Things To Consider When Choosing Your Birth Control

by ParentCo. May 11, 2016

The Pill

Ask yourself this - how much of your memory bank is already overburdened with Kelly Clarkson lyrics? Because this method requires you to remember something every single day. At the exact. Same. Time. Sure, you can set an alarm on your phone. But will you remember to set the alarm? And when you go to turn off said alarm, can you be sure you won’t be distracted by a photo of a dog that looks exactly like Tom Hiddleston that someone just put on Facebook? If the answer is yes, then go on. Pill it up. Downside: Sore breasts, possible weight gain, and an increased risk of every few weeks screaming at your partner in an explosive rage when you ask him if he likes your shoes and all he says is, “Sure.” (Bonus: Save one of the round empty packs for Halloween. Tape it to your partner’s chest and tell everyone he is Iron Man.)

Depo-Provera

Kind of sounds like an Italian boy band, but is in fact a shot. Provides effective, estrogen-free protection for three months. Perfect! I hear you say. Get the needle in my arm, already! However, please consider that possible, though less common side effects include:

• weight gain
• decreased sex drive
• depression
• increased hair loss, OR increased hair on face.

So there is a small risk of turning into a bald, fat, depressed were-woman. Which may result in more tepid advances from your partner. Fortunately, with your decreased sex drive, you likely will not care.

The IUD

Your partner claims to “know someone” who was once “poked” by the sturdy strings on this device. You agree that having one’s genitals jabbed mid-coitus could be a bit of a mood killer. You now fear if an IUD were inserted into your person, your partner would then regard sex with you like that scene in Flash Gordon, where Flash has to fearfully reach into that weird tree, expecting at any moment to be mortally wounded by a green alien scorpion. Consider this a check in the con column. Pro: One of the most effective forms available. Plus, you don’t have to remember to do anything for twelve whole years, and can reserve all available brainpower for thinking random thoughts, like how once when you were getting a half head of highlights the hairdresser told you she has two uteruses. (Uteri?)

The Mirena

Like the IUD, but is serious for realz not joking around, because it also releases hormones. Once inserted, you won’t even know it’s there, except for the first few months when you may experience what some call “light cramping,” and what your friend called “someone twisting a corkscrew into her liver.” But it’s 99% effective, lasts up to five years, and if you can fall asleep at night without the words “uterine migration and perforation” floating into your brain and closing your throat with anxiety, then this might be the one for you.

The NuvaRing

A good choice if you enjoy shoving a rubber, eighties-style bracelet into your vagina, then every few weeks ferreting it back out again. Possible risks include vaginal itching, headaches, and forgetting if you’ve taken it out, or if you are just stacking them in there like a small, cervical Claire’s Boutique. Upside: one day if you do decide to have a baby, he might emerge wearing them all on his wrist like the lead singer of A-ha. And who doesn’t like “Take on Me”?

Pull and Pray

And then name the resulting child Piper. Send her to live at Ted Cruz’s house. When considering this method, take a moment to remember how your mom once confusingly said, “What’s that called again? ‘The push and explode?’” Chuckle quietly to yourself. And wonder if this is why you have seven siblings.

Condoms

An excellent option if you’d like to see your partner’s manhood retreat in such a way that it appears to somehow have ascended up into his body.

Have a Baby

This is a foolproof way to keep further seed from entering your person, as you will be so tired you will soon think “sex” is that thing where you lie next to each other and doze off while talking about how you never finished season 2 of Serial. You will have lots of “sex.” The pros: You will be performing a public service by also acting as birth control for the other residents of your building. For when they see your child lie prone on the floor of the elevator and refuse to be moved, or hear him rise at 6am to play his ’lectric guh-tar with the broken volume knob, rest assured that all of your neighbors have now pledged themselves to a childless existence. The cons: labor intensive. Costly. Greatly increased risk of destroying your nipples, social life, and all expensive electronics.

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