Gratuitous Uterus joins the Planned Parenthood blog carnival.

Pictured: G.U. in front of Planned Parenthood where sie has just made a donation.

I was raised in an authoritarian fundamentalist religion where sex was prohibited outside of marriage and looked down upon in just about every way. When I broke free of that group at age 24, I had some experience with sex from my failed marriage, but I was woefully ignorant about sex and dating in the real world.

The first guy I went out with was an absolute creep who took advantage of my ignorance and manipulated me into going sans condom. It never occurred to me that I might have contracted an STD (I didn’t) but I was scared I might get pregnant. The next day, I made my first visit to Planned Parenthood where I was given Plan B.

At this point in my life, I was just forming my own opinions on many things (rather than the ones given to me by my former religion), and I hadn’t decided yet how I felt about abortion. My religion had told me that the morning after pill was an abortion pill, so I expressed my concerns to the lady at PP. She explained that the pill would only prevent me from getting pregnant, not cease a pregnancy that had already taken effect. I took the pill, feeling the satisfaction of doing everything I could to remedy the mistake I’d made.

Today, I made my second visit to Planned Parenthood. It’s something I’ve been intending to do since I started this blog. I wanted a picture of Gratuitous Uterus writing out a check in donation to PP. When I expressed this wish to the lady at PP who met with me to take the donation, she told me that since they’ve had so many people try to set them up, they didn’t want any pictures taken. I completely understood. She gave me the okay to take a pic outside, as you see above.

I’d like to say that after my first lousy dating experience, I immediately wised up and made better choices, but the truth is, I just got lucky that my bad choices didn’t give me their worst consequences. I was fortunate to go out with two good men, the second of whom I’ve been with for two and half years now, going strong.

And during this time of relative sexual safety, I’ve had the opportunity to finally catch up on my knowledge and understanding of safe and consensual sexual relations. And what I understand is that Planned Parenthood performs a valuable and indispensable service. I am grateful to them for their help, even as I am grateful that I haven’t needed it again. I stand with Planned Parenthood.

For more stories of personal experiences, see the carnival hub at What Tami Said.