You may not give much thought to your ovaries till you try to get pregnant. But these reproductive organs play a huge role in your daily life. Poonam Agarwal, a consultant gynaecologist at the Bombay Hospital, tells you five things you didn’t know about your reproductive organ.
They can change in size: Did you know that the size of your ovaries changes a lot over the course of your menstrual cycle and your lifetime? With ovulation, your ovaries can temporarily grow a little in size. And these small changes in the size of your ovaries stop when you hit menopause.
Stress can affect your ovaries: When your body is under a lot of pressure brought along by a major change like moving to a new city or losing a lot of weight your ovaries might stop releasing eggs due to the stress. You can say that is nature’s way of preventing pregnancy when you are stressed.
They help develop female body parts: Your ovaries secrete a lot of hormones like estrogen and progesterone which are responsible for the development of breasts and widening of hips during pregnancy. Your ovaries also produce small amounts of testosterone which is responsible for your sex drive.
They can be behind your acne: Since your ovaries produce hormones, they can be the cause of hormonally-driven body issues. For instance, if you suffer from conditions like polycystic ovarian syndrome, the hormonal imbalance of estrogen and progesterone can give you acne.
They respond well to birth-control pills: According to a study published in the Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, birth control pills can reduce the chances of ovarian cancer [1]. Birth control pills are said to be extremely useful and can even lessen the risk of ovarian cancer by up to 50 percent.
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