Perhaps your checklist for New Year’s Eve includes:
* sexy clothes: to get yourself or a partner in the mood
* mood-altering beverage: see above
* money: for meals, gifts, fun
* extra money: to make sure you get home from all that fun
* clean the house or apartment—at least the bedroom (or at least the bed!): just in case
* clean and strategically place the sex toys: optional
What’s missing from this picture?
If you and your colleague are of different genders, birth control.
And in case that fails—or, more likely, you do—Emergency Contraception.
This is a reminder that Emergency Contraception (EC) is completely legal in the U.S., and is available without a prescription for anyone 17 and older. Those under 17 in California, Alaska (no excuses, Bristol!) and 7 other states can also get it without a prescription.
Like a data backup, extra eyeglasses, and earthquake insurance, EC is best acquired before you need it. Everything we said when you still needed a prescription to get it is still relevant: Get it now. Keep it somewhere easily accessible—not in your gym locker or sister’s house. Read the directions now, while you’re perfectly calm and it seems like a waste of time—because if you do use it, you won’t be calm enough to read your own name.
From 2000-2008 our federal government was an anti-science propaganda arm of the Religious Right, so in case their disinformation campaign has confused the issue, EC is NOT the abortion pill. It can’t cause an abortion because it is used before a woman is pregnant. That’s why it’s called emergency contraception.
Click here for more information on EC. For a quick laugh on the subject, click here.
A lot of people busted butt for years to make EC available to Americans without a prescription. Don’t waste the amazing opportunity they created.
And gentlemen, remember that you can get and keep EC, too. Talk about feeling safe…