NFP/fertility question

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jennyr

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I took my first NFP class last week, very excited and happy to get started… as soon as my SO decides they are ready… anyways

I was a bit sad to learn more about the female’s fertility. From what I learned, in a nutshell, fertilization has to occur right after ovulation, with the egg growing for 3-4 days(I believe) so its big enough and developed enough to implant.

I started thinking and realized that if anyone has sex a few days after ovulation, and fertilization occurs you are virtually assured of an abortion, because the fertilized egg won’t attach because its not big enough. This has been bothering me lately. Why would God create us that way? why would abortions be “built” into our bodies like that.

It got my mind going down paths that I didn’t necessary want it to. Ideas such as, “man… it makes so much more sense then that God doesn’t create the soul until implantation” which is obviously non-Catholic. Any flaws in my thinking or advice? God Bless
 
jennyr,
I hope you get some good answers to your question. Don’t despair! God is in charge!

After ovulation the egg only lives for 24-48 hours. We do not know yet the precise moment the egg is released. We know the very small window of time.

Fertilization does not take place a “few days” after ovulation. The egg doesn’t survive that long. I am not sure what you mean that fertilization has to occur “right after” ovulation. What is “right after?” If my body released an egg early in the morning and I did not have relations with my husband until late that night it could be 16 hours after the egg is released that it is fertilized. There is still a very high probability of implantation.

Maybe I don’t understand your concern.

I don’t think I understand where you were referencing “the egg growing for 3-4 days.” Are you referring to the fertilized egg (embryo) growing? The egg itself doesn’t grow or change unless fertilized. The embryo grows in the fallopian tube as it descends to the uterus. For something the size of the point of a very sharp pin, the journey down the tube is a loooong one. (3 or 4 days.)

I think your fears and concerns are coming from a misunderstanding of the process. Please help me understand where your questions are in the development process. When we are sure we agree on the process, then we can get to the theological side of it.

I hope I can help put your fears to rest. Sorry for any spelling errors here. It is late and my mind is not working well.
 
I am just a guy so take what I say with a grain of salt. While our bodies are of wonderful and awesome design, they are not precision machines. There is a fair amount of “slop” in how they work. It is my understanding that there are a fair number of “spontaneous abortions” occurring; some so early that the couple would not even be aware of it. Some so late that it is tragic,miscarriages. The only re-assurance I can offer is that God in his providence takes care of those young souls. We can only wonder why He might let this happen but be assured of His wisdom and His love for them. I think Little Deb has the biological process quite accurately discribed.
 
jennyr said:
I started thinking and realized that if anyone has sex a few days after ovulation, and fertilization occurs you are virtually assured of an abortion, because the fertilized egg won’t attach because its not big enough. This has been bothering me lately.
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This doesn’t even make any sense to me.

The egg can’t start to grow until it is fertilized - at which point he or she is in the zygote stage. The growth cycle would begin at the moment of fertilization, so it shouldn’t matter when the fertilization occurs, assuming the egg is viable.

If the egg isn’t viable, no actual fertilization (and thus, no conception) would be able to occur.
 
hi, sorry I guess I asked the question very poorly!!

My understanding is that the egg is released at time x. The egg then travels the tubes and takes an extra 3-4 days to reach the uterus. I was taught that the egg needs to be fertilized fairly soon(within a day?) after releasing for it to attach in the uterus days later.

So… once the egg is fertilized it starts to grow. BUT, only eggs of a certain size can implant. SO if your egg has already traveled 4 days and is unfertilized in the uterus, and hits sperm there, it obviously gets fertilized but has no chance of implantation so an abortion happens.

That obviously is the latest fertilization can occur. But what after the egg has traveled for 3 days lets say. If its fertilized at THAT point, it will only grow a day and still not be big enough to implant and abort. Does that make any more sense??

Its those days when the egg is traveling down the tubes, but won’t have the time to grow big enought that I’m concerned about with this query.
 
Why wouldn’t it just keep growing until it was big enough to implant?

I guess that’s the part that I don’t understand.
 
If the fertilized egg doesn’t keep growing, it is already non-viable. The fact that it doesn’t implant is secondary. It has plenty of time to grow enough while traveling to the uterus. If it doesn’t grow, it will die, and that is indicative of much larger problems.

Often embryos that have huge, non-viable mutations will not survive past the first few hours or days past fertilization. This is not our fault, there is nothing we can do about it. There is no way of knowing if and when this will happen, or to whom. The only way to avoid such an occurrence is to avoid sex completely, which is not generally healthy in a normal marriage, especially if the only reason for avoidance is a fear of very early miscarriage.

I’m nearly positive that we lost one unborn child at 5 weeks, and there may have been others that were so early we wouldn’t have known or even guessed. I believe that I have at least one personal saint in heaven, perhaps others. God has His reasons. Maybe they can do more good from there than they could down here. If we hadn’t been trying, we wouldn’t even have that much.
 
The parents might not ever know that they have a baby, but God does. He loves that baby as much as one who is implanted or born or 100 years old. To us, a fertilized egg doesn’t seem “human.” But, to God that baby has the genes, the soul, the material of human life. In fact, to God that baby looks a lot like any other human.

Blame it on original sin. If we had stayed in the garden, every child conceived would have been born. 😦
 
jennyr said:
So… once the egg is fertilized it starts to grow. BUT, only eggs of a certain size can implant. SO if your egg has already traveled 4 days and is unfertilized in the uterus, and hits sperm there, it obviously gets fertilized but has no chance of implantation so an abortion happens.
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I think this is part of the confusion. An unfertilized egg would be “past its expiration” by this point. Sperm might come into contact with it, but sperm cannot penetrate the egg wall because it is no longer “live.” I am putting all those words in quotes because I don’t want to give the impression that the egg alone has a separate “life” before fertilization.

Think of it this way. The egg is released. No relations happen for a week. The egg will travel down the tube and “die” along the way. The egg will remain in the uterus for about 12-14 days until menstruation. It cannot be fertilized at that point because the egg has expired. The egg alone has expired. Even if sperm came into contact with it, the egg has expired. Fertilization would not occur. Fertilization must occur within 24-48 hours of ovulation or it doesn’t happen. Eggs have a “shelf life” of only 24-48 hours upon release. Sperm has a “shelf life” of 5-7 days.

I think there also might be a further confusion as to what causes the “size” of a fertilized egg. Early miscarriages are caused by a number of factors as the previous poster mentioned. Some implant and miscarry anyway. If the egg by itself was too small to be viable and is fertilized immediately it would still possibly miscarry.

If you could give a reference for “only eggs of a certain size can implant” I might be able to understand where the confusion is happening. Cell division happens “immediately” after fertilization. Is the concern that a zygote (thanks jmcrae for the right term!) won’t have enough “time” to grow if it is fertilized at 36 hours instead of 12?

Please forgive all the confusion from me. I would like to understand because it is an important subject. Anything that might make someone stray from Catholic teaching is very important to discuss.
 
jennyr said:
So… once the egg is fertilized it starts to grow. BUT, only eggs of a certain size can implant. SO if your egg has already traveled 4 days and is unfertilized in the uterus, and hits sperm there, it obviously gets fertilized but has no chance of implantation so an abortion happens.
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No, generally if fertilization doesn’t occur within about 24 hours after ovulation, the ovum starts to generate and will not be fertilized even if it is exposed to sperm.

Nevertheless, your original concern remains. Roughly half of all fertilized eggs will fail to implant in the uterus.
 
ahh!! thanks so much, the last 2 posts really cleared things up for me! I didn’t know that the egg couldn’t be fertilized after a certain point. It makes perfect sense, thanks!
 
Additionally.

From what I understand … each egg really only has 24 hrs.

The reason that various NFP methods say “24-48 hrs” is because:
A - You can not be sure of exactly when ovulation took place
B - A double ovulation may have occured - i.e. one egg in each ovary. (Rare, but it may happen from time to time)

God Bless

tjp
 
BTW: May we suggest two video documentaries? -which are very enlightening:
“Life’s Greatest Miracle”
Code: 
    &    "The Intimate Universe,"   vol. 1
…very informative and helpful here. M&M 😉 :cool:
 
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