To hope I get pregnant even though my partner withdraws?

[JambalayaFan]

Me and my partner are in a bit of a strange situation. We own our own home, plenty of savings and a very happy stable relationship. He’d like to wait a couple of years to TTC as we are considering emigrating to where his family lives in 2 years, and the emigration process will obviously be more costly with a baby. I on the other hand would like to start trying ASAP as endometriosis/infertility runs in my family on both sides (several aunties never managed to get pregnant, I have loads of lovely adopted cousins). For this reason, I experience great anxiety about any sort of contraception as I so want to become a mother and don’t want to lower the chances when it may already be a struggle.

We have a great relationship and have no trouble discussing things, and we came to a deal. Our deal was that we won’t TTC yet until he is ready but we’ll do the withdrawal method. He accepts the high risk of pregnancy and agrees if it happens we’ll keep the baby. It may seem odd to many but for us it was a fair compromise. He isn’t quite ready to TTC yet but understands I may not have the biological clock that most women do and therefore I don’t want to mess around with my fertility. I know non-hormonal contraception exists, but it’s also about not wanting to miss chances to get pregnant. I haven’t pressured him into anything, he’s welcome to use condoms if he wants but he does know my feelings on the situation and we came to this solution together. I’m sure many reading this are judging but I promise, we have a very healthy relationship. This situation has come from a lot of discussion between me and my partner. It can’t be compared to a situation where woman lies about being on the pill to get pregnant. I was honest with my partner about wanting a baby.

anyway, the reason I am posting is I am curious if anybody has gotten pregnant from the withdrawal method? If so, did he pull out last minute (so he came as soon as he pulled out and didn’t have to touch himself)? Or is he ejaculating with plenty of time to spare? Me and my partner are doing the first one. Feeling a bit disheartened because a few friends and my mother have told me they did pull-out successfully for years, which isn’t good to hear when I’m wanting it to fail!

I think you should try now, as you know what the NHS can offer regarding pregnancy and childbirth, and if in 2 years time you will have not conceived then you will hopefully be in a country that may be better than the NHS to assist.
But that's just my take on it.

The withdrawal method has worked for me for the past 3 years (sorry, probably not what you want to hear). However, I have heard of it failing with other people.

It sounds as though he does eventually want to have kids, so it's not the end of the world if it does happen!

Alternatively, get him drunk and he'll probably forget to pull out. That's how it happened with my first Daughter anyway!!

Alternatively, get him drunk and he'll probably forget to pull out. That's how it happened with my first Daughter anyway!!

bloody hell...

Alternatively, get him drunk and he'll probably forget to pull out.

You know that's called rape and entrapment, right?

@LadyMinerva I'm not sure that's rape 🤣. Entrapment perhaps.

I can't finish reading this thread, it's been a day for snippy replies on Mumsnet 🙄 OP, you both sound fine to me! Not everyone goes at conception like a science project; it's quite normal to just have unprotected sex and see what happens. This is what you're doing, while trying to delay the 'happening' - you're just weighting the odds because conceiving right now would be inconvenient, not a disaster.

The only thing I would say is that you might need to have another talk about your obvious anxiety about your fertility. Perhaps you might agree to stop withdrawing and be more relaxed about the prospect of emigrating with a baby. You're both EU citizens, your child could inherit citizenship from you, I believe?

Getting someone drunk and having sex with them certainly is. Decision making is impaired by alcohol. You cannot confirm that consent was given if either are drunk.

I'm going to go against the grain here and say I don't see anything wrong with your choice of contraception.

You've chosen a course of action which has a lower probability of pregnancy than some options, and a higher probability than some other options. This seems to fit with the fact that the least keen of the potential parents has a weak preference for delaying starting a family.

On another note though, if I had a hereditary disease which could be quite painful for sufferers (endometriosis in your case) I wouldn't be trying to conceive. I'm not saying you're necessarily wrong to do so, but have you stopped to think about this, and if you'll be OK with yourself if years down the road you see your daughter in significant pain every month?

Being pedantic, in the UK it'd be sexual assault but not rape.

Rape as defined in the law of all jurisdictions within the UK can only be committed by the perpetrator using a penis.

To be clear, sexual assault is not acceptable either!

If I have understood this correctly, you are claiming that you will be quite happy if you are not pregnant after X amount of time if you "weren't really trying", whereas if you had been really trying, you would be stressed. In other words, your mental state will depend not on the outcome (pregnant or not) but on the quiet bet that you made with yourself before you started.

Put politely, you are kidding yourself. Put less politely, it is childish and delusional. The truth of the matter is that you want to get pregnant, but you are not ready to deal with the consequences of that not happening, so you are making up stories to fall back on. These might just about work for people on your outer circle of acquaintanceship, but when push comes to shove, they will not fool your real friends, you family, your DP, or you. In fact your failure to confront the possibility of failure from that start will make that failure, if it happens, all the harder to take.

I would suggest counselling of some kind, but you may be able to self-help yourself out of this. Invest a tenner in this book, which I think might help you to face up to your situation.

I apologise if this post is a bit brutal. 🙏 I mostly try to be relentlessly positive in what I write online. But in this case, I think you need to give your head a major wobble.

No it's not rape (in the UK.)

And you can't rape without a penis!

Yep I’ve had 2 babies from the method. I couldn’t tell you how - I think it was a mixture of poor timing and not realising I was ovulating and maybe pulling out too slowly.

I came off contraception as the hormones had negative effects on my moods.

Good luck

Not going to go into the in's and out's of your choices and relationship, but will answer your OP, other than to say look very closely into where you are looking at emigrating to as if it doesnt work out, you may be forced to stay if there is a child in the mix (thinking Aus in particular, but other countries too).

Used withdrawal for 7 years with no pregnancy, the first method you mentioned. Got PG second month we actively didnt use it.

fucking well should be.

I hate the assumption that consent only goes one way.

Hmm, @PyongyangKipperbang, a woman having sex with a non-consenting man:
is unlikely to succeed
won't injure his internal organs
can't make him pregnant.

Otherwise, yeah, it's just the same.

Hi OP that sounds fine to me! Sprry youMre getting lors of anippy remarks, not everything needs to be treated as a science project as PP said.
Two questions here to provide a bit
more stability in your project:

• Couldn't you move earlier to your chosen country?
• What would prevent you to get married now? Even just a registry wedding. Like this you have the commitment If an oopsie not so oopsie pregnancy were to happen.

Our pull out method (I had just come off hormonal) failed the very first time, but some friends who wish to use it more as a contraception, along with tracking their cycles, have been successfulin avoiding a pregnancy for years.

Well said. Some posters seem to think when it's about a man not being able to fully consent to conceiving a child it's just a funny anecdote to tell...

I’m fairly likely to have issues getting pregnant he feels it would be better waiting until in the new country before officially TTC because if we start now and I’m still not pregnant in a year or two years, we’d be faced with the struggle of trying to decide whether to go for the NHS funded fertility treatment at the cost of delaying the move.

THIS MAKES NO SENSE. He would rather not know whether you would struggle to conceive for 2 years so you wouldn't seek treatment? Then what? Start trying, find out you can't conceive but then you are 3 years down the line and every single year is HUGE in IVF land. The older you are, the less likely to be successful.

So he's burying his head in the sand at the cost of your fertility. Nice.

He's immature and you're too desperate to put your foot down.

Good luck.

This all sounds totally mad!

Your obsession with infertility?

Your "suspected" endometriosis, why suspected?

Your "anxiety" around getting pregnant.

I've no doubt you're tracking your cycle and initiating sex at your fertile window?

Your want to know "how" people used the withdrawal method and at what stage the man withdrew is utterly bizarre, because you want to know how people made it fail.

If he was listening to you, he'd go ahead with a pregnancy now, but he's playing you and you're accepting it.

I think you want a baby and will make sure to get pregnant.

I don't think you have endometriosis.

I have Endometriosis. Most women know. It's not a subtle disease.

@buma yours in such a shit relationship that you have to entrap your partner into a pregnancy? And you think it's a good idea to tell others to do the same?

It's women like you that give other women a bad name.

You should be ashamed of your actions.

My friend and her boyfriend used withdrawal method and she wanted a baby and he said he did in the future…
she got pregnant 3 years in and was delighted she’d now have a “proper family”

he suggested an abortion and I listened politely to the drama and said if she wanted the baby she should be prepared to be a single mother…she didn’t want that but she “knew” he’d come round because he “loved kids” and “wanted a family”.

more drama throughout pregnancy…he worked a lot “for when the baby came”
he got his shit together a bit at the end and was there for the birth.

he left around 4months after baby was born, she had to go back to work at 5/6m as she couldn’t afford to live otherwise…

the baby is 2 and he has him Sat midday to Sunday 9am every other day and pays absolute legal minimum. She is fucking miserable hates her life and complains all the time about how she has no time, money, etc etc and spends her time wishing her child was asleep.
it’s desperately sad.

Are you off your head? I strongly suggest you educate yourself a bit.