to be getting more and more annoyed by the attitude that kids can be planned

[stitch10yearson]

Because if you dtd, then there is always a risk of pregnancy. condoms are only 98% effective, the pill and the coil 97%. This means basically that if you do the deed, then the only way of ensuring that you don't have a baby is terminating it.

And breathe.

IMO, NOT having kids is a lifestyle choice, not the other way around. If a man doesn't want kids, then he needs to always always wear a condom, even if she ison the pill and has a coil in, or have the snip. and probably still wear a condom. Or only have sex with someone who is post menopausal.

you are also making up stats if you are saying condoms are more effective than the pill/coil

If you're serious about not getting pregnant, the odds of you getting pregnant are vanishingly rare.

The coil, which I would very much consider the domain of the "serious about not getting pregnant", is 99.9% effective.

I would have no issue with an early term abortion so I can live with the risk of sex with a coil.

Ha, as usual lots of people who have never experienced a contraceptive failure being judgey about those who have. I've had three.
#1 was a drug interaction, I specifically asked the gp if the medication would affect the pill and he said "no". I should have read the box insert but I was 21 and believed the Dr instead. The drug was also teratogenic. I lost the pregnancy at 11weeks.
#2 was concieved through an IUD (copper, not hormonal) and a condom. I lost the pregnancy at about 9 weeks, the IUD came with it.
#3 was conceived four weeks after my third depo shot (so 7 months after I started on depo). That kid is 8 now.

Lots and lots of people assume before (and sometimes after) I tell them that I'm just an idiot/liar, but short of photocopying my medical records there's not much I can do about it. Just now I have an implant and my gp periodically has my bloods done to check I'm not ovulating. I'll have it replaced after 2.5 years rather than 3. I am a normal BMI and take no other medication. I'm just very fertile. My mother was the same.

I love the idea that contraceptive failures are caused only by the idiocy of the people using the contraception

goodbye, the coil does not prevent any pregnancy, it only aborts them

X-post with kitchen. Have had two failures myself. No idea whether its me or DP causing it, but it continues to happen.

Of course planning exists to an extent. Not a perfect science and some people are less lucky with fertility and predictably, but saying it's not possible at all is ludicrous, simply not true.

"If you really don't want a baby, then the only option that is guaranteed is a termination. Whereas if you really want a baby, then there are avenues open to use. Whether they are acceptable to you or not is a totally different discussion."

You realise that sounds like you are saying that adoption, IVF etc. are easy choices to make and are available to every infertile person whereas abstaining is too difficult.

I think if there was a survey of infertile people asking if they could have the children they want but they would have to give up sex at least until they hit menopause there'd be several who would bite your hand off to accept those terms.

that's untrue about the coil. The copper is a mild spermicide and the mirena has contraceptive hormone in it. The abortion stuff is Catholic propaganda( I'm catholic and had it)

Contraception failures are not ALL caused by the people using them, but a lot of them are. You need to not take it so personally ,its an easily demonstrable fact.
I got pregnant on the pill. My own fault, I should have doubled up with another method when I was ill, I knew it but thought the risk was small. Wrong move!
The majority of failures are because someone slipped up, not because the contraception didn't work (which does of course happen, but a lot less)

It is a choice - I have had the Mirena coil since it first went on trial many years ago, I have never become pregnant, had it removed and , hey presto! I am expecting.

I think the percentage chances of getting pregnant are based on all usage, not 'proper' usage. Those that miss pills, don't abstain if using antibiotics, occasionally use the withdrawl method when running out of condoms are playing russian roulette. The only time I have known an (in date) condom to fail is when the man has been big headed and bought a size too large for his penis and it has slipped off (this happened to me grrr), or the woman has sabotaged it. Generally contraception is pretty reliable.

OP, you're completely ignoring the point that I (and many others) have made about abstinence from PIV sex being a 100% effective form of contraception.

What's your answer to that?

OK, there may be some failures but if that failure rate really is 3 in every 100 women, how come I don't know any women who had a "failure"?

fancy, I am not catholic and have never come across any catholic propoganda, I'm just a science teacher, I just teach the basics of how contraceptions work as supplied to schools by the SH clinic.

Minipie, exactly, if you don't want a baby, don't have sex. Simples.

Seth, how do you know that you don't know anyone? Do you think people tell everyone they met that their PFB was a contraceptive failure? Do you think women tell loads of people if they have a termination?

Bella, friends do talk about things. However the overwhelming majority of comments on this thread tend to back me up too

As I am Catholic, although a very lapsed and cynical one I asked at the FP clinic about the copper coil, as I didn't really get on with hormonal contraception. They told me that it works by making the womb inhospitable and the copper is spermicidal. The Mirena has progesterone in it, so stops ovulation, hence no periods. I'll be very annoyed if it works by aborting a foetus, even though I'm pro choice.

It doesn't, its anti-choice propaganda.

OK, there may be some failures but if that failure rate really is 3 in every 100 women, how come I don't know any women who had a "failure"?

You do know some, almost certainly.

I am post menopausal.

(OP suggests I am good to go regarding having sex with zero risk of conception. Just saying)

well, according to the info I'm given it does make the womb inhospitable, but it works after conception on the embryo, not before conception on the sperm, having said that, I don't think my information refers specifically to the mirena, but I don't have it at home, so can't look.

grockle, why would I be getting anti-choice propaganda from the NHS?

It's just the bog standard material issued for schools, nothing obscure.

The whole 'if you don’t want a baby don't have unprotected sex' thing is absolutely right, but that does not, as some people on MN seem to think, equal that everyone who has unprotected sex wants a baby.

I think for many its just something that doesn't even register in the heat of the moment.

I've had a termination. I've not told anyone about it. Take a swizz at the Pregnancy Choices board and see how many women on there haven't told a soul.