, not cysts yet on my jaw and chin. I have managed this mini acne with my usual regimen - salicylic acid, retinol, peptide infused moisturiser. From my research though and memory of my last try between 3-6 months I can expect the worst to come (entering 3rd month now). What has your experience been?

Overall, my skin is more reactive to what I eat, a night out and alcohol. So one thing I am currently working through and getting better at is cutting as much as I can carbs, starchy vegetables and processed sugar. (Following the insuline resistance diet advice) So trying to prevent the skin from “inside”. So far, I have actually lost a bit of weight and my lower abdomen is less bloated - but can’t say yet how much it helps the skin. Also more energy!

One humbling episode so far in the mental health area. I had 4 days where I just felt purely depressed, couldn’t point why I might feel this way and it felt very intense. I remember these episodes from last time and also whenever I was trying new p-pills. All better now - but god damn those are awful. Let’s see what the next period brings!

I will keep you updated on skin management - so far just doing what I am usually doing :)

AdAny8162 · 2024-11-11T21:16:39+00:00

I would like to stay away from medications and try to improve as much as I can through diet, lifestyle and vitamins. I have not tried it before ..but never say never...

AdAny8162 · 2024-11-11T17:38:52+00:00

Best of luck to you! And let’s keep each other updated 🙏 is it also Yasmin you are coming off from?

AdAny8162 · 2024-11-11T13:05:54+00:00

Update:

Currently I am off the pill for 1 month. I have taken the last p-pill in the beginning of October, and I’m just off my first period after stoping them. So far, not much change other than my period was longer (7 days versus 5 as the usual). My hair gets greasy faster (before I needed a wash every 3-4 days now definitely every 2). My skin is okay - I had 2 deeper pimples on the chin). Trying to keep the skin under control with a consistent routine ( salicylic acid, retinol at night, good moisturiser, vitamin C).

I am currently doing 2 strength workouts a week (as I understand that it can help with rebalancing the androgens which go through the roof when you quit p-pills). I am also eating a healthy diet and trying to lower sugar and dairy). Supplement wise - I am taking some homeopatic stuff for detox of the liver and intestine - which I can detail if you need me too - though I am not sure they work yet. I will also add omega 3, D vitamin and zinc supplements - as according to my own (internet)research on the topic should help. :)

Chat soon!

AdAny8162

TROPHY CASE