Tell Me My Choices

After having taught 3 different NFP methods over the past 6 years to about 100 couples, I have to admit that abstinence is the hardest part to sell. Couples can get on board with the natural, hormone free, organic nature of NFP. They like the increased communication, the health benefits, the awareness of their fertility. The appreciation for children, the appreciation for each other, the reverence for life and how we cooperate with God to bring new life into the world.

But abstinence. Oh, abstinence. You crazy, fun-hating beast of burden who just waltzed into the bedroom with your muddy feet, swarm of flies and hot, stinky breath.

Yes, abstaining from genital contact during the fertile phase of your combined fertility cycle can be the worst of all bad bummers. It is even harder when your fertility signs are muddled and difficult to read and you desperately need to avoid a pregnancy and the abstinence stretches on for weeks and months. It can make you ache. It can feel like it is tearing your marriage apart.

 

If you struggle with long periods of abstinence due to health concerns or obscured fertility signs when using NFP, please, please, please make seeing a physician who will support you in your use of NFP a priority. NaPro doctors (choose Find a Medical Consultant on the left navigation) are specially trained to identify and correct health issues in ways that support the normal, healthy functions of your reproductive cycle. If a NaPro doctor isn't available near you, check for a health care provider at the One More Soul website or check with the local Catholic diocese to see if there is a doctor in the area to whom they can refer you. A healthy cycle is easier to interpret and can help reduce the times of abstinence when you need to avoid a pregnancy.

And while it can be difficult for many people to abstain during the fertile phase of an "average" or "normal" cycle, there is a light at the end of the fertile tunnel.

If you are happy with your NFP method - AWESOME!!!!!  I am so glad you have found a method that works for you and your spouse at this time in your reproductive life. Keep on keepin' on.

If you are not happy with your NFP method - let's find you a new one. There are so many effective, reliable methods available today to suit your needs. Your needs may change over time and what was once your dream method may become a nightmare for you and your spouse. Don't be afraid to switch to something that works for you now - you can always change your mind later and go back or change to another entirely different method.

There are ones that are highly regimented and the instruction is completely tailored to your unique fertility (Creighton - especially for people with known health, reproductive & fertility issues). Plenty of unmarried women chart simply for the information they glean about their health status from their charts or to manage their health in a holistic manner.

 

 There are methods that combine 2 or 3 major signs of fertility to determine times fertility (Couple-to-Couple League Sympto-Thermal, Northwest Family Planning, Serena). There are methods that only use 1 sign of fertility (Billing Ovulation Method, Family of the Americas, Temperature Method. There are methods that use monitors to test for Luteinizing Hormone (Marquette Method). There is a method that uses a monitor to track your Basal Body Temperature only (Lady Comp) and compares it to a database of more than 900,000 cycles of data points to determine times of fertility. There are mobile apps to track your cycle; there are cycle beads to track your cycle; there are ferning microscopes where you can observe your saliva or cervical mucus to watch for developing fertility. There's the 2-Day Method, the Temperature Method, the Boston-Cross Check method, Marquette method, Billings Ovulation Method, Family of the Americas Billings Ovulation Method, and the Standard Days Method. Many diocese and Archdiocese teach their own version of STM or OM.

There's even a great quiz that can help you figure out which method might suit your current needs. This is especially awesome if you have no idea where to start.

There are online courses, instructors who will teach long-distance, instructors who will meet with you in person or on the phone. There are group classes and individual private sessions. There are instructors who can work with you on the cost of instruction and there are instructors who only charge for materials, and I know some dioceses have scholarships for couples who need it. There are books (Taking Charge of Your Fertility, The Billings Method). Basically, there's a way to learn that can work for you.

If you like your method, but don't connect with your instructor - find a new one! I think most of us NFP teachers understand that not everyone can be best friends and our feelings will not be hurt if you switch to a different instructor or method. A good NFP instructor just wants you to find a method that works for you and your unique fertility and circumstances and will do what it takes to help you do that.

Most importantly, if you feel like you just can't do NFP anymore because it's too hard and too much and too difficult and too UGH - don't give up. As the great Simcha Fisher, author of The Sinner's Guide to Natural Family Planning (which I cannot recommend enough) says, "It's the worst possible method, except for all the others."

Welcome to Natural Family Planning Awareness Week! I have a couple posts about NFP this week. Please know that I am not speaking with a condemning tone towards anyone or towards the way anyone practices NFP. I am not putting down anyone's experience with NFP. As an NFP user and teacher, I have encountered people in every walk of life living NFP in difficult circumstances on all parts of the infertility/subfertility/average fertility/super fertility scale. In fact, I've moved along this scale myself over the years. Please know that you and your spouse and family are in my prayers. If you are using NFP - I admire you - not many have the courage to go against the grain and commit to such a radical view of and respect for their fertility.

NOTE: These are NOT affiliate links. I do not receive any compensation for sharing this information with you. I just thought you'd like to know. 

Miracle Fruit to Prevent Pregnancy

What?

There is a miracle fruit you can use to prevent pregnancy. Really.

I had no idea it was even possible to use a fruit for family planning, but you totally can.

I scoured the internet for information about fruit that could help plan a family and found this:

"In botany, a fruit is a part of a flowering plant that derives from specific tissues of the flower, one or more ovaries, and in some cases accessory tissues.

Fruits are the means by which these plants disseminate seeds."

Via - emphasis mine

And thought (and I quote) "HA! Ovaries, seeds...that's funny. And ironic."

OK - you want to know what the fruit is? Fine, fine...I'll let you in on this well-kept secret. The miracle fruit is...

Self-control.

Self-control? A fruit? Yes.

- Galatians 5:22-23 

Self-control, as a fruit of the Spirit of the new life into which we've been raised up with Christ through our baptism, is actually able to help you plan your family. Of course it's much easier to say than to do; most things are easier to say than to do.

Except "prodigious persistent procrastination" which is difficult to say, but easy to do. Just me?

I want to break this down a bit. There's so much in the statement that self-control is a fruit of the spirit. And so much in saying that we can use self-control to plan our family.

That fruit comes from a flowering plant makes sense. After all, flowers are a thing of beauty. Humans, animals, and insects like flowers. Flowers on the plant attract bees & insects to promote pollination & fertilization, so it seems apropos that a fruit could be used as a family planning tool. Flowers attract the eye, they are things of beauty and are typically sweet smelling, attracting humans and animals to the plant so we can use its fruit as food.

But when flowers are cut off from the branch, vine, or plant they wither and die quickly and do not produce their fruit.

Jesus said, "I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing." (John 15:5). I find it incredibly comforting to know that if I remain in Christ he will strengthen me to bear the fruit I am meant to produce. The thing about vines and branches is that it can be very difficult to see where the vine stops and the branch starts; conversely it can be difficult to see where the branch stops and the vine starts. They seem to meld to seamlessly into one another. I tend to think Christ had that in mind when he made this statement. Remain in me, and I'll remain in you and it'll be hard to tell where I stop and you start and vice versa.

Jesus promised us in Matthew 28:20 that he would be with us always, even until the end of the age. The Lord said he would never leave us or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5, Deuteronomy 31:6 & 8, Joshua 1:5). He remains in us - He comes to us in the Eucharist, literally entering our body, strengthening it and becoming one with us.

The farmer or vine grower prunes the branches so that they produce even more fruit. "He takes away every branch in me that does not bear fruit, and everyone that does he prunes so that it bears more fruit." (John 15:3)

Have you even gone to Confession and left feeling a bit, ummm, wounded? Like when the Priest cuts through your parsing of words where you tried to talk around your sin and he picks the one thing you wish he would ignore to counsel you in a way to help you grow and rip the sin out of your life? And it is for your own good, you know that. But it hurts.

That's pruning.

When we remain in Him by frequenting the sacrament of Reconciliation which allows us to receive Him in the Holy Eucharist, he truly remains in us strengthening us to bear fruit.

Can I just point something out about this particular fruit (self-control) though?

This fruit, self-control, is a stone fruit, Seriously, it's the pits.

The core of the fruit is hard, tough and when people encounter it, they usually want to spit or throw it out - but it is the seed - and if you use that hard part, you can grow more fruit!

I'd liken self-control to an avocado. It looks ugly on the outside (who would want to practice self-control?! That's no fun at all!). When you get into it though - mmmmm, so good (and good for you). Then you hit the pit. The big, hard, can't cut it, pit. And you think, "no way, this is too hard. I can't continue." But if you do - if you look at the hard part for what it is and use it like it is meant to be used (you plant it - offering it back to God), it bears more fruit. More delicious green avocado goodness.

Natural Family Planning (fertility awareness combined with self-control, a.k.a., abstinence) is all about helping us grow temperance, self-control and self-mastery in our marriages. Our marriages, a sacrament of communion, are all about helping our spouse to grow into the person God created him/her to be. And being the people God created us to be will lead us to our ultimate goal: Heaven.

And who are we meant to be? Someone who knows, loves and serves God. His disciples. "By this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples." (John 15:8)

Spend a few moments contemplating Matthew 13:3-9, the parable of the sower who sowed his seed, some on the path, some on the rocky ground, some among the thorns and some in rich soil.

When you think about the fruit (of the spirit) as a way for the vine (Christ, God) to disseminate seeds - what does Matthew 13:3-9 mean to you?

Welcome to Natural Family Planning Awareness Week! I have a couple posts about NFP this week. Please know that I am not speaking with a condemning tone towards anyone or towards the way anyone practices NFP. I am not putting down anyone's experience with NFP. As an NFP user and teacher, I have encountered people in every walk of life living NFP in difficult circumstances on all parts of the infertility/subfertility/average fertility/super fertility scale. In fact, I've moved along this scale myself over the years. Please know that you and your spouse and family are in my prayers. If you are using NFP - I admire you - not many have the courage to go against the grain and commit to such a radical view of and respect for their fertility.

Playing Catch Up

I have been a very bad blogger lately. Not only have I neglected my own blog, but I haven't been commenting either. For shame!

Things have been crazy hectic here. We closed on our new home and moved in a week later. It's been non-stop around here since. We started teaching a new NFP class series and also had the privilege to speak as a witness couple at a medical conference earlier this month.

Last, but not least, we are finally able to discuss publicly something I wasn't quite ready to bring out into the open back at the beginning of December. We are expecting again. This is our fifth pregnancy and it has been very emotional for all of us. We supplemented with proge.sterone until just over 12 weeks. I was allowed to stop even though we didn't run bloodwork to check my levels. Are there people who say they miss proge.sterone? I am one of them. Since going off the supplements, my all-day sickness has got much much worse and I have started having headaches. We had an ultrasound just past 12 weeks and saw the baby. S/he is doing great in there...jumping all around. We think the baby is a girl, but we don't know for sure.  I am now 16 weeks along and have another appointment scheduled with my doctor for Friday.

Please pray that all continues to go well with this pregnancy and that we will get to meet this little one in August.

I will leave you with two pictures of my new babies...first the new hardwood floors in our new home, second the baby...as if you might confuse them!

Ignore the crazy-eyed man in the top left corner.  My husband couldn't resist jumping into the frame.

This was baby #5 at 12 weeks, 2 days...measuring 12 weeks, 6 days.  I grow 'em BIG.