Shortcuts: “My Sugar Daddy Got Me Pregnant”
It’s time again for Shortcuts. For every question, I’ll give my advice in just a few sentences because sometimes the answer to a person’s question is so obvious and the need to hear it so great that being as clear and frank as possible is simply the best way to go.
Take the damn money and get an abortion!!! He doesn’t need to know that’s what you’re doing. Ask a friend to go with you and then erase loser sugar daddy from your life and practice smarter choices moving forward. Do NOT let this guy talk you into keeping this baby. You’re 20 years old and pregnant by a married man who has zero intention of being a reliable co-parent. An abortion will be far cheaper than raising this child on your own. Also: MOA!
Tell him you appreciate the gift he gave you and you hope he appreciates the thought you put into the gift you selected for him, but in the future, if spending an equal amount on gifts is so important to him, you should stick to an agreed-upon price range that you’re comfortable spending on a gift (like $50-$75). Alternatively (or in addition to a gift), you could celebrate special occasions in less commercial ways, like making dinner together, going on a weekend getaway, and planning a nice date. But if your boyfriend’s truly keeping a tally on financial investments you’re making in the relationship, I’d consider that a red flag and discuss with him all the other ways you’re investing in the relationship that he should also consider.
Six months into your relationship the sex “died,” and yet you not only continued dating him another two and a half years, but you also MARRIED the guy??! And you want to know what your uncontrollable tears through your wedding ceremony meant? Um, how about that somewhere deep inside you know marrying this guy was a big mistake? I’m not sure how all the issues could be your fault, but I am sure that, if you think that’s true, you need to seek therapy immediately, and please consider annulling your marriage or getting a divorce. It’s clear that this is not a happy marriage.
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If you have a relationship/dating question I can help answer, you can send me your letters at [email protected].
Wow these are good ones today!
LW1: Is your sugar daddy your only source of income? Seems like you are really planning ahead for your future…
LW2: Man if that doesn’t tell you a whole lot of how the rest of your relationship is going to go, I don’t know what does. It’s just starting with these gifts wait until it becomes shared expenses, if he makes way more money than you is he still going to expect you to pay half even when he wants to buy nice things? He is always going to be keeping a tab on everything.
LW3: Um do people really want to stay in a relationship and marry a person who six months into it doesn’t care about their sex life anymore and sleeps on the couch? Why were you living together 6 months in anyways, especially when he has kids? I need a reason why somebody would stay in this type of relationship, because it just doesn’t make sense!!! The issues aren’t your fault, but staying in the relationship is.
Regarding LW3, it sounds like she has the idea that because she sacrifices for him and his kids, that he owes her love in return. Or that he ‘should’ feel love for her because she does all that. I see nothing in the letter about how they’re best friends and soulmates except for the problems in the bedroom, or how she couldn’t imagine life without him, etc.
LW1: Yes, abortion, and while you’re at the doctor’s office, get a prescription for contraceptives, or make an appointment to get an IUD. If you’re going to make a career out of being paid to have sex, then you need to take care of your own contraception, STD testing, etc. Make sure you negotiate enough pay to cover those expenses with the next sugar daddy.
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LW2: That’s a deal breaker. Sorry. I’d be done with the guy. The way that’s handled by people with manners is that he thanks you graciously for your gift, you thank him graciously for his, and you resolve to have a conversation about how much to spend before the next gifting occasion.
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LW3: Have you ever talked to your husband about making things better in the bedroom? You’re allowed to, you know. But as for why you were crying at the wedding? Come on, you know the answer as well as we do. Your relationship sucked before you got married, and you knew your marriage was going to suck. Get an annulment, walk away, and in the meantime, for the love of god, use contraception if by some miracle he does want to have sex. The last thing you want to do is have kids when your marriage is collapsing.
I would bet that the first thing that LW3 wants to do is actually have kids before she gets out of the marriage… just a hunch though.
Yeah, could be. Wouldn’t be the first person who figured they’d save a bad marriage by having kids.
Or feels that their baby making time is running out and they need to have a baby now or never, with the guy who is available, even if he is a total dud.
Love the advice about building in potential future expenses into pay structure. It’s what I do in my own (non-sex worker) business.
LW1: Women over the age of 16 who have not been raped or tricked in some way need to stop saying “he got me pregnant.” You got YOURSELF pregnant by letting him in you without protection. What, nobody told you where babies come from? You never heard of the pill or a condom? Take responsibility for your choices.
Technically she wrote “I’m a 20-year-old girl who got pregnant by my sugar daddy.” This is accurate. She did not impregnate herself. I agree she needs to take responsibility for her own body and reproductive choices. Ideally, she should not continue to take money from someone she plans to end her relationship with to hasten the process. Legally, I doubt he can be made to pay for an abortion. But its significantly less than he would be legally required to pay for the alternative.
It’s definitely morally murky but I think the end justifies the means in this case. But then I see very early abortions as more ethical than later abortions.
Most very late abortions are due to severe birth defects where the child will have a incredibly poor quality of life. The type of child who would have died at birth 50 or more years ago but now is kept alive, often living in pain, with no quality of life. Most are wanted children whose parents are saving them from a horrible life.
I’m pro-choice across the spectrum. I think a woman’s physical, mental, and emotional health trump the rights of a fetus. I think there are very good reasons for safe, legal late-term abortions. I think it is unethical to shame and condemn someone for making the choice that is best for them. But I do see a fetus as a form of life, just not on the same level as the mother. On a personal note I feel like the more this fetus is developed and the closer it is to autonomous viability, the more significant the loss. I also suspect that in many cases later term abortions are more difficult for the mother to process and recover from than earlier abortions. So if an abortion is what a mother chooses, I think earlier is preferable in most cases. Of course there are exceptions but in this particular letter it is still my personal opinion that sooner is better.
I was going to say the same thing. The late-term ones are the most necessary ones, and are typically not even wanted. They need multiple doctors to sign off, and are done to either save the life or quality of life of the mother, or to spare the baby from a short, extremely painful life. There’s nothing unethical about them.
They also aren’t covered by insurance and are a large financial burden to the family even though the medical care the baby would receive if it were born would be a huge cost to the health insurance company.
Seriously? That’s messed up. Here in Canada all abortions are covered (by the govt!) with the exception of some private clinics in some provinces. But if you get it at a hospital, it’s covered. Which means all the late-term ones are covered since the clinics don’t do those. Of course there are groups trying to change that (Catholic Church is a biggie), and also groups trying to outlaw late-term abortion.
I agree. The debate over late term abortions is a very smart tactic by the pro life crowd that distracts people from the true consequences of anti choice legislation. While many (most) people feel squeamish about the thought of a woman aborting her otherwise healthy abortion late in her pregnancy for no other reason than she was lazy, the truth is that situation is very very rare. Most women decide pretty early whether they want to carry a pregnancy to term very early on. Most later abortions are due to women who have a fetus with major health issues, or they lacked access to procure an abortion as early they wanted, or they extracted themselves from a bad situation later in their pregnancy.
Getting people to get emotional and argue about these mythical late term abortions, and potentially restrict them, has been a very effective way for anti choices to incrementally restrict access across the board.
While I hope late term abortions are rare, we should not restrict womens’ access to them. You never know why a woman wants one, and chances are there’s a damn good reason she didn’t seek out an abortion earlier.
Totally. For my post above about health care coverage in Canada, I looked it up to make sure I was correct before posting. It was hard to find the info, instead I found tons and tons of pages with all these “myths” about abortion, mainly focusing on late-term since that’s what I’d searched on. They were full of hand-wringing about how many happen per year (a tiny percentage), and how Canada allows legal abortions at any stage, without ever once mentioning the facts of the matter: it has to be done in a hospital, by a doctor, none of whom will do it just because the mother “wants” one. Like, come on. These aren’t fun for the doctors. They’re human. No doctor is sitting there like “yeah, bring me your 30-week fetus, I’ll abort it, no prob”. In fact it’s hard to find doctors who will do them even for valid medical reasons, because it’s so psychologically difficult. Especially if the baby’s fine but the mother’s life is at risk. Those doctors have to be very strong to be able to handle doing it. They’re not just doing it willy-nilly, especially since here in Canada it’s not like they can charge some crazy amount of money to make it more “worth it” to put themselves through that kind of emotional turmoil.
“But then I see very early abortions as more ethical than later abortions.”
I realize this was poor wording on my part. Pro-life Politicians do use late-term abortion horror stories to make gruesome caricatures of the women who seek them out. It is designed to pander to emotion. Given the current political threat on a woman’s right to choose, I should have been more careful choosing my wording.
My original statement was not referring to women who opt for late-term abortions. In this particular letter writer’s case, I highly doubt the topic is relevant. But it can be difficult for a woman who has already made a choice to have an abortion to have quick and safe access to one. The women who have the most trouble are the ones who don’t have the money, transportation, time off from work, or support to get one. My opinion on abortion is that my opinion on abortion should not be a determining factor on the legality and accessibility of the procedure. A woman has the right to self-determination of her own reproductive health.
My original statement is reflective of my own personal feelings. Reading about my own kid’s fetal development on a week by week basis made me appreciate how fast change occurs. I think every woman has the right to decide whether an abortion is in line with their personal code of ethics. This does not mean I or anyone else should get to make this decision for anyone else. But I don’t think I’m the only pro-choice woman who feels a growing fetus is something more the longer that it gestates. This observation is not meant to make women who made the difficult choice to opt for a late-term abortion feel bad. It was stated as full disclosure to the letter writer that I think a sense of urgency for an abortion can be justified to the woman who has it. And that moral sense of urgency might outweigh the sense of obligation she might feel she owes to her “sugar daddy” when obtaining his money. That’s all.
I mean sure, every woman considering an abortion has to contend with her on own personal morality on the subject, no matter where she is in the pregnancy. I’m sure the letter writer has and has decided she’s okay (enough) with it still want one.
But I guess it was confusing for you to bring up your own personal opinions on it (even odder that you would bring in late term abortion which as far as we know, isn’t the scenario she’s in). As you noted, your morality (or mine or anyone else’s) is not relevant to her. She wasn’t even asking for opinions about whether she should or shouldn’t have one or not, her question was whether she should take his money to pay for it.
I’m sorry if I’m coming across as an asshole for chastising you for expressing a personal opinion, but there’s such a fine line between expressing your own moral musings and vilifying someone else for having different morals then you, especially on a loaded topic like abortion. And not that that’s your intent, but a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy doesn’t necessarily understand your intent.
If you believe that abortion is a personal decision, then don’t haul out your personal beliefs unless it’s you who’s pregnant.
Well I hope my intent was clarified by my follow-up comment. I never intended to reference late-term abortions in my original comment, but I concede that my comment wasn’t well-stated. This letter writer has only told us she is twenty and wants to take money from a sugar daddy to get an abortion. I made mental assumptions that she was pondering over if was okay to take the money because she didn’t have any other source of income. This did not make me think about IF she should get an abortion but WHEN she should get one. Other people were also probing the letter writer’s level of responsibility for the situation. I don’t think I’m the only one who wondered whether she should wait and get another job in order to pay for the procedure by herself. I think there might be personal and physical reasons that she shouldn’t wait to have it done. Of course there might not be. She might be just fine waiting a few weeks and this might just be a question about whether the sugar daddy should have to shell out because it is his baby.
“If you believe that abortion is a personal decision, then don’t haul out your personal beliefs unless it’s you who’s pregnant.”
I wouldn’t haul out my personal beliefs to talk someone in or out of an abortion. I wrote the comment I did at the time because it seemed like it could be relevant. Looking back, I can see how it might be confusing. But to be fair, this is a comment section of an entertainment column. I think we all do our share of hauling out our personal beliefs about situations that don’t directly affect us. I think it is a good space for musings. It’s okay with me if you disagree with my opinion. I’ll try to communicate more clearly but I’ll probably keep giving my opinion as long as it’s enjoyable.
I think she is better off getting it sooner rather than later if for no other reason than the price goes up the longer you wait and she doesn’t seem to have the money to pay the cheaper, earlier price. She should get the money together however she can and get the procedure done.
We don’t know whether she used birth control or not. We assume she didn’t but we don’t know that. Maybe she also used an antibiotic or other medication that prevented it from working properly. Maybe she is broke and can’t afford birth control and used a little magical thinking to hope she wouldn’t get pregnant. Maybe she wanted to get pregnant but changed her mind. Who knows. All we know is that she is pregnant and doesn’t have the money to get an abortion. I’d say take the money from the guy and get the procedure done. She is worried about the morality of taking money for having sex with a married man and then using it for an abortion when he wants her to keep the baby. I think that when you are having sex with a married man you’ve already crossed a bigger moral boundary. He’s paying her to have sex and she should be able to use that money any way she wants. She’s earned it. I assume he’s lying to his wife about where he is and what he’s doing when he’s having sex with her and I assume he doesn’t mention how he’s spending the money so I don’t see her being too morally wrong for lying to him about the baby and then spending the money the way she wants. In a perfect world she wouldn’t be providing sex for money to a married man and wouldn’t be in this situation. In a perfect world she’d have a different job and not be pregnant and would be supporting herself. This isn’t a perfect world and she doesn’t have a lot of time to get the money.
Agreed.
Diablo, I get the point you’re trying to make about sexual responsibility, but there’s a dangerous and outdated syntax to it.
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“She went and got herself pregnant” makes my blood boil. How exactly did she do that? A turkey baster? No. Two people are responsible for making a child.
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Maybe “he got me pregnant” isn’t the most correct either, but anatomically, it is – that’s just how it works. Before we start using historically slut-shaming terms condemning one party to this conception, (and for all you know she was on birth control that failed), let’s keep in mind that the man is just as responsible in this scenario.
LW1: It might be a great step for you to figure out how to pay for the abortion yourself, without having to trick someone into giving you money.
LW2: Making assumptions, but I read this letter as that you are probably quite young, and your guy might be really insecure and be reading the price difference in your gifts to think that he cares more about you than you do about him. Try first talking to him and making sure he understands the price of the gift does not directly equate to how much you care about him. If you’re not young, this is a bad sign.
LW3: I don’t even know.
LW1: Why don’t you get yourself a job and pay for your own abortion?????
She probably doesn’t have time to find the job and save for the abortion in order to get it in a timely manner.
Oh good point. Still, I can’t stand people like this LW who use others for money and can’t take responsibility for their own actions.
I’m confused about whether this a sugar daddy/baby service-transaction or if the letter writer is having a seedy affair for the money. If it’s the former then I suppose she has the right to use the money she continues to “earn” on whatever she wants. If it is the latter, she could ask for help from others but if help isn’t immediate, I still think she should use whatever he gives her to secure her abortion and MOA and make better choices in the future.
He’s willingly paying her for sex, essentially. I don’t think he’s being used.
I consider this mutual using. He uses her for sex and she uses him for money. An illegal business transaction. Neither of them has the moral high ground.
LW1 – GET A JOB – No adult should be choosing to be in the position to have so little financial strength they can’t afford an abortion (before anyone flips, I know some families choose to have a stay at home parent which is very different than deciding to f**k some old dude so you don’t have to work). Also, BIRTH CONTROL.
LW2 – communication. communication. communication. Don’t assume you guys are on the same page about things. Have the conversation.
LW3 – Do you care so little about yourself that you wanted to stop dating someone and married him instead? Honestly, I think this one needs a professional.
LW 1: You do NOT have to have a baby you do not want. And yes, it is completely appropriate to use that jackass’s money to procure an abortion. You do not owe him any explanation other than, “I’m no longer pregnant,” and at that point, cut ties like Wendy says. I’m sure a 20 year old wouldn’t have trouble finding a less controlling sugar daddy with all the websites and such devoted to those kinds of pairings.
LW2: Yes, your bf was rude, but gifts can make people a little crazy. My friend bought her then-boyfriend, now-husband a super expensive iPod (when those were still a thing) and he got her a picture frame. Even if it’s not very romantic, deciding on a budget-range for gifts is a really simple way to solve that problem for next year. (So WWS)
LW3: I read somewhere (wish I could remember where and link) that a lot of people, particularly women, who end up getting divorced, had very negative emotions on their wedding day or just before. Cold feet doesn’t really make sense when you’re excited to start a life with someone you love. Sobbing through your ceremony (if they aren’t tears of joy) was clearly a red flag that you buried, maybe to save face or because you felt it was too late to back out. It will be harder to split now that you’re married, but the longer you wait, the harder it will be. And definitely look into therapy so you can learn to trust that inner voice that’s telling you when the decision you are making is a mistake.
My cousin’s ex-wife cried all the way through their wedding. Down the aisle, through the ceremony, etc. She said they were tears of joy, but it didn’t seem that way. I’ve done “tears of joy”, and they come and go at specific emotional times. They’re not constant over a 45-min period. The marriage lasted about 5 years.
I didn’t cry at all at my wedding. Not one drop. What does that say?
Also I’m totally picturing that scene when the prince almost marries the princess of Spain from Ever After.
I’ve been to a fair number of weddings, and I would say the majority didn’t involve anyone crying. I thought I’d cry at mine, but I didn’t. Which I’m glad of because it made the pictures much nicer. 🙂
I am a big ole cry baby; I cry at books, movies, TV shows, everyone else’s weddings, that google commercial of only the google search box that details a couple’s entire relationship and ends with “how to put together a baby crib”, it goes on. I totally expected to cry at my own wedding and had two hankerchiefs ready. Up the aisle, under the chuppah, put the ring on him, he put the ring on me, said the prayers, nothing. The recessional started, and we had picked a really upbeat song, and we literally danced back down the aisle holding hands, smiling the whole time. But once we got through the double doors, I suddenly sprinted to lean against the wall and started BAWLING. Like SOBBING, where it came from I have no idea, and it was done in about a minute. Totally strange.
LW1). Have that abortion immediately. And figure out birthcontrol for fucks sake.
LW2). I don ‘t even get why he is upset… I mean SOOOOO much thought goes into buying somebody a cheap fleece (shudder) shirt.
LW3). Clueless and dimwitted people often end up in shitty lives that were totally preventable, I guess. Surprise, surprise.
Is $65 for a shirt cheap? Doesn’t sound cheap to me!
If you are working as a prostitute you should use protection. You are probably not his only partner.
LW2: I think you’d have to be a jerk to complain that someone didn’t spend $200 on you. Wendy is right. He needs to suck it up and maybe spend less if it upsets him to not get as much in return. But I personally would have trouble respecting someone so greedy.