Have you ever had a partner sabotage your birth control?

Many people consider birth control sabotage something a woman does…she’s trying to “trap” a man into marriage or into staying with her and so she lies about her birth control in order to get pregnant.   But that’s not always how it works.  In a recent Huffington Post article, Laura Sessions Stepp told the story of her friend, college senior Anya Alvarez (also a guest poster for Sex Really), who realized in the middle of sex that not only had her partner removed her NuvaRing but he’d also removed the condom he was wearing – all without her knowledge.  WHAT?

I’ll say it again…WHAT?!  I had no idea birth control sabotage (or reproductive coercion, as it’s commonly referred to when a man is the perpetrator) was such a common practice, but I’m realizing that it’s far more common than I could have ever imagined.  In fact, according to the Huffington Post article, “… an article in the journal Contraception reported that among more than 1,300 young mothers in Northern California, ages 16-29, 15 percent had experienced some form of partner sabotage.” Alvarez is now considering legal action against her partner, arguing that his behavior was akin to a sexual assault. 

So have you ever experienced birth control sabotage, or known someone who has?  Would you ever consider sabotaging your/your partner’s birth control?  Tell us in the comments if you have any thoughts or experiences on this issue.

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