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Babies: 6 - 9 Months
lijah
member
Natural Family planning moms...
lijah
member
I'm thinking about doing this for pregnancy prevention but I'm very nervous. I used this method for getting pregnant and it worked great. I just don't want to get pregnant by accident!!! Do you really trust it???
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Re: Natural Family planning moms...
If done correctly, it is very effective. It is as effective as the pill. Just as easy, too, IMO. For the first 6 cycles, there are additional rules to help you identify your fertile days. Do you have the book from the "couple to couple league"? Or TCOYF?
I am thinking of trying this:
https://www.raxmedical.com/pearly.php
If my doc writes a script for it, I may be able to have my HSA pay for it, which would be great.
AF still has not come for me, though, so I haven't been too good about checking fertile signs these days.
Good luck! You should try it!
I did NFP for a year. When I decided to TTC, I got KU after 3 months. There is very little risk. It is definitely worth consideration.
I too did NFP for a year. When we started TTC I was pregnant within two months. That doesn't mean you can't have a wonky cycle every now and then. If an unplanned pregnancy would be a big problem in your life I'd say thats a pretty big risk. And unless you are having sex 8x a week I don't see how wearing a condom a couple times a month is that much of an inconvience.
this. You have to be pretty religious about it. It's not a follow every once in a while kinda thing. It was too much for me.
It's really not a lot of work if you have a regular cycle by which you can temp and learn your body signs (I used www.fertilityfriend.com and entered temps each morning on my phone, which was really easy). But I agree with Jhawk in that irregular cycles can make it tricky -- but you won't know that unless you try.
By temping, I found out a definitive physical sign that I was ovulating (nipple tenderness, not CM or anything else they point out). BUT the cycle I conceived DD was very odd in that I O'd a week early and my only indicator was the nipple pain.
I still can't fully put my trust in it, but I also don't have issues with BC so I tend to stick with that.
If you have a regular cycle, I think it works great. One of the easiest methods is the Standard Days Method. If your cycle is 26-32 days long, you can use this method. Basically day 1-7, funky time ok, day 8-19 use a condom or some form of protection, day 20-32 funky time is ok again.
I'm just lurking here, but this is not always the case. I charted with fertilityfriend and generally had 32 day cycles. I usually ovulated on day 20 or 21, so in my case, I would NOT have been ok without birth control if I'd wanted to prevent pregnancy.
You do NOT need a regular cycle and what is described here is NOT NFP.
NFP works for any woman, regardless of regularity or cycle length. It teaches you how to observe your symptoms so you can recognize when you are fertile (or about to become fertile). It has the same efficacy of BCP, if you practice it correctly. (For me, this is taking a temp every morning. NBD.) Taking Charge of your Fertility is a great resource for both TTA (trying to avoid conception) practices and TTC.
DH and I used NFP for about three years TTA before DS and then conceived the first cycle we were TTC. Definitely worked for us.
i have a lady comp. i love it. i used it for 2 years before we conceived and we used it for that too. we used condoms on days when i was fertile. i'm hoping to start it again once i get another mp.
sorry, thought i'd add a link in case anyone was interested:
https://www.naturallyforher.com/products/Lady-Comp
it charts your cycle by tracking your oral temperature. i am not organized enough for unassisted nfp.
When I first looked at your link, I thought it was awesome and wanted one immediately... then I saw the price! OMG. I think I paid $15 for my basal thermometer. But I suppose if you pay $10-30/month for BCP, you would save money in the long run.
Ditto this NOT being NFP or any form thereof. Even with 28-day cycles, your O day may be earlier/later than the "traditional" day 14.
When I referred to regular, I meant a predictable cycle for YOU, so either way you need to be very careful for at least the first couple of months so you get to know your body and determine your own symptoms for fertility.
I still disagree with your terminology. You do not need to have any sort of regular or predictable cycles. You could have 20 or 50 day cycles or anywhere in between. It does not matter. The symptoms for fertility are the same for every woman, every cycle. Once you know the symptoms and can find them, the timing of when they happen is irrelevant.
I didn't say it was impossible, just takes more observation if your cycles are not predictable. This is meaning I had a 35 day cycle and then a 30 day cycle and then a 24 day cycle. Symptoms/temps never coincided exactly day by day for me.
And I don't agree that the symptoms are the same for every woman. Some women don't get as much CM as others, and IMO, checking your actual cervix can be difficult to do. Like I said, IMO. And my most easily detected symptom was not even in the books except as an aside, so obviously not all other women had painful nips before they ovulated.
It's a reliable method, but when just starting out and having no experience, I wouldn't recommend it as a person's only form of BC. I think every woman needs a few months of figuring out her own body before it is as reliable as condoms or hormonal BC.
We were doing what my ob/gyn at the time called modified NFP (meaning we used condoms at the fertile times instead of abstaining) when DD was conceived. (Of course I am so glad to have her, but it wasn't planned.)
But we hadn't read books on it or taken classes. I did a little research and talked to my doc, but pretty much all I was doing was taking my morning temp daily. I think it can work much better if you invest in it more, and maybe if you really do abstain on your fertile days.
You're correct.
DH and I took a 3-month course. It was required for us to get married in our archdiocese (Catholic). The Creighton Method is mucous signs- no temps. Although I have friends with great success with this method, we use the Sympto-Thermal Method. I kept track of temps, mucous, and cervix signs. The cervix signs are optional, but I found them to be very, very helpful and easy.
Hmm.. I guess I used the wrong terminology. I thought Standard Days Method was a form of natural family planning, on many websites it is listed under 'Natural Family Planning'. According to planned parenthood, it is a 'Fertility Awareness Based Method'. But anyways, it is another method of planning your family, an easy method. It obviously will not work for everyone, it has a 5% failure rate, but it will work for most people.
https://www.plannedparenthood.org/health-topics/birth-control/fam-standard-days-method-22141.htm
(And I do agree, reading TCOYF is a great recommendation.)