Can I get pregnant?

This question comes up A LOT! The first thing to keep in mind is that CHILD CHARACTERS are not allowed in Outbreak.

The Short Answer:

Yes you can get pregnant. Yes you can have a full-term pregnancy and have a prim baby. But no, it won't survive the first year.

The Long Answer:

This has been discussed often and a few important points have been brought up during the discussions.

1. YES, you can get pregnant and RP a full-term pregnancy if you wish.

We get the that the whole risk of pregnancy is a kink for some--an exciting/arousing factor in some RP. We get that condoms would be getting scarce. The hospital might have some forms of BC in stock (IUD's, Implants, BC pills), but they won't last forever, so it is realistic to have the risk of pregnancy. We also get that it would add incredibly to your character's life drama if they got pregnant.

2. REALISM/Immersion Factor:

If you are looking for realism, then also keep in mind that it's almost a year into the Outbreak. Chances are we've also had some times of austerity, lack of food, etc--especially if your character has been traipsing through the wilderness for a long time. Not only will you have probably lost a lot of weight and body-fat, but your body has been on the move for a long time.  Most of us don't walk more than a mile in a day without the apocalypse.  Suddenly you are walking 20 with intermittent 100-yard dashes to get away from baddies.  Many athletes suffer from one form of hormonal dysfunction or amenorrhea (lack of a period not due to pregnancy), and in some extreme cases this rapid weight loss, malnutrition, and extreme increases in constant activity can lead to other health problems like hormonal imbalances and even infertility, and also a higher risk/chance/incidences of miscarriages. A premature baby could very well likely die since we don't have the same medical resources either.

But Okay... you are going to go through with this and get pregnant and carry your baby to term:

3. RP LIMITS

This is a ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE SIM. Bad shit happens! Graphic, violent, bloody bad shit--and not just with zombies. You knew bad shit could happen when you when you came around to see the sim, when you filled out the app, and when you got accepted.  Some people put up absurd limits to their rp because of the baby/pregnancy. We see this often in other sims. "No attacking me while I'm with my baby." "No attacking me while I'm pregnant." "No attacking my baby" Its like going to play in a vampire sim and having a "no biting" limit. You can limit the things your own character does, for example, stay indoors and out of harms way, and consent is always a factor, but really? Raiders want to attack a building but they can't because you are 8 months pregnant and you are inside. Or you are walking down the street and there is a zombie herd coming along but they can't attack you? If you put yourself in harms way, accept the IC consequences of that and play it out accordingly. Powergaming out of it because of the pregnancy or baby is still Powergaming, and it is messing with someone else's fun and interfering with the SIM's story lines.

2. FEEDING

We are hard-pressed for resources.  We do have a poor diet, and that could interfere with milk production.  Breast feeding burns a lot of calories. If you are already malnourished you are looking at even more weight loss, and maybe no milk at all. So to realistically play this you'd have to go on a lot more runs, or spend quite a bit ordering from the ATC... I don't think I need to spell this out more. You have enough trouble keeping your own character fed and hydrated on the hud, imagine trying to keep this baby fed.

3. LONGEVITY

Say we just had a wonderful safe pregnancy that went to full term and had plenty of milk for the baby.

Crying Baby = Zombie Magnet.

While you might have a prim baby, understand that at some point something TERRIBLE is going to happen to it. Realistically, and I do mean RL Zombie Apocalypse, this baby could grow up - I mean we do need to repopulate the Earth, and you could keep it relatively safe, etc. But as we said, due to the violent graphic nature of the SIM/story line/environment, CHILD CHARACTERS are not allowed, so this baby cannot survive.  Also, you can send it away to live somewhere safe, but if there is somewhere safer than here, why are you not THERE with it? Why send it away to somewhere safer than this island, but come back to live here?

Also this could be a devastating loss for your character and those around you. It could negatively impact a lot of people, not just you, and could change them forever.

In a nut shell:

Yes you can get pregnant. Yes you can have a full-term pregnancy and have a prim baby. But no, it won't survive the first year.

• This topic was modified 9 years ago by  Kali.