With over 388 million search results, one of the most Googled questions there is involves a worrisome potential mother or father wondering if their night of fun has turned into a lifetime of responsibility. Even with almost everyone taking at least a couple Sex Ed classes when they were in school, the act of conception remains a mystery to most, shrouded in myth, paranoia and outright lies. In this podcast we look to dispel the myths and ease your troubled mind with facts that will arm you with a knowledge that can help you prevent any unwanted pregnancies. Read on and listen or download the podcast below for more insight.

If You Have Unprotected Sex You Will most likely Get Pregnant.

Obviously having unprotected sex will raise the odds that you will get pregnant, but the odds are still pretty low, even in the most ideal conditions. You see, fertilization relies on a whole lot of thing going right and many things can kill sperm before they get anywhere near the finish line. Even with numbers, around 100 million, on their side sperm are traveling an uphill battle. Studies have shown that the odds of pregnancy are anywhere from 9-25% during ovulation, less other times of the month. That’s assuming everything went perfectly and the woman was ovulating. Even with the most ideal conditions there is a lot of things that can go wrong. There are millions of sperm in the average ejaculation, but sadly we will lose the majority of these brave soldiers en route to their bounty. In the best case scenario only about 100 viable sperm will reach the fallopian tubes, although typically there are as few as five or less remaining sperm cells. The journey is treacherous and sperm are very sensitive to many different conditions that could be present. The first problem they encounter is the vagina, which can be very acidic, which is deadly to sperm cells. This is where many of the sperm become unviable. Once the sperm reach the cervix and, uterus and Fallopian tubes things will be a little more hospitable for them, but by this time their numbers are greatly reduced and there could be few, if any, healthy sperm left to actually reach and fertilize the egg. Plus the Egg has a thick layer that makes it difficult for sperm to penetrate even if they make it all the way to the egg. Other factors can also lower the odds, like frequency of ejaculation prior to intercourse, naturally low sperm counts and whether or not the woman gets up after sex and cleans herself up, which can greatly reduce the chances of pregnancy. Using lubes, even ones that are not spermicidal, can greatly reduce the chances of sperm reaching the cervix and any that do will not be healthy enough to fertilize.  So, while it is not recommended you have unprotected sex if you are trying to avoid having a baby, it is not a sure thing if you do. In fact it is a miracle there are as many of us on this planet as it is with these low odds. The trick to successful reproduction is the frequency of sex. While a once time encounter has very low odd, many encounters over  the course of a year has pretty good odds, like around 95%, so keep your going raw to a minimum if you don’t want kids.

Conception Is Instantaneous

Maybe it is the churches definition of life or the scare tactics many parents and teachers use to dissuade teenagers from having sex, but many people are not really sure how long it actually takes for all that Sperm to reach their target. The truth? It takes a while. Researchers have said the quickest that the sperm could make the long journey to the egg is thirty minutes. That, of course would mean there are ideal conditions and your swimmers are some of the best athletes around. Remember, we are talking about something that is at a microscopic level. The sperm have to travel the equivalent of about 4,000 miles, which I think we can all safely say is a long journey. This is why the morning after pill and other emergency contraceptives are so effective. There is plenty of time after intercourse to take action and try to interrupt the little guy army’s journey. While the pills are commonly called the morning after pill, one can take them up to five days after sex and still prevent a pregnancy. Also, contrary to popular belief, if you are already pregnant the pill will not end your pregnancy and should not be confused with so-called abortion pills.

Sperm Have Super Abilities And Should Be Avoided At All Costs

One of the sillier things I have ever heard from someone when talking about sex was when a girl told me that her friend got pregnant after her boyfriend came on her leg. I laughed at her thinking she was telling some kind of a joke, but she was dead serious. She really thought that sperm somehow could travel the equivalent of hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of miles to the vagina, maneuver their way in, which some grown men have trouble with, and after all of that make it to the cervix, up the fallopian tubes and fertilize the egg. Talk about low odds, the chances of that happening are exceedingly slim to impossible. The truth about sperm is that outside the body they do not last long. In dry conditions sperm have only a few minutes to live. They need warm, wet conditions to thrive, but outside of the female body is a tough place for a sperm to find work, if you know what I mean. Chances are you won’t remain still enough for the sperm to find their way in your body, so worrying about it would be silly. Sperm inside the testicles are also pretty sensitive and sperm count can be lowered by a variety of factors including things like drug and alcohol abuse, hot tubs, obesity, STDs and more.

Condoms Vs. Pull Out Method

The two most common birth control methods are condoms and the pull out method. It doesn’t take a scientist to figure out which method is your best bet if you are trying to avoid pregnancy, but you would be surprised to find out that if done correctly, both methods are very close in effectiveness.  A few years back a sex researcher released her study that said if done correctly the pull out  or withdrawal method has only a four percent failure rate compared to a two percent failure rate for condoms when they are used correctly. That means if you pull out every time, on time, before you ejaculate, only four percent of  the time will the sex result in pregnancy. This study had its share of controversy and many cited anecdotal evidence of how they or their children were conceived because the pull out method failed. The thing is though, that the pull out method didn’t fail, the guy pulling out failed to pull out on time, which is why the method is not as reliable as it can be under ideal conditions. Typical use of both methods have around a 17% failure rate, which under the circumstances is not very good odds that you will get pregnant. The biggest controversy lies within the myth that pre-ejaculate actually contains sperm, which is false. This is widely believed because no one really studied it until recently, but the findings are pretty conclusive that pre-ejaculate is sperm free as long as there wasn’t a previous ejaculation before sex. Which means if you urinate after ejaculation you will be fine.

The other myth is the myth of broken condoms. As we talked about earlier, condoms have a 2-17% percent failure rate when used correctly. Which means you put it on right, pay attention and make sure it is still on when you are done. Many people will claim that the condom broke, but that is probably code for we didn’t use one or it fell off and I was too oblivious to notice until it was too late. Even if the condom fails, like we talked about earlier, your chances of getting pregnant are still pretty low.If you break condoms a lot, you are doing something wrong!

If You Don’t Want to Get Pregnant, Take Care to Lower Your Odds.

When it comes down to it the chances of pregnancy is a numbers game. The odds of pregnancy wanted or unwanted depend on a lot of factors that are both in and out of you and your partners control. Ideally you would want to take all of the precautions you can, which include everything we were taught in health class, including the annoying mantra about the safest sex is no sex. The truth is that the ideal situation doesn’t exist and we all do things that are risky at times of our lives, some of us more than others. The trick is to make sure if you do have unprotected sex to make sure you have a backup plan to help lower the odds. Obviously birth control pills are the easiest way, but using lube, cleaning yourself (ladies) off after sex, pulling out and other things can all lower the odds of an accident. It will also help you from having to Google things in the middle of the night to ease your troubled mind. Stay off the Yahoo answers site, keep the morning after pill handy and try using condoms for a change, they really are not that bad and believe me they probably won’t break and if they do, don’t worry, the odds are still on your side.

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