Re: Birth Control

1

Love the prequil.

I think I've told the story here before of asking an obgyn about tube tying and him telling me he'd be delighted to do that for me just as soon as the better half provided a note from the obgyn's urologist friend upstairs, explaining why the better half couldn't get his tubes snipped.


Posted by: dairy queen | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 1:39 PM
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2

Apo has the answer to that, but I can't find it because I'm in a meeting. It involves cheerleaders and the end of human civilization.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 1:59 PM
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1: I kind of like that. Since it's a less invasive procedure, I think the man ought to man up. Of course, if you're not in a monogamous relationship, that doesn't apply. so, to sum up, you shouldn't need permission to get your tubes tied, but men above a certain age who are interested in permanent birth control should be encouraged to get a vasectomy.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 2:10 PM
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4

I've been looking into getting snipped soon and found a couple of references to doctors who want the signature of the man's wife to do the job. I'm not expecting to run into that myself, but at least part of the world is strangely parallel (and equally inappropriate) about it.

(Also, I want to get a pre-snip sperm count done, because it seems weird to take the post-snip count without a baseline to compare to, but it's not clear if anyone will just do that or if I'd have to invent some infertility story to get a test "prescribed". Why do tests require a prescription?)


Posted by: John Kennedy | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 2:19 PM
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5

I think the gossypol research (reversible male sterilization) is finally paying off. Can't remember where I read it tho.


Posted by: | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 2:19 PM
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6

There's a mom at Rascal's day care with three kids, oldest maybe four. We were commiserating about life being hectic, and she said, "They were all birth control babies. With this one," gesturing to the baby, "I was six month pregnant before I found out I was pregnant." She went on to say she'd had her tubes tied this past winter.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 2:19 PM
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7

4: Without a script, you're just jacking off.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 2:20 PM
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8

The whole "once you've had a couple kids then you can have the birth control but not before that" bit is really the creepiest part to me. I mean, the overall situation was super nasty and awful, but there's something just so bald faced and almost inexplicable about that part that astonishes me.


Posted by: MHPH | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 3:02 PM
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9

A friend of mine got himself snipped in his late twenties because he was leaving a job with good benefits and was like, might as well make the most of it.

He regrets nothing, a dozen years later. His wife (to whom I intropuced him a few years later) needed some convincing but seems mostly there.


Posted by: k-sky | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 3:39 PM
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10

Typo or joke I missed?


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 3:44 PM
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11

I'd have a hard time convincing myself to take male hormonal birth control if it were available (and have always been curious how many other men feel the same). I'd be unscientifically spooked about altering my body chemistry every day. Getting an IUD sounds super-unpleasant and diaphragms have their own problems.

Just another area where men have it easy. Many invisible (to men) burdens like this = why women initiate all the breakups?


Posted by: torque | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 3:47 PM
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12

Also has anyone linked to Sofia Vergara's ex suing her to let him bring their frozen embryos to life?


Posted by: torque | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 3:48 PM
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13

Given 11, do you really not feel responsible for doing the unpleasant half the time?


Posted by: clew | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 3:51 PM
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14

Breaking up kills both birds with the same stone.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 4:10 PM
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15

12: whoa


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 4:23 PM
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16

10: intropuced? typo, but see if you can retcon a joke.


Posted by: k-sky | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 5:12 PM
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17

If I were a doctor, and a childless patient asked me to make them permanently unable to conceive, I would do it, but I don't think I could ask "are you SURE?" enough times.


Posted by: Todd | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 7:09 PM
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18

I was really apprehensive about asking for a vasectomy because I was expecting to be given a hard time about it or even denied by the doctor, but it turned at the doctor wasn't bothered by my not having kids. I guess I'm now old enough that they're less bothered.

I have to say that the surgery and its recovery were really not a big deal, but shaving and recovery from shaving were way way more annoying that I would have ever imagined. Also the drug they gave me was really good and I'd totally do that drug again.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 7:54 PM
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Fortunately, I'm already a regular shaver of that region, so that part will be easy.

The drugs kind of weird me out. I hear that Valium or some other benzo is often prescribed in advance, but I think I'm more afraid of how I would feel on a drug type I've never used before than I am about being cut open. Ditto for Vicodin in recovery.


Posted by: John Kennedy | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 8:34 PM
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20

You wouldn't be the only one, Todd.

I can see my way to believing why Doctors might be reluctant to do that*, even though I don't think they're justified in the slightest. (After all even if a patient did decide she wanted a child after all there are other ways to get ahold of one.) But it's still a pretty sketchy holdover from that era, and attitudes haven't shifted that much as far as letting women make their own reproductive choices. I was mostly astonished by the extent to which that applied to birth control, because at least with irreversible sterilization it's kind of a big irreversible step that people should be pretty certain about before taking (and one where there's an almost-as-good option that's completely reversible).

*Mostly "Very few people become obstetricians because they think babies aren't like the greatest things ever" though, not necessarily a really great reason.


Posted by: MHPH | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 8:34 PM
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21

It occurs to me that I've been using some form or another of hormonal birth control for over half my life. I had the menstrual periods from hell as a kid--especially bad between 11 and 16--so I started taking the bill a year or two before needing its primary purpose.

Meanwhile, I've been trying to walk the fine line of encouraging but not nagging Mr. Robot to get snipped for the nearly eight years we've been married. A close friend of his who had the procedure done started feeling pain right in the middle of the operation, and it seems like no amount of positive counter-stories will ease Mr. Robot's mind. Then again, that's basically how I feel about getting an IUD, so maybe it's fair.

My position is that if one of us is going to have a surgical procedure to prevent procreation, then it should be him. He's 11 years older than I, has never ever wanted children, and hasn't been the one responsible for altering ones hormones to prevent a pregnancy neither of us want.

So we stick with the status quo, the Nuva ring, which means u need to remember to schedule my annual exam so they'll write me the damn prescription.


Posted by: J, Robot | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 9:07 PM
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22

which means u need to remember to schedule my annual exam so they'll write me the damn prescription

That's putting a lot of responsibility on the commenters here.


Posted by: fake accent | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 9:25 PM
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23

It only takes one call, fa.


Posted by: teofilo | Link to this comment | 04-30-15 9:27 PM
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24

I've considered getting snipped, and it's become somewhat more attractive as easily reversed options have become available. I don't have the oomph to get off my ass and actually do it, though. If a doctor gave me crap about kids I think I'd go ballistic. It'd be an easier decision if I was 100% resolute about not wanting kids, but I waver every now and then when my friend's kids do something especially adorable. OTOH, spending much time around kids who are not being adorable shores up my resolve quite firmly.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 5:49 AM
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25

Some interesting data on the effectiveness of various methods of birth control. I'm surprised at just how bad some of them are. It makes getting the snip seem that much more worthwhile.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 6:52 AM
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26

It really wasn't that long ago when you had to get your husband or father's permission to get the pill. Even as a grown-ass adult.

"just as soon as the better half provided a note from the obgyn's urologist friend upstairs, explaining why the better half couldn't get his tubes snipped."

I love this as long is it is mostly a suggestion and encouragement, and you aren't having sex with other men.


Posted by: will | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 7:08 AM
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27

25: The "typical use" numbers are population-level important but I think more misleading on an individual level. This is noted in the top of that article, but "typical" use includes not using whatever method consistently. So the "typical use" rate of pregnancy with condoms, for example, includes the incidence of forgetting or not bothering to use a condom.

(Which is hard for me to get my head around. As a long-time condom user for birth control, I've even woken up in the middle of the night after sex panicked that I somehow had forgotten to use a condom, and had to get up and check the trash or something before I could calm down and go back to sleep.)


Posted by: Nathan Williams | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 7:52 AM
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28

I'm currently using condoms for BC and I hate the bloody things. It's easy to see how people might skip them in the heat of the moment.

One method that's not often talked about but that accidentally worked wonders for my BIL is to take a scalding hot bath before sex. It cooks the swimmers well enough that with a full year of trying he was unable to get his wife pregnant. Once he stopped the hot bath routine she was pregnant within a couple of months.

Perhaps one could invent a comfy little nut-cooking pouch that men could wear during the day to keep their balls too hot for sperm survival.


Posted by: togolosh | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:08 AM
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29

And you found two.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:08 AM
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30

http://newmalecontraception.org/heat-methods/
Surprisingly long-lasting effect, kind of unclear exactly how reversible it is.


Posted by: Nathan Williams | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:21 AM
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31

If they're bloody perhaps you need a larger size.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:22 AM
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32

Or it was just that time of the month. In which case you can probably skip the condoms.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:24 AM
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33

Skip the condoms, but install a bidet for cleanup after.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:44 AM
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26.2: yes, context was his 2 adolescent kidd and our then baby, better half is, I don't want to say significantly older than me but that's probably the right way to describe us, definitely may-decemberish, and although we weren't hitched at that time we were clearly thoroughly steeped in monogamy.


Posted by: dairy queen | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 8:54 AM
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35

21: IUD pain is not that bad. You go home afterwards with ibuprofen and a hot water bottle.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 11:26 AM
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27 and 28: I'm kind of excited that the Gates foundation is putting money into designing better condoms. They're hoping to get something which enhances the experience of sex so that men will *want* to use them.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 11:30 AM
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36: they should play sports sounds or something. Maybe a big cheer for at the end?


Posted by: Turgid Jacobian | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 11:41 AM
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38

37 was my attempt at channeling the absent Moby


Posted by: Turgid Jacobian | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 11:43 AM
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39

Did I read or only imagine that the initiative has caused some to question Melinda's Catholicism?


Posted by: idp | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 11:46 AM
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40

we were clearly thoroughly steeped in monogamy

I enjoy my monogamy steeped. aka
soaked in water or other liquid so as to extract its flavor or to soften it.


Posted by: will | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 11:49 AM
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36: combination condom and frozen anal beads?


Posted by: No longer Middle Aged Man | Link to this comment | 05- 1-15 2:21 PM
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