Sterilize Me, Please

[seabeyond]

There are some people who don’t want to have kids. Then there are some people who really don’t want to have kids. As we learned in a recent Double X series of essays exploring this choice, some men and women never heed (or even feel) the tick of the biological clock. But others are more proactive. Monica Trombley is in the latter camp. As described in her piece, Trombley decided at the age of 26 that permanent sterilization by tubal ligation—a procedure colloquially called “getting your tubes tied”—was the right choice for her.

But as Trombley quickly learned, many gynecologists disagreed. After consulting a number of doctors who tried to dissuade her for what she describes as “paternalistic” reasons, Trombley finally became so exasperated that she actually considered inventing dangerous and unavoidable family members in order to convince a doctor that she could not live in an environment fit for children. (In the end, she found a specialist who required less cajoling.)

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Victoria Amrhein, a 23-year-old living in Jacksonville, Fla., detailed her frustration in an email

Each doctor I went to had the same story—the new ones straight out of med school or the ones who'd been around the block for 30 years. I discussed the fact that getting abortions is much more dangerous than being sterilized and the fact that every time I got pregnant I could get one, but I am unable to get sterilized. It amazed me that they were OK (well at least open) to the fact of having abortions, but not of permanent sterilization which would prevent my ever needing an abortion! … I do believe I faced quite a bit of discrimination.

*

So what many women experience as “discrimination” at their OB’s office, doctors seem to regard as protection against future emotional pain. But this raises the question of whether a medical professional has any business worrying about a patient’s hypothetical future feelings in the first place. Where you stand on this may depend on how you define “harm” in a medical sense; after all, a core tenet of medicine’s Hippocratic tradition is to do none. So what happens when a doctor considers regret—immediate or in the future—as harm? Is the physician who performed the ligation on a 24-year-old (knowing that there was some significant possibility that she would later regret her decision) responsible for her 35-year-old heartache?

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2012/07/getting_your_tubes_tied_why_do_young_women_have_a_hard_time_getting_sterilized_.html

[HockeyMom]

1. Even if you have kids they give you a hard time with sterilization

Well, at least back in 1984 they did when my husband went for his. We were in our mid 30s with 2 kids. We had to listen to a doctor lecture us. What if your kids should die? The doctor actually asked us that question. We told him then we would not have any more kids. We didn't feel our already born children could ever be replaced. I found all of his lecture, and my consent form, very insulting. If they did this to a couple WITH kids, I can only imagine what a childless person would have to go through to be sterilized.

[seabeyond]

2. i was working to 40"s

i was older before having my two. i was talking to a man. he said the same thing. i thought that an odd argument. "replacing" children, with a what id they died, didnt really do it for me. i thought it odd. i guess not.

hubby had it. but he knew the doctor. he said he wanted, my gyno said better for the man, he didnt have this.

[MineralMan]

3. I'm not surprised that it's difficult.

It shouldn't be. Not reproducing was a decision I made in 1965. Voluntary sterilization wasn't even an option then. So, it took some determination and care with contraception to make that decision work, along with serious discussion with potential life partners.

Since there are many reasons to make such a decision, perhaps a movement to recruit physicians into performing such surgeries in conjunction with PP or another organization could work. I'd have done it in a flash, back in the 60s, but I have no doubt that convincing a physician would have been impossible. Many people can't imagine that someone could actually make that decision early in life. That's probably why it's such a difficult procedure to have done, even today.

[seabeyond]

4. Many people can't imagine that someone could actually make that decision early in life.

agreed.

but, i also feel that an adult should be allowed to make the decision, regardless of what they may feel later. true enough. there will be some that wish they had not done it. there are options. but, a person making this decision has heard it all from enough people, before making it to the doctor. and too many people are parents simply because of the act of intercourse, not desire.

[MineralMan]

5. Since it's an elective procedure,

any doctor can simply refuse to perform it. And many, if not most, will simply refuse. That's why some effort needs to be put into identifying doctors who will do it, and to build a referral network. Otherwise, an individual wanting a sterilization procedure will be left to hunt for someone on his or her own, and that could be frustrating enough to put them right off the thing.

In 1965, I don't think anyone was doing vasectomies, for example. However, up until 1967, California was still involuntarily sterilizing women for a number of reasons. The disconnect is remarkable.

When I made my decision, few people understood it, even after the population issue was explained to them. So, I stopped bringing it up, until I had to with people I was seriously involved with. Luckily, both of the women I've been married to were of the same mind. Many others were not. The discussion ended a couple of relationships, but it was something I normally brought up early on, so it was never a traumatic thing. It's a difficult subject when you're in your early 20s, and anytime, really. But I thought that full disclosure of my decision was an important thing, and early in a relationship.

[seabeyond]

6. i dont know. my dad got it in the 60's. three kids, three years, one year apart.....

by the time they got to me, my mom said.... enough.

[MineralMan]

7. I think it's a lot easier when a couple already has children to

find someone to do either procedure. If you've not reproduced, though, it seems like doctors don't even want to discuss it and recommend other methods. I'm sure there are physicians who will do the procedures, but finding those might be very difficult for childless people. I remember the reactions many people had to my decision. Very few agreed with it or even tried to understand it. More women than men, though got it, thank goodness.

[hlthe2b]

18. Ironically, I've been told that the one place that has no problem performing vasectomies--

is the military... or at least during the period a few of my friends served in their military services (Vietnam era to Persian Gulf War I)....

I doubt, however, the same would be said for women's ability to get a tubal ligation.

[cwydro]

8. I suffered from horrible cramps when I was younger...

the campus doctor when I was in college suggested pregnancy...told me I wouldn't have them after that.

Wrong on so many levels.

Unfortunately I've not had much better experiences with female docs.

Now I'm dealing with peri-menopause, and still no good answers.

[seabeyond]

9. 3 advil as soon as the pain starts. lol

and no, having babies was not the magical cure

geeez

[cwydro]

10. I know right?

I'm a gay woman, and pregnancy would not have been an option at my age at that time despite my sexual orientation.

But yeah, you're so right,,,my straight friends (actually almost all my friends are straight lol) tell me that their cramps did not get better after bearing children.

Stupid doctors...can you imagine if men had to deal with cramps?

[hlthe2b]

19. I never thought anything could be worse than the cramps--until in my mid-20s the menstrual migraines

started. And while the European GYN community knew that continuous birth control (without monthly break) was effective in treating this (and safe) not one physician here at the time would consider doing so. And, though there was a huge body of literature on hormonal influence of migraine, at the time, all i'd get was it was "stress"...Even some of the younger female physicians would spout that.

Uggh. How much of the best years of my life were wasted with such excruciating and incapacitating pain.

[seabeyond]

21. isnt it truly amazing how the "emotional" still hold with women, even today. the condescending

patting on the head.

[redqueen]

11. Talk about ignorant... mine got *worse* after having kids.

And yeah, if men got cramps it sure as fuck wouldn't have resulted in them being told it was all in their heads.

[cwydro]

12. omg...if men got cramps...can you imagine?

Crying in a corner somewhere lol.

I'm older now, but the days that I just went to work and tried to deal with the pain....wow, I'm in awe of my younger self.

[cwydro]

13. ugh

now I have to deal with the symptoms of perimenopause...or whatever it is....I wish I knew how to deal with this...i'm really having a hard time

[redqueen]

14. Hormonal treatments are popular,

but I think many doctors counsel patients who are just starting to experience symptoms to try some of the herbal remedies first, as many find relief with those. I'm not looking forward to it. Good luck dealing with all the changes, and know you always have a supportive group to turn to here to complain to.

[cwydro]

15. Thanks...

I actually tried Black Cohosh, which worked, but then my period started again!

I HATE having a period so I stopped taking it. Since then, my period has returned on an occasional basis, so perhaps it was not the cohosh...I guess I should try it again.

Sigh, Thanks for the hug.

[seabeyond]

16. i think that is consistent, normal. nt

[TorchTheWitch]

17. I went through this same shit

And for me to become pregnant is physically dangerous AND I'm unable to take the pill. Not only would no doctor do it, two of them flat out said that women have a biological desire to reproduce and they would never do it for a woman in her 20's or 30's or even 40's if she's never had any children. What. The. Fuck. Of course I was frustrated and angry and made the comparison of men getting vasectomies at ridiculously young ages even though they never had any kids, and they claimed that men are wired differently and don't have that mysterious biological desire that women do. And of course, when I said if that were true than I must be the first women ever in the history of the world to be devoid of this mysterious biological desire to have kids, and of course, they scoffed and said something to the equivalent of "oh, your 'clock' just hasn't kicked in yet, but it's there" as if I didn't know my own "frivolous womanly" mind. And this shit even though they knew all about my medical issues and that it was too dangerous for me to become pregnant and I couldn't take the pill.

And even though now I'm in the later 40's I STILL can't find a doctor willing to do it because I've never had any kids. These fucking morons KNOW it is too dangerous for me to be pregnant, yet they tell me that they can't do it because I'm still young enough to have a child. They also completely ignored the fact that here I am approaching 50 and STILL never had a single tiny spark of desire to have any kids, so so much for the "oh, your biological clock just hasn't kicked in yet"... oh, you'll change your mind later when you 'grow up' (this they said to me in my late 20's!!!!)... oh, there may be something medically possible years from now when you 'grow up' that will enable you to become pregnant without the danger it is now"... blabbity, blabbity, blah. Now the latest excuse is "oh, no doctor would do that because if you changed your mind later you might sue. What. The. Fuck.

Meanwhile, a friend's 24 year old son with no kids (that he's aware of) goes and gets a vasectomy with no questions asked. His reasoning is that he doesn't want to be "saddled" with a kid he'd have to "pay for" till they were 18 "ruining his life" and he shouldn't have to suffer wearing a condom every time he has sex to make sure he gets no one pregnant because they're just so icky, and it's just so "unfair".

I could fucking puke.

[seabeyond]

20. "that mysterious biological desire" this would be science? lol. hm. that is some story torch

just amazing all these years and still unavailable. incredible