On the Futility of Pulling Out

The Futility of Pulling Out

Or "They're Called Swimmers for a Reason!"

A common trope in erotic fiction revolves around Coitus Interruptus, or "pulling out," as an effective primary method of birth control. Let Nurse B assure you; it is not.

While pulling out does decrease your chances of impregnating a woman, it only decreases them from excellent to fair. In other words, it makes the risk just barely low enough to cloud the judgement of one or both parties involved.

A deeper look into human anatomy reveals why coitus interruptus is not as effective as you may believe.

Every single day, an average adult male produces about 400 million sperm, over 250,000 per minute in a continuous stream, which puts the lie to another birth control myth, that a second ejaculation contains no sperm.

As I hope you are about to see, keeping sperm away from their goal is usually not possible without some help from modern technology. Those who advocate for abstinence as birth control will assert (correctly) that theirs is the only certain method, and will point to things like failed condoms, ineffective or forgotten birth control pills, or even deliberate failure to withdraw, which I will not address here. I'm well aware these things happen and unwanted pregnancies result, but that's a societal issue. I'm here to synopsize an anatomy textbook for you in plain language.

We start our journey through the male reproductive system, colloquially know as your junk, in the testicles, which many refer to as "balls", although even a cursory examination clearly shows they are not round. This is where the seminiferous tubules are located, which is where sperm are produced, but not where more than 95% of what comes out when you ejaculate, or "come," is made. In fact, sperm are generally only about 5% or less of the total amount of semen.

Having served in the United States Navy, I know of at least a dozen synonyms for this sticky white fluid, many of them quite colorful. Whatever you choose to call it, your doctor calls it semen, unless he's really pretentious, in which case he calls it "The Ejaculate," and it's absolutely packed with things to ensure that your sperm experience smooth sailing directly to the nearest ovum.

Down here in the testicles however, all that is being produced is sperm, testosterone, and some trace nutrients. A different type of tissue produces the testosterone, which gets released into the blood stream, whereas your sperm is released into the epididymis, that little thing on top of each testicle that you can feel through the skin of your scrotum.

The epididymis is an interesting little structure, full of tiny passages. It's where the sperm go to mature, and here they stay for about 20 days until fluid pressure forces them up into the spermatic cord and on to the vas deferens. I have a friend whose epididymis swelled to the size of a grapefruit. He lost that testicle, but hey, I bet he was glad to see it go! One is plenty. He still had two kids after that.

And now, without further ado, the vas deferens. At the time of this writing, a vasectomy is a man's only choice for truly effective birth control. But before you make a rash decision to sever your vas deferens, as I have severed mine, be aware this is not a risk-free operation. No operation is risk free.

Bleeding in the scrotum and post operative infection are real things with vasectomies. My post operative infection had me on testosterone replacement within three years of surgery, and not the easy testosterone therapy like gels or patches, no sir, I get big, deep, intramuscular injections of a thick oily solution, thereby guaranteeing I get the most of everything you hate in an injection. People in my situation are not terribly rare, although most are not afflicted to as high a degree. There are other risks to discuss with your doctor; be sure you're fully informed before you make a decision. That being said, a vasectomy is very effective; if you change your mind within a short window, it can even be reversed.

However, if like most men, your vas deferens is intact, it is busy even now delivering the sperm it collected from both spermatic cords to the point where it widens out to become the ampulla. The ampulla then join with the ducts of the seminal vesicles to form the ejaculatory ducts. It is at this point that sperm produced in the testicles mixes with all the things that were produced in the seminal vesicles. At last, we have cum! Well, almost. There's still the considerable output of the prostate and bulbourethral glands to be mixed in further downstream, but we'll get to that in a minute. First, we must discuss the seminal vesicles and all the wonderful things they bring to our little brew.

The seminal vesicles sit on top of the bladder, and are about the size and shape of a little finger. This is where 60 percent of what comes out in an ejaculation is made. And it's made of some pretty specialized stuff. The basic fluid is alkaline, to neutralize one of the vagina's key defense mechanisms, its acidity.

The fluid produced by the seminal vesicles is kind of yellow looking by itself, even though the finished product tends toward white. To this yellow alkaline fluid your body adds fructose sugar to sustain your sperm on their trip, vitamin C for its antioxidant properties, a coagulating enzyme called vesiculase, which temporarily turns the semen into a white sticky goo, and a hormone like substance called prostaglandin, which not only dissolves the mucus plug in the endocervical canal (the passage from the vagina to the uterus), it induces "reverse peristalsis." This results in the uterus and fallopian tubes contracting in such a way that pulls the sperm along toward their goal.

So now your fluid has been propelled out into the ejaculatory ducts and mixed with sperm from the testicles. It will rest comfortably here, waiting for its neighbor down the line to do the heavy lifting. Allow me to present the next, and possibly most important player, the prostate gland.

The prostate is a single gland that encircles the part of the urethra just below the bladder. It's basically a bunch of little tubes embedded in a ring of really strong muscle and connective tissue. The fluid produced by the prostate is a milky, slightly acidic fluid that contains fibrinolysin and some other enzymes, all of which play a role in activating the sperm.

When you orgasm, the prostate contracts and this fluid is forced into the urethra to mix with the fluid contained in the ejaculatory ducts and then propelled downstream by something called peristalsis. Briefly, peristalsis is your body's ability to send a ripple or "peristaltic wave" through certain tissues. For example, without peristalsis, your food wouldn't move through your intestines. There are numerous places in the body that utilize peristalsis to transport things; in this case, it's transporting your semen into the part of your urethra called the spongy urethra and on out to its date with destiny.

In some men peristalsis can begin on some level well before ejaculation, releasing millions of sperm cells per minute to be carried directly into the vagina by the increasing output of the next and final contributor to our semen, the bulbourethral glands, hereinafter referred to as the BU glands, because my fingers struggle to type "bulbourethral." The BU glands are little pea sized things that sit below the prostate and empty into the spongy urethra a bit downstream from the rest of our semen. The sticky clear fluid is believed to neutralize trace urine in the urethra. Our semen is now a perfectly balanced life support system for sperm in the harsh environment of the female reproductive tract.

It's time to ejaculate. The nerve impulses have reached a critical level, resulting in a massive discharge to the genital organs. The ejaculatory ducts and all of those glands and vesicles we've been talking about contract, propelling their contents into the urethra. The bladder sphincter muscle closes, and the muscles of the penis contract rhythmically, propelling semen down the spongy urethra and, voila! Semen erupts from the urethral meatus, hopefully, at least from nature's point of view, in close proximity to a cervix. But not in our case, no no no. We've pulled out! Surely, we're safe?

Lol, NO.

Now we begin to explain just exactly why it's so hard to keep your little swimmers from fulfilling their intended purpose. We know that the fluid we call semen is produced from four places, approximately 60 % from the seminal vesicles, 30% to 35% from the prostate, 5% or less from the testicles, and the remainder from the BU glands.

Using some basic math, you can determine that since the output of the prostate and BU glands are not added until ejaculation, sperm constitutes about 8% of the fluid collected in the ejaculatory ducts, which tells you that the same fluid pressure that brought them up in the first place is pushing a continuous stream of about 18,000 sperm cells per minute out into the urethra. The volume of this amount is way less than a milliliter, it doesn't make it out of the penis without the aid of urine or the output of the BU glands. But it's there none the less.

Now, when you become sexually stimulated, early in the erection process the BU glands are triggered to begin producing that thick clear mucus which is released into the urethra during ejaculation. But the system isn't perfectly sealed; this stuff leaks out of all of us to some degree, some more than others. The output of these glands varies from miniscule to copious, yet even in very small amounts it can still effectively transport sperm to the vagina. The more pre-seminal fluid is produced, the more effectively sperm is delivered. And rest assured those sperm are being pushed into that tube in your penis we call the urethra even now, in an uninterrupted flow that started at puberty, and will continue until you either die, or just can't make any more.

So, let's say you're a normal man with a normal sperm count. You are also blessed with a prostate gland that never ever experiences inappropriate peristalsis. It is the best of all possible scenarios for pulling out to work. As you and your lover approach the end of a leisurely 30 minute romp one fine evening a day or so after ovulation, you pull out in plenty of time.

Congratulations! You have just deposited over half a million sperm cells in prime position to fulfill their destiny. No, it's not the 400 million in an average full ejaculation, but trust me, it's enough...more than enough. And remember, this is an idealized projection. You, my friend, are almost certainly considerably leakier. I hope you like her, because there's a fair chance you're going to be raising a kid with her.

And don't get me started on the rhythm method. Sperm can live in the fallopian tubes for days and days.

Just put a hat on it, okay?

B