# Your own conception
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [February 25, 2010, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411 "2010-02-25T17:24:14Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/1 "2010-02-25T17:24:14Z")
Do you know the circumstances of your own conception?
Me: My mother wanted another child, so she did exactly what she had done three years earlier. She knew she needed to get a few drinks into my father. Since he only drank on special occasions, she waited until New Year’s Eve. So once again they did it on New Year’s Eve, and once again it worked.
My brother was born on the night of September 30, and I was born 3 years later, on the morning of October 1.
How/where/when/why were you conceived?
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### Author:  [@otternell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/otternell)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/2 "2010-02-25T17:26:31Z")
I was told I was an accident (told in a humorous way, so I don’t feel upset about it or anything).
My parents already had 3 boys and that was plenty. They were using contraceptive. Interestingly, before my mom even missed a period, she had a sign that she was pregnant. Every time she was pregnant with the boys (before she knew) she would accidentally drop the carton of milk.
That was their first clue that they were having a 4th. My mom dropped the milk!
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### Author:  [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/3 "2010-02-25T17:32:08Z")
No, no idea, and I’m fine with that.
It’s better than what my husband and I know about his conception - waaaaaaay too much. This includes how they tried a different position that was supposed to favor getting a boy (multiple previous kids were girls), how many miscarriages my mother-in-law had before this one “took”, how they were snowed in at the time and alcohol was involved, etc., etc. Gee thanks, father-in-law, for oversharing yet again.
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### Author:  [@MitzeKatze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MitzeKatze)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/4 "2010-02-25T17:43:31Z")
> [@otternell](#):
>
> I was told I was an accident (told in a humorous way, so I don’t feel upset about it or anything).
I was an accident too! My parents wanted another child but my older sister had just been born, so they weren’t planning to “try” again for a couple years at least. Mom was breastfeeding and the wisdom of the time as it was passed on to her was that you couldn’t get pregnant while breastfeeding (which of course we all know is untrue) so my parents weren’t that careful about it, and about eight weeks after my sister’s birth they discovered that I was on the way.
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### Author:  [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/5 "2010-02-25T17:50:18Z")
As far as I’m concerned, I was delivered by the stork.
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### Author:  [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/6 "2010-02-25T17:56:37Z")
I was conceived when my dad was home on leave in 1944.
It was hard to keep shoes on me when I was a kid, and mom said it was because I was conceived in Tennessee. I don’t know what they’d be doing in Tennessee. He was based in Florida, but you don’t need to pass through Tennessee to get from Iowa to Florida.
Maybe she was joking. 🙂
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### Author:  [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/7 "2010-02-25T17:58:40Z")
My mom & dad could apparently conceive at will. They told me they had specifically wanted to have two children four years apart. And they did. I also think that the indication that WWII was about to end might have played a factor. I was born about 10 months after Hiroshima.
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### Author:  [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/8 "2010-02-25T18:07:13Z")
No, but it was only a couple or few weeks before my dad died.
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### Author:  [@shiftless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shiftless)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/9 "2010-02-25T18:10:51Z")
Mine was immaculate.
Some may find that hard to believe but the alternative is that my parents had sex and I am not ready to believe that.
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### Author:  [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/10 "2010-02-25T18:16:38Z")
Apparently there was a hurricane or tropical storm the summer of 76’ and my parents both called called in at work to say they weren’t going out in that mess. According to my mother it was the only time they, um, saw, each other that month, so…
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### Author:  [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/11 "2010-02-25T18:21:09Z")
I don’t know many details about my conception, but I do know that my parents are almost never civil to each other, never affectionate, and can barely have a conversation about any topic - it always devolves into an argument, no matter what. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen them kiss; it was always a quick peck and nearly always a command performance of some kind. (“It’s our anniverrrrrrrsary, and you never/you always …”)
Yes, they’re still married - over three decades now.
I’m not sure how they could stand each other long enough to make me, but I do know that probably factors into why I’m an only child!
(It occurs to me that perhaps I was the reason they _had_ to get married, if ya know what I mean, but no one has ever said one word to me about anything like that.)
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### Author:  [@5\_time\_champ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/5_time_champ)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/12 "2010-02-25T18:50:56Z")
Hmm- my birthday is November 5, my father’s birthday is February 5. So I would have born 9 months to the day after my dad’s 23rd birthday. Dunno if I was the product of hot birthday sex??
My parents divorced when I was 10, so I really don’t know.
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### Author:  [@Mrs.Cake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mrs.Cake)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/13 "2010-02-25T18:52:45Z")
Sort of. Dad’s birthday is at the beginning of December. My sisters and myself were all born at the end of August (with a 14-year span between the three of us).
Other than that, I understand that as my older brother had a lot of physical difficulties in his first year and my parents were told he might not live long, my dad did not want another child at the time and my mother really wanted to make sure she had at least two alive. So, his birthday rolled around again and I’m assuming she either got a couple drinks into him or had the Helms Bakery delivery man drop off more than some doughnuts one morning. Which would account for my otherwise inexplicable love of doughnuts, come to think of it.
My brother is now 52 with four kids, so I guess he must have survived.
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### Author:  [@MissMossie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MissMossie)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/14 "2010-02-25T18:54:32Z")
One of my sisters was born in mid-to-late November…about a week after her due date. We brought this up to my mom in a teasing manner when it hit us that November is nine months after February. Her response? “Oh yeah, and you, Mossie, were because your dad had just gotten back from a business trip.”
> [@shiftless](#):
>
> Mine was immaculate.
>
> Some may find that hard to believe but the alternative is that my parents had sex and I am not ready to believe that.
Uhh…I don’t think [that means](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Conception) what you think it means.
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### Author:  [@GESancMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GESancMan)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/15 "2010-02-25T20:25:43Z")
> [@5\_time\_champ](#):
>
> Hmm- my birthday is November 5, my father’s birthday is February 5. So I would have born 9 months to the day after my dad’s 23rd birthday. Dunno if I was the product of hot birthday sex??
Heh… my birthday is nine months to the day after my mother’s. I am 38 years old, and I never made this connection before now. :rolleyes:
ETA: er, I wasn’t born nine months after my mother… birthdays are on the same day of the month.
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/16 "2010-02-25T21:15:17Z")
I was born exactly nine months after Valentine’s Day, and 9 months and two days after my parents’ anniversary. That’s all I even want to think about this.
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### Author:  [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/17 "2010-02-25T21:23:37Z")
My middle name is Hamilton. Approximately 9 months before I was born, my parents were vacationing in Hamilton, Bermuda.
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### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/18 "2010-02-25T21:42:23Z")
9 months and 2 weeks prior to my brother’s birthday is Valentine’s Day, so no mystery there. 9 months prior to my birthday is February 1st. Maybe my parents were celebrating just 2 more weeks of winter.
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### Author:  [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/19 "2010-02-25T21:50:47Z")
I know nothing!
But I am sure I was there 🙂
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### Author:  [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2010, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-own-conception/530411/20 "2010-02-25T21:55:13Z")
A little. I was definitely an accident.
My parents were not married (well - not to each other. Father was married), and in the 1970s in India, it was very difficult for an unmarried man and a woman to be alone for any length of time (it’s still difficult, but it has gotten much easier). As far as I know, my mother and father were seeing each other for about four years before I came along and fucked everything up\*. They occasionally were able to sneak in some sex somewhere; I was conceived during one of these cases.
\*I don’t say this out of self-pity or anything. Mother getting pregnant was what caused the whole story to come out; it destroyed their relationship, Father disappeared and refused to take ownership, my aunt’s engagement was cancelled as was _her best friend’s_ because no one wanted to have their boys marry amongst people with such loose morals. I kid you not.
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