Last updated on October 21, 2020
Question:
Can I get pregnant without him ejaculating?
Answer:
While the odds are small, the possibility does remain. When a man becomes sexually aroused, his body begins producing a fluid from two glands called the Cowper’s glands. The purpose of the fluid is to cleanse his urinary tract prior to intercourse (the acids in urine kill sperm). Depending on the man and his level of arousal, the quantity of fluid produced can be little or a lot. The excess drips from the end of his penis and provides a small amount of lubrication for intercourse. I mention all of this to point out that the fluid comes long before he reaches the point of ejaculation, but because of the way his body is built, small quantities of sperm can be present in this fluid (sometimes called pre-cum in slang).
It only takes one sperm meeting with one egg to produce a child. And, you must remember that sperm swim. So even if the fluid containing the sperm is deposited near the entrance of your vagina, it is possible for a sperm to swim up the vagina and reach an egg that you are releasing.
To give you an idea of the possibilities, a married couple trying to conceive a child have an 85% chance in a year’s time frame. Or another way of looking at it, if a hundred couples were trying to conceive, in one year eighty-five will have achieved their goal. The withdrawal method of contraception (where the man withdraws his penis before he ejaculates) lowers these odds to 19%. In other words, if a hundred couples were using the withdrawal method to prevent conception, in one year nineteen of the women would be pregnant anyway.
Far too many young men and women think that heavy petting is not harmful. They naively think that as long as the boy doesn’t insert his penis or as long as it wasn’t in the vagina when he ejaculated, that they weren’t really having sex. The truth is that heavy petting is foreplay and foreplay is an essential step in sexual intercourse. It is during foreplay that both the man and woman’s bodies produce lubricants for sexual intercourse, but those same lubricants raise the possibility of pregnancy occurring. The lubricants from a man’s penis might contain sperm. Face it, when you are engaged in heavy petting, are you not thinking about what might come next? Recall that Jesus warned, “whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). This warning is not limited to just men or married couples. When you strongly desire to do what is sinful, you are committing that sin in your heart — even when the sinful actions do not follow. Live a righteous life and save all portions of sex for the time after your marriage.
Before I finish, there is something else you need to keep in mind. Pregnancy is not the only risk being taken. Most sexually transmitted diseases involve body fluids. The lubricating fluids from the Cowper’s gland can contain more than sperm, it can also contain bacteria and viruses that the boy picked up from other sex partners. The fluid does not even need to be placed near your vagina for you to pick up these diseases.
God was not arbitrary when He commanded men and women to save sex for only married couples (Hebrews 13:4). His command also promotes better health.