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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Men pretending they don't know how babies are made

29 replies

CoalTit · 03/07/2025 23:23

I met a clever, cultivated, caring man who is very open about wanting a relationship and is marvellous in bed. He has adult sons who he says are very pleased that he's Met Someone.
But he told me the other day how the youngest was conceived after only a week of sex and how the mother was just after a baby.
I'm getting old and outspoken, although I try very hard to be kind and tactful. I said: "Didn't you use condoms?" And he said, with a face of innocent surprise: "But it had only been a week!"
I said: "But you know how babies are made, don't you," and went on to tell him about my father getting angry with my mother for getting pregnant again after they'd finally got the all-important boy, and my mother telling the resulting child this after dad died.
New boyfriend thought that was very cruel of my mother, and we said nothing more about men acting as if they don't know how babies are made. But it's been bothering me. I looked for that Gabrielle Blair essay about how men are fertile all month long and so on, but it's behind a paywall now.
I suppose there is a lot of coyness and outright lying from both sexes about wanting children, and I'm postmenopausal, so too old to be personally affected by it now, but it still,
AIBU to be furious about this willful blindness?

OP posts:
Bananalanacake · 04/07/2025 05:34

I couldn't respect a stupid man. I would also insist on condoms unless he's had a full STD check.

PsychoHotSauce · 04/07/2025 05:40

Archived link to the essay: https://archive.ph/Wiurg

Paraphrasing the rules of misogyny: If a woman can be blamed for a man's (in)action, then they will be.

2catsandhappy · 04/07/2025 05:59

I had an ex accuse me of an affair as 'we only had sex once' after he returned from working away. He just could not grasp that each conception is from one time sex.
More recently I've been questioned about getting/falling pregnant at 58. I was stunned at the lack of knowledge from a(different) 59 year old man.
They walk among us.

Shenmen · 04/07/2025 06:08

2catsandhappy · 04/07/2025 05:59

I had an ex accuse me of an affair as 'we only had sex once' after he returned from working away. He just could not grasp that each conception is from one time sex.
More recently I've been questioned about getting/falling pregnant at 58. I was stunned at the lack of knowledge from a(different) 59 year old man.
They walk among us.

TBF getting pregnant at 58 is incredibly rare, it is actually newsworthy when it happens without IVF. The oldest person I've ever met who got pregnant was 50 and I work in a medical setting where this is asked daily!

Planesmistakenforstars · 04/07/2025 06:09

I met a clever, cultivated, caring man

You really haven't.

justkeepswimingswiming · 04/07/2025 07:45

If he was clever & cultivated he wouldnt be saying things like that. He sounds very dense.

User1786 · 04/07/2025 07:59

Was he saying he still didn’t know or that he didn’t know back when he was young? Many young men and women seem rather unclear on this. “We only did it once” or “he pulled out so how can I be pregnant” so I don’t think it’s a man issue at that age.

Codlingmoths · 04/07/2025 08:01

Shenmen · 04/07/2025 06:08

TBF getting pregnant at 58 is incredibly rare, it is actually newsworthy when it happens without IVF. The oldest person I've ever met who got pregnant was 50 and I work in a medical setting where this is asked daily!

i expect she means this man thought it perfectly normal for a woman to fall pregnant at 58. Because he knew nothing at all about a woman’s reproductive system.

PollyBell · 04/07/2025 08:02

I would set my standards much higher

OverheardInAWhisper · 04/07/2025 08:04

What did he mean by ‘It had only been a week’? Was he labouring under the delusion that it took months or years of beavering away condomless to conceive?

Kindly, he sounds like a dope.

Naunet · 04/07/2025 08:33

He's an idiot. What does he mean it was only a week? Did he think it takes months of some kind of sperm build up, and if a woman gets pregnant sooner than that, it's because she's done some witchy magic and got herself pregnant early somehow, therefore tricking him?

Dinosweetpea · 04/07/2025 08:34

I've never met a man who doesn't understand how babies are made and that it can only take one time of unprotected sex. He's an idiot.

KimberleyClark · 04/07/2025 08:36

Naunet · 04/07/2025 08:33

He's an idiot. What does he mean it was only a week? Did he think it takes months of some kind of sperm build up, and if a woman gets pregnant sooner than that, it's because she's done some witchy magic and got herself pregnant early somehow, therefore tricking him?

Tbf it does sometimes take months for a couple to get pregnant. But yes it can only take one time too.

Naunet · 04/07/2025 08:39

KimberleyClark · 04/07/2025 08:36

Tbf it does sometimes take months for a couple to get pregnant. But yes it can only take one time too.

We all know it can take months, just as it can take once, because we know how babies are made. My confusion is around how HE thinks they're made!

RentalWoesNotFun · 04/07/2025 08:44

Men don’t like to think too hard about what will essentially be a problem for someone else.

They cannot always align the thoughts of the penis with the through of the brain. Sometimes one wins sometimes the other.

Until we have more negative consequences for men and they are made to fully pay in time, energy, career and money for their offspring they will continue to not really research issues that don’t affect them and not really challenge the thoughts of the penis v risks.

we did it standing up = potential pregnancy
she only just had her period = potential pregnancy
it was just the one time = potential pregnancy
she was a virgin = potential pregnancy
she just had a baby = potential pregnancy
shes still breast feeding = potential pregnancy
she didn’t orgasm = potential pregnancy
she took the morning after pill = potential pregnancy.
etc.

GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER · 04/07/2025 08:55

TBH an awful lot of men are clueless about basic biology. Though in the case of making babies, I suspect that a lot of it’s down to wilful ignorance.

honeylulu · 04/07/2025 09:12

What a dope. We are all (save for IVF etc) created from a single act of intercourse. It might be the first opportunity or after years of multiple opportunities but the premise is the same! A cumulative build up of semen is not required.

To be honest I think it's something men don't really give any thought to until the woman is pregnant and then get all indignant about being "tricked" and "oh you can just have an abortion". Grrr. And they think they are the more logical sex, go figure.

I will add though that I've sometimes felt pretty astonished at the ignorance of some women about their bodies. I've heard some women in their late 40s and early 50s say "oh I could have more babies if I wanted them, my periods are as regular as clockwork". Erm, well so are mine (age 51) but statistically I think I would have markedly less than 1% chance! Periods alone are not a fertility guarantee.

JustFeedMeCake · 04/07/2025 09:14

He’s clearly not clever at all 🤣 and he sounds rather awful actually!

soupyspoon · 04/07/2025 09:14

Hes not very bright

There are also lots of not very bright women who also say things like this.

Its how 'accidents' occur.

soupyspoon · 04/07/2025 09:16

KimberleyClark · 04/07/2025 08:36

Tbf it does sometimes take months for a couple to get pregnant. But yes it can only take one time too.

It always 'only takes one time'.

Its just the once that it occurs, conception.

plantsdieinmyhouse · 04/07/2025 09:38

People who have t got very high IQs struggle with the concept of causation that isn’t automatic.

yes sex makes babies, but it doesn’t every time, in fact each individual time you have sex is more likely not to create a pregnancy than to create one.

so people start to disassociate sex from baby making.

I’ve had unprotected sex hundreds of times but only 5 have resulted in pregnancies.

NotrialNodeal · 04/07/2025 09:40

Eughhhh this would completely put me off! Stupidity and or irresponsibility is a huge turn off here!

Shenmen · 04/07/2025 12:15

Codlingmoths · 04/07/2025 08:01

i expect she means this man thought it perfectly normal for a woman to fall pregnant at 58. Because he knew nothing at all about a woman’s reproductive system.

D'oh 😁. Thank you for pointing out the bleeding obvious. I think I better go and check I haven't turned into a man 😂

MiloMinderbinder925 · 04/07/2025 12:22

It's a weird kind of cognitive dissonance. You often get men complaining that they never wanted children but they didn't get a vasectomy or use condoms.

Codlingmoths · 04/07/2025 12:30

plantsdieinmyhouse · 04/07/2025 09:38

People who have t got very high IQs struggle with the concept of causation that isn’t automatic.

yes sex makes babies, but it doesn’t every time, in fact each individual time you have sex is more likely not to create a pregnancy than to create one.

so people start to disassociate sex from baby making.

I’ve had unprotected sex hundreds of times but only 5 have resulted in pregnancies.

whereas I think my first two babies only took a few days each. That’s why their due dates are a week apart calendar wise.