Miserable with NFP!

[Em_in_FL]

This thread is scaring me! I am so afraid of getting pregnant again right after my first is born. This pregnancy was sort of unplanned, I say “sort of” because we disregarded the rules, and oopsy daisy, I’m pregnant! I’m just very reluctant to trust the ecological breastfeeding method because I’ve heard that so many women have gotten pregnant while breastfeeding.

Please don’t get too scared.
The key is good education. READ as much as you can on NFP. There are lots of great free websites… great books like “Taking Charge of Your Fertility”, and “The Art of Natural Family Planning”, etc, etc… I’m sure you’ve read them… just do it over and over. Every time I read an NFP book I pick up something new.

I just simply couldn’t DO ecological breastfeeding. I found it extremely unnatural for my lifestyle. I was excited when my cycle returned because then it was EASY to track again.
Breastfeeding fertility is challenging, but it’s certainly something that can be tracked. It took a little more abstinence… but not so much that our relationship was challenged.

I’ll raise my hand as the biggest lover of NFP! I had a great experience with postpartum breastfeeding! I was able to detect ovulation before my first postpartum period after both my pregnancies. It was a challenge… but something that is DEFINITELY doable! (have no fear!)

 

[Em_in_FL]

One thing I always find BOGGLING is how very orthodox Catholics spend a great deal of time furious and vocally fighting birth control within the Church, touting NFP, and yet, the Church itself seems to not care much?

I say this because how much do most parishes actually spend in time and treasure educating their parishoners about NFP? My parish is very orthodox and traditional and yet never have we had any NFP classes offered or education, nothing spoken of it at all, period? We live in Visalia, CA and, if interested in NFP, the Couple to Couple League will refer you to a couple one hour north up in Fresno who will assist you FOR A $50 fee? It seems like no class, retreat, or experience in our church ever comes without a fee and it’s never easy to find? Most Catholics hear we’re not supposed to use artificial birth control but they assume it’s a ludicrous teaching because they don’t know about NFP and assume the rythmn method or just nothing at all is the alternative to the pill. The Church puts very little effort into NFP except on EWTN internet and radio (which is all they seem to talk about day in and day out, birth control) so it is no surprise that the parishoners feel the Church is aquiescent or just turning a blind eye to it altogether.

I agree… this is a problem in the church. There needs to be MORE support for those who really want to following the teachings of the church.

I am so sorry you are struggling with NFP. It can be challenging. My only advice is to FIGHT for more training. Call your diocese. Talk to your priest. Call the Bishop himself!
Look up NFP online… find LOTS of reading material and get as educated as possible. Every time I read (or re-read) an NFP book I learn something new. Constant education is so important.
My prayers are with you.

At a lot of parishes around here, NFP is not promoted so much because people get sooooo offended. We’re at the point where our parish leaders are trying to figure out how to get people back to church and they are doing that dance of trying not to offend. It is even going on in our Confirmation program. You’re not “allowed” to ask them if they went to Mass on Sunday. WHAT!? “They might not come back…”. They are really trying - it is so frustrating for them. Also - NFP users and promoters are so ridiculed it’s not even funny. The constant jokes about vasectomies and getting snipped and don’t you dare go home and have sex tonight you might have another baby really get to you after awhile. This all adds up to some reservations about promoting NFP to people who are in no way going to give it the time of day.

Very good point. I pray the church can stand up and educate and support those of us who want to follow the faith. It is frustrating to have to take this responsibility on ourselves.

 

[Socio_Momma]

ITA with learning more on NFP prior to the arrival of a baby to “refresh” and get that support going. We went through a total “refresher” course on everything when I was pg with DD (my 16.5–almost 17month old). It helped a great deal with narrowing down our time for abstaining so we weren’t stuck in unnecessary abstaining (we still had our own fears & just finding time to connect to each other while caring for our family, but this wasn’t method related). It also helped to understand the couple wacky patterns that emerged with changes in my hormones due to breastfeeding (which I had a pretty good overall time with). That and asking for more help from an instructor & other NFP’rs when we weren’t sure what was going on, that’s what help is for, kwim?

Even when we switched methods (which we did prior to my cycles returning) this previous “refresher” really helped since CM is still what is the primary indicator of fertility. The only reason for the addition of the monitor was just to “verify” what we were already charting with CM.

Education (or a “refresher” for the pp time), support, keeping open & loving communication with DH and prayer best way to overcome that fear:thumbsup:

 

[Angela_Tate]

My wife and I feel so isolated and unhappy when we can’t be together intimately at times. This is not everyday but there are inevitably about five or six times per month where we want each other intimately and** it is just not allowed**.

I always wonder where the ‘not allowed’ opinion comes from when I hear this compliant. It sounds like the people blame the church for ‘not allowing’ them to have sex when they desire to.

The church desires married couples to live full, loving lives. The church desires married couples to participate in intimate embraces for unitive and/or procreative purposes. The church is all about love.

It is the will of the couple which ‘prohibits’ sex on demand. It is through the couples’ discernment that they recognize they cannot risk the natural consequence of the intimate embrace. The church recognizes and approves of couples’ discernment in this area and she supports couples in their efforts to do what is best for their family.

To me the bottom line is sex or no sex, but the decision is always the couple’s to make, not the church’s. God designed the human body to desire sex at the most fertile time of a woman’s cycle. It is a gift first, foremost, and always. When a couple discerns they cannot bring more children into the family they work together, as a team, to help the other refrain from giving into the natural desire to unite at the fertile times.

Instead of commiserating with each other one of the partners is supposed to help the other not focus so much on what they have chosen not to have. I picture two adults sulking like young children having been told ‘no’ by the parents, but the church has never said ‘no’. THEY said no, and for good reasons, so why the sulking? I just don’t understand that.

From a woman’s perspective, there is nothing more painful than to feel like a human failure when our bodies are unpredictable. Our husbands desire to be with us but we have to decline. Having to say no to the husband is difficult enough, but if the husband allows himself to show frustration - even if it’s directed toward the circumstances and not the wife - the wife will still internalize it. Husbands need to go the extra mile to help the wives not feel like utter failures. Together I’m certain couples can find other ways to share intimacy and they can come up with activities to do together to distract them from focusing on the hormonal signs to unite.

The couple chooses their sexual fate, not the church. The couple is responsible to help each other live with their choice without resentment and bitterness against God or the church or each other. I think the OP couple could benefit from marriage counseling to help them discover other ways to nurture their personal intimate relationship and come up with other things to do during the ‘peak’ times.

 

[Feanaro_s_Wife]

Luckily, I practiced NFP on my own before I got married so I knew what to look for. It’s the post-partum I am so worried about! We are meeting with our instructors on Thursday to discuss PP Fertility, hopefully, that’ll put many fears to rest.

**That’s great about meeting with your instructor! I’m sure they will put most of your fears to rest. And, if they don’t, you have time to find a new instructor before baby comes.

Malia**

 

[PennitentMan]

I’m just going to jump in here and say it.

NFP sucks.

We’ve been through exactly what the OP describes.

My wife and I feel exactly the same. NFP caused us infinitely more harm that it did good.
There’s no way around it. It sucks all the romance and excitement and fun out of a marital sex life.
It makes you frustrated, it separates you intimately from your wife and therefore makes you very lonely. It puts severe strain on a marriage

It’s the only solution for practicing Catholics who don’t want to have more kids, but it’s an imperfect solution. So, you WILL have more kids. Full stop, no two ways about it.
No matter what method you use, it will fail at some point.

Don’t believe the statistics quoted, it’s not that effective.

Brother, you are certainly not alone, there are plenty of us who are suffering through NFP.

I’ll pray for you and your marriage.

 

[kage_ar]

So, you WILL have more kids. Full stop, no two ways about it.
No matter what method you use, it will fail at some point.

Don’t believe the statistics quoted, it’s not that effective.

Some of us were thrilled when we discovered NFP, because due to dire health reasons we had no choice but abstainence. NFP allowed us to again have relations. NFP for over 10 years now, and no more children. In fact, now, I wish I had been more “risky” and had a “failure” or two.

I will also pray for all on here.

 

[RWMorris]

To the OP:
We also had a miserable experience with NFP. I simply could not avoid getting pregnant. I am thrilled we had four children, and looking back, should have had more, but I am very familiar with the stress of becoming pregnant with one child right after the other. We opted for a tubal (we weren’t Catholic then) and I have regretted every day since.
I don’t know what the answer is but I sympathize with you.

 

[PennitentMan]

Some of us were thrilled when we discovered NFP, because due to dire health reasons we had no choice but abstainence. NFP allowed us to again have relations. NFP for over 10 years now, and no more children. In fact, now, I wish I had been more “risky” and had a “failure” or two.

I will also pray for all on here.

Good point. You are obviously one of the few that has not gotten pregnant yet. I guess that’s why the average is higher than I think it should be

For us though it’s not about being “Risky” as you put it…that denotes incorrect user procedure (Note how un-intimate that sounds), but NFP that failed. We followed ALL the rules and still got pregnant. It’s an imperfect system.

I’m glad that you have been able to avoid pregnancy, but for many many of us, NFP is bad…very bad.

If I can add here a general remark, if I was to follow my frustrations to it’s conclusion, I’d run into the wall that I bang my head into daily,
Standing at that wall, I the one logical question I would have to ask is:
So, if it’s not effective and is such a bad part of your marriage…what can I do to avoid this?

Well, as a practicing Catholic, the solution is horrible: Adstinence.

So, I can choose between an intermediate, robotic sex life that makes us more frustrated than intimate, with the risk of another (unwanted at this stage) pregnancy, or we can abstain and not be intimate at all.

Sex without marriage, not so much by free choice, but by force for fear of the alternative.
Alternative? Dead wife.

 

[Sure]

I’m just going to jump in here and say it.

NFP sucks.

We’ve been through exactly what the OP describes.

My wife and I feel exactly the same. NFP caused us infinitely more harm that it did good.
There’s no way around it. It sucks all the romance and excitement and fun out of a marital sex life.
It makes you frustrated, it separates you intimately from your wife and therefore makes you very lonely. It puts severe strain on a marriage

It’s the only solution for practicing Catholics who don’t want to have more kids, but it’s an imperfect solution. So, you WILL have more kids. Full stop, no two ways about it.
No matter what method you use, it will fail at some point.

Don’t believe the statistics quoted, it’s not that effective.

Brother, you are certainly not alone, there are plenty of us who are suffering through NFP.

I’ll pray for you and your marriage.

Yes, NFP is difficult. Yes, it is suffering. Yes, it is a cross to bear. It is something that is not the norm and should not be used “all the time.” It is something that we have recourse to when times are difficult and there is serious reason to avoid having another child at that time. I also get extremely irritated when people bounce around exclaiming how “NFP is so great, La La, La La!” It is great just as any suffering is great. It is great just as Christ’s agony on the Holy Cross was great! But it can be through the difficulty that our lives are enriched.

It IS effective. The studies that have shown its effectiveness are not lies. The accurate practice of it is more difficult for some than for others. I find that sometimes those who have the most difficulty with the practice are perhaps focusing too much on “controlling” the situation (at least that’s what I have found in my own marriage).

Do not despair. If you have a need to avoid pregnancy, use NFP. Be careful and follow the conservative rules. If a pregnancy occurs, thank God for giving you an opportunity to submit your will to His will. At the end of your life, you will not regret it.

Embrace the cross! And remember that God will never give more than you can handle.

 

[ElizabethAnne]

I’m just going to jump in here and say it.

NFP sucks.

I know you have had your share of struggles with this issue PennitentMan, and I can understand why you feel this way about NFP.

NFP involves sacrifice and self-control. It’s downright difficult sometimes! I believe that NFP advocates who ignore this when promoting NFP do a disservice to NFP. It’s not an easy, beneficial alternative to contraceptives. It’s a challenging alternative to complete abstinance for those who are faithful to God.

That said, NFP does not “suck” any more than sacrifice “sucks.” And though it can seem too difficult or even impossible to do God’s will, we are called to turn to Him in our struggles and carry our crosses with joy out of love for the Lord.

 

[3GirlsRUs]

Good point. You are obviously one of the few that has not gotten pregnant yet. I guess that’s why the average is higher than I think it should be

For us though it’s not about being “Risky” as you put it…that denotes incorrect user procedure (Note how un-intimate that sounds), but NFP that failed. We followed ALL the rules and still got pregnant. It’s an imperfect system.

I hiope this doesn’t sound insensitive…I never know beforehand how this stuff sounds to someone in your situation…however, perhaps God TRIUMPHED instead of NFP failed.

I always hated it that my parents referred to my younger three siblings as “neither planned for nor prevented” although I guess that sounds better than “NFP Failure” (i.e., we sure as heck didn’t want them…)

I think it’s definitely difficult, but very important to remember that we should hope for “Thy Will Be Done” meaning “God’s Will” and children are placed in the womb by Him alone…not just because of “negligence”.

I am so sorry for you who have trouble with NFP. I won’t say it’s easy for DH and me. But I will say, that mutual acceptance for whatever God wills has made it much easier for us to accept the children we have received and the fact that we haven’t received any more…

I hope you and the all who have trouble with NFP or with the Church’s teaching on marital love find peace.

 

[PennitentMan]

I know you have had your share of struggles with this issue PennitentMan, and I can understand why you feel this way about NFP.

NFP involves sacrifice and self-control. It’s downright difficult sometimes! I believe that NFP advocates who ignore this when promoting NFP do a disservice to NFP. It’s not an easy, beneficial alternative to contraceptives. It’s a challenging alternative to complete abstinance for those who are faithful to God.

That said, NFP does not “suck” any more than sacrifice “sucks.” And though it can seem too difficult or even impossible to do God’s will, we are called to turn to Him in our struggles and carry our crosses with joy out of love for the Lord.

I understand what you are saying and it rings true about suffering and sacrifice.
However…
My beef with NFP is what it does to marraiges, and at the same time is proclaimed to be the “best thing ever”.

You are right, we should embrace sacrifice and it’s consequent suffering and offer it up and be enriched from it.
Life is hard and sufferings and sacrifices will happen. But usually sufferings are unwanted. They appear in your life due to circumstances that are out of our control, so we accept it and power through.
A death in the family. An amputated leg, Diabetes, etc…all these things are forms of sufferings in today’s life.

NFP is not that.
NFP is something that you willingly engage in. Usually without knowing what effect it will have on your marriage.

If someone told me to take an injection that would give me a very severe illness…but I shouldn’t worry, I will have a great opportunity to enrich your life and draw closer to God through this.
I’d tell them to shove it somewhere dark and that I would enrich my life in other ways, like Eucharistic adoration, praying the Liturgy of the Hours, The Rosary, Meditating throught the stations of the Cross, Daily Mass, frequent confession, etc

NFP is even worse than that injection, because the person handing the injection to you is not telling you what it is. They tell you how awesome it is. How it would draw you closer to your spouse and to God…when usually it’s exactly the opposite.

Llife is hard enough without having something proclaimed as awesome, and it ends up making my marriage a shadow of what it was.

That’s my beef with NFP.

 

[Sure]

I understand what you are saying and it rings true about suffering and sacrifice.
However…
My beef with NFP is what it does to marraiges, and at the same time is proclaimed to be the “best thing ever”.

You are right, we should embrace sacrifice and it’s consequent suffering and offer it up and be enriched from it.
Life is hard and sufferings and sacrifices will happen. But usually sufferings are unwanted. They appear in your life due to circumstances that are out of our control, so we accept it and power through.
A death in the family. An amputated leg, Diabetes, etc…all these things are forms of sufferings in today’s life.

NFP is not that.
NFP is something that you willingly engage in. Usually without knowing what effect it will have on your marriage.

If someone told me to take an injection that would give me a very severe illness…but I shouldn’t worry, I will have a great opportunity to enrich your life and draw closer to God through this.
I’d tell them to shove it somewhere dark and that I would enrich my life in other ways, like Eucharistic adoration, praying the Liturgy of the Hours, The Rosary, Meditating throught the stations of the Cross, Daily Mass, frequent confession, etc

NFP is even worse than that injection, because the person handing the injection to you is not telling you what it is. They tell you how awesome it is. How it would draw you closer to your spouse and to God…when usually it’s exactly the opposite.

Llife is hard enough without having something proclaimed as awesome, and it ends up making my marriage a shadow of what it was.

That’s my beef with NFP.

Yes, you make a good point that many push NFP as “happy fun marriage medicine” when it’s not, and it’s not meant to be.

Most couples God-willing will never have to practice NFP. And those that do should understand the difficulties and the sacrifice at the beginning. We’d all be better off if we started viewing NFP as the exception and not the norm.

As far as it making your marriage a shadow of what it once was, it only does that if you let it. If the Lord presents you with a cross don’t bemoan the fact and look back at how great things were before you got your cross. Rather thank Him profusely for giving you this cross.

“This terrible pain is only the kiss of Jesus — a sign that you have come so close to Jesus on the cross that he can kiss you.” Blessed Theresa of Calcutta

 

[manualman]

PenitentMan,

You are weighing your experience of NFP and extrapolating a conclusion that your problems are INHERENT to NFP. As I noted in my post above, they are not. I share the view that claiming that NFP inherently enhances marriages to be rather a stretch, but where we differ is that I see NFP as a way to deal with problems in having more kids without DAMAGING the marriage.

I’m afraid I can’t relate to your claims about NFP making your marriage suffer. If you are unable to establish intimacy in a restricted time frame, I’m afraid I can’t support you in a claim that this is NFP’s fault! I CAN relate. As I noted, I hated NFP for years because I felt it very much deprived me of much of my sex life. I came to realize that the problem wasn’t NFP, it was my attitude about sex. I came to realize that I was a product of a sexually brutalized culture. Any chance you might be too? Hope you’ve considered that angle.

 

[PennitentMan]

PenitentMan,

You are weighing your experience of NFP and extrapolating a conclusion that your problems are INHERENT to NFP. As I noted in my post above, they are not. I share the view that claiming that NFP inherently enhances marriages to be rather a stretch, but where we differ is that I see NFP as a way to deal with problems in having more kids without DAMAGING the marriage.

I’m afraid I can’t relate to your claims about NFP making your marriage suffer. If you are unable to establish intimacy in a restricted time frame, I’m afraid I can’t support you in a claim that this is NFP’s fault! I CAN relate. As I noted, I hated NFP for years because I felt it very much deprived me of much of my sex life. I came to realize that the problem wasn’t NFP, it was my attitude about sex. I came to realize that I was a product of a sexually brutalized culture. Any chance you might be too? Hope you’ve considered that angle.

I definately have considered that angle. But the things is I’m not wanting sex per se, the intimacy between husband and wife is gone. If it was a husband craving too much sex, or the wife for that matter, thats a different story…I can see that due to NFP, for both of us, we cannot be intimate with each other, for very long periods of time.

All signs point to NFP as where this problem started.

As I mentioned earlier, it doesn’t help knowing that NFP is the cause, because I cannot do anything about it. The other alternative is even worse.
It’s definately not a perfect system as folks make it out to be, and it’s certainly the cause of our intimacy problems. For sure.

 

[kage_ar]

A couple can have sex 4 times each day and still not have intimacy.

Sex is not imtimacy, intimacy is not sex. Our culture tells us otherwise, that is very sad.

Matthew Kelly’s book “Seven Levels of Imtimacy” - have you read it?

 

[PennitentMan]

A couple can have sex 4 times each day and still not have intimacy.

That is true.

Sex is not imtimacy, intimacy is not sex. Our culture tells us otherwise, that is very sad.

You can’t make that assumption. Sex within marriage between the two spouses is most certainly a form of intimacy. I say a form of intimacy because I do concede that thee a many forms of intimacy, but to exclude sex from marital intimacy is just not right.
To say that you are taking the Unitive aspect out of Catholic sex.

Matthew Kelly’s book “Seven Levels of Imtimacy” - have you read it?

No, but I have read the five love languages, Christopher West as well as the proper care and feeding of husbands.

So, sex is most certainly a form of marital intimacy and if that is your primary love language, and it’s not addressed, then all the flowers, chocklate or washed dishes is not going to further your spousal intimacy one bit.

 

[kage_ar]

Well, since 5 Love Languages and Care & Feeding are by non-Catholic authors, I’m not a big proponent.

Marriage is a Sacrament, so, IMHO first source for teaching and info on Marriage is from fellow Catholics.

Also, the unititive nature of sex is a good thing that was created by God. That is on reason that sex is reserved for marriage, a kind of chemical and emotional bonding takes place during sex.

That does not mean that everyone who has lots of sex has intimacy in the marriage, I have seen some miserable married couples who have that bond but lack intimacy.

 

[mnmom]

Gurney,

You are not the only couple to feel this way. NFP is hard and taxing on the marriage. My husband supported me in NFP until after our first child was born then he wanted nothing to do with it. I was on my own. He felt resentful of me not understanding why he wanted to use ABC and I was resentful he didn’t want to contiue NFP. We still use NFP but I am on my own and it is hard. Our children are nine, six, four, two and one due in January. My husband literallyl exploded with pregnancy number five. Although each of our first four pregnancy we knew we were fertile and took a risk the fith was a surpise as I was not supposed to be fertile. Breastfeeding was not a problem for me and I never became pregnant while breastfeeding even though I worked full time and supplemented with bottles I remained infertile until I completley quit breastfeeding. Then watch out very fertile from then on.

This situation is difficult in our marriage because of husbands medical issues, my medical issed and this pregnancy which is considered high risk because of my medical problems. Money is also tight and I work full time.

I guess difficulties with NFP are our crosses to bear even if it is not easy. Jesus has said that it will be husband against wife, mother against daughter etc. to follow him and boy is he right. Just because you are tempted to stop NFP and use either ABC or Sterilization think long and hard. You may think this will solve all your problems but it will not.