Vasectomy. Seriously.

We here at Go-To Girl Headquarters have covered vasectomy before but thanks to J for this new tip. CNN writes about young(ish) men who have chosen to go under the knife (or microsurgical cauterization, more likely) because they were really, really sure they didn't want to have children.

What we love about the vasectomy discourse in this culture is that the teeniest threat of not returning to immediate virility (oops, we mean fertility) makes physicians incredibly reluctant to offer vasectomy to men who don't already have children.

But as Dr. Lawrence Ross of the University of Illinois-Chicago says:

Within 10 years of having a vasectomy, there's a 90 to 95 percent success rate for reversal surgery. Beyond that, the success rate drops to 75 to 80 percent.

For the record, that's a great reversal rate. Women do not universally return to fertility after discontinuing a birth control method, but our notions of masculinity are so tied to sperm production that we just can't seem to offer men a birth control method that lets them have up to 10 years of baby-free sex and provides a 90-95% chance that they'll be able to have children if and when they decide to reverse the vasectomy.

A growing pro-vasectomy sentiment among men's health physicians will, hopefully, allow men to have easier access to vasectomy as a long term--but temporary--method of birth control.

And no, vasectomy doesn't reduce testosterone or make you into a girl.