Short of rape, how does one achieve an "unwanted pregnancy"?

A broken condom is a legit excuse for an unwanted pregnancy. Anything else should be considered an “irresponsible pregnancy”. Am I right?

1. Failed Birth-control (i.e. broken condom, failed IUD, pill fails somehow, his vasectomy reverses itself? Rare but I’ve met people who swear this happened..)

2. Abusive relationship (i.e. he starts beating you…you find out you’re pregnant..Hmm…do you really want to co-parent with your abuser for the next 18+ years?)

3. Ectopic pregnancy ..or some other medical condition that will result in harming the mother’s health and most likely will not result in a healthy live baby.

I have a friend for whom this was the case. Doctors assured her if the baby was not stillborn it was “not compatible with life” and would perish immediately after birth. Meanwhile, while in utero, the baby was literally dragging her health down to the point she was unable to live outside of the hospital due to multiple medical complications. She might survive the pregnancy but would have long lasting ill effects. Moreover, they already had two other children that were going to be left motherless potentially.

I guess this isn’t merely an “unwanted” pregnancy..it was a very much wanted baby..but even in this day and age women can die from pregnancy and childbirth.

@Katniss
Yes. The broken condom problem is always out there. A statistical outlier probably. But still out there.

She lied and said she was on the pill but really wasn’t.

My ex SIL had a tubal ligation and got pregnant. I’m pretty sure since she went to that length to not have another child, it was an unwanted pregnancy.

What? This happens all the time. No birth control regime is 100% effective.

All forms of birth control (other than complete abstinence) that are available are not 100% effective. Some people cannot use certain forms of birth control, I being one of them, because of the hormones that they contain. So the IUD and the Pill and the vaginal ring and the patch are out of the question for me. Also there are some m)edications, such as certain antibiotics and herbs (which the doctor may or may not know about and conditions that make the Pill and other hormone types of birth control less effective, things that may or may not be known to the mother/father/general public. Condoms break and can slip off. Vasectomies can sometimes be done incorrectly. What more do you need to know?

@Kardamom
Interesting. What is it that the doctor may or may not know about?
Not that it applies to me, but I am always curious.

@josie “The broken condom problem is always out there. A statistical outlier probably. But still out there.”

It is indeed a statistical outlier. But a 2% failure rate (at best) is still going to result in a lot of pregnancies in a population.

I’ve only been having sex for 6 years, but I’ve never experienced a condom breaking. What cheap ass condoms are these people improperly using and how the hell are they using them incorrectly? Any idiot can put a condom on a penis.

@livelaughlove21 Simply, the fact that it hasn’t happened to you yet does not mean it can’t happen to anyone. Apparently, men cannot put a condom on a penis at least 2% of the time.

@josie Perhaps you might reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies by requiring a breathalyzer test in the bedroom. Of course, that would mean more government involvement…

Both my sister and my neice got pregnant on the pill, my sister it was because the strength of the pill was too low and my neice was on and off antibotics so regular that it messed with her pill. My neice is now pregnant with her 2nd child as a result of this, however I do remember telling her before she got pregnant with the first to be sure to use a condom whenever she was on antibiotics and even reminder her after the birth of her first child that either she needs a different form that would be be effected by antibiotics or be sure to use a condom, but us adults do not know anything and she didn’t listen. So in May it will be 2 children later I am hoping she listens this time.

MOST of the time it’s due to irresponsibility. They just get carried away. The sex wasn’t planned, what ever.

My first pregnancy was due to irresponsibility. We had broken up for over a month, and were careless when we reconciled. I elected to terminate that pregnancy as I was a junior in college and the relationship was obviously shaky.

I was taking birth control pills when my son was conceived. They are only 99.9% effective… I am the 0.1%

When my son was just over a year old, a condom broke. That unplanned pregnancy, which wanted – just not yet – ended in a spontaneous miscarriage.

@josie The doctor may not know that the patient is taking legal (or illegal) herbs. The doctor prescribing anti-biotics for a bacterial infection may not know, or even ask if the patient is taking birth control pills. The gynecologist prescribing the birth control pills may not even bother to ask if the patient is taking anti-biotics. Sometimes it matters what time of the day a person takes the pills to make them more or less effective. Sometimes the patients are doing things that they wouldn’t realize make their form of birth control less effective and wouldn’t know to tell their doctor.

@glacial Men? My husband hasn’t put a condom on himself since we met.

@livelaughlove21 Sometimes it’s the fact that the guy doesn’t know how to properly take off the condom that results in a pregnancy. He tries to take it off too fast and it spills all over and into his partner. It only takes one sperm one time. Drunks tend not to know how to use their penises or condoms correctly. Good intentions, bad results. Most drunk sex partners are like most drunk drivers, they don’t think they’re drunk.

A broken condom is a statistical outlier? Hmmm. My daughter Becky would be the result of that.
Does she really exist?

I have not used a ton of condoms in my day, but I have still had one occasion where one slipped off inside of me. That right there could have resulted in a pregnancy. Like everyone else has said no birth control method is 100% effective, it can happen ANY TIME, TO ANYONE, even though most people think it can’t. The odds are low, yes, but that does not mean it is impossible. It happened to me. No one else’s business how I dealt with it, honestly.

A friend of mine got pregnant while she had an IUD in place. This was in the 20th century, granted, but it was unwanted. She was over 40 and had two teen-aged kids already. She chose, with great sadness, to terminate.

I had a Trojan condom that ripped big time, and I know how to put a condom on. It just ripped completely open long before I came.

How about an unwanted immaculate conception of a minor? Or any minor?

Did you know that the 99% effectiveness rate for the Pill is based on several factors, including taking the pill at the exact same time every single day?

If you’re off by a couple of hours, or happen to get caught out and about and forget about a dose, you can drop your effectiveness up to a third.

That, along with the fact that your body naturally changes, and the Pill you’ve taken for several years just might not work anymore, or you get an infection and have to take antibiotics, or your prescription runs out and it takes a few days to get into the doctor’s office for a refill…

There are a million reasons your birth control can fail. Because we live in the real world, not some fairytale land where everything does exactly what it says on the tin.

It feels like you are placing all the responsibility on the woman. That seems to be your MO so not surprising.

Do you think Obamacare should cover birth-control?

In my observations it is the result of irresponsibility. The woman can’t be bothered with birth control, or can’t afford it. Free clinics are very inconvenient. Many women are too spaced out on drugs to care.

@YARNLADY Tell that to @filmfann‘s wife.

@glacial I’ve never met her or them. I have read of such accidents, however.

@johnpowell
The way I see it, when it comes to pregnancy, there are two kinds of people. Those who can get pregnant and those who cannot. Those who cannot would include all males, and some females who are post menopausal, or have some other reason that would prevent them from becoming pregnant.

That leaves those females who can become pregnant.
In the 21st Century, females who can become pregnant have many choices of avoiding it, other than rape (or condom failure). So in most cases, pregnancy can be avoided. So why is the phrase “unwanted pregnancy” part of the discussion?
I am more interested in the choice of words, “unwanted pregnancy”, than I am in whether or not women get pregnant, which is not an issue that interests me unless it involves me personally.

Obama Care covers birth control. But in fact, Obama Care only forces people who have no interest in birth control to pay for birth control for those who do have an interest in it. Sort of like the fact that Obama Care forces people to pay for prostate biopsies, even if they do not have a prostate gland. Seems sort of unfair to me. But I also know that I have lost that argument, so I will worry about something else for the moment. But your question is a good one, and I bet it will not go away any time soon.

@YARNLADY So, not always irresponsibility or drug users, then. There you go.

If it a pregnancy, and the person who is pregnant did not wish to be pregnant, it is an “unwanted pregnancy”.

Not exactly heavy sematics.

“Unplanned pregnancy” is probably the term I dislike most, and it may be better suited for a question like this.

‘Oh, we weren’t trying to get pregnant; it just happened.’ Were you using protection? No? Then you were trying to get pregnant.

Lack of knowledge on sexual health among teenagers is also another reason.

Sick of you trying to find ways to debunk the need for Obamacare. Unwanted pregnancies happen. Sometimes through carelessness, sometimes through the failure of control methods we trust which let us down, sometimes because the pregnancy WAS wanted but health problems have changed the outlook. The last would be the cases of baby wanted, but not that one pregnancy.
No one program is going to please everyone. As a responsible driver of several decades, I don’t care to pay auto insurance which covers the expensive wrecks of other people I never met. Still, auto insurance has been required for quite some time.
I’m sure there are brilliant, careful physicians who resent the need to pay malpractice insurance.
There are likely employers who get irked with paying out for unemployment benefits.
A good society does what is responsible for the entire community, in keeping all factions as healthy and productive as possible.
As far as REproductive, sometimes that needs to be controlled.
When you have a crisis in your life, I hope people will be more supportive than judgemental.

What “rational context”? Are you laboring under the delusion that human beings are rational actors? Is it your contention that unintended pregnancies must be “wanted” unless an abortion is performed?

@johnpowell This may not be a popular comment, but it really is all on the woman. Shouldn’t be. Men should take just as much responsibility, but they don’t because they don’t have any real consequences to worry about.

@johnpowell “Obama Care” is not insurance. It is reform of the current insurance companies. I’m sure they’ll continue to cover birth control the same way they always have.

My daughter is also the result of a condom that split. I don’t think of it as an unwanted pregnancy though. She is very much wanted and loved, even though she arrived a couple of years before we expected her to.

Istruggle with this. Seems lack of proper use of birth control in most women I know, but they keep the babies. Multiple.

I got pregnant age 27 with an IUD in place and using a foam spermicide. Thank you, those of you who have slammed me, for your respectful comments on what a whore I am.

@susanc Who said someone with an unplanned pregnancy is a whore? Am I missing something? Not using protection doesn’t automatically make someone a whore. Not the most responsible nor the brightest bulb in the tanning bed, perhaps, but not a whore. Even if it did, you did use protection, so I’m not sure where you’re coming from here. I’m pretty sure any comment calling someone a whore would be promptly moderated, anyway.

Talk about taking offense when there’s none to be taken.

@livelaughlove21, you’re right. I should have written “irresponsible slut”. Thanks for the correction.

[mod says] Let’s get back to the topic at hand, folks. Thanks!