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Pregnancy, single sailor-mom numbers rising

NORFOLK, Va. — Women have never played a bigger role in the Navy. They fuel and fly fighter jets, they stand watch on the bridges of warships, and they build bombs.

They also have babies.

Reconciling those roles is a challenge for Navy brass. During wartime, sailors must be ready to deploy at a moment’s notice — something pregnant women can’t do and single parents can’t do easily.

Compounding the issue is a rise in the number of single mothers in uniform and concern about unplanned pregnancies among enlisted sailors.

The Navy’s most recent survey found 14 percent of all women in the Navy were single mothers in 2005, up from 7 percent in 2001 and 11 percent in 2003. Fourteen percent isn’t unprecedented — similar statistics were found in 1989 and 1999 — but military officials say they don’t know the reason for the recent increase.

The pregnancy and parenthood survey also found that almost two-thirds of enlisted women who became pregnant in the previous year had not planned to do so. That’s higher than the overall U.S. unintended pregnancy rate of 49 percent — and well above the Defense Department’s target rate of 30 percent.

The biennial survey is being updated this year, with results expected in 2008.

Whether expectant moms are single or married, pregnancy poses thorny issues for the Navy. There are more than 50,000 women in the Navy — about 15 percent of the total force — and most are in their prime childbearing years. The most recent survey found 38 percent of women in the Navy are mothers. Forty-seven percent of Navy men are fathers.

This summer, the Navy changed its pregnancy policy, allowing new mothers a full year of shore duty after giving birth. Previously, sailors who had babies got a four-month reprieve from ship deployments or assignments in war zones.

“How we handle family issues will continue to be a major factor in whether many individuals decide to stay in the Navy,” Vice Adm. John C. Harvey Jr. said in a news release announcing the change, which took effect in July. “We need to make sure we are doing what is in the best interest of the individual, the family and the Navy.”

Until 1975, women expecting babies had to leave the military. That year, pregnant sailors were given the option of staying in uniform. But because far fewer women served in what were considered “critical” jobs, it was easier for the Navy to absorb the loss if they left.

Now, with women almost completely integrated — only submarines and commando units are off-limits — the Navy can’t afford to lose them. Today, the Navy allows pregnant women to leave before their enlistment is up only if they demonstrate “overriding and compelling factors of personal need.”

According to Mike McLellan, a spokesman for Naval Personnel Command, 107 pregnant women were allowed to leave the Navy before their commitments ended in 2006. In 2005, 96 women did so.

When pregnant sailors are reassigned, shipmates must shoulder their workload until a replacement arrives, often months later. Inevitably, sailors grumble about women getting pregnant to avoid deploying.

Lt. Stephanie Miller, head of women’s policy for the Chief of Naval Personnel Diversity Directorate, acknowledges “there probably are women who do [get pregnant] intentionally.”

But when she hears “rumors and speculation” to that effect, Miller said, she informs sailors that far more men don’t deploy — or get sent home midway through a cruise — because of sports injuries, discipline issues or testing positive for drugs.

“Generally when I show the data, they’re like, ‘Oh, wow, I didn’t really know that,’” Miller said. She also pointed out that women who become pregnant while on sea duty don’t get a permanent reprieve: They are sent back to a ship when their “postpartum operational deferment” ends.

Besides encouraging sailors to use birth control and plan their pregnancies, there isn’t much the service can do to reduce pregnancy in the ranks.

A Navy training video, “Give Yourself a Chance,” tackles the issue.

The narrator emphasizes: “The fleet isn’t a 9-to-5, commute-to-work, everyday kind of job. It’s a military force, and all Marines and sailors must be ready to deploy with their unit anywhere, at any time. Your unit works as a team with each member as a vital part. If you can’t deploy, everyone is let down.”

In addition to emphasizing the importance of condoms, birth control pills and other methods of contraception, the Navy also makes available emergency contraceptive pills for use within 72 hours of unprotected sex. The pills are available at every Navy medical clinic and hospital.

A 2005 report from the Navy Environmental Health Center noted that 64 percent of all enlisted female sailors who became pregnant in 2005 did not plan to do so, up from 55 percent in 1992. As part of its Healthy People 2010 objective, the Defense Department wants to reduce the percentage of unplanned pregnancies among service members to 30 percent.

Petty Officer 2nd Class Nina Brown’s pregnancy interrupted her sea duty.

Last summer, while stationed on an aircraft carrier gearing up for deployment, Brown, 29, learned she was pregnant with her second child.

“At first I thought they’d be like, ‘Brown got pregnant because she didn’t want to go on cruise,’” said the information systems technician. Sydney, now 3 years old, was born while Brown was assigned to a shore-based staff command in New Orleans.

A few people groused, Brown said, but most of her shipmates on the Eisenhower were supportive when she transferred to a shore job at Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base, Va.

Brown and her partner — he’s also a sailor — welcomed their second daughter, India, in January. In June, four months after returning to work, Brown went back on sea duty.

Though she just missed out on qualifying for 12 months of postpartum shore duty, Brown considers herself lucky. She’s now stationed on the amphibious assault ship Bataan, which is under repair at a local shipyard — meaning no extended deployments for the time being.

If she had to deploy now and leave the girls in their father’s care, “my heart would drop,” Brown said. “I don’t think they are ready for me to leave yet.”