Vasectomy – A Childfree Male’s Journey

by Lucas Chaney, Founder of #NoKids and co-founder of Buy Childfree By Childfree

I wanted to take a moment and talk to y’all about my childfree vasectomy journey and what that procedure was like. After 5 years of marriage, I decided in 2017 to go get the vasectomy done.  I would have done it sooner, but my wife Gina was used to birth control pills and how it helped her in other areas… but as we got older, I knew it would be better for me to take that burden off her with a vasectomy.

I looked up the vasectomy procedure and saw that it’s easy and has a very quick recovery time.  My work health insurance made it easy to find a doctor that was in my network.  That first appointment is a simple consultation where it’s just a discussion about why you want to get a vasectomy.  It went through all the regular things like, “Are you sure you don’t want kids?” and the “While it is reversable, it’s a very effective sterilization procedure”.  Since we were in our mid 30’s and definitively childfree, I continued to assuage the good doctor that yes that is what WE want.  I put the WE in caps because Gina was right beside me in this consultation… and yet the doctor had the nerve to state “What if your next wife wants kids?!” I was taken aback by the audacity to question not only our childfree choice but also the disrespect shown to Gina as if she wasn’t in the room.  Since I realized that I would inevitably get these similar types of questions from any urologist, I decided to just restate that we are married for life and are 100% childfree by choice and will never be wanting to have kids.  Maybe it was the sternness in my voice, but he stopped asking dumb questions after that and said we could come back in 2 weeks for the procedure.  I never understood the requirement for the 2 weeks between consultation and procedure.

After 2 week waiting period, we went down for the appointment on a Friday morning.  The vasectomy itself was a quick and easy procedure.  It only took 20 minutes to do it from start to finish and because I’m a medical nerd, I watched the entire thing talking with the doctor the whole time.  They do a local anesthetic with needle.  That was only painful part of the vasectomy.  They give it a few minutes to take full effect, then get started with the cutting part of the procedure.  A small incision to get the tube out then he cut it, tied it, then cauterized it, and repeated for second tube.  This part just felt like small amount of pressure, but no pain.  It was fascinating to watch.  A few stitches and all done!

Recovery from a vasectomy is a couple of days.  Day 1 was lying in bed sleeping & watching TV while Gina rotated frozen peas and carrots bags for me to help control swelling.  Pro tip, grab 3 bags of that to keep in continuous rotation.  Also wear snug underwear during the recovery, it helps a lot!  Day 2 was upgraded to the couch and binge-watching shows with Gina.  Day 3 I had a new car delivered and walked outside to take delivery and drive it into garage.  I was ready to go back to work on Monday.

I can’t state enough how I think every childfree man should go get a vasectomy!  It’s very easy procedure and doesn’t negatively affect your life in the least bit.  Let’s do our part to remove some of the birth control burden from the important women in our lives!

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