“There's this strange phenomena floating about - it's called unplanned pregnancy.”
Yes and I’ve had one myself when I was very young and much more naive.
There’s also contraception!
And after that pregnancy when not ttc I insisted on 2 forms being used.
I also don’t buy that all accidental pregnancies are truly accidental.
Partly poor education - women/girls need to be told much more widely/bluntly about all the things that can interfere with hormonal contraception, AND of emergency contraception if you know something’s gone wrong eg split condom.
I’ve also taken map 3 times.
And while I think it relatively rare sadly there are women who will risk missing a couple pills etc and “see what happens”
Even more rare, but do exist, women who stop taking contraception without telling their partner. Yes the men should be using condoms of course, still a shitty thing to do. Still happens with the women usually foolishly thinking a pregnancy will bind the guy to them/prompt a proposal.
There’s also abortion. Not for everyone I know but it is available as an option.
I was very clear when I met my ex that I had no intention of staying with anyone long term without marriage and also that marriage was for me to come before babies.
Not because I was old fashioned, or moral or religious. But because I had already seen by the time I met him the potential damaging repercussions for women/children if no marriage.
He was army too and I also wasn’t going to trail after him, trying to find suitable accommodation in places I was unfamiliar with, paying out endless deposits and moving costs with no commitment from him. Dad was army and I knew if we were married that meant married quarters, no moving costs, no deposits, no flat hunting.
He also had deployments in war zones and if anything had happened to him how everything then gets dealt with if you’re married is so much simpler. He and I both had roles working for/attached to the army where we dealt with people who’s partners were in when they were injured seriously or died and it made things very complicated, especially if the partners didn’t get along with the “in laws” or where there were supposed doubts on paternity of children etc
Unfortunately there's also a phenomenon where someone who's dated a soldier and is pregnant by someone else if the soldier dies in service they sometimes try and claim the child is the soldiers. It's thankfully pretty rare but it does happen on occasion. Or at the very least they don't know until baby born.
Marriage just makes things a whole lot more practical and easier.
And it ensured a level of fairness when we split too. He tried to get away with certain things but couldn’t completely because we were married.