Sigh. In the midst of unprecedented restrictions on access to termination of pregnancy, people on TikTok are sharing viral videos about the calendar method or rhythm method. 😳🤦‍♀️😫 Fertility awareness methods, where you track your cycles and use findings like body temperature rise, or changes in cervical mucus to determine approximately when you're ovulating each cycle, are notoriously poor at preventing pregnancy in most people. 24% of People using it will get pregnant within a year - that is almost the same as those using NO method to prevent pregnancy. (Edited to add that for people with very regular cycles, who can keep up with the monitoring required every month, the failure rate can be lower. However in typical use, failure rates reflect the variability in many people's cycles, and difficulty keeping up with the monitoring of mucus and temps, etc) * Cycles can change month to month, very few people have perfect cycles * Signs like temperature rise only happens AFTER ovulation, by which point sperm that's there from sex in the prior 3-5 days can still be alive and get you pregnant. So if you ovulate at a different time that month, it's already too late to avoid sex or use a condom. * If you end abstain or use condoms during the wide "fertile window" you're abstaining or using condoms for almost half of the month anyway. This method can be fine for those who want to avoid hormones or have religious objections to birth control, and are ok with the possibility of pregnancy, BUT... should never be used as the only method by anyone who would NOT be OK getting pregnant, because the risk is high!! 🤰 Questions...? And yes, this is from the volcano resort in Costa Rica, I'm sorry for the background nature sounds that the mic picked up... 😅 #birthcontrol #contraception #fertilityawarenessmethod #rhythmmethod #calendarmethod