Yes there are such things as accidental pregnancies

[greenwithglee]

I am getting increasingly frustrated with this on a site which is supposed to support mums and women. Someone will post for advice relating to an accidental pregnancy, and you can pretty much guarantee within the first 2 pages some prick will come along and ask "well how did it happen?". Errr quite frankly its none of your business and doesn't really relate to what the OP is asking.

It is judgemental, unhelpful and none of you bloody business. There are plenty of reasons birth control fails. Actually when you look at developments in BC effectiveness hasn't really changed for decades- availability and impact on pleasure has, but not effectiveness.

The reckon 50% of births globally are accidental pregnancies, and in the UK and UK that number is still 40-50%

When your doctor tells you about effectiveness rates, that is for one off encounters, the way the % compound over time means the failure rate is actually quite staggering, as illustrated here. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/09/14/sunday-review/unplanned-pregnancies.html

I dont think this perpetuation of these myths that unplanned pregnancies must be "someones fault", and us as women allowing these judgemental comments to go unchecked on this site is in anyway helpful.

What a stupid thing to say. That’s like saying you can’t have a car accident because you didn’t get into the car accidentally.

Are you suggesting someone who gets pregnant with a coil in is not an accident? That would suggest you think it’s deliberate.

"by chance" and "without deliberate cause" sounds like it would quite accurately describe a pregnancy resulting from contraceptive failure to me?

I think a lot of people class their pregnancies as accidents when really it was carelessness rather than a true contraception failure.

Also unless you live in a place where abortion and the morning after pill are illegal all babies are deliberate even if the pregnancy was not.

A friend has an accidental pregnancy and baby. The accident? She was too lazy to go and renew her pill.

Yeah, this. So incredibly unlikely. I’m firmly in the “you can’t get pregnant by accident” camp, and I got pregnant by accident! 🤣

I can’t class it as an accident though, I wasn’t on contraceptives anymore due to side effects, my DP knew this, yet finished anyway!!!

So yeah I could say it was an “accidental” pregnancy, but it wasn’t, was it? It was just him being a total idiot.

Presumably you were okay with him “being a total idiot” and finishing inside you or you would have got the MAP. 😛 (Unless you did!)

So IUS, (IUD if hormones are undesirable/ contraindicated), and then abortion in the 2/100 cases in 10 years that result in pregnancy. It's not accidental to continue with a pregnancy that is known about early enough, this is an active choice, made for a variety of reasons.

Obviously there will be a few women who can't keep a coil in, but they will need to use other methods vigilantly, the MAP for back up and abortion as a last resort.

The only accidental births are those that don't know until the second trimester that they are pregnant, having had a failure of the most reliable form of contraception suitable for them.

You can have as many babies in which ever way you like just pay for them . Rightly or wrongly People always think a single person unplanned pregnancy will be a benefit drain .

Termination

Fair enough!

I got pregnant by accident twice, the contraception I was using wasn’t suitable for me but I didn’t know until I got pregnant. I changed the contraception and then got pregnant on another form of contraception due to illness (I should’ve used another form of contraception though). DH is getting the snip now as I can’t risk it again.

If something happened that I didn't intend to happen, I'd use "accident" pretty interchangeably with "unplanned", "unexpected". My big question is: why does it matter? Who cares if people use "accidental" or "unplanned"?

This is exactly what I mean; this conversation would never happen in real life because people do not care. Only on Mumsnet are people so weirdly hung up on this and desperate for some non-existent moral high ground that they come out with bangers like "The hyperbole doesn't really add credence to your argument". 🤣

I tripped and fell the other day while looking at my phone. That was an accident / unplanned / unexpected.

I got pregnant after missing a pill. That was an accident / unplanned / unexpected.

Also, plenty of people have lots of unprotected sex and can't get pregnant. I did it once and got pregnant. Sounds like chance was involved there.

I also don’t understand the obsession with distinguishing between “accidental”, “unplanned” and “unexpected” in this context and often use those words interchangeably.

Can someone please explain what all the fuss is about? Is this about benefits? Or being anti-abortion? Seriously, WHY does this matter?

This is exactly what I mean; this conversation would never happen in real life because people do not care.

I'm sorry but that's incredibly naive.

My friend had two surprise pregnancies because she didn’t know until she was around 28 week mark… she didn’t show, no symptoms, periods as normal. On the coil. Did everything right, it sometimes happens. Should she be blamed? Absolutely not! Contraception does fail sometimes, everyone getting on a high horse about it thinking that people should be celibate to be 100% certain is just silly. Also, why does it matter? If someone posts here asking for advice for an accidental pregnancy, give advice, not judgement.

I don't think there is an "obsession" about the distinctions. For me, I was just putting forward an observation based on the points I had read people making.

Language is nuanced. Presumably you wouldn't used the words "accidental" and "unplanned" interchangeably to describe a car crash? You would only call it an accident (assuming non-deliberate), you wouldn't call it an unplanned car crash. The words carry different implications, hence having different words. It's not unreasonable for people to react to those nuances.

As for what the fuss is about, I don't know what prompted the op to start the thread. The type of thread where I've seen this description being challenged are the type of scenario where someone already has multiple children and is asking for financial advice to deal with their latest "accidental" addition.

From what I gather, some people take issue with the attempt to distance themselves from responsibility for their actions.

Aren't you passing judgement in this post though?

Accidental pregnancies generally don't happen if you don't want them to and take measures to avoid it. They absolutely can be avoided, especially if you both take contraceptive means.

We're all aware of certain factors that can diminish the effectiveness, eg antibiotics. Relying on methods like withdrawal, oh it's not fertile time, forgot a pill etc basically mean it can happen and if very fertile it will most likely happen. Xx

The second one wasn't an accident, she new that the Coil didn't work reliably for her and she knew that her body has the rare, rare ability to conceal a pregnancy to 6 1/2 months. She should have been doubling up on contraception AND monitoring with pregnancy tests if she did not wish to have another unplanned birth, obviously if she didn't care either way and could afford the second child then fine, but still not accidental.

People suggesting abstinence during fertile window (as if all women meticulously track this), always using 2+ forms of contraception “just to be safe”, etc. are being silly and can’t live in the real world.

Most of us don’t plan sex like a military operation. 🤷‍♀️

Yes there are unplanned pregnancies but if used correctly contraception is very unlikely to fail! My first pregnancy came as such a shock, I had forgotten to take the pill over a very short period, couple of days!!! However, me and husband had been discussing starting a family in the near future so after the shock wore off we were very excited. Earlier on in our relationship this would simply never have happened, that I would forget a day. Same after I gave birth to our third, in fact I was so paranoid my husband got the snip and myself hysterectomy. Yes overkill perhaps but for me worth it as the thought of another pregnancy caused so much anxiety …

So yes I think most unplanned pregnancies could have been avoided. But agree there’s no need for unhelpful comments or openly judging…

40 - 50% in the UK?.. I don’t believe that. I know very few people who would say their pregnancy was accidental. I do however know several women who told reluctant partners it was an ‘accident’ (one of them had been with her partner for 20 years without having any ‘accidents’…)

Close your legs. I hth?

I had an "accidental" pregnancy when I was 17. But actually it wasn't accidental, I was careless.

25 years of only using the pill as contraception - no accidental pregnancies.

Generally, if you use contraception correctly, accidental pregnancies are pretty rare.

Since the vast majority of contraception failures do not result in pregnancy, all those polishing their halos as they've never conceived unintentionally actually cannot say whether it was luck or judgement. Its most likely a mix of both.

Accidents happen when you don’t actively try to stop them. Funny that.