Menstrual Suppression for Soldiers and Astronauts

  • Thread starter Thread starter QuizBowlNerd
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Q

QuizBowlNerd

Guest
I have read that some female soldiers, prior to deployment, opt to have a device implanted or to go on birth control so as not to menstruate in a location where sanitary accoutrements may be in short supply. I have heard hypothetical suggestions about female astronauts who might go on longer term space missions doing the same. Are these justifiable reasons to suppress menstruation? Would it make a difference whether the woman in question was married or single? If a female soldier who took such a measure were deployed someplace where she ran the risk of being raped, how would the potentially abortifacient effect in the event of rape and impregnation square morally?
 
QuizBowlNerd said:
I have read that some female soldiers, prior to deployment, opt to have a device implanted or to go on birth control so as not to menstruate in a location where sanitary accoutrements may be in short supply. I have heard hypothetical suggestions about female astronauts who might go on longer term space missions doing the same. Are these justifiable reasons to suppress menstruation? Would it make a difference whether the woman in question was married or single? If a female soldier who took such a measure were deployed someplace where she ran the risk of being raped, how would the potentially abortifacient effect in the event of rape and impregnation square morally?
Click to expand...
The principle of double effect would probably apply here. If the intent is to avoid menstruation for some genuinely needful reason, rather than a desire to contracept, then it should be fine. Most contraceptives don’t actually suporess menstruation anyway, so the medication or whatever is probably even being used in a different way than if it were for contraceptive purposes.

I don’t think marital status matters - who gets deployed or sent into space with their spouse, after all?
 
Last edited:
I don’t know if it’s a moral issue but for the sake of her health, I would say that if a woman can’t go unless she takes medication for her period, then she shouldn’t go. Messing with your body that way is not healthy.
 
Dare I say that this is just one great reason that women ought not to be in combat roles? Because how long before this is required of women?
Astronauts I don’t know. At least they’re not under fire.
 
Last edited:
If the intent is for a medical reason other than to contracept than it ought to be okay. Periods affect women in different ways and for some people it is usually mild and for others it is much more severe.

The last part about a female soldier being potentially raped seems risible because nobody plans on those scenarios occurring and it is unlikely to happen.
 
Last edited:
But not every woman soldier wants to flood her body with artificial hormones or use an iud, I bet.
But here on this website it seems like women are encouraged to suppress.

What would happen if women would be subject to the draft, heaven forbid?

 
Last edited:
Ugh, I have an issue with so many things in this article. It is indeed true that many women suffer from PMS, crampings and heavy flow. Birth control DOES NOT treat any of this things, it just supresses the symtoms and conceal the health problems that are causing them. Hormonal birth control makes the women go into an artificial menopause which has a lot of side effects.
IUDs, that are mentioned in the article, can also perforate the uterus and cause ectopic pregnancies.
 
27lw said:
Dare I say that this is just one great reason that women ought not to be in combat roles?
Click to expand...
You dare. But, I’m not sure there is much merit to the contention, unlike the points made by tuffsmurf.
 
Last edited:
@27lw

It just depends on the individual situation. Medications have varying side effects and some women have much worse symptoms related to menstruation than others.

I just know the standard answer you’ll get from a Catholic bioethicist is that if the intent is not to contracept, but for some other medical reason, then it is fine.
 
LilyM said:
I don’t think marital status matters - who gets deployed or sent into space with their spouse, after all?
Click to expand...
I was thinking of this more in terms of effects that it might have before or after the deployment. For example, would there be more concern about the potential effect upon a married woman’s fertility? Or if she took the measure some time prior to deployment, would there be rules governing whether marital relations could take place during that interval?
 
What happens if a woman get pregnant while serving in the military?
 
tuffsmurf said:
What happens if a woman get pregnant while serving in the military?
Click to expand...
If she’s deployed to a combat zone, she’s sent home as soon as it becomes known she’s pregnant. And subject to some kind of punishment, since sex while deployed is forbidden.

If she’s serving at a regular base, then she just has a baby like anyone else. There are plenty of married women in the military who have kids just like their civilian counterparts.
 
Last edited:
What happens to the baby if the woman gives birth on a military base? Can family members live there? Doesn’t she need time of to care for the child?
 
tuffsmurf said:
What happens to the baby if the woman gives birth on a military base? Can family members live there? Doesn’t she need time of to care for the child?
Click to expand...
Sure. Most married women don’t live on base anyway. They just live in houses or apartments out in town like anyone else and commute to work in the morning. And yes, mothers get maternity leave. And there’s day care on most bases.

I think you’re picturing the military as it was in the 1940s when most people were living in barracks with thirty other soldiers. That generally only happens in basic training now.
 
I’ll just point out that there are reusable menstrual products out there, if one lives in the kind of environment where one fears the supply might run short, or simply if one cares about the ecological impact of single-use products.

Of course, the problem of whether a woman feels comfortable using them - or any other menstrual product for that matter - and letting on that she is on her period in a mainly male environment is a wholly other problem.
 
Yes, I’ll have to admit that I have very little knowledge about military life. Is it like an employment, meaning that if the woman felt that being pregnant or being a mother in the military would be too stressful, could she just quit and find another job?
 
tuffsmurf said:
Yes, I’ll have to admit that I have very little knowledge about military life. Is it like an employment, meaning that if the woman felt that being pregnant or being a mother in the military would be too stressful, could she just quit and find another job?
Click to expand...
Not really. You enlist for a specific period of time. You can ask to be released from your enlistment early but it’s generally only granted in extreme situations.

But really, having kids in the military is really not unusual. Most people who stay in long enough will eventually get married and have kids like anyone else. I’m not saying there aren’t unique challenges, but it’s not an uncommon thing at all.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top