Q: My boyfriend has ejaculated in me a few times and I’ve never gotten pregnant. Does this mean I can’t have kids?
A: No. If you’re not trying to get pregnant, it just means you’ve gotten lucky. And if you are trying to get pregnant, it most likely means you’re not having sex at the right time.
Pregnancy can only happen a few days out of the month. Specifically, this is when a woman is ovulating (releasing an egg).
Typically, a woman ovulates 14 days after the first day of her last period. In this scenario, sex the day before and the day of ovulation would be the most likely to result in pregnancy.
Of course, a lot of women’s bodies don’t follow this pattern. They might ovulate irregularly and not be able to calculate when it is going to happen.
Plus, sometimes sperm lives for a number of days inside a woman’s body just waiting for her to release an egg. So even if you have sex many days before your period, pregnancy could still occur if this was the case.
If you don’t want to have a baby now, I’d recommend a reliable form of birth control like condoms or the pill. If you are trying to get pregnant, then it could be helpful to chart your periods for a few months to try to figure out when you are most likely to be ovulating.
If you’re still a teen, holding off on having a baby–even for a few more years–can make a big difference. Sure, there are success stories (Don’t count Jamie Lynn Spears yet. The jury’s still out on how she’s doing!) However, stories of really intense struggles are a lot more common from teen parents.