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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

AIBU to not understand how a baby can be "unplanned"

104 replies

sansae · 22/06/2011 22:44

I can understand if contraceptive methods failed - condom broke - etc

but when you're actively having unprotected sex with no contraceptive method.. how is it unplanned?

One of my acquaintances recently told me she got pregnant, i'm chuffed for her but she said it was unplanned but she's very happy. so i asked, oh you mean your contraceptive method failed? She said oh, no, we weren't using anything!

aibu to not get this? perhaps it's just me being thick..

OP posts:

Curlybrunette · 22/06/2011 23:08

From when I first did sex education, both at school and from what my mum/sister told me I was aware that having unprotected sex even once could result in a pregnancy, so I agree that if people just don't use contraception, or use methods such as withdrawal how can they be surprised if they get pregnant.

NettoSuperstar · 22/06/2011 23:08

Until a few years ago, when I got the internet and joined parenting forums, I didn't know that people actively TTC, unless they were having problems, say after a year or so.

Now I've learned that people don't just get rid of the contraception and shag, they start taking temperatures, and using those pee sticks, and acting all weird if they don't get pregnant immediately.

DD was planned, but it didn't occur to exdp and I to do that. I came off the pill and we carried on as normal.

I see planned now as meaning using all this stuff and shagging to a schedule.
I often see people all stressed about it, after 10 minutes 2 months of this measuring, and want to tell them to get real.
Why make sex so clinical?

Shoesytwoesy · 22/06/2011 23:09

you get drunk have sex then realise ....oops no you didn't use safe sex....

FreudianSlipper · 22/06/2011 23:09

i can't beleive i am the only one who has taken risks and just thought i would be ok, didn't really give it much more thought than that and i was ok, by that i mean i didn't fall pregnant. it was not something i have done on many occasions but a few times

naturalbaby · 22/06/2011 23:10

i can see your point sansae but taking a risk and waiting to see what will happen is not planning something in my book. i planned dc1 very carefully, obsessively even. i took a risk with my contraception, or lack of, but i didn't actually plan to get pregnant that time.

Ivortheengine8 · 22/06/2011 23:11

I know what you mean sansae.....I'm having trouble expressing myself!
I know you are not trying to judge anyone. I was just thinking out aloud really.............

KoolAidKid · 22/06/2011 23:12

Nope. A lot of people like to live with their heads firmly in the sand OP. This is absolutely no criticism to anyone who has thought (or not thought) like this.

pacific I'm guessing the reason for this is that infertility would actually be the worse option (if the choice is infertility or surprise baby) so they are willing to take risks if only to 'tempt fate' to see if it's true or not...

Ivortheengine8 · 22/06/2011 23:13

Netto - thats it!! I agree!!

OddBoots · 22/06/2011 23:15

I think it is a very modern thing to think in terms of planned and unplanned.

It is a wonderful thing that we have so much more control over conception but it is drawing a line that makes it a very black and white 'trying for a baby' and 'trying not to have a baby' and casting to history the historically most common situation of 'what will be, will be'.

ButterflySally · 22/06/2011 23:17

I fell pregnant after stopping the pill. My partner and I initially decided we would use condoms but... ahem... soon got carried away and they went by the wayside somewhat. I then vaguely started keeping track of my menstrual cycle so we could avoid having sex during the time I was ovulating. And we dabbled in the withdrawal method as well.

In my mind, we weren't actively trying for a baby - to me that means keeping track of your cycle and having sex at your most fertile times. However, I know how contraception works and we both knew that we were taking risks. Given our lackadaisical attitude to contraception, it would have been naive to think we wouldn't eventually get pregnant!

But for us, we were at a stage where, whilst we didn't want to actively try for a baby, we weren't worried if it did actually happen. It was still a surprise. We tend to describe it as 'not planned but not entirely unplanned'.

Ivortheengine8 · 22/06/2011 23:19

...and well said boots.
But maybe thats because people are in more casual relationships now compared to before where people were generally married before they had kids?

rainbowtoenails · 22/06/2011 23:24

LOADS of people have sex without using contraception, only some of them are actively ttc.

Original poster

sansae · 22/06/2011 23:24

I see! i think i'm not quite grasping the idea of an unplanned pregnancy as one where you aren't actively ttc.

When people say unplanned i think - it must have been quite a surprise to them?

me and my husband have just started discussing a baby and we have stopped contraception, i'm not keeping track of things, temperatures and things like that but if i did get pregnant i would consider it planned.

I apologize if anyone thought i was being judgy, that honestly wasn't my intention, i think i might be seeing things a bit black and white

OP posts:

naturalbaby · 22/06/2011 23:32

a surprise would be if there was a contraception failure that you weren't aware of, or those mad stories you read about women who discover they are 5 months pregnant or even go into labour without knowing they are pregnant. now that is something i struggle to understand!

as much as one of my dc was unplanned, i knew almost straight away (next day) that i was pregnant so no surprises for me!

kaid100 · 22/06/2011 23:34

Not strictly to the point, but related:

This reminds me of a story I once heard of a Schools Inspector who was inspecting a secondary school. He spoke to an obviously pregnant pupil, and asked her she had any Sex Education classes. She said that she had, and that they were very clear on how to prevent pregnancy etc, but that "You're not really thinking about school when you're shagging, are you?"

mrsjohnsimm · 22/06/2011 23:39

A "planned" baby is one where you've actually, as a minimum, had a conversation and agreed that you want to have a baby. Potentially also thought about stages of life, career plans, etc.

If you haven't done any of that but are having regular unprotected sex then a pregnancy/baby shouldn't come as a surprise, but it hasn't been planned either, therefore is unplanned.

EmmalinaC · 22/06/2011 23:42

For me 'unplanned' means this: we had planned to have a baby after a few years of marriage but during a happy holiday not long after our wedding we had wild drunken unplanned unprotected sex et voila! 9 months later we had DD1. Not unwanted, not unexpected but definitely unplanned!

piprabbit · 22/06/2011 23:48

Unplanned babies are the ones where - for whatever reason - the parents did not realised that the consequence of unprotected sex would, for them, be a baby.

Medical issues, drunken thoughtlessness, myths about not getting pg standing up (or first time, or if BFing), contraceptive failures etc.

BTW, please don't ever tell your child they were unplanned, they may well hear 'unwanted' by mistake.

Mumwithadragontattoo · 22/06/2011 23:55

After 10 years on the pill DD was carefully planned. For the year after she was born we used condoms carefully as we knew we didn't want to get pregnant when she was less than a year but also didn't want to use hormonal contraceptives as we knew we wanted another with a 2-3 year gap. After DD was 1 we carried on using condoms but were not quite as carefully as before every single time. We found out when she was about 14 months that I was 6 weeks pg. We were really happy but also surprised (as we'd been mostly careful). This wasn't a planned pregnancy as we hadn't deliberately said we were going to try for no 2 but at the same time we were taking more risks than we would have normally because we knew we wanted another child in the near future and would be happy if it happened. Is this a planned pg or not? I genuinely don't know.

piprabbit · 23/06/2011 00:04

Mumwithadragontattoo, I think that knowingly taking risks with your contraception, happy in the knowledge that you would welcome a baby, is 'planning'.

Or perhaps there should be an additional category: planned, unplanned, and russian roulette (in the nicest way ).

MsChanandlerBong · 23/06/2011 00:07

Sansae - I think I share you definition of an unplanned pregnancy... if you're not using contraception then in effect you are planning a pregnancy in some way, shape or form.

Not all 'planned' pregnancies involve thermometers, ovulation charts and intense looks of concentration during sex. My pregnancy was planned in that we made the joint decision to stop using contraception, but we still managed to have a normal, spontaneous sex life (thank you very much!).

I always when people tell me their pregnancy was unplanned, and then they go on to tell me breezily "but we weren't using contraception".

MsChanandlerBong · 23/06/2011 00:09

piprabbit I think you have hit the nail on the head! Russian roulette conception is probably at the root of about 75% of all births

TheSparrow · 23/06/2011 00:12

TBH, still can't work out exactly how DS1 happened; just very glad he did.

Mumwithadragontattoo · 23/06/2011 00:13

Piprabbit - well our little Russian roulette baby is fast asleep upstair and I for one am very glad about it!

NettoSuperstar · 23/06/2011 00:13

I've learned that 'unplanned' means no contraception, but not taking temps and having clinical sex with legs in the air after.
Planned means doing all that.

Mind you, I left that forum as they all liked to make a meal out of everything and also talked about babydancing

To me, planning a baby meant stopping taking the pill, and then carrying on as normal, and normal meant having sex, as it tends to in a relationship.

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