Safer Sex

Your doctor can give you the best information about your sexual health, but for whatever motives—ease, seclusion, or anxiety and urgency—one day you may find yourself searching the Internet for answers to intimate and important questions.

It’s good to learn more about your body and your requirements, but explore those search results with caution. A recent Stanford University study on adolescent reproductive health found that health websites often riddled with errors, omissions, and provide outdated advice, and that it’s not always easy to find the truth about common myths believed by many teenagers and possibly many adults as well.

You are pregnant the first time you have sex?

It may seem like the chances are in your favor, but there’s no reason to risk it: You may get pregnant he first time you have sex with your partner “it is fact that some statistics say that 20% of people get pregnant within a month of starting sex.

You can’t get pregnant during your period

There are few chances, but still possibility is there, especially if you’re not using a condom or birth control. The reason is that some women have long periods that overlap with the beginning of ovulation, which means they can be fertile even though they’re menstruating.

There’s also the infamous late-in-life pregnancy that can occur during perimenopause, when periods are erratic. Experts say it’s not safe to ditch birth control until you haven’t had a period for a year.

Safer Sex Activities

Safe sex activities don’t spread HIV. Abstinence (never having sex) is entirely safe. Sex with just one partner is safe. If either of you is infected and if any one of you ever has sex or shares needles with anyone else.

Masturbation, fantasy or hand jobs (where you keep your fluids to yourself), non-sexual massage and sexy talk are also safe. These kinds of activities avoid contact with blood or sexual fluids, so there is no risk of transmitting HIV.

To be safe, assume that your sex partners are infected with HIV. You can’t tell if people are infected by how they look. They could be lying if they tell you they are not infected, especially if they want to have sex with you. Some people got HIV from their steady partners who were unfaithful “just once“.

Even people might be infected who got a negative test. They might have been infected after they got tested. This is possibility they might have gotten the test too soon after they were exposed to HIV.

Unsafe Activities

Unsafe sex is a major cause of spreading HIV. The greatest risk is when blood or sexual fluid touches the soft, moist areas (mucous membrane) inside the rectum, vagina, mouth, nose, or at the tip of the penis. These can be damaged easily and HIV gets a way to get into the body.

Without protection vaginal or rectal intercourse is very unsafe. Sexual fluids enter the body, and wherever a man’s penis is inserted, it can cause small tears that make HIV infection more likely. The receptive partner is more likely to be infected, although HIV might be able to enter the penis, especially if it has contact with HIV-infected blood or vaginal fluids for a long time or if it has any open sores.

Set Your Limits

First decide how much risk you are willing to take. You must know how much protection is required during different kinds of sexual activities.

Before you have sex,

• Have a knowledge about safer sex
• set your confines
• get a supply of lubricant and condoms or other barriers, and be sure they are easy to find when you need them
• talk to your partners so they know your limits.

Stick to your limits. Don’t let alcohol or drugs. Beware an attractive partner make you forget to protect yourself.

The Bottom Line

HIV infection can occur during sexual activity. Sex is safe only if there is no HIV, sexual fluids or no blood, or no way for HIV to get into the body.

You can reduce the risk of infection if you avoid unsafe activities or if you use barriers like condoms. Decide on your limits and stick to them.