{"id":4358,"date":"2022-01-11T00:26:06","date_gmt":"2022-01-11T00:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movesflash.com\/?p=4358"},"modified":"2022-01-11T00:26:06","modified_gmt":"2022-01-11T00:26:06","slug":"jagged-little-pill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/2022\/01\/11\/jagged-little-pill\/","title":{"rendered":"Jagged Little Pill"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Jagged Little Pill<\/h3>\n
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DEK: It\u2019s time to leave the frat boy behind. For those men who shy away from the mere mention of the words \u201cBirth Control\u201d let alone paying for it, I\u2019ve got news for you: wake up. You\u2019ll find you\u2019ll grow an inch or two in her estimation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Gregory Goodwin Pincus<\/b> (April 9, 1903 \u2013 August 22, 1967) was an American <\/span>biologist<\/span><\/a> and researcher who co-invented the <\/span>combined oral contraceptive pill<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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I couldn\u2019t believe what I had just said. Those words actually came out of my mouth? It was after she (she being my amazing fianc\u00e9) cooked us both \u2013 or me, however you\u2019d like to spin it \u2013 dinner in her apartment, slaving over the stove, wiggling around two other roommates as I sat in the makeshift dining room that we frequent; a table and two chairs in her bedroom. I had just taken my last bite of spinach quiche \u2013 her mother\u2019s recipe \u2013 and finished polishing off a glass of Shiraz when she turned to me and said, \u201cOh, can you remind me tomorrow that I have to pick up my birth control pills?\u201d My immediate reply: \u201cWhy don\u2019t I pick up for you.\u201d<\/p>\n

This instinctive response (for which I am now so inordinately proud) wasn\u2019t really a question, rather a statement. Notice the period above. I really couldn\u2019t believe I had said it, and by the look on her face, neither could she: a little bewilderment mixed with joy, ending with a \u201cer no, it\u2019s okay, I\u2019ll get them.\u201d I mean, it\u2019s a common thing every couple deals with, goes through, and what most men, say like 99%, shun. The words \u2018birth control pill\u2019 are not part of the male psyche; it\u2019s a \u201cpharmaceutical item\u201d a woman takes monthly (give or take a few days) so she \u201cdoesn\u2019t get pregnant.\u201d The topic isn\u2019t off-limits in a guy\u2019s mind, it\u2019s just not there. Not ignored, just never considered. I am wondering how we men haven\u2019t been more hands-on with the whole thing; why isn\u2019t it part of our responsibilities. After all it\u2019s as vital to a committed responsible relationship as, well just about anything else.<\/p>\n

It amazes me how far we can get right now \u2013 politically we are on the brink of something remarkable, a first, a seismic shift in US attitudes. Then look at something as simple as birth control where our parent\u2019s and even grandparent\u2019s attitudes prevail. (Anything further back in time is a real mystery) But men clam up, don\u2019t do it, never have, the big no-no. It\u2019s as if the word was blasphemous, sent by Satan himself. So I\u2019ll ask the question: Why do men vie away and still view birth control as \u201cmagic pills?\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve had my share of relationships, and somewhere, somehow, the question of protection always came up. That casual segway while relaxing on the couch, or a conversation over dinner, or even well into the preliminaries and a breathless advanced stage of undress. \u201cCondom?\u201d \u201cI\u2019m on the pill.\u201d \u201cEr, okay then.\u201d It\u2019s something we \u2018talk\u2019 about once and then assume forever after. As in never considered again. Everybody goes through it. We always want to be assured that we are dealing with responsible adults and that the person you are about to have sex with hasn\u2019t been raw dog all these years. I am not being insensitive to the topic and I am aware of the problems of going on birth control: headaches, dizziness, breast tenderness, mood swings, decrease in libido and even, in extremis, thrombosis. These have all been well documented and I am sensible enough to know it is not a topic to be taken lightly.<\/p>\n

Until I posed the question I was one of those men, a blind eye at the very thought of birth control: As long as I know she\u2019s on it, ah, it\u2019s out of my hands . Wrong. Why hasn\u2019t this been touched before? We offer\/open doors, we pay\/offer to pay for dinner, we do purchase gifts, even offer\/pull a seat out, wear a condom (voluntarily, not complaining here), yet we have a hard time grasping a 50-50 relationship with birth control pills.<\/p>\n

At first I thought it was no big deal, my girlfriend or \u201cfriend\u201d just went to Duane Reade on the third Thursday of every month at 9PM on a full moon wearing only red with a blue knit scarf. You know, like most women. It was trapped, hidden from my daily thoughts, something never touched on. I think as men we tend to fall into a malaise, a funk so to speak, letting tradition take hold and never let go. Like my fianc\u00e9 cooking us dinner. Why? It\u2019s easier. If we followed a pattern of things that were done before us, why change? It\u2019s just one more thing to not think about.<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s why we have to change. Come on guys, step up to the plate. Your not in college anymore and you shouldn\u2019t be obliterating the real world in all its glorious technicolors from your lives. There should be nothing, repeat nothing taken for granted in a relationship to ensure success, however embarrassing, expensive or potentially damaging. Best to grow up and face it. Maybe we\u2019ll even get our good name (and cojones) back.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Jagged Little Pill DEK: It\u2019s time to leave the frat boy behind. For those men who shy away from the mere mention of the words \u201cBirth Control\u201d let alone paying for it, I\u2019ve got news for you: wake up. You\u2019ll find you\u2019ll grow an inch or two in her estimation. Gregory Goodwin Pincus (April 9, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3810,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4358","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-featured"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev2025-2-2.movesflash.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}