New Life through Natural Family Planning

Spring is in the air, and you know what that means: new life! Babies are everywhere in nature during spring, which reminds me of one my favorite special services as a doctor:

Helping couples get pregnant!

Now, I am not a fertility expert, but I do know how to tell if a woman is ovulating and if they're "good" ones or not. I also have the knowledge to do a good initial work-up for infertility and what to do on a primary care level to alleviate the most common treatable causes of subfertility. How do I have such a superpower as a physician without being a fertility specialist?

Natural. Family. Planning.

I have been trained as a Billings Ovulation Method teacher. I've incorporated BOM into my practice for 12 years now. Prior to that, my husband and I were trained in personal use of the Creighton Method, which we used to get pregnant with our first child and helped us see clearly when we failed to get pregnant again.

Sadly, most women disdain their fertility and spend years trying to suppress it until the fateful day they decide to use this most sacred power of procreation. Even more sadly, women who disdained their God-given gift for so many years and suppressed it so vehemently find it frustrating that they can't just get pregnant when they want to. They act as if fertility is a switch you just turn on and off.  In fact, most couples find it astounding that normally fertile couples only have about a 20% chance per year of getting pregnant when they are not aware of when the woman is ovulating.

It is rare to find a young woman who has been educated on when she is ovulating. As a matter of fact, what girls are taught about their reproductive system & menstruation is generally negative. What they are taught is based on bleeding, regularity of that bleeding and the fact that it is somehow dirty and something to be suppressed. They are taught by the culture to become sexually active and take sexual risks at younger and younger ages. It's no wonder then that as soon as a girl can get on birth control pills, patches, IUDs, implants, etc. they or their parents want it. Never do they get full informed consent about the beauty of this sensitive and damageable body system! Hormonal contraceptives, early sexually transmitted infections, and abortions all have negative effects on fertility that often cannot be reversed. Even among those who are not sexually active, today's Standard American Diet, lack of exercise and stress also leave many women infertile or subfertile from conditions such as obesity and polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS).

People, it's time to appreciate and respect fertility!

When men and women are able to fully appreciate the power of procreation and their respective responsibilities in it, they can own and protect this most sacred gift of life. Truly, we give ourselves way too much credit when it comes to making babies.

Let me explain:

Ovulation, not bleeding, is the most important event of the menstrual cycle. Without a good ovulation, good quality cervical mucus, a normal uterus and normal sperm, pregnancy can't happen. It also harder than we think for these qualifiers to come together in what is normally only a 12-16 hour window of time per cycle!!

Natural Family Planning methods that utilize cervical mucus monitoring can help couples get pregnant in just 2 menstrual cycles if both partners are normally fertile. If pregnancy is not happening, earlier work-up can be initiated and treatments started when doctor and patient closely follow ovulation.

So, what is NFP?

Natural Family Planning methods vary and are all aimed at trying to identify ovulation in the female. With that said, not all NFP methods are created equal, so let's explore this concept and which methods work the best.

When most folks think of NFP (even in 2019!), they think of the Rhythm Method. There's a calendar, app and beads out there to use with Rhythm Method. Some even couple it with a thermometer to test basal body temperature. Those all look hip, but none of these methods are reliable, even in "regularly" menstruating females. This is because ovulation doesn't just come on the 15th of every month or the middle of every woman's menstrual cycle. This is also because "regular bleeding" isn't necessarily menstruation. It is not unusual to find "regularly bleeding" women with PCOS who haven't ovulated in years!

Due to the lack of reliability of the Rhythm Method, a reliable method of cervical mucus monitoring was developed back in 1953 by Dr. John Billings and named The Billings Ovulation Method. I won't go into the long history of this method, nor a lengthy comparison of it with Creighton Method that came along in 1980. Suffice it to say that we've got more than 60 years of scientific verification behind these methods which are continued to be studied and utilized by physicians all over the world. They are both 99.9% effective in preventing pregnancy if used according to simple rules and can be used by women of all ages, regardless of whether or not their cycles are "regular."

I love to use BOM to diagnose menstrual problems and monitor the course of reproductive health issues in women. But if I'm being completely honest, I love using BOM most to help couples get pregnant!

The best sex most couples will ever have is trying to have a baby. This is contrary to what the culture wants to sell us, which is to say that sex is sexiest when done casually and in the context of a "hook up." But I'm here to tell ya'll the best sex is when a married couple is given the green light and encouraged to make a baby!! Tell all your friends I said that, OK?

There's nothing more fun than telling a married couple (especially when the husband is in the exam room) to "get after it" and have more sex. All day, every day if they want to. It's refreshing for me to reinforce something natural and normal in regard to sex for a change!!

It's also exciting to think of the joy and fun of having a new baby in my practice, which I love equally well.

So, for all of you who are struggling to have a baby and haven't been worked up yet, start with a Billings or Creighton Method teacher. Most of the time, your timing is just off. Sometimes, though, we find a problem and can get you to the help you need in a hurry.

Here's to New Life and the advent of Spring!

Dr. Lydia