The couple walked into the consultation room and after the formalities of introduction, went quiet. They both looked anxious and there was palpable tension between them.
“Yes, whatever it is just tell me, I am here to help find a solution,” I told them to break the ice.
“We have no problem,” the woman said.
“Doctor, the truth is that we want an abortion,” the man informed, “she has missed her periods and we don’t want a baby.”
There was momentary silence then the woman went into an emotional fit, crying uncontrollably. I realised that there was a problem and instinctively asked the man to step out of the room to allow me to talk to the lady.
The couple had known each other for six months during which they had sex. According to the woman, she was deeply in love.
“I don’t believe that people should go to the extent of having sex unless they are in love and have a long-term commitment,” she explained.
She was happy when she conceived because for her that was an expected outcome of their intimacy. She fantasised about her pregnancy and imagined how they would be a complete family with the arrival of the baby. She had talked to her parents about the relationship and had on several occasions requested the man to make a formal visit to her parents.
“You don’t just walk to your in-laws without proper planning, I need time to plan,” the man would say.
But the shock of her life was yet to come. The first time she mentioned the pregnancy to the man he just went quiet. His moods changed. He requested time to think about it. Two days later he said he had decided that she should get an abortion because he was not ready to marry yet or have children.
“He painfully put it that we were just having a good time and that for him that did not mean being in love and getting tied up in a long-term commitment,” the woman explained, “In fact, he said that I am not his type when it comes to marriage.”
The experience of this couple is common in today’s world. Although a number of religions and cultures would like to tie sex to love and marriage, many people, want to just have sex for the fun of it with no strings attached. Well, I know you may be saying to yourself that this is really unacceptable but look at the world around you and you will realise that unmarried young people are getting intimate; strangers who may never meet again are caught on; and that those who are already married are getting it away from their marital beds.
One man recently put it to me this way: there is sex to meet bodily desires and sex to fortify love and social obligations. He said people are all very hypocritical about these truths and that because we want to appear moral, we lie to each other that we are in love when what we are looking for is sex.
The problem with this world view of sex is that it leads to serious disappointments to the people who tie sex to love. They are lied to and they take those lies and give all their best to the relationship. They get heartbroken when they later realise that they were played.
Two pieces of advice: be clear about your intentions from the get-go. It is important to let your partner know that you are attracted to them sexually and that it is not really love. Tell them that you are not thinking of marriage or any long-term commitment. Who knows, maybe they are equally interested in such an adventure. It is a matter of matching your values to those with whom you associate. Do not lie that you are in love; it is heartbreaking when people later learn that they were taken for a ride.
Secondly, sex has consequences. Pregnancy is one. There is also HIV and other infections. And yes, there are social consequences too. Pleasurable as it may be, it can be catastrophic if misplaced.
“So can we have the abortion now that we did not think of all this in advance?” the man asked after our long conversation.
“What? Over my dead body!” screamed the woman, “you have been unfair to me, you want to have sex all over the place and run away from responsibility, I hate you!”
And that was the point of departure. The man stood up and left the consultation room, telling the woman never to call him and to forget about him forever.
After a long bout of crying, the woman too left, resolving to keep the baby.
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