March 30th, 2009
Doctor Discussion
One of those silly arguments made in our slightly confused culture, where, despite the progresses in the realm of feminism, I am still considered mostly a biological vehicle for babies.
One time, I told a doctor that, if I changed my mind, I could adopt. She told me “it’s not the same thing”. I was pretty pissed, as an adopted kid, myself, and asked her if she wanted to tell my mother that.
March 30th, 2009 at 4:20 am
As an adopted child myself, I HEARTILY agree with you. This kind of thing pisses me off too, especially when…. no, that’s a rant for another time. Sorry!
DID the doc want to tell your mother that? ^0_o^
March 30th, 2009 at 7:03 am
Well, it -is- somewhat reversible, but it’s also a very drastic decision. I don’t disagree that it ought to be a woman’s choice what to do (and undo) with her body, but I can also see why doctors would be quite hesitant to perform such a procedure.
March 30th, 2009 at 10:12 am
My mum was about 20 when she wanted to get her tubes tied, but in the state where she lived at the time forbid it. Her only choice was to wait till she was 24 or had three kids. Well she used birth control and the old man wrapped his package, but sometimes stuff just happens. My mum had her third kid by the time she was 23. She debated if an abortion was the right thing to do, but as you can tell from the sentence before this one, that she did not do it. But the state believed that they had the right to tell her what she could do and could not do with her own body. She already had two other children, she didn’t want anymore. But my brother is now 22 and a true pain in the ass, I myself am 24 and I don’t have any children nor do I want any. If there ever comes a time in my life where I want them, their are plenty of children in this world that need loving homes.
March 30th, 2009 at 11:59 am
Yeah, I figure that there are plenty of kids out there who could use homes if I ever decide that I need to get a kid. People put too much importance on “blood” these days, dropping thousands and thousands on fertility medicine when kids around the world (and plenty in the US) are unwanted and un cared for.
March 30th, 2009 at 5:22 pm
RE: Steve:
Yeah, doctors are afraid of being sued if the woman does change her mind.
March 30th, 2009 at 11:23 pm
Yeah, but someone shouldn’t be able to sue for that. *tsk* America. We’re so screwy at this point.
March 30th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
Sadly, if you were poor and black, the doctor might be far less inclined to argue.
March 31st, 2009 at 11:31 am
hey, if you were a member of the fleet and president roslin told you no, i’d have to agree with her. gotta keep the human race alive, people.
March 31st, 2009 at 11:40 pm
RE: kumquat:
Like over six BILLION of us isn’t enough? ^o_0^
April 9th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
I understand!!! I am 27, married and neither of us wants kids, but I still cannot make this choice. When I was 22 I was told when I was 30 I could decide, they have moved it back now to 35 for me, and the nurse in the room told me that I was wrong to want to make this dicesion! ARRG!
April 9th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
I think the worst part is my hubby is now 30 and we are trying to get him fixed instead, now the Dr. wants us to go to counceling!
August 30th, 2009 at 12:57 am
I had my tubes tied when I was 25. that was at the beginning of this year. I was lucky to have a doctor that understood. He just told me he wanted me to understand the whole thing and the chance of being able to reverse it and being able to have kids was slim. We set up a date about a month later (he wanted to set it up like 2 weeks) from the initial day of this appointment.I went home and knew people were going to think I was crazy. I have no children and people told me and still do tell me I will regret this. I would be outraged to have someone tell me what to do with my own body. I mean if you make the choice and sign the paper, it is all on you. It is all about the money to some of these docotrs. it really is disgusting.
August 30th, 2009 at 1:08 am
I was just told this and we have 4 kids. My husband was also told he was not mature enough to make the decision to get a vasectomy. WTF? We have four kids.
August 30th, 2009 at 1:09 am
On the one hand I completely agree with you, I really do, but on the other hand I look at my own life and… When I was 21 I came out as a lesbian, and I mean I was out. I was out at work, out to my family, out everywhere, lived with various girlfriends in committed relationships, took them home to meet mum and dad etc. I can tell you that if my parents or anyone had dared to suggest to me that classic cliched phrase of “it’s just a phase you’re going through” I would have kicked their frickin teeth in! Then one day about seven years later a guy came along who knew just how to push my buttons both mentally and physically. After I split up with him I met another. I am now married and at 38 am trying to conceive a baby for the first time. Was it just a phase? I don’t know but I do know that forever is a very long time. Plus, on the adoption front, I get where you are coming from but at the risk of having only the most vacuous example to give that everyone will know can I nonetheless just say Brangelina…? It can happen, y’know? Please don’t be mad I told you that!
August 30th, 2009 at 3:53 am
The funniest part is, it isn’t as though there is some type of “had a kid” test. Just lie and say you have four. (didn’t work for the one lady who actually does, but I think that is an exception)
Don’t give up because one doctor says no. Tell them you have a genetic issue – a parent with some terrible disease – it is not as if they double-check these things.
I say Planned Parenthood all the way. They truly believe in women choosing for their own bodies and lives. They did it for me at 23 or 24 after I had two kids and one abortion.
August 30th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
Those who are pro-choice need to include this choice in their campaigns. I know so many women who knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that they didn’t want any kids, or any more kids than they already had, and yet were told by doctors that they could not have permanent sterilization performed because they were too young.
More aggravating, those on medicaid are often told that the state will not pay for a tubal ligation/permanent sterilization until after they’ve had 3 kids, or are X years of age, which varies. Some are told 24, others 30, and I’ve even heard some told they had to be 35. Yet, these same women are allowed to pop out child after child after child on the state’s dime.
August 30th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
This really is a messy issue. I can see the argument that perhaps you want to discourage someone from making such a permanent choice at a young age. Nonetheless, it should still be ultimately up to the woman (or man, for that matter) who wishes to decide to eliminate the possibility of reproduction. If we as a society are going to say that 18 yr olds are mature enough to decide to sign up for the military and risk their lives overseas, then we should certainly allow that adults in their 20s are mature enough to decide what to do with their bodies.
August 31st, 2009 at 4:46 am
I don’t believe anyone makes such a decision lightly. Yep, it’s a near-permanent decision, but I don’t see how it’s worse than having a child that is unwanted. The government has enough to deal with, trying to look after all the other unwanted children who are out there. Let the government protect them, before stopping women from bearing children they knew they never wanted to begin with.
August 31st, 2009 at 8:35 am
A tricky one! I think you’re totally right: it’s about control of your body. I’m speaking as a man who’s had two children and then a vasectomy! I could understand a doctor hesitating and talking it over, but not giving a blanket “no” to a 24-year-old! The “what if you change your mind?” question is valid – and adoption is one answer. Another is that even if you don’t want to have children yourself, you can always be an influence over children you like and be involved in their lives – that’s just like making friends. It’s just that tying your tubes is … well … forever. I know I had doubts when I got mine done. So, hesitation is healthy, being forbidden totally sucks. You know what would be ideal? A sure-fire 10-year solution, like an injection or something that lets you “come back to it in 10 years.” Yes, I know I’m dreaming. The stories I’m reading in posts here about having to be a certain age or have a certain number of kids – that’s certainly OUTRAGEOUS. Your body, your decision!
August 31st, 2009 at 4:13 pm
That is so stupid. I don’t want children and I never have and at the age of 20(almost) I haven’t changed my mind in the past 4 1/2 years. People keep telling me that once I meet Mr. Right that I’ll WANT to have his children. Oh ugh. How lame. I really don’t understand why people feel the need to force us into having children. It sucks.
PLUS… It’s my body. I sure as all can decide what I want to do with it. And when. If that means 22 or 24 or even 20 then that means those years. Not after I have their specific limit of children.
UGH….
little creepies of me. *bleh*
September 1st, 2009 at 9:14 am
move to Australia!
September 1st, 2009 at 3:38 pm
I had almost this exact convo with my gyno last year. I am married happily and am totally and completely sure I don’t want children. My GP was very helpful and respectful of my decision, but the gyno just kept telling me that once I was “settled down and could afford a nanny I would change my mind” WHAT?! So once I can afford to hand my kid off to someone else, I’ll want one? NO I WON’T! It is very frustrating how nobody trusts young women to make this choice and how many of us feel that we have to have children because “That’s what you do”. Makes me sick kind of. Blerg.
September 1st, 2009 at 4:07 pm
I don’t know if you’ve heard of this place, but this is where I found a doctor willing to sterilize me.
http://community.livejournal.com/cf_resources/
Good luck! It’s a crappy double standard, but we can get around it if we try hard enough.
September 1st, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Glad I’m not the only one with these issues! I never wanted children until last year. Now I’m 41, don’t even have any little eggs to make a baby, and have an adopted infant–but still can’t get a doctor to perform a hysterectomy! Thinking about going to the veterinarian!
September 1st, 2009 at 6:26 pm
I am 30 and have been trying to undergo sterilization for the past ten years. My doctors won’t do it. Planned Parenthood won’t do it. People give me the same old, tired rhetoric: “Oh, but you might change your mind! What if you meet the right man! When you get older you’ll feel differently! You’re just selfish right now and that’s okay, you’ll grow out of it!” Funny how the age at which I’d “get older” used to be 25, and then 30, and now it’s 35. All of those statements – every single one – are statements that people who already have children desperately need to believe for themselves.
In our society, you are a pariah if you even hint at thinking about how your life might have been without children. It’s a kind of social blasphemy to talk about regrets related to having kids, and god forbid you actually imagine a better life without them. Believing that people who are child-free by choice will eventually give in and change their minds means that there’s no escape from a life of raising children – that nothing would have or could have been different.
I love my life. I have found the man I am spending the rest of my life with, and he feels the same about me. We’re successful and happy, and have set goals for ourselves. Those goals don’t involve having kids because neither he nor I wants to. We aren’t “being selfish” – what’s selfish about not wanting to bring another child onto our overcrowded planet? Our love for each other and growing older has not “changed our minds” about anything. If anything, it’s strengthened our resolve. We don’t have “overflowing love that we need to pour into something else” (yes, someone actually said that to me once) because there is no limit on how much love we can give to each other.
I’m greatful that I was able to get the Mirena IUD and definitely enjoying the benefits it brings, especially not having periods! But when it comes right down to it, no doctor should be able to pass judgment on me, regardless of their amateur assessment of my possible future feelings. Lawsuits are not an excuse because a simple form would suffice to render the chance of that void. What it comes down to is that there is still the pervasive assumption that instinct cannot be overcome and that we are created for the purpose of giving birth.
This is not a gray area or a tricky issue or anything of the kind. It’s a very black and white fact that if women want to make the decision to ensure they will never have children, they should be permitted to do so with no questions asked, lectures, rhetoric, or denials. Until we are permitted to do so, this is another way of controlling our reproductive rights. I leave you with this thought: right now, I could walk in to my doctor’s office, request an abortion, and get one. Could I do the same with sterilization?
Why not?
September 1st, 2009 at 6:32 pm
Three additional things:
1. Sorry for the long comment.
2. I’m different from the other Sarah that commented.
3. LOVE the comic!
=)
September 2nd, 2009 at 12:46 pm
I’m also a childfree-by-choice adult adoptee and I get the same crap and I give the same answer.
I also say, so what if I change my mind later? Isn’t living with the consequences of our actions all part of being a grown-up? If I change my mind about *having* kids, I can’t take it back, but if I change my mind about *not* having kids, there are plenty of alternatives available. Including the likelihood that, as I get older, my dating pool will have an increased number of males who already have children.
I knew when I was 6, I knew when I was 12, I knew when I was 18, I knew when I was 24, I knew when I was 29 and had an abortion, I knew when I was 30, and at nearly 33, I STILL know that I DO NOT WANT KIDS and have absolutely no doubts or regrets at not having them. It’s one of the few things about my goals, dreams and plans that has never changed.
How f*cking condescending is it to say “when you meet the right man, you’ll change your mind”. Bull! The “right man” *also* does not want kids.
September 3rd, 2009 at 6:16 pm
Love the comic. You’re right, women should be able to make ANY decision they want regarding their bodies. Considering how far we’ve come with birth control and abortion access, you’d think that’d be common knowledge by now…
~Allyssa
September 9th, 2009 at 10:27 pm
wow. I have had this *exact same* conversation with various doctors! It’s like they’re reciting from some pamphlet…
September 10th, 2009 at 10:17 pm
Here’s my theory: white babies make a lot of money in those Christian Adoption agencies – and who’s getting sterilized & abortions? The white women! – They have access to more resources, like health care at a nice OB-GYN office… and have a little more power than minority women… So, they just want to make $$.
September 10th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
This website post made my day; I think it is your body, your choice. Good for you for questioning this, and being resilient to the possibility.
I am also adopted, but have been fortunate to meet both sides of my birth family. There are some times when I think I don’t want to bear children, but it is constantly changing. It has to be your decision. It is reversible, however, the surgery is pretty brutal, and this is probably why your Doc advised against it. S/he does not have the right to deny this from you. I like your creative approach to expressing how you felt afterwards.
September 17th, 2009 at 1:24 am
I agree with making your own decision. I have gotten pregnant 3 times using condoms. I used to be on birth control but it wreaked havoc on my system. So what do I do? Tying the tubes is my only option except no one will do it for me : \ Being pregnant wouldn’t be so bad if I could keep it. My mom went through 11 miscarriages before me. We have a disorder with our uterus that makes it difficult to hold a child to term even though we’re extremely fertile. What a curse, right? As painful and awful they are, I’ll be going through miscarriages for another 20 years I guess.
October 1st, 2009 at 2:03 pm
I am 19 and never wanted to pop out children of my own.Nor I ever will.I don`t get why wouldn`t doctors perform voluntary sterilization to patients.Contraception pills are expensive and abortion is painful.If one ever feels like having kids,they can adopt.
Thumbs up for this comic!
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:09 pm
I agree with this, and sadly, have experienced much of the same. I’ve been called selfish, and much worse, for “not wanting to fulfill my role as a woman.” I think it’s crap, it’s my choice, and if I can choose to have an abortion, and kill a child, I should be able to not have the children in the first place.
October 29th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
I’m a card carrying feminist all the way, but I think this issue has some real gray area. Women at 18 or 19 or 20 or even sometimes 24 are often still mentally and emotionally teenagers. The human brain does not even fully mature out of the adolescent stage until about 25. There are plenty of women in their early 20s who are mature enough to make this decision and will never regret it, but there are plenty who are not and who would, and there is really no objective test for that kind of thing. How many teenagers have you met who are certain beyond the shadow of a doubt that they are going to be with their girlfriend/boyfriend FOREVER? probably a lot, and how many of them actually do? So yes, I do think there should be a limit, and I think it should be the same for both men and women, which it sadly is not.
November 10th, 2009 at 9:04 pm
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January 9th, 2010 at 11:49 am
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January 30th, 2010 at 6:53 pm
I think that it is, by and large, irresponsible to want to have more than two children in this country. Goddamned right-to-lifers and their dogmatic refusal to listen to LOGIC.
February 1st, 2010 at 2:20 am
I think some doctors refuse to do it for fear of a lawsuit years after the procedure. I can just see it now. In a courtroom a crying young woman points a finger at a doctor saying I can’t have a baby because that person took away my ability!! She/He should have known I was too young!!:wailwailwail:
In this ‘a woman is baby factory’ society who do you think would win that case? Maybe I am being cynical but I don’t think the fact that she chose to have the procedure done would matter.
Just my opinion.
February 21st, 2010 at 5:13 pm
I believe that a woman should be able to not have children if it is her choice, also for the most part it is reversible now just costly and has a higher chance for ectopic pregnancy. My mother was eighteen when she had me, she didn’t want me at first but with the support of my grandparents she had me and instantly fell in love with me. But she was able to get her tubes tied not long after I was born because she knew she did not want anymore children. She is one of the lucky unlucky ones because a few years later she had a ectopic pregnancy which almost cause her death and she had to have a hysterectomy because somehow a hole had developed in on of her tubes. So my biggest advice if you do decide to get one look into all that can happen with doing it.
March 27th, 2010 at 7:55 pm
Sadly, we live in a society which defines a woman by her reproductive status, and women who choose to not reproduce are seen as sad deviants who must be protected from themselves. I had the conversation illustrated in the comic with doctors when I was 23, 28, and 35. Apparently, being single and childfree is a strong indicator of not being able to make such weighty decisions for myself. Basically, the idea is that I have no right to make this decision on behalf of my future husband…whomever he may be.
Bastard. I despise him already.
God, what a society.
March 27th, 2010 at 9:41 pm
I have a friend who had her first child very prem – he was born at 24 weeks. He spent his fist 10 months in hospital and spend his first year on oxygen. He’s also just being weined from his feeding tube (PEG) at 18 months. She has looked into the chances of exactly the same thing happening for future pregnancies, and found that there is a very high chance (about 60%). She asked to have her tubes tied, and got the same lecture from the Doctor!
April 5th, 2010 at 9:00 pm
I have children myself, but nearly made the choice to be childfree (and there are days… oh, there are days). I have so much sympathy for those that wish to be sterilized but cannot find a doctor to do it. I have had several friends in this boat, actually, that have all been told they must be 35. I find it a sad state of affairs that we are perfectly fine with 16 year olds having babies, but women can’t make the choice not to have a baby until just a few years before nature takes away the choice anyway.
April 7th, 2010 at 8:38 pm
I got my tubes tied when I was 23. I asked my doctor who said, “no,” at the time. He compromised with me by telling me to come back in 6 months, and if I still wanted it done, he would refer me to someone. Well, needless to say…
This was in Indiana. I had already had 2 sons too, and had recently divorced their father.
April 8th, 2010 at 5:36 am
you can always get an IUD, it’s 5 years contraceptive and is just as effective as getting your tubes tied. I’m 21 and know I won’t want to have another kid for quite some time, so it was a good option for me.
April 8th, 2010 at 11:15 am
I live in good old Blighty and dispite having a fairly liberal system over here. My boss went for a longer term contraceptive, but instead was sent for a psych consult as she didn’t want any kids. The doctor apparently thought that there was something wrong about a woman who didn’t want to spawn the next generation of our species.
April 8th, 2010 at 1:45 pm
It’s remarkable that this discussion has gone off in the direction birth control, when it could equally well have started talking about the status and role of doctors.
They insist it’s not the same as in the 50s, but doctors are still notoriously arrogant and think they’re entitled to take people’s decisions for them. Sometimes they even conceal from them what decisions they take, and often they do so about people they have met, if at all, only five minutes earlier.
There’s nothing new or exceptional about this behaviour by doctors. Other groups who identify themselves – often wrongly – as responsible members of society such as policemen (or so-called policemen) and social workers will also arrogate the right to direct other people’s lives in a certain direction, and in the past members of the priesthood would even execute people, “pour encourager les autres”.
One doctor apologised to me once that the only advice he could give me would consist of information. I told him that any fool could give orders, that advice consisting of information was the only advice worth listening to. If those who identify as high-bourgeois – whether or not they use that term – saw their role as giving information instead of imposing their decisions on their “subordinates” the world would be a better place.
April 12th, 2010 at 2:36 am
I hate to open the family can of worm but here goes. My sister is 29 years old and has three kids. All three of them have other homes or families. They do not know their mother and it is honestly what is best for them. She has no right to them. This world is so off kilter that is makes me angry. People like you have every right to choose what you want with your body and they tell you it has to be this way. But a grown ass woman can have babies she doesn’t want and can not care for but there is nobody there telling her to stop its not whats best. How ass backward is that?
April 23rd, 2010 at 11:19 pm
I saw a bumper sticker today that said “A CHILD IS A GIFT FROM GOD” and I thought to myself… Hmmm. That must mean Osama Bin Laden, Adolph Hitler, Pol Pot, Ted Bundy, Timothy McVeigh, and Jeffrey Dahmer were all gifts from God.
So the next doctor who tells me I might birth the curer of cancer or the champion of world peace will hopefully realize that I’m much more likely to birth instead a dispicable pedophile or a homicidal alcoholic. Why can’t people get their heads straight about kids???
April 24th, 2010 at 3:48 pm
People who think that babies are a nuisance, a burden, and a curse–yes, let those people opt out of the cycle of generations. I’m sure my kids will be glad to pay for their old age pensions along with theirs and mine.
July 16th, 2010 at 11:48 am
How is this a tricky subject? When you’re legally old enough to have sex, you’re old enough to decide what to do with your own body. You guys got some really screwed rules down there. Kick the religion out of your country already, then this wouldn’t be an issue.
July 19th, 2010 at 4:29 pm
As a teenage female, I have no plans to have children now, and… in all honesty? I can’t picture myself having them, though I’m not dead set against it. However, I don’t think I’d ever get sterilised – if only for the fear of something going wrong.
I think everyone has the right to do what they want with their bodies.