I am starting to worry a little bit about my body right now. I’ve been on birth control since I was 16 and now i’m 24. This past year my boyfriend and I have stopped having sex (it’s a long distance relationship) and so I stopped taking my birth control about 6 months ago. However, I kept feeling the symptoms of PMS that I did not like so I decided that I would start birth control again 3 months ago. I’ve been horrible with remembering to take it and two months ago I took the pill for 14 days and started to bleed so i discarded the whole pack and just let my body not have protection for the third week. The following week I started a new pack. Again, I’ve been pretty bad at taking the pill. Last week, on my second week of active pills, I missed my birth control on thursday and had to take thursdays and fridays pills on friday. I started to see that I was spotting again but I decided to keep going to not freak my body out. Then on Sunday I didn’t have my pack on me and had to take Sunday’s and Monday’s pill on Monday. On Sunday night, I had sex, and it was unprotected. He did not finish inside me (at least that’s what he says) but when I looked at my stomach where he finished there wasn’t much on me…Now I am freaking out. Also, I was spotting pretty heavily on Friday, Saturday, and up until the moment that we had sex. The next morning, I put in a tampon and thought nothing of it until I took out the tampon and realized there wasn’t any more spotting…at all. My spotting completely stopped. I’m scared that I may have gotten pregnant. I know that he didn’t “finish inside me” but I shouldn’t take his word on that right? I should get checked out? I was supposed to get my period yesterday/today but it hasn’t come.
Take an over-the-counter pregnancy test (yes, it’s not too early to take one), and call your prescribing doctor regardless of the results. Spotting and irregular periods can be cause by incorrect Pill use, but it can also be caused by stress, or pregnancy.
And for the love of all that’s good, don’t rely on withdrawal when your pill-taking is that disrupted. Used perfectly, withdrawal can be fairly effective, but few people are all that good at actually performing withdrawal reliably.
If you can’t take the pill correctly (which isn’t hard in the era of cell phone alarms), then you should switch to a different method. Mirena (a hormonal IUD) is good. So are condoms. Both together are even better.
Withdrawal is not effective even if used perfectly, because live sperm are present in pre-ejaculate.
Studies have shown that pulling out rivals condoms in effectiveness.
To the OP - Get an IUD. Never have to worry about it, and has best rate of prevention known at this time (barring no sex at all, of course).
Medical advice is best suited to IMHO.
However, for serious questions such as this you are much better off seeing a medical professional rather than asking for advice on a message board.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
They have a name for people who use withdrawal as birth control… “parents”.
The only thing you can guarantee with a spotty (sorry) pill schedule is that you have no idea whatsoever when you are ovulating. The pill IIRC fools your body into thinking it has already ovulated. miss more than one, and your ovaries may take over at that point and set up their own schedule. Once they do, even taking pills on time after that may not stop the progress of ovulation.
Yes there are tests you can take to determine if you are pregnant pretty early now; I’ve seen TV ads that suggest they can tell at day 6. Implantation bleeding, I think, does not usually happen until the 6 to 12 day mark, so day 4 is a bit early, it may simply be spotting. However, the first rule of reproduction is that almost any rule may not apply: You could register negative in early tests and still be pregnant; Ovulation might happen anytime in your cycle; Even birth control fails sometime…
At this point, all you can do is wait and see, it’s Mother Nature’s special miracle. Within a week and a half or so you should get a definite answer from a simple test.
Until then, good luck. Either learn to set a smartphone alarm (and follow it!!) or else look into more hands-free solutions. Unless you don’t have to…
Yes, this. For the love of…something…get a patch or a ring or something you don’t have to remember every day.
Withdrawal is statistically very nearly as effective as condoms at preventing pregnancy, even with typical use (17% failure rate for condoms, 18% for withdrawal) - but perfect use is very hard for some men, especially young men.
Exactly. He has a few seconds to decide… His jollies or your future… decisions, decisions…
18% failure means within a year, there’s about 1 in 6 chance the “couple” will end up pregnant. Or, at least one of them will.
Yep…and also why I’d never rely on condoms alone to prevent pregnancy myself. Condoms for STI risk reduction, birth control for birth control.
Most people who say that withdrawal doesn’t work, or that people who practice withdrawal are called parents, or other disparaging things about withdrawal have a very hard time believing that it’s nearly as good as condoms (perfect use *and *typical use.) So either withdrawal is better than most people think, or condoms are worse than most people think. Tomayto, tomahto.
lol you are right. I need to talk to a medical professional. Thank you
Guess you’ll be joining me for Baby Watch '13. I’ve got to wait until September 23…
I’ve known a couple for whom rhythm and withdrawal worked all 4 years of college. Others, did not last the year. This is the situation where YMMV is most applicable.
Withdrawal is the one method where it is very much up to the guy. Depends on his motivation at a critical point, more than hers.
Here is a sort of relevant article with plenty of links to keep you entertained while you wait for your test results. When reading them, please keep in mind that old saying about opinions. I posted the link because there are things in there to get you thinking. You have lots of options and if you don’t want a baby right now you need to start looking at them. Actually, you should have been looking before you started having sex but, nobody’s perfect.
It sounds like the pill is not the solution for you. It’s no longer the solution for me. Until earlier this year, I had been using the pill to keep my crazy periods under control. Then I got really sick. I had 6-7 hepatocelluar adenomas on my liver. Two of them were big enough that I could have died if they ruptured and bled into my abdomen unchecked. I had to get those two removed in May. After I got my diagnosis I was told that the tumors were caused by the birth control pills. Statistics I found later indicated a 1 in 1 million chance of getting the tumors without the pill. With the pill the chance drops to about 1 in 530. Most women have no symptoms and never know the tumors are there. In October, I’m scheduled for a scan to see if the remaining tumors have shrunk now that I’m off hormone based birth control. I’m currently working with my OBGYN to find a new way to handle the problem with my periods. I won’t start taking anything until I get the results of the scan back. When you begin your search, be sure to ask plenty of questions about possible side effects.
I’m not denying that this condition REALLY sucks. I’m sorry you’re having to deal with it. But speaking rationally, a 1/530 chance is pretty good odds for the general population. I wouldn’t let a 0.1887% chance of a bizarre side effect dissuade me from taking otherwise-proven-effective medication.
Don’t forget the copper IUD, with no hormones. Best of both worlds, IMO.
I wasn’t saying it should. I just meant the she should make an informed decision about any contraception, or any medication, she chooses. When you ask about the side effects, ask about their rate of frequency, too. Ask how it may interact with anything else you’re taking or if it could aggravate any preexisting conditions. I had cancer when I was younger and I’m prone to forming benign tumors. I had no idea that the side effect I experienced even existed. All the warnings I’ve ever been given were about blood clots and high blood pressure with no mention of tumors. My main point is to always ask questions about any pill or device before it goes into your body.