Natural Family Planning
Natural Family Planning is NOT the same as the rhythm method. Want to learn more? Keep reading!
Saving time again today so I can keep cranking on the promised cloth-diapering post. I read this blog post back in February. So glad I get to share it with you now.
We don’t use the Fertility Awareness Method (FAM) yet but I did read the book she highlights, Taking Charge of Your Fertility, 10th Anniversary Edition: The Definitive Guide to Natural Birth Control, Pregnancy Achievement, and Reproductive Health
I DO plan to use FAM as soon as I’m done breastfeeding and bearing children. It’s just a little too difficult (for me) when your cycles are all out of whack.
So, here’s the post: Let’s Talk about N-F-P! (answering The Birth Control Question)
Devin and I are using this method and love it. I was on the pill for about a year (including the time leading up to our marriage to get my body acclimated) and I am sooo much happier using the Fertility Awareness Method for birth control as outlined in “Taking Charge of Your Fertility.” GREAT book! We have been use F.A.M. for about 5 months now and it has been very successful for us (aka – I’m not pregnant.)
It is definitely not a method that many people are familiar with, or that gets much positive press (even my GYN was skeptical), but in reality it is a GREAT method that I think more women need to be aware of!
*There IS a big difference between Natural Family Planning and Fertility Awareness Method – I would recommend anyone considering either read the book mentioned above. It does a really good job explaining the differences.
I am definitely more interested in NFP or FAM (I confess…I don’t know the difference) than I ever thought I’d be. I took BCP for about 4 years before we tried to conceive our first. It took us 7 months, and my cycles were always irregular (hence the longer time it took us to conceive). BFing was good enough birth control for me for close to a year (but I was taking the mini-pill just in case and didn’t even have a period until the week before my daughter’s first b-day). We got pregnant as soon as I quit taking that (and was essentially only BFing once a day). I took the mini-pill for a couple of months after having my second, but it seemed to be affecting my milk supply, so we switched to barrier methods.
Once I quit BFing my second (a LOT sooner than I wanted) and started ovulating again, we have used a combination of barrier and FAM. And you know what, for the first time in my life, I have regular-length cycles! I’m so much more in tune to what’s going on with my body and can generally predict my “fertile days”. I doubt I ever will take BCP again. I didn’t ever really notice a difference in how I felt, but I liked how in the post your linked to the author said something to the affect that taking medicines implies that something is broken. I worry about the long-term effects of manipulating my hormones as well.
To many natural family planning just means “the rhythm method” which is very different from FAM (charting, temping, etc). I like to use FAM so there is no confusion.
I took BCP for the first 6 years we were married (we’ve been married 11 now) and despite changing the type several times I constantly had hormonal issues (including horrible night sweats). We’ve been doing what you do Risha – using barrier methods although I’m super sensitive to my fertile periods, which is a big reason why I was able to get pregnant the first time both times – and probably why we got boys – LOL.
I wonder how many women have side effects from BCP that could easily be resolved by using FAM instead.