Birth Control

Immediately after my surgery, I'm talking immediately, like when I was still being wheeled into the recovery room and asking my husband what had happened, a resident popped her head over my bed rail and asked me, "So. What method of birth control will you be practicing?"

I was pretty out of it, on drugs, etc. Not to mention I had just become a mother! I was certain I misheard her. "What?" I said, all polite methods of asking her to repeat herself forgotten.

"What method of birth control will you be using?"

"We haven't discussed it yet," I told her, incredulously. Every few hours for the next two days, someone came to my hospital room and asked the same question. My mom told me to say abstinence. My husband got really cranky and suggested a number of dirty things I should say instead.

My midwife eventually explained to me that there was a medical risk in getting pregnant too soon. What the residents meant to be explaining was that I should avoid pregnancy (and the uterus-stretching it would cause) for 18 months. In order to avoid this, they wanted to make sure I knew everything there was to know about birth control.

I eventually just told them something to make the questions stop: diaphragm.

What a bad choice that was! I left it on my chart so long that, at my 5 week checkup, I actually had to get fitted for a diaphragm. Good lord, that's a horrendous invention. Terrifically awful in every way.

But what else was I supposed to use? Eighteen months of condoms sounded like a terrible idea to both my husband and me. The idea of an IUD in my uterus filled me with fear. I didn't want a hormonal birth control anymore...I felt like I had limited options.

Needless to say, the diaphragm did not last long and I switched to the mini-pill, which is safe to use with nursing. But I don't really like that much because I don't want to be on a hormonal birth control, like I said before. And I'm terrible at remembering to take the pill! What mother of a new baby can remember to take a pill at the same time every day? I often don't remember to brush my teeth (I'm ok admitting that).

What birth control method did other new moms find successful in between babies? I'm dying to know what other choices are out there AND how those choices play out in real life. Anybody have some good advice?