I think the idea of breastfeeding = birth control comes from the days before women were back in the workforce in 6 weeks. In the times where the only option was to exclusively breastfeed your child on demand or find a wetnurse, most women probably could rely on it to prevent a sibling for at least six months. The problem is the list of caveats has gotten lost in the shuffle. They are important caveats. Likely too many people are told, “You can’t get pregnant while breastfeeding” and take that at face value. That doesn’t make them negligent or stupid. Just underinformed.
Minipills are progesterone only - no estrogen. They can be used as birth control for women who aren’t lactating, but they are not as forgiving as the more common combination pills. Minipills do not supress ovulation as effectivley as combo pills and work primarily by thickening the cervical mucus to the point that it’s a barrier to sperm. Minipills MUST be taken the same time every day. They should not be taken so much as an hour late if it can be helped. It was also suggested to me that if we were a “morning” couple that I take the pill at bedtime so that it was at its most effective during sex (or vice versa).
Now let’s look at the sex during period problem: Typical woman’s cycle is 28-32 days. YMMV. For this example, let’s take a woman with a slightly shorter cycle, say 26 days. The second (post ovulation) portion of the cycle, the luteal phase, is almost always 14 days (barring a luteal phase defect). This would mean a woman would ovulate on day 12, with the count being started from the first day of the menstrual cycle. Let’s say she has a 6 day menstrual cycle and has sex on the 6th day, what with her flow being a little lighter and therefore less messy that day. I’m having trouble nailing down a firm lifetime in days for sperm (not easy to google from work) but I’ve heard numbers as long as five days. This means if the woman ovulates one day early, or if we’ve got some extra long-life sperm, pregnancy is entirely conceivable (pun totally intended).
Now take the above explanation to the general populace. Ask them:
- What is day 1 of a woman’s menstrual cycle counted?
- Define the luteal phase.
- How long can sperm live inside a woman after sex?
- When in their cycle do women typically ovulate?
- What period in a woman’s cycle is typically the most fertile?
- How many women’s cycles are typical?
And I think you will find large chunks of people both male and female who do not know the answers to more than a couple of those questions. Why? Because it’s “gross.” Or confusing. Or uninteresting. Why do people play reproductive roulette? Because they’re horny, and because “It won’t happen to me. Not this time. Probably.”
And this from a woman who knew better and had an (adorable) oops baby due to being too lazy to chart temps and quite possibly being bad at counting. Math minor indeed.