Rabble

Sexual Health Fact of the Day #21: STDs can be spread during birth?

Yes.

If a pregnant person has an STD, they can potentially give it to the fetus or through labor. Some STDs may even induce an abortion or severe anomalies in the fetus.

For example, gonorrhea can cause stillbirth, eye infections, and even ectopic pregnancies or premature birth. Chlamydia can cause pneumonia in a newborn.

There are all sorts of complications that can occur during pregnancy if an STD is present. Luckily, most prenatal care involves a complete STD screen, and if an STD is found it is easily treatable and serious complications can be prevented. 

Sexual Health Fact of the Day #16: Does Breastfeeding Prevent Breast Cancer?

Breastfeeding may not prevent cancer but it can reduce someone’s chances of getting it.

The theory behind why this is the case has to do with estrogen and how being pregnant and breastfeeding can affect it. Estrogen causes approximately 80% of breast cancers.

When someone is pregnant or breastfeeding, they aren’t having as many menstrual cycles so your body isn’t being exposed to as much estrogen as someone who isn’t pregnant or breastfeeding is. The age at which someone has their first child is plays a role in this, though. People who are older (30+) when they give birth to their first child do not seem to have a lowered risk of breast cancer.

Studies suggest that multiple births and extended breastfeeding (1-2 years) over a person’s lifetime can lower a person’s risk of breast cancer, as well as other cancers such as ovarian cancer.

Source

Sexual Health Fact of the Day #11: What exactly are breasts?

During puberty, breasts develop. This is called thelarche (theh-lahr-key).

The breast has two main regions to it:

• The axillary tail
• The body

The body of the breast is what hangs down and it contains the areola (usually a round area that is darker than the rest of the breast) and the nipple, while the axillary tail is connected to the underarm area and contains a lot of lymphatic nodes.

(The picture below shows a drawing of a breast with the axillary tail (not labelled, but it is the upper part on the left) and the quadrants of the breast body divided into fourths)

The inside of the breast contains three main tissues:

1. Adipose tissue (fat)
2. Suspensory ligaments (attach the breast to the underlying chest muscles) and connective tissues
3. Mammary glands (produces milk, not present in individuals who are not currently lactating, degenerates after nursing has ceased)

During pregnancy, mammary glands develop and begin producing milk. The milk is secreted through lactiferous ducts and then out of the nipple. Once nursing has ceased, the mammary glands eventually stop producing milk and degenerate. 

The size of a person’s breasts is reliant on the amount of adipose tissue stored within them.

fuckyeahsexeducation:

TW: victim blaming, rape, sex shaming

Because a lot of people have been talking about this lately here is your quarterly reminder to not shame people for being sexually active or being sexual people and to not call women “sluts” or any other related word unless they are reclaiming the word for themselves and you use it in a positive way that they gave their explicit permission for you to do. 

If you are angry at someone and dislike them instead of going straight to calling them “sluts”, “hos”, “bitches” or any other word think about why you dislike them and then call them out on that. Did they cheat on your best friend? Just tell people that they cheated on your best friend! Do they not know how to have safer sex? Just tell people they don’t know how to have safer sex!

If you find that whatever the reason you dislike them is something that people call you out on “They got raped”, “They have an STI”, “They sleep with lots of people”, “They have one night stands”, “They have had an abortion” well then maybe you shouldn’t be calling people sluts.

Here’s the thing

This is a novel idea for some

HAVING SEX IS OKAY

Having a lot of sex is okay

Dealing with the repercussions of sex is okay (getting an STI, getting pregnant, dealing with a relationship or breakup)

Someone can get pregnant or get an STI the first time they have sex. It could be after being in a long lasting relationship, it could be after they’ve been married, they may have been born with an STI, or they may have been raped and sexually abused. It’s a slippery slope. Even if someone has tons of sex and never uses protection and has millions of STIs and abortions or adopts off all the babies or whatever you can’t judge them because you’re also going to be judging all the other people in similar situations. And chances are that person had next to no sex education and didn’t know any better and maybe had other problems going on as well.

The thing is we are human. Don’t judge someone for the amount of sex they have. Sex is fun. There are ways to have sex responsibly and chances are the people that don’t just had horrible sex education. How about we work towards making sure everyone has great sex education so that they can make informed decisions instead of making sex a shameful thing that usually just makes people hate themselves and have unsafe sex anyway while feeling incredibly guilty about it and making everything a million times worse.

People don’t get STI treatments or tests because they are ashamed

People don’t tell their partners they’ve had STI treatments because they are ashamed

People don’t get help for sexual abuse because they are ashamed

People stay in abusive relationships because they are ashamed

People don’t take care of themselves because they are ashamed

People hurt themselves because they are ashamed

People are forced into marriages or being parents or getting abortions when they don’t want to because they are ashamed

People think it’s okay for them to feel like crap because they deserve it because YOU shame them

So before you shame that person for having sex or taking pictures of themselves naked (or even people who never have had sex or never want sex) take a moment to think about what affect you’re having on the world.

Stop the cycle that makes people ashamed of their bodies and their urges (or lack thereof) and help people feel empowered enough to realize they deserve to have their needs taken care of and they deserve to do it in the safest way possible and they deserve to get treatment if something does happen and they deserve love and great sex AND a great life after.

god-is-prochoice:

It never ceases to amaze me how many anti-choicers think that the vast majority of pro-choice uteri-owners don’t know what happens during a pregnancy… or that pro-choicers in general don’t know what a fetus looks like…

Newsflash: There are reasons why we are pro-choice. We like facts and reality.

I find it to actually be the opposite case. Most anit-choicers don’t really understand the basic biology of the uterus and how it works in terms of ovulation, menstrual cycle, etc., they don’t understand the concepts behind pregnancy, they don’t understand the consequences of a pregnancy or the common complications that it can cause, and they don’t understand what happens to a person’s body during and after a pregnancy.

This makes it easy for them to try and prescribe what every person should and shouldn’t do when it comes to pregnancy (because in their mind it’s super easy and not a big deal and has no lasting consequences when pro-choicers know it does).

I mean, just look at the understanding anti-choicers have about gestational ages of fetuses…that’s enough right there to show they have no fucking clue what’s going on inside a pregnant person.

Love,

Rabble

Doulas as Emotional Birth Companions

myplannedparenthood:

Today’s Feronia author thinks doulas are dynamite. Here’s why.