Reproductive coercion is an insidious way of unfairly convincing you (through pressure, coercion, or threats) to become pregnant, keep an unwanted pregnancy, or terminate a wanted pregnancy. It’s about what someone else wants, rather than respecting your wishes, preferences, or choices about whether to have a baby or not – which is our human right as women.

 

Reproductive coercion can be confusing, overwhelming, and it is not always clear what is happening. Knowing what it is and how to resist or navigate it is essential. This is the part that every woman needs to know: What can you do if you experience reproductive coercion? 

 

A review explored how women have done this, which can be a guide or starting point for the many women who may experience this type of coercion. Resistance strategies included:

• • • Using contraception that cannot be easily tampered with (or detected). For example, women relied on depot injections, intrauterine devices (IUDs), or Implanon to prevent unwanted pregnancies and tampering with birth control. It is then your choice whether you share that you are using birth control, or whether you hide it. Hiding that you use birth control can make life easier by preventing unwanted fights, discussion, or threats.
    • Hiding contraception and emergency contraception from their partner. You might have safe places around the home to hide contraceptive pills, condoms, or emergency contraception.
    • Obtaining birth control pills from another country, so that their partner could not read the label and determine what the medication was. This is hiding contraception in plain sight.
    • Double checking condoms prior to or during sex. This is to ensure they are not damaged or stealthed to create a pregnancy.
    • Only having sex when condoms are being used. Yes, it’s the classic ‘No glove, no love’, and lowers the risk of a partner not withdrawing when they said they would.
    • Lying about being pregnant. This can make life easier in the short-term when the pressure is relentless and the coercion is cruel.
    • Secretly leaving an abortion clinic after being dropped off by a partner – it’s pretending to access a termination. (Because surely their success rate is not 100%, right…)
    • Accessing an abortion against their partner’s wishes – regardless of threats or pressure. This may be done on the quiet, or presented as a miscarriage.

 

Every woman needs to make reproductive decisions that they can live with. In an ideal world, women would be supported to make their reproductive decisions freely.

Unfortunately, when this is not the case, doing what is best for you in the bigger picture is essential.  Some of the ways that women may resist reproductive coercion may not feel ideal, however, they are very necessary in a coercive context.

Every woman needs to know how to resist reproductive coercion – it can happen to any one of us.