“He Doesn’t Want to Meet My Family”

118 Comments

1. LW3…omg stop getting pregnant. It’s not that hard to NOT get pregnant. I’ve been sexually active for 7 years and have never gotten accidentally pregnant. Yes, accidents happen, but 3 accidents!!?

   1. I second this! I typically find the “accidental” pregnancy excuse a little suspicious, but especially when there have been 3 in what seems like a rather short time period. I’ve been sexually active for 13 years (holy crap, writing that makes me feel old) and have never had an “accidental” pregnancy. LW needs to get herself to Planned Parenthood, stat!

   2. Right. You guys know that I tend to err on the side of kind compassion but this time,I have to tell you that LW3 makes me want to throw objects against the wall while screaming. Abortions, miscarriage, a 3rd pregnancy. I can’t help it, as someone who lost a baby she wanted, it makes me angry.

      Beyond that, put the baby up for adoption. At least then, some fertility challenged person who want a child and is prepared for a child will benefit.

   3. I can understand 1 unplanned/unexpected pregnancy…stuff happens. We all need to be responsible & sometimes that doesn’t happen. But 3?! And jobless?! Hell yeah lady I’m judging you on that. This is 2012. There are many many forms of birth control, IUD/pill/depo/nuva ring/condoms. They aren’t hard to use.
      And how are you planning on raising any of these 3 potential children you almost had? Statistically you probably didn’t win powerball & you have no income currently. This is the foresight that most people don’t have.
      Go find out if you’re pregnant (hint don’t use the ER we use the same dollar store preg tests as everyone else. Then decide how you will have money to raise this child (and yourself) to be productive members of society.
      Sorry, this may be bit more on the rant-y side. I work in the ER & today we had a 14 year old child come in because she was pregnant. It’s frustrating

2. LW1: It souds like the “other woman” is still in his life. Move on. And PLEASE don´t just be in a r/ship “because everyone else is”. That´s a crappy reason to do things in life.

   LW3: Birth control. FFS use birth control. 3 “accidental” pregnancies in a year?

   1. I thought the exact same thing for LW1. Clearly, there is some other woman that is his first priority.

      1. Agree. The problem isn’t he won’t meet your family – the problem is he likely has one of his own he has to go home to on the weekends.

   2. Also LW3 you´re at college (presumably). Take advantage of that to read and learn, instead of ll these “accidental” pregnancies. Guilty “conscious” really??

      1. Oops, reread and saw you´ve graduated now. You can still read though. So start with birth control pamphlets, and continue with everything you can find.

      2. Oh JK this made me laugh out loud! ” start with birth control pamphlets” 😀 Well said!

      3. Uggghhhh I HATE when people use “conscious” when they mean “CONSCIENCE”. It’s CONSCIENCE!!!! I have been seeing this everywhere lately. Yet another example of the dumbing-down of modern civilization.

         Birth control. Birth control. Birth control. And back-up birth control. And condoms. In this day and age, no matter where you live, there is no excuse for THREE!! accidental pregnancies in a year. I am sure there are lots of women/couples out there who desperately want a child, and are in a position to raise a child, but can’t get pregnant. (They are probably smacking their heads on their desks right now.)

3. Um, who gets pregnant not once, not twice, but THREE times?!?! I’d think the first time would be enough to teach any sane woman that she needs birth control!

   1. Hiding my name in case the person I’m talking about reads this but yeah, a girl I know has had 5 accidental pregnancies. 2 abortions as a teenager and then 3 accidental babies. All with different fathers.

      Another childhood friend has had 4 accidental pregnancies. She has 3 children (all different guys as well) but the 4th time she miscarried. And since she was only 15 with the first child, she lost custody of it to the much older father.

      I don’t understand it for the life of me how the hell anybody could have more than once accidental pregnancy. One time, yes, it happens. But FFS you get an IUD or you double up on birth control. People are absolutely nuts.

      1. Stories like these depress me. I don’t think these should be called “accidental pregnancies” – it’s more like user error pregnancies. And why the hell is there not better education post-abortion on how to avoid getting pregnant again!!! Seriously. Why aren’t IUD’s like standard practice after an abortion? Unplanned pregnancy urks me.

      2. why arent IUDs standard practice PERIOD?

      3. I had a great idea that everyone would have to get an IUD after they get their period for the first time, and then you’d have to pay to get it removed when you were ready to have kids. Obviously this wouldn’t work in the real world, but in my ideal world, where wine flowed out of water fountains, it would be awesome!

      4. ill happily live in your world…. lol

         but seriously- i just went to my gyno to talk about getting an IUD and he gave me the big pamphlet about mirena, and in it they rank birth control success rates, and IUDs are right under tubal ligation… i think they should be common practice. i know that even putting them into women who have never had a baby is kind of “new” even now, so maybe in the future it will just be as common as the pill. i hope. also, i hope that my insurance covers them in the new year! then i will get one too!

      5. I wish a doctor would have suggested an IUD to me back in high school or college. I would have saved so much money, a lot of worry, two pregnancy scares etc etc etc if they would just start recomending IUDs to women who haven’t been pregnant before! Now that I’m finally educated enough to know I want an IUD, I’m planning on trying to conceive in the next two years so I don’t think it’s worth it to get one.

      6. Yeah. I got an IUD right before college, and it’s been a god-send. I don’t have to worry about it, my periods are under way better control (I didn’t even have them for a year… then they kicked in again, bleh, haha), and because I’m in a long-term relationship, it works perfectly.

         I wish more people knew about them. I think they would be the best fit for a lot of young women.

      7. Ugh no! IUDs scare the crap out of me. I would support mandatory birth control if you can’t afford to raise children but what kind of BC should be optional. If you are responsible enough to take a pill every day and don’t want a creepy metal insect stuck in your body, that’s a great option. I’m a great example of how well the pill works when used correctly. Almost 10 years and zero unplanned pregnancies.

      8. Of course what sort of birth control you use should be up to the individual, but I was on the pill for 8 years successfully when I got pregnant. And I never missed a pill, EVER. There’s a reason why it’s only 99% effective…. because even when there is zero user error involved, 1% of the time you can still get pregnant, and that’s what happened to me.

      9. and stastically, IUDs have a better success rate then the pill anyway. user error is taken out of the equation, basically, because there is no “user” responsibilities.

      10. I’ve heard that sometimes if you have a virus, it can not work perfectly, which really doesn’t make it anyone’s fault, its just sometimes something doesn’t work just right

      11. I think for me, the birth control failure had something to do with my epilepsy. My doctor mentioned that could have been the case.

      12. I wasn’t actually saying it should be mandated, that is just wrong! But if someone is getting pregnant “accidentally” because they are forgetting to that their pill or isn’t usuing condoms regularly, then I think the abortion provider or who ever is counceling them should strongly encourage them to consider a method of birth control that has just about zero chance for user error- an IUD.

      13. There is the depo shot and norplant too that take the user error away.

      14. Well with the shot you do have to show up to the appointments every 12 weeks so there is a chance you could miss them.

      15. IUDs are THAT bad. I understand that they aren’t for some people, but it’s not anything to be horrified over. Certainly not a creepy metal insect… 🙂

      16. It is for people who have trauma having things inserted vaginally. Implanon is a good option. It made me a irregular, but I was irregular before going on bc anyway.

      17. Yeah, I definitely fall into that category. Having a doctor insert anything in my body is traumatic. Having a pap smear leaves me feeling like I’ve been sexually assaulted. I’ve considered (when the time comes to have children) doing a hippie-style home birth in a tub with a midwife just so I don’t have to go through the ordeal of being in a scary hospital with scary doctors sticking things in me.

      18. The thing is… it’s not about education. The people getting pregnant like this (at least the people I’m talking about) KNOW about birth control but are so emotionally messed up that they choose to ignore what could happen or they secretly actually want to get pregnant.

          The second girl I’m talking about had an IUD put in after the 2nd pregnancy but took it out soon after because she could “feel the strings and didn’t like it” (which I think is BS cuz I have an IUD and I’ve never noticed it, neither has my partner).

          When she got pregnant for the 4th time I asked her why the hell she was keeping the child (after being on and off welfare, in and out of abusive relationships, the guy who knocked her up straight up told her that he didn’t want her to have the child and that he didn’t ever want to marry her) she told me it’s because she wants so badly to have a family with a husband and a white picket fence, etc. And with her delusional insecurity she clings to men and clings to the idea that if she gets pregnant it will all magically fall into place and the guy will love her and live happily ever after with her (hasn’t happened yet!).

          The sad part is that she’s from an affluent background, grew up in the suburbs, had all the same great opportunities I did, but was desperately insecure that she’d cling to and have sex with any guy that paid the slightest bit of attention to her.

      19. That reasoning is exactly why I said stories like these depress me. Babies are NEVER solutions to relationship problems. EVER. But unfortunately there is some crazy thing that happens in some women that makes them think a baby will make everything perfect. It just makes me so sad to think there are so many “broken” women out there and so many children being born to be solutions to problems. 🙁

      20. What’s also sad is that they don’t learn the first time. They keep thinking “this time it will be the one”. And I can sort of understand that mentality because I went through a phase where I was extremely insecure too and I slept around a lot. And logically I knew that if I just kept meeting up with these guys online, etc and sleeping with them immediately they would lose respect for me, yet each time a new opportunity arose I’d ignore what I knew to be logical and tell myself OK, this time will be different. Thank god I never secretly or subconsciously wished to be pregnant, because it never is different.

      21. Girls like this don’t need to be taught about birth control. They need to be taught about self respect, to be encouraged to pursue their dreams, to be told that they are smart and capable and that their worth does not depend on a man’s love, and that by taking responsibility for their sexual health they are empowering themselves. It’s desperate insecurity that causes pregnancies like these.

      22. This discussion is getting me worked up. I wish so desperately that I could do something to help teach young girls that sex does not equal love and that they are amazing enough on their own, and that there are more important things in life than finding a boyfriend.

      23. i hear you. its going to take a huge, huge cultural shift to make that happen… im not even sure its possible. but who knows? all you can do is treat the young girls in your life that you know well. i always try to be very careful about what i say and how i say things around young girls…

      24. I 110% feel the same way. There is something so broken in our society/culture and I have no idea how to fix it. It is heartbreaking.

      25. That logic reminds me of Lexi from Where The Heart Is (STILL love that movie), where she’s explaining that she had the first baby, then wanted to find a daddy for him and ended up with baby #2, and so on and so forth. It’s really sad.

      26. When I got my abortion, they handed me a pack of pills and a prescription for more. I also had to fill out a form about my contraceptive history, what I’m planning on using in the future, and I’m pretty sure it had the effectiveness statistics in parentheses next to each option. I don’t know how common that is though.

      27. I had an abortion this summer. Mine truly was an accidental pregnancy (won’t got into specifics, but there was absolutely no user error involved, it was just a fluke). I’m Canadian, so the abortion was fully covered and they offered to insert an IUD at the same time (also at no cost) so I went with that option. So with the women I’m mentioning above, they don’t even have the excuse of the cost. I can tell you though, I am so so happy with my IUD!

      28. Wow, they offered you a free IUD?! That’s amazing! I’m surprised they didn’t make you wait a bit to heal before inserting it, but I think that’s a really good option. I hope we have that sort of access here in the US soon. Abortions here are very expensive and difficult to get in many places. I was 18, and I really struggled to pay for my abortion. (To give you an idea of the cost, my medical abortion was $600 plus travel expenses, but if I hadn’t been able to scrape up the money by that last week, I would have been looking at about $1200, which I never would have been able to get). I know I certainly wouldn’t have been able to afford an IUD after that huge expense.

      29. They said it’s easier to insert the IUD while the cervix is already dilated anyway, so they did it right then and there at the same time as the abortion procedure.

          I feel very grateful that we have such easy access to abortion here in Canada. When I found out that I was pregnant, I was terrified. I went to my doctor right away and he immediately laid all my options out on the table for me. My partner and I decided obviously not to continue with the pregnancy, so my doctor scheduled the appointment at the Morgentaler clinic for me. I only waited a week, my boyfriend drove me there in the morning and I was out of there within an hour and a half, IUD and all. Did not cost me a dime, all I did was show my health card.

          The clinic was incredibly clean, quiet, professional, supportive, etc. I’m so glad the experience was so smooth because it was a hard decision for me.

      30. Remember that in Canada health care is fully covered by the government plan. You never pay for anything, there isn’t co-pay, there never is the need for the insurer to approve treatment. There can be delays though.

          Of course we pay (much) higher taxes but don’t pay for any insurance and you never loose coverage. My quick comparison with US coworkers tells me that the extra taxes I am paying are equivalent to the insurance premium.

      31. Yeah, I’m very jealous of that.

      32. That’s not quite accurate. Some provinces (Ont, BC, formerly AB) have provincial health premiums (some employers pay this as a taxable benefit). They also don’t cover perscriptions (including BC), ambulance rides, dental, eye exams, etc., so I also pay for extended health insurance through work. When I was a contract employee, I got my own Blue Cross as well.

      33. Quebec does cover prescriptions (if you don’t have work coverage but it’s an extra tax) and it’s common for employers to have some medical coverage as a taxable benefit. Self employed are at a disadvantage.

          However, there isn’t an enrollment period. People don’t go bankrupt due to medical bills, medical history is not a factor for coverage (preconditions don’t disqualify you from coverage) you never loose coverage (exceptions above noted) and medical coverage is not a factor in employment decisions (hiring, leaving). For instance you don’t hear of people not being able to leave their current jobs because a pre-condition makes them uninsurable elsewhere.

          It’s not a perfect system. There can be delays, equipment is not always the newest and while usually you are dealing with courteous service providers, you will sometimes get less than stellar service, you won’t fell pampered as in a SPA. However (having discussed this with a US physician) there isn’t pressure to perform battery of tests that aren’t essential in treatment since tests aren’t a VP. profit center and there isn’t as much (if any really) liability issue.

          Overall it’s more efficient as Canada spends less of a percentage of it’s GDP than the US (9% vs. 12%?) and more people are covered. It’s less fancy more utilitarian system. The well off don’t get great service but the rank and file aren’t out in a lurch.

          Canada’s system is rather unique. I believe all EU and UK plus Japan have similar extensive government coverage. It’s worth noting that in each country the recipe is different.

          One final note. It’s been reported that, in Canada, the health care system spends about 50% of it’s budget on the last year of live of an individual. Presumably that’s the result of our inescapable fate that is death and that it usually comes in the form of some treatable illness. That, and the fact that US medical coverage past 65 is government supplied really points to a US system where universal government coverage is already an important component of the system (presumably half!) Somehow that always escapes debates and discussions. The US would already be half way into a government system but is somehow denying that fact to itself. Rather ironic.

      34. But how effective is handing someone a sheet with some percentages of effectiveness on it? I wish there was more counceling or therapy involved when someone goes in for an abortion. I whole heartly believe we should have to right to have an abortion, but I think women (and men to if they are invovled) should have more support for their mental and emotional health during the process and a refresher course in contraceptives wouldn’t hurt anyone either.

      35. i think that the underlying thing is that for this to happen people actually have to start talking about sex…. and it is very apparent that most people would rather not.

      36. I’m really sensitive to assuming that people need mental or emotional support after an abortion. I don’t like that at all. I like the idea of giving someone a list of numbers if they need a support group or counseling, but that shouldn’t be pushed on them at all. Getting my abortion meant that I was free. It gave me life. It was a relief, and I certainly didn’t need counseling for it. Implying that people need a lot of emotional support after an abortion is something that almost tells women and couples that the choice they made was wrong, and it should be grieved. Sometimes it’s the most wonderful thing the woman could experience! If she feels good about her decision, then more power to her! I say that the support should be there if they want it, but it shouldn’t be a big issue, and no one should push it on them. As a side note though, I’ve always really wanted to lead an abortion support group. I hope I get to do that one day. There aren’t any in my area because people are too ashamed and/or scared of what could happen to them if someone found out.

          (And I know that you don’t mean that women should be guilted into feeling bad for it, but that’s what pushing counseling does. Not everyone needs counseling.)

      37. For me, it was a huge relief as well, but I also felt conflicted. Not because I felt it was wrong in any way… I am so glad that I chose to have an abortion and I would certainly make the same choice again if if I had to go back in time, but I was also conflicted because I wanted to be ready, if that makes sense. I didn’t want to have a baby at the time, but I wanted to be ready to have a baby. I was wishing that I could fast forward my life, that I was older and made more money and that I was married and that the pregnancy was planned. Does that make any sense?

          And no, I didn’t need counseling either.

      38. That definitely makes sense. I think I would feel similarly if I got pregnant today. I never felt conflicted when I had mine though. The only thing I’ve ever struggled with is the way people react. Not very many people know about mine, but even the ones who do (like my best friend and fiance) just don’t know what to say when I bring it up. They’re confused because I’m happy about it, but they’re surrounded by messages that it’s sad, and they don’t know how to respond, so they usually nod and smile and really try hard to say neutral things to avoid offending me. I wish our culture was different in that way, because I’m very well adjusted to my own abortion experience. I’d just like to talk about it in a normal way, like it’s just something that happened in my life.

      39. I’m curious, truly not trying to sound judgemental, just wondering about the thought process…. why not continue the pregnancy and place the baby for adoption? A friend of mine has an 18 yr old daughter who got pregnant her Sr. yr of high school and just barely gave birth. She chose an open adoption and both families are thrilled with how it worked out. Of course the adoptive parents are over the moon and even the girl who went through the pregnancy (even though it meant deferring college for a semester) has grown and matured in many, many ways because of this.

          Another lady I know with an adopted child said his birth mother’s family pressured her a LOT to get an abortion but she was unable to go through with it. And again, the adoptive mom is eternally greatful for that decision.

          I fully understand not being ready to parent a child or not wanting children at all (being a parent is not for everyone). I also understand not continuing a pregnancy when there are health risks or a traumatic conception (like rape or incest). But I’ve always been curious as to why a woman chooses abortion over adoption. I’m not aware of anyone in my circle of friends who’s had an abortion for me to ask about it so I hope you don’t mind me asking here to those of you who have been open enough to share that experience.

      40. I don’t mind answering, because you seem genuinely curious and not judgmental about it.

          I was deeply depressed and suicidal when I got pregnant. I had been heavily using drugs, drinking, and taking anti-depressants. When I got pregnant, it felt like the final thread of my life breaking. I knew that I couldn’t handle nine months of pregnancy, and I couldn’t handle the emotional and social ramifications of it on top of my already extremely fragile state. I knew that I would end up killing myself if I tried to go through with it, and I had decided that if I couldn’t get up the money for the abortion, I actually would go through with suicide. Abortion was the best decision for me, and it literally saved my life, though in a very different way than people usually say that.

          If I hadn’t been so depressed though, I probably still would have wanted an abortion. I could never bond with my future child all through a pregnancy, hold it, and then give it away. I would have ended up keeping the kid, dropping out of college, and living with my parents for the rest of my life. I think I still would have gotten an abortion to save my future. My dreams and potential would have been bigger than what I would have been able to do in my old childhood bedroom with a crib.

      41. Thank you for sharing that. I can certainly see where you were coming from.

      42. You also have to understand that not every woman wants to go through 9 months of pregnancy just to turn around and send her baby packing. A pregnancy is a huge physical trauma to a woman’s body. Not just physical but emotional. And incredibly public.

          You also have to understand that not everybody believes a fetus to be a baby. It’s a cluster of growing cells. So unless you’re of the mentality that abortion is wrong and killing a baby, why on earth would you want to publicly go through 9 months of physical and emotional trauma just to be emotionally scarred and wondering where your offspring is for the rest of your life?

          Now, I’m not saying that everyone should have abortions. People believe different things, and everybody has the right to make their own choice. But for someone like me, having an abortion is not much different from having a tooth pulled. You’re removing a mass of cells, and there’s nothing wrong about it, so why would I choose any different?

          I actually have a difficult time understanding why any woman would want to give birth just to give up the child for adoption when abortion is so easily accessible. Seems like an odd mentality to me, but I don’t judge and I am glad that there are families out there who are able to adopt children that they can love as their own.

      43. Yes! This is exactly it!

      44. Abortion is such a difficult subject to talk about. I don’t really have much experience with it to be honest. I would guess that your experience is really different from a lot of people’s expeinces. I guess in reality every womens experience is completely different from anothers. While I understand your point about counceling could imply that what is being done is wrong and that there is a population of women who wouldn’t need the support, I also don’t know that a list of numbers is enough. I feel that a lot of women would not reach out to seek counceling, not matter how badly they need it.

      45. If you mean that feeling relief is different from other people’s experiences, I would disagree with you there. I can’t imagine that there are any reliable studies about it, but plenty of women feel relief, and plenty of women also need some support. I’d imagine it’s split pretty evenly, but I don’t know.

          If not a list of numbers, then what do you think is the solution? Forcing everyone to do it seems extremely wrong, dangerous, and counterproductive to me. I think the best thing we can do is offer information so women and couples can make their own decisions. People in delicate situations (ie: crisis, grief, depression, etc) should be empowered, not forced into something. Empowerment is one of the most essentially important things in healing. People don’t heal if they’re not ready to, or if they’re not interested in the counseling. They have to make a decision to do it, and that itself is a major step in healing. Telling them they need it 1) says their decision was wrong, 2) takes a very essential choice away from them, and 3) forces them to talk about something they might not be ready to talk about.

      46. I don’t have a solution. I don’t know that anyone has a solution that, across the board, in every case would work perfectly. I just think the mentality regarding sex and birth control and abortion and respecting women etc etc is just so wrong in our culture. We idolize rappers who say incredibly profane things (that FloRida whistle song…kids listen to that!!) but stigmatize women who want/get an abortion. It just doesn’t make any sense. I know that forcing someone to do something (like an addict into rehab) almost never produces a positive result…but I don’t think handing them a piece of paper and saying good luck does either. There would have to be a monumental shift in popular thinking and that is going to take a long time.

      47. Ugh, try explaining to a kid why that Whistle song is inappropriate!

      48. And Akon had some song on the radio all the time about strippers and he’s basically saying “You already know I wanna fuck you” but in the radio they changed it to “I wanna love you”. Talked about mixed messaging for young girls… he’s singing about a woman winding and grinding on a stripper pole and then says he wants to love her? Not appropriate.

          Also, I was in a family restaurant with my boyfriend the other day when another Akon song came on the radio and these are the words:

          I just had sex (Ay)
          And it felt so good (Felt so good)
          A woman let me put my penis inside of her (Her)
          Have you ever had sex?
          I have, it felt great (Yeah)
          It felt so good when I did it with my penis (Yeah)
          A girl let me do it, it literally just happened
          Having sex should make a nice man out the meanest

          plus more terrible words.

          This was playing on the radio in a family restaurant with a table full of children next to us. WTF??

          Read more: AKON – I JUST HAD SEX LYRICS

      49. haha, well, in that song’s defense, its a song from the SNL song skits, so its meant to be a ridiculous joke.

          but still, yes, shouldnt be played in a restaurant.

      50. @Katie, yeah I figured the song was a joke, but I was appalled that it was playing on the radio in a family restaurant. I don ‘t even have children and I wanted to complain.

      51. honestly, i dont even know why they play those songs on the radio at all. i mean its funny when you see it on SNL, and maybe once more if you hear it, but after that its just not funny anymore and its dumb…. and definitely not something i would want to listen to while eating!

      52. Haha I actually love both of the songs you mention (and the Whistle song – it is so damn catchy). But I am an adult who understands the subject matter and how to have respectful (but still enjoyable) sexual relationships. Children do not.

          The other day FloRida was on the Today show singing that whistle song and they kept zooming in on children in the audience who were singing. I was appalled and almost wrote into the Today show. Showing children signing about giving blow jobs is so wrong.

      53. I’m not saying that a sheet of percentages is necessarily effective, but a refresher course isn’t either. It comes down to choice. They could have handed me a lifetime supply of pills, but that wouldn’t have made me take them. You can give someone information and talk about it all day, but that doesn’t do anything unless they’re able to use it and choose to use it. I still think that stuff should be available, of course. I’m just not convinced it will fix the problem.

          I’m also nervous about mandating much of anything related to reproduction because I’m constantly living in fear that my ability to make choices about what I put into or take out of my body will be taken away from me in the lovely conservative South.

      54. Thanks for talking about your experiences so openly and freely. I’m not going to be cliched and say how strong you are, but I will say that you sound like a great and happy person! And I thank you for your perspective. Its an important one, and one we don’t always get to hear.

   2. If you have insurance, a lot of birth control is free now. Kind of limits the excuses for not using it.

4. LW1: WWS+MOA=happier LW1

   LW2: WWS.

   LW3: How does a woman who doesn’t want to have a baby get pregnant three times within a year? Oh wait, you weren’t using birth control. I really don’t understand this LW. Birth control exists in many forms: condoms, pills, patches, rings, IUDs, arm implants, etc. Double or triple up your protection if you don’t want to have a baby OR an abortion. There is no excuse for unwanted pregnancies anymore. Get with the program lady

   1. BTW, I feel like one more “whoopsie I got pregnant” story is going to make my head explode. I can’t take it anymore. It’s not like birth control is a secret, everybody knows about it. Find methods that work for you and then use them.

5. Ugh.

   LW1: How does this guy make you feel “heard and loved” when he has no time for you? And why are you already thinking you “don’t want to lose him for anything in the world” after only two and a half months? It doesn’t even sound like you’re in a real relationship with this guy (who seems to have at least 2 other women in his life at the moment). Pull yourself together & MOA.

   LW2: Just move on. For the record, if things are right, then there’s no such thing as “ruining” the relationship potential by moving too quickly. But it seems as if both of you are totally freaked out– not a good sign.

   LW3: I hate being harsh with such a sensitive subject, but seriously, LW. Have you never heard of birth control? If you have a guilty conscience over the first abortion, then wouldn’t you have tried to be extra EXTRA careful next time?

   I’m sorry you’re going through this, though! You have a hard decision to make & I hope you have an open-minded friend or counseler to help support you. If you’re jobless & the man who impregnated you now wants nothing to do with you, I’d say that’s a terrible situation for a new baby (as well as for you)

6. LW1 – “At first I just wanted to be with him because most of my friends are settling and getting married…” There’s your problem. That should NEVER be the first reason you are seeing someone. And how can you feel loved if you never see the guy? Sounds like you’re clinging on because of the reason you started seeing someone. And just because “everyone” is in a relationship doesn’t mean you need to be. We all do those things on our own timetable – you just haven’t reached that milestone yet. Don’t go ahead of schedule just because you feel desperate.

   LW2 – You said it was his first time. It’s possible that after that, maybe the whole mystery of it is gone, and he wants to pursue other options. So, WWS, don’t hold your breath. “Let’s slow things down” is usually the kiss of death, unless you’re in a car and telling someone to slow down to the speed limit on the highway.

   LW3 – You sound like someone I knew in college, who basically used Plan B as her birth control. For the love of humanity, PLEASE invest in birth control. Take control of your ability to get pregnant!! It doesn’t cost as much to prevent a pregnancy.

7. i have little to no faith in humanity anymore….

   1. Google the story of the adorable NY city police officer who bought shoes for a homeless man on his beat. It helps a little.

      1. aw i did see that on the news this morning… ok, maybe theres a little. but still.

      2. My boyfriend was grocery shopping last night and told me the old man ahead of him in line had brought in two cut-out barcodes for like crackers and soup that he realized he wasn’t charged for the last time he’d been in the store and asked to pay for them this time around

      3. aw!

      4. I saw that picture last night on CNN, so sweet, also highly recommend the CNN heroes show coming on this Sunday night – I watch every year for the double-impact of feeling like I am a failure because I haven’t developed a way for people to make their own homemade water purifier energy system (which kicks me back to volunteering and being more charitable) and makes me feel amazing about society. Some of the stories are so inspiring… read and feel better about the world!!

   2. Two more good stories about humanity…

      I just heard about a “Secret Santa” who is going around handing out $100 bills to victims of hurricane Sandy. He plans to give out $100,000 in total. I also heard a lady on the radio this morning who was calling in excited that today, she is adopting her three foster children (three brothers).

      1. oh i love those secret santa people. i hear about them every year around christmas time… also, the secret santa’s who will go to like kmart and walmarts and buy people’s layaways. thats nice too.

8. I’m on a college campus, and here, birthcontrol is given out like candy. Any time I go in for ANY womanly problem, BC is the solution. A month’s supply is cheaper than chinese take out. LW3 – take advantage of that.

   Geez.. how do you get pregnant 3x in a year? No wonder why he freaked out..

   1. Not to mention that apparently LW3 kept the first 2 pregnancies a “secret” and now decided to spring all this info on him.

   2. Well, he is responsible for those 3 pregnancies too you know? He could have used a condom.

9. Sometimes I think it wouldn’t actually be so bad if the Mayan Prophecy were true and the world ends on 12.21.12…. These letters today make me really scared for humanity.

   To all LWs today: Use BIRTH CONTROL and grow up a little. please?

10. LW3 – Seriously? using abortion as birth control is abhorent.

11. LW1: The other woman is still around. Not being available on weekends is a dead giveaway. MOA
    LW2: Maybe you did move too fast – for him. Especially if it was his first time. He got freaked out. MOA
    LW3: Birth control, birth control, birth control. Please.

12. LW3 – What you do is go to the doctor and figure out if you are indeed pregnant. Whatever you decide to do – make birth control part of your future. And know that if you are pregnant – a child won’t be able to save your relationship – either you raise the baby alone with no support system or job , terminate your pregnancy or pursue adoption.
    LW1 – I had a guy tell me once he had a girl he was breaking up with and he wanted a relationship with me…yeah…turns out the girl was his wife of 17 years….
    I’m afraid your boyfriend has a life with someone else that keeps him busy on the weekend. Don’t even tell him you know – just move on, my dear, and don’t be tempted to settle again just because that is the trend in your friend circle.

13. LW3 you got pregnant in February, September and November? Really? Please do your self a serious favor and get some education on contraceptives. You can start here-

    There is absolutely no chance in hell that your birth control method (be it condoms, the pill, a diaphram, etc) failed 3 times in one calendar year unless there was USER error. Make an appointment at your doctor, Planned Parenthood, etc etc and educate yourself and get tested for STDs. If you are in fact pregnant again please explore all of your options (abortion, adoption, anything else that gets presented to you) and seriously weigh if you are at a point in your life that you can raise a child.

    Also if you are pregnant, I would reach out to the father and ask him to have some input. It sounds like he might not have been thrilled with your previous decision to have an abortion.

    1. I agree in theory that the guy deserves a say if this third baby is real and is his, but I also wouldn’t blame him for hanging up on her.

       I’m really at a loss for words with LW3. I keep starting sentences in my head but they’re all muffled by the palm on my face.

       1. I’m so torn on this issue. I believe in almost all situations, you should tell the guy, but I shamefully admit I wish I hadn’t after knowing how it all turned out.

       2. Yeah, it’s a super tough call (about telling the father). But I mean he has a right, right? What if he wants to keep the child and be the sole provider for it (assuming the mother doesn’t want to care for the child) shouldn’t he have the chance? I know there is so so much grey area since the women would have to carry the child to term and usually the mother is the primary care giver and so many other reasons, but it’s his child too.

          I have no idea why I want to give him a chance considering I have a deadbeat dad of my own, but I just think he should have a chance to voice his opinion.

       3. Theoretically, he has a right, I guess. And I’m sure that if I were in a relationship and my decision to keep the baby or not was based on his commitment or I was wishy-washy, I might want his input. But honestly, if I feel strongly that I should have or not have a baby, no guy is going to get to overrule that. Maybe I feel this way because I don’t plan on having kids, so an accidental pregnancy would change my entire life plan, not just my timeline. (Granted, I have an IUD and use condoms, too, so I’m trying my hardest to avoid this kind of decision.)

          It’s a good idea if you’re in a serious relationship to determine beforehand what you’d do if you got pregnant, so if you’re both on the same page, and no one is going to get forced down a road they don’t want to go down. It’s good to know if you’re with someone who is going to try to force you to abort or to shame you for not keeping a baby.

       4. Of course it’s your right not to tell the father. But if you tell him after the fact, don’t expect him to want to stay with you.

14. “getting your tubes tied”

    That’s a really final way to go when we don’t know what her long-term plans are.

15. Oy for all three of these. Oy. Oy. Oy.

16. Oy indeed. For all three LWs. I would be crying now – okay, crying inside – if this hadn’t cracked me up:

    “At most, you’re friends with benefits, but considering he doesn’t sound very friendly and the benefits don’t sound great, you need to move on already.”

17. 3 “accidental” pregnancies in a year are not accidents.

18. How can you LOVE someone after two months? Two months isn’t even enough time to get to know someone and you barely even see him. Please please for yourself get some self esteem and don’t ever settle like that again.

    1. Two months into dating my now fiance I didn’t even know when his birthday was!

       1. I don’t know my siblings birthdays.. lol

    2. I know someone who INSISTS he fell in love with a girl he met in person twice (drunk at parties), then didn’t speak to for a year, then saw her a third time after that and KNEW it was love. Creepy! (The girl agreed when he tried to pursue her, by the way.) Haha.

19. WHY DO YOU KEEP GETTING PREGNANT?!?# That poor poor kid.

20. http://www.facepalm.com/triple-facepalm-13612.html

21. “[H]e didn’t want to be rude by dumping her so suddenly.” This made me laugh aloud. That’s really, REALLY not how these things work.

    1. *this* made me laugh out loud!

22. Everyone is alll “Oh LW3, use BC!! HOW DID YOU GET KNOCKED UP THREE TIMES??!!”

    And my takeaway was only: “I fell in love with this guy late last year while on campus and I loved him.”

    D- for redundancy. Also, stop getting fucking pregnant.

    1. It’s also written in past tense. Guess she doesn’t love him anymore.

23. LW 1: I think you might be dealing with relationship timeline issues. So when you were younger, your parents/family/friends all get involved in things early. As you get older, these things happen later than 2.5 months. I think you are expecting a different timeline that your man. For example, it is alot of pressure early in a relationship to go to a wedding where you don’t know anyone and to meet all your friends. Parents come in much later. Take a breath and let this all play out.

24. LW1: You need to love yourself more.
    LW2: Let him figure it out, but let him know that you’re available.
    LW3: You need to love yourself more … literally START MASTURBATING AND STOP HAVING SEX WITHOUT CONDOMS, FFS.

25. LW1). Learn to respect yourself.

    LW2). Learn to drink responsibly.

    LW3). Learn to use a fucking condom.

26. “he told me there was another woman in his life but he wanted me to be his girlfriend and so he was going to leave her, plus she didn’t mean anything to him, but he didn’t want to be rude by dumping her so suddenly”
    How can people actually believe this kind of thing when it comes out of somebodies mouth? Consider him doing you a favor by not going to this wedding, and dump him now before the cheating and the lies get too out of control.

    LW3: Wow three pregnancies since February! Some people don’t learn from there mistakes! Sounds like the 2nd and 3rd times you were maybe trying to use it to keep him around though.

27. Attention ladies of the world: If you get pregnant 3 times in a 12 month period (otherwise known as “a year”), then you are WANTING to get pregnant. Condoms have a 99.9% success rate when used properly (or at all). Yes, my oldest was conceived even though I used condoms. Guess what – I had a TON of sex. And we used cheap condoms.
    If your pregnancies were the result of faulty birth control, it’s time to rethink the birth control method you’re using and CHANGE IT. If you aren’t using birth control, then you are asking to get pregnant and shouldn’t be surprised.
    LW3, you THINK you’re pregnant again. You don’t have any confirmation whatsoever at this point. Get confirmation before you do anything. You may not be and it could be a “phantom pregnancy” (where your body gives you all signs of a pregnancy without there being one, it’s a psychological thing), or you could be dealing with a complication from your miscarriage, or worse, a uterine issue that does need to be taken care of.
    If it’s confirmed that you are pregnant – well, THEN you have a decision to make. I am assuming that this guy left you because you hid the abortion from him. And the fact that you allowed yourself to become pregnant 2x in a year. Well, you really should contact him to let him know that it has happened again. Regardless of his feelings towards you, if you are pregnant, the child you carry is his as well and he should be allowed to know. The two of you can decide on what to do, but I personally would recommend another abortion. You aren’t ready for a baby.

28. LW3, I’m sorry everyone here is giving you a hard time. I’m sorry your bf left when you told him. I’m sorry for what you had to go through. I can’t imagine it being easy, and it looks like your instinct was right – he was going to leave you anyway.

    Promise yourself that in the future, whenever you have a problem like this, you bring it up right away, and figure out ways how to solve it with your partner. Stop holding in all the pain.

    Oh, by the way, the miscarriage was not caused by your previous abortion, so stop carrying that pain with you. Google miscarriages and why they happen.

    Think hard why you didn’t discuss this with your bf. Are you having a hard time having difficult conversations? Were you afraid he was going to dump you? Do you have low self-esteem? Maybe you should have a couple of meetings with a counselor.

29. Hello, BIRTH CONTROL!!! Getting pregnant three times in one year? Seriously?!? I’m really sorry if I’m being harsh, but it’s common fucking sense. And if you get an abortion without telling your boyfriend, it’s perfectly understandable that he wouldn’t want to see you anymore once he found out (though it is incredibly sad and I really am sorry you’re hurt). There are certain situations where it’s okay to not tell the guy about an abortion, but, in general, if you’re in an actual relationship with the father then he has a right to know.

30. Wow.

    LW1: The “other woman” he “left” and “didn’t mean anything” is probably his wife. Also, how can he be oh so perfect when he barely gives you any time? And you’ve only been “together” for only 2.5 months and you already broke up once? Get some self respect and lose him.

    LW2: Maybe back off alcohol a little. Actually, stop drinking. If you can’t control how much you drink that you get to the point of blacking out then you should not be drinking.

    LW3: You do know different forms of birth control exist right? Have you heard of condoms? I hear they work pretty well, plus they protect you from getting STD’s. You don’t have a job and you barely out of college. And the fact that you got “accidentally pregnant” THREE TIMES in 10 MONTHS should be a sign that you are not ready to take care of a baby.

    FFS

31. Did you ever think that if the loser-ish guys some women are so desperate to be with are only with those men because the men don’t love them back. Like a I Must Win/Conquer thing?
    If the men actually showed them all the attention and love women are so desperate to get from the ones that don’t give it, the women would realize what losers they are and MOA right away? (I’m barely forming sentences, so good luck making sense of the point I’m trying to make)

    1. YES! That made perfect sense. I wasted two years of my life trying to “win.” I started dating a guy who I didn’t realize was a loser at first, and as we kept dating, I said “I love you” (though looking back, I didn’t), but he didn’t say it back. I spent the next year and a half trying to make him love me until I realized that I didn’t care if he did or not anyway because…. blech. Now I can’t believe I wasted more than a week on him.

32. The idea that this happened to someone three times in one year scares me. Hell, the idea of three sinus infections in one year scares me. Three flat tires. Three late payments. Three of ANYTHING you don’t want to happen! Gah

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