One thing I remember from sex ed classes is the repeated lesson that one does not always have to engage in intercourse to become pregnant, and this fear was reinforced by a letter to a sex advice columnist I read in 'Teen magazine when I was 11 or 12, in which a virgin got pregnant from “fooling around” (and even at the time, I thought she was just kidding herself, but hey, who was I to judge).
However, this article at Salon.com ( http://www.salon.com/sex/feature/2001/03/14/columnists_1/index1.html ) says that those insane fears are completely untrue.
And the man seems quite adamant about it, too.
So was the “if your boyfriend ejaculates and you get the semen on your hand and then you touch yourself–YOU JUST GOT YOURSELF PREGNANT!!!” theory from the volleyball coach who taught me sex ed real science, or just total scare tactics they used to keep us completely dressed until we learned better?
IANAD, but it seems that the there is always a chance for pregnancy when live sperm enter the vagina. I would put the odds at somewhere above zero for pregnancy in your volleyball coach scenario. However, I would say that the odds are still extraordinarily remote. I doubt they even show up on statistics, nor have I ever heard of a documented case of this happening. So, while it is technically possible to get pregnant from “fooling around”, the chances of it happening are so low it isn’t something anyone should have to worry about. A sex-ed teacher warning you about it basically amounts to a scare tactic.
Sorry for the wishy-washy response. Maybe someone else can give a more concrete answer.
Back when I was in law school, one of the cases we took in Family Law was based on this type of situation. It was a paternity suit, and the court ruled that the guy was the father, even though he had not “gone all the way” with the mother of the child. So based on that case, I would say it is theoretically possible, but I’d guess extremely unlikely.
I also think this is possible but unlikely. Obviously anything that delivers sperm into the vagina, from artificial insemination to regrettable sex play, could get one pregnant. I have read medical accounts of such things, including the frequent note that the hymen was intact (which in decades past seemed to mean much more than it does now).
But of course there must be any number of people who get pregnant in the usual way who would like to be able to claim they didn’t have intercourse. Cynicism about these claims may overshadow any realistic appraisal of unusual insemination events.
Pregnancy can happen without intercourse, as described above. However, the number of cases where that actually happens is vanishingly small. If, whenever you encounter a pregnant person, you assume she is pregnant either thru penile-vaginal intercourse or artificial insemination, statistically it is unlikely that you will ever be wrong in your lifetime.
This drives me crazy. Listen to the “for teens and pre-teens” sex information, and you’ll hear that you can get pregnant from just unhooking your bra in front of a guy. Open any woman’s magazine, and you’ll see ads for ovulation prediction kits telling you you’re fertile for about 49 seconds out of any month.
No wonder teens (and a lot of the rest of us) don’t believe anything they hear.
Apropos of this topic in general, I have heard very good things about a book called “Taking charge of your own fertility.” Women who have found it useful for getting pregnant have reported it’s also useful for NOT getting pregnant.
Details, details. The lesson here is that Mother Nature in whatever form you wish to think of it (evolutionary drive, Gaia, divine intervention) wants pregnancy and live offspring, and there is no certain way to avoid it except through abstinence. (And I include the Pill in that because it relies on 0% human error to work 100%).
And since the size of the payoff is huge compared to the size of the bet (1 baby to care for vs. momentary pleasure), you’re taking a helluva risk even dry-humping. Sometimes, you just have to accept that Murphy’s Law trumps all, and either keep your pecker in your pocket, or find other ways of getting off
I’m almost sure your volleyball coach is right, especially if you touch yourself immediately after so the sperm is live and kickin’. Hell, that was the climax(hehehe) to a bestseller in 2000.
But let’s say, instead, he came on my stomach, which I touched with my fingers, then ran under water (but didn’t use soap), and then a couple minutes later, touched myself? What are the chances I could be pregnant?
I’m just making myself crazy here, aren’t I? Why the hell do I do this to myself?
By the way, what book?
And Northern Piper, what was the outcome of that case?
Very, very, very low. It is really impossible to put a number on it though. If you had dried your hands, I would say zero. Sperm cannot live without moisture. Dry everything and you will be fine.
Yes, you are. Don’t worry about it. You are less likely to be pregnant than if you actually had sex and used every birth control method in the world. It would take NASA years to crunch the numbers on how long the odds are. You are not pregnant.
Say, uhhm, what are the odds of getting pregnant for unprotected sex? I think this might have been a SD column or something. I mean how likely are you to produce a child from a single random session of intercourse? (Now that I think about it, I believe the aforementioned column was on the odds of getting AIDS).
Unprotected intercourse does not equal pregnancy even if the odds are pretty good.
I would agree that it is probably possible to get pregnant from sperm accidentally making it into your vagina, but I agree that the chances are small.
Oh my God, guys, I’m so sorry. I should not be allowed to post while tired and paranoid and making myself crazy. I stopped taking my birth control pills a couple weeks ago because they were making my cramps really bad, and then my period didn’t come last week, as scheduled, and I’ve been making myself totally, absolutely crazy ever since then. I haven’t had sex in the past month, but I convinced still convinced myself I was pregnant, even though I knew how ridiculous and completely improbable it was. I told my best friend, and she laughed because that’s how inane the idea that I was pregnant was, and that didn’t make me feel any better. I was just going mad. My stupid low self-esteem problems can’t allow me to believe for a second that my life is okay, so I get a fantastic charming beautiful wonderful boyfriend, and then I immediatly turn it into a crazy practice of making myself think I’m knocked up.
Anyway, I just got my period, and I am so relived. Thank you guys so much (and you, too, sex columinst from the Salon article) for telling me how totally crazy I am making myself. Thank you so much. Seriously.
I don’t know the statistics for one session of intercourse, but when unprotected sex is compared alongside other birth control methods a figure of 80% is most often given. This means that a typical couple has an 80% chance of getting pregnant after a year of regular, unprotected sex. This number probably varies a lot from couple to couple.
ThisYearsGirl: That is great to hear! Don’t worry about bugging the SDMB with your craziness. We’re all a little crazy here.
