to wonder why there are so many Unplanned pregnancies

[worldgonemad72]

HI all

A friend of mine has recently told me she is pregnant after a 1 night stand, while i will support her with whatever decision she makes i just dont understand how, that in this day and age people can have an 'unplanned' pregnancy.
I know contraceptions are not 100% effective but if used correctly there should be a lot less unplanned pregnancies surely??
Ive spoken to her about it and she says she was on the pill but she sometimes forgets to take it at the same time etc, when i asked her about whether they used a condon she said no as she was on the pill!! what about STD's??
Is it just me that thinks if you dont want a child then be over careful?

Message withdrawn

I had an unplanned pregnancy -ish. But I was careless and over the moon.

Unplanned pregnancies are not ideal but I equally don't get these couples who say ''lets have our next baby next August dear.'' Babies don't always arrive on scedule.
Sometimes babies come when THEY want to. Of course I'm not excusing sloppy use of contraception as was the case with me. Morning after pill is rubbish. I was lucky in that I was ecstatic with my up pregnancy. I would have hated to have a baby with a one night stand and not have been ready.
Op- I can understand your concerns but it is a tad judgemental.

My cousin got pregnant on the pill but luckily she was in a stable relationship.
She had a stomach disorder IBS which she didn't realise can effect the efficiency of the pill.
In the future I will always insist that my pertner wera a condom. I am glad that I got pregnant but it has made me aware of how quickly and easily it can happen.
Also I value my gynacological health a lot more then when I was younger and more feckless!

I also had a lot of drunken flings and I'm not sure if I used protection. So shoot me you more sensible ladies. But thank the lord I didn't get pregnnat. I'm not proud of myself but I was young, wounded and stupid.

I am also wondering why noone has asked why men don't insist on wearing protection? Why don't they refuse to have sex unless suited and booted?
It's far easiet to see that a man is wearing a condom than to acertain if a woman has taken the pill. As usual us women get the stick when it does take two to tango.

And whatever you do, don't say women use abortion as a form of contraceptive.

Which is what some women do, the woman who runs our local EPAU told me she gets women back 3, 4, some even 5 times. They just don't learn. Then some of them come a few years later with fertility problems....... Every abortion costs the tax payer hundreds of pounds.

I don't question abortion for a woman who does not want to continue an unplanned pregnancy. But I do have a problem with women who have repeated abortions, that's just stupid. And there are plenty of them.

I do understand where you're coming from but I had an unfortunate scare with a broken condom with my now DH on the millennium of all occasions and could not get emergency contraception for 3 days which was far too late! I had to endure the agony of waiting for period to come. However, this incident made me really careful regarding contraception.

kittybang, that is totally reasonable imo, I have no problem with that at all personally.

My only problem is the women who have persistent abortions - that seems unethical in my opinion. Is it reasonable to get pregnant by mistake LOADS of times? I don't think so, particularly as the tax payer has to pick up the bill for a pissed up night out and a bloke that can't be bothered to wear a wet suit. I mean, I almost start to have sympathy for some of these groups which think we are far too sexually incontinent in our society!
Showing my age!

I wonder how many 'unplanned' pregnancies are really as such in that I mean how many people didnt deep down want to get pregnant.

Few of my friends actually tried to conceive. A number got drunk and knew they could get pregnant but didnt think it would happen but didnt mind as such.

Am I making any sense?

My DS was unplanned, and I'll put my hand up to having been 'careless' with contraception. However I took what I thought was a reasonable risk, being (at the time) 39, with a history of minor gynaecological problems and no previous pregnancies despite not always having been all that careful. Basically I reckoned I was not exactly super-fertile, DS' dad was an old drinking buddy who, unlike me, hadn't that many sexual partners and takes reasonable care of his health, so I thought: ow risk shag, what the hell.

It was a hell of a shock but there are no regrets.

Mind you, I do think that male behaviour needs addressing here as well, not just 'women are drunken stupid sluts who should be condemned and punished for daring to have lots of sex'. Quite a lot of men are actively resistant to using condoms, and a lot of women ae still fairly well socialized to put men first and give in to them. Some even fib about having had the snip.
But it's also important to remember that not every fuck produces a baby: pregnancy is not a foregone conclusion of having sex, nor is a live birth a foregone conclusion of conception, whether or not the woman takes action. And many unplanned PGS result in much loved DC, so really, people could do with spending less time squawking and fretting about what other people do WRT having sex when they fancy it, and maybe more time addressing the many far worse things there are to worry about.

My dad always used to tell me that the only real means of avoiding pregnancy is abstinence

I have 2 unplanned children, who I love dearly.

DS1 was the product of an unprotected one night stand. I didn't use contraception, at that time in my life I was having a pretty horrendous time: going out, getting off my face drunk and pulling unsuitable men (most of whom I didnt actually have sex with) was my way of avoiding reality. I didnt care if I caught an STD, or got pregnant. Thankfully I escaped the former, but did fall pregnant. I was in a good job, owned my own house, so was able to manage financially without difficulty.

DS2 was also unplanned, his father and I were using condoms but I can only presume one must have split.

I agree there are better things to worry about than unplanned pregnancies (incidentally I was also unplanned - my parents thought they were too old to have children so didnt use contraception, luckily they were wrong!)

I've had two unplanned pregnancies, dd I was on the pill, took it properly, no illness/ab's etc but still got pregnant.

DS we'd said about having another quite close to dd, I had gone on the pill after her but went a bit mental on it so came off it and we were using safe days. Only 2 days after my (5 day) period wasn't a safe day like we thought it was...

Neither was unwanted though, dd in particular was a big shock and timing could have been better but she was still very much wanted.

I think there is a big difference between a contraception failiure - especially a condom splitting, how can anyone predict or avoid that? - and actually not using anything at all, zilch. Surely those are very different things - one is risk taking (even if it is a measured risk like the one SolidGoldBrass took) and one is active risk AVOIDANCE like claireybee.

My DS was a totally unplanned pregnancy, I was 19 had been with DP for 5 years and I am ashamed to say we never and still have never used condoms although I was on the pill and then the DEPO for a while before I took an allergic reaction to it and ended up with a bloody skin disorder! Oh and a baby boy

Definately unplanned but not once did we say he was unwanted. I am now 3 years on, on the implant which works well and have been with DP for 9 years now but if we were to split up and I was to sleep with anyone else I would NEVER not use condoms now that I am older and wiser...