Illinois Public Aid requires a 6-week waiting period between requesting sterilization, and undergoing it. I found out about it when I heard about a woman who did not seek prenatal care until shortly before term, and wanted it done while she was still in the hospital. Unfortunately, the doctor did indeed have to wait until the baby was about a month old before she could have it done. IMNSHO, it’s to prevent unethical things like sterilization without consent.
Insurance almost always does pay for it; the only places I’ve personally heard of that didn’t were insurances carried by strict Catholic companies, whether hospitals, the local diocese, etc. I’ve received a lot of conflicting information about the ACA and what those policies may or may not pay for.
Nowadays, it’s not uncommon for women to have a TL concurrently with a c-section. I do remember that lots of doctors have been hesitant to do that, unless there are overwhelming reasons why she should not have another baby, and wait until the next day regardless of how the baby is birthed, in case it has something wrong with it. I’m very aware that some things may not show up for years, but the most serious things will probably be evident right away.
I think it’s to prevent rash decision making in the throes of labor pain. Which I can kind of see, except it sometimes leads to absurdities. Mine was an emergency C-section, and due to some Stuff, I was told (before the surgery) that I shouldn’t have another baby after this one for risk to my life, but if I did, it had to be another C-section, assuming I survived until delivery. Which is a total dealbreaker for me. I asked them to do a tubal ligation, “while you’re in there,” but that was an absolute nonstarter. Because I might have been making that decision out of fear, apparently, and not the rational choice based on the risk to my life the doctor had just finished telling me about.
When I got my vasectomy years ago, the female doctor (and her female assistant) asked my wife if she understood that it meant I could no longer have children.
So there I was, in a room with two women actively rerouting my plumbing and they were concerned that my *wife *understood what was happening. If I hadn’t been so nervous about what was going on I would’ve been pretty pissed.
Just remember, what you were feeling right then - people of the opposite gender reworking your plumbing and getting very concerned/discussing your plumbing - is what women all too often put up with their entire lives. Which is why some of them get so worked up about reproductive rights, women’s rights, etc.
I was fine being awake for my vasectomy but I think the doctor would have preferred that I was knocked out. I talked to him and asked questions during the whole thing. After a few minutes he told me to stop talking. I figured it was best not to bother him any further while he was holding a scalpel, so I shut up.
A couple of differences between men and women in this regard.
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[li]The procedure is more likely to be reversible for men.[/li][li]Women are possibly more likely to change their minds (based on hormonal changes driving a nurturing instinct).[/li][/ul]
Well I don’t know if it’s true, which is why I wrote “possibly”. The main thing is whether people - a category that includes doctors - think it’s true, and a lot of people think it is. So this might be a reason for doctors to be more cautious about offering sterilization to women unless they have a higher level of confidence about it.
As to whether it’s true, again, I don’t know but a lot of people think it is, and that many women suddenly feel their biological time clocks ticking and start feeling maternal instincts that they hadn’t previously felt, or hadn’t felt to nearly the same extent.
I can only speak for myself, but I had plenty of physical changes after child birth! (I am male).
The first change I noticed was the bags under my eyes from sleepless nights. :eek: Once the wee one was old enough to walk and talk, my hair started falling out.
Thing is though, most of those women who start hearing the clock ticking didn’t actually change their minds. They weren’t so strongly opposed to the idea of having children that they wanted their tubes tied. They either weren’t sure whether they wanted children at all, or they always knew that ideally they wanted children at some point (when they had a better job, after they had traveled enough, when they found the right man) and the clock ticking is them realizing they are running out of time.
Actually I believe that many more women would choose to skip child-bearing if not for so much societal pressure. Someone mentioned Zero Population Growth earlier. If only this idea had caught on, the world would be so much better a place. Too bad we can’t reverse the pressure to NOT bringing more people into an overpopulated world.
That’s all irrelevant to a doctor considering surgery. Makes no difference to him if the risk is a women changing her mind due to biology/hormones or whether it’s due to societal pressure.
my ex went through something similar, but from the opposite direction. she’d always known she didnt want children, but when she started being peri-menopausal, the looming deadline after which she could no longer change her mind, made her freak out a little.
now i’m not a woman, so i cant know exactly what she was going through, but watching her behavior, and talking with her about her feelings made me realize just how little our own rational decisions mean when pitted against our biology.
that being said, at a certain point we have to give women (and men) the responsibilty for making decisions about themselves. potential regret is not a good reason to deny people the ability to make their own decisions.
The problem with the ‘biological clock ticking’ theory is that it’s always presented as yet another manifestation of women being irrational semi-human creatures in thrall to hormone-driven hysteria, who hit 35 and suddenly get BABY FEVER!!! where they MUST MAKE A BABY RIGHT NOW!!!
I have a whole bunch of female friends who’ve hit 35 and 40 without having kids, either because they didn’t want them or because it didn’t happen for some reason, and none of them were like that. Not one. But almost every single one of them - including many of the ones who didn’t want kids - had a moment when she realised ‘Oh, shit. If I’m ever going to do this, it has to be now. The decision is about to be taken out of my hands. That’s a lot of pressure and it’s scary and weird.’
This isn’t hormone-driven hysteria. This is the rational reaction to realising that a major life decision is about to be taken out of your hands; one of your biggest choices in life is about to vanish for good. Unless you’re 100% certain about what you want, you’re going to take a step back and put a bit of serious thought into it.
My friends who didn’t want kids didn’t change their minds (or they haven’t so far), but they mostly needed that bit of serious thought to confirm that, yep, they really were sure.
I got sterilised at the age of 24 (no kids). The doctor did ask if my husband was aware that I was planning to be sterilised, but that was in the ‘just chatting’ part of the consult when he was obviously trying to see if I was reasonably sane. Other than the usual medical forms, there was an extra form stating that I understood it was permanent and irreversible surgery. Only I needed to sign that, not my husband
It was one of those ‘comedy of errors’ things- small office, their admin called in sick, which meant the nurse was doing double duty. Nurse got pulled out of the room mid-operation to do… something, I don’t recall what, leaving the doc on his own. I was in the room and had previous medical experience, so I scrubbed in to help.
The only bad part was it turned out my former husband only had one vas deferens, and it took a while for the doc to figure it out.
I’m very aware that some things may not show up for years, but the most serious things will probably be evident right away.