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Birth Control

Family planning or birth control in the 21st century is an exciting time of continuous breakthroughs, both in hormonal and barrier methods. Despite these developments, there remains only one method that guarantees 100 percent against pregnancy and disease -- abstinence.

By abstaining from sexual activity, you protect yourself and your partner from an unplanned pregnancy and any unwanted sexually transmitted infections. While it's the only method that guarantees no pregnancy or STIs, it's a challenging method that requires on-going communication between you and your partner.

Abstinence has no concrete definition and can mean a variety of things to different people. For some, abstinence means to refrain from any sexual contact or any activity that could incite sexual feelings. For others, abstinence may be defined as refraining from any of the three types of sexual intercourse, oral, anal or vaginal. By talking with your partner and outlining the parameters of your relationship, the chances of abstinence being a satisfying method of birth control and disease protection are increased ten-fold.

For additional information on ways of making abstinence work for you, click the link or contact the health educator or nurses at Women's Health Services.

In the event your relationship does become sexual, there are many options for preventing unplanned pregnancies.

The following questions can help you determine what method may be best for you:

Do you have more than one partner or multiple partners?
How often do you have intimate relations?
What kind of protection do you plan to use against sexually transmitted diseases?
Are you looking for a long- or short-term contraceptive method?
Do you smoke?

Once you begin to narrow down your birth control and disease protection options, you may have additional questions, which you can find answers to by clicking the individual methods featured on this site.

Those questions may include:

How effective is it?
How convenient is it to use?
What happens if you miss taking it?
What if you don't use it properly?

By being frank with your healthcare provider, the two of you can work together to determine the birth control and disease prevention methods that best suits your health, your preferences and your lifestyle.

For more information, click on the hormonal and barrier birth control links.

Hormonal Birth Control

Barrier Birth Control