Well, I have to admit I’m shocked at this one. The American Academy of Pediatrics is now recommending that teenagers be given prescriptions for Plan B, an emergency contraceptive that generally reduces the fertilization of egg and sperm with hopes that the measure will reduce teen pregnancy. Plan B is not to be confused with the abortion pill, which hastens a miscarriage once an embryo is formed in the uterus. Plan B is basically a massive dose of hormones found in the typical birth control pill.

Doctors should give underage teenagers prescriptions for emergency contraceptives like Plan B before they start having sex instead of waiting until a young patient’s “plan A” goes awry, the American Academy of Pediatrics says in a new policy statement. It says doctors should also counsel teens on the various options for emergency birth control as part of an overall strategy to reduce teen pregnancy.

The academy is issuing the new position paper, published online Monday by the journal Pediatrics, as physicians and other health experts struggle to reduce the nation’s high birthrate among adolescents.

Truth time: I have taken Plan B. I took it when The Hubster and I were dating and the condom broke. I was in college and raising Maxi Me, and no way in hell was I going to have another kid as a single mom. Mike and I agreed that we simply could not afford the risk, so I went to my university doctor and got the prescription. Now mind you–it wasn’t FOR SURE that I would be pregnant, the only thing for certain at that time was that the condom broke. No abortion took place. I just want to make that clear to anyone reading this who has an abnormal, mouth-frothing hatred for me and masturbates to the thought of spreading fresh gossip. It’s also the reason why No Wedding No Womb has always advocated for birth control and part of the solution to the sky-high out-of-wedlock problem. I know better than anybody how mishaps can happen.

So I filled the prescription and took the two pills. You take one the first day and then take the other the next. This pill is no joke. I was horribly nauseous for 48 hours. Mike, helpless to nurse me because he lived 70 miles away and me living with my parents while I finished school, and unable to tell my generally hysterical mother anything personal, I suffered in silence until it was over. It’s not a pill you’d take as a lazy man’s birth control, ya’ll. The side effects alone are enough to not ever want to be put into the position of needing it again. Plan B was a success, and Mike and I didn’t make another slip like that until it was accidentally-on-purpose in our marriage bed. We “let it slip” one time. And that one time, I got pregnant with Chloe (aka Clo Clo). We had another “slip” two years later, then Zachary aka The Boy came along. We thought we were done. I wanted The Hubster to get The Big V. He didn’t. So…24 hours after Barack Obama’s 2008 inauguration, The Babster (Emma) was conceived, despite our best efforts to prevent it. Just a word of caution–skip the lambskin condoms on the sex rack at CVS. Trust me…it’s best to use the latex.

I say all that to show you how easily my husband has been able to impregnate me. When I am ovulating, there’s about a 100% chance I’ll get knocked up, so we were wise to use Plan B while we were dating, because at 25, I for sure would have gotten pregnant, and that would have been a disaster.

But…I was 25. These doctors are talking about putting Plan B into the hands of teenagers before they even have sex. My initial thought was, “What the hell? My kid isn’t even 15 yet. Why are these doctors pushing birth control down our kid’s throats? My kid just barely had her first kiss!” Then, I had another thought. I know, in my heart of hearts, that if my daughter sought out the Plan B pill, I would not stand in her way. I don’t know if I’d be comfortable having that conversation with her in a pediatrician’s office for God’s sake–these are fricken BABY DOCTORS!! But if the doctor brought it up in a conversation with Maxi Me, and suggested she have this prescription, I wouldn’t go H.A.M. I might warn her not to ever get herself into a situation in which she might need to cash that check. Thing is, I remember what it was like in high school. Girls got pregnant all around me. It was absolutely insane. I don’t want that for any of my girls. I want them to have 100% control over when they decide to have children.

And now for the zinger. A longtime BB&W member and physician, Law Wanxi, asked me to bring this up for discussion. Here’s what he said to me:

I think we’ve come to a point where women should just write off and discard the idea that men should have any contraception responsibility at all. Period. I know that a lot of people will say “Well, the man should…”, but the Real World truth of the matter is that the man isn’t and that is that. It’s a nice little fantasy world to live in, but I live in the Real World, a cold and unrelentingly cruel place where the undeserving prosper, the good die before their time and where love is statistically non-existent.

 

So folks, what say you?