A dissent on ecological breastfeeding

My husband and I are Protestant Christians and practice the "Fertility Awareness Method." It is basically a secular version of NFP. I admit i shy away from saying NFP because of the negative ideas/images it brings to mind. I feel like I have more of an open door to discuss this type of method when I mention and then explain FAM. Interestingly, though, a friend who is not Catholic but who has taken NFP classes wanted to clarify that there was a difference, though I'm not sure what that is. I will say that once I explain what FAM (and NFP) is to friends, most women have no idea that it is even possible to follow such a method...I guess that goes to show you how in the church, and I guess I should say Protestant church, there is little support, understanding, and teaching of such things. And yes, an amen to the fact that it is hard and frustrating at times!

My credentials: We are sort-of NFPers. Meaning: I learned NFP, we used it when necessary, but have stopped charting and all that (although we will probably go back to charting soon) but haven't used any artificial means at all since we became Catholic. My husband is 40, I'm 37. We have four children, ages 11, 8, 5 and 2.

I have read a lot of CCL's materials and now that the Kippleys have split from CCL, I've read some of their separate writings too. I think EBF is the Ideal, sort of in the way that living in harmony with nature and "living green" is the ideal for our society. But the reality is, it's a process of moving from where we are, to where we'd like to be.

NFP and breastfeeding involves a huge amount of private struggle on the part of the mother or husband & wife that really doesn't do well in public discussion because it involves prudential judgment.

Zealous NFPers do ignore the fact that a lot of couples need to/desire to avoid conception for longer than extended breastfeeding allows for. It always comes back down to the argument between whether the spacing of children can be decided for only "grave" reasons or simply "just" reasons.

I think where the EBF promoters go wrong is in creating rules for something so full of mystery. I think Eastern Christian thought has an advantage in its emphasis on the unknowableness of Mystery. Breastfeeding and NFP are not sacramentals! But they do involve the inner workings of the Sacrament of Marriage.

I nursed my four children exclusively, although our third used a pacifier to transition to a crib when the family bed was making us crazy and our fourth became failure to thrive and had to be formula-fed to save his life. These were not the ideal experiences I had in mind, but it wasn't sinful to use either pacifier or formula.

In some ways, the "EBP/NFP or else" mentality seems to me like expecting a new convert to Christianity to immediately have the spiritual depth of experience as St. John of the Cross. Does God even plan for each of us to delve as fully into the spiritual truths as the greatest saints? Or is simply being as open to life as you are able (without the sin of using artificial birth control) good enough for many?

What we really need is guidance and support on how younger married couples are to bear with living celibately when having more children is not wise, or when couples don't agree on the issue or when NFP followed "correctly" still seems difficult.

My wife and I have loved using NFP, and she'll scream from the rooftops that ecological breastfeeding is the best, easiest, and healthiest way to take care of a child. That's all I have to say - maybe I'll see if she wants to write something about it later on.

I'm Catholic and have practiced NFP since the beginning of my marriage. I had no idea that there was any link between NFP and ecological breast feeding. I mean, I know that EBF affects fertility, but this post is the first time I have ever encountered the assumption that people who use NFP also probably do EBF. I breastfed one baby for 9 months and the next one for 16 months. For both of them, I had completely cut out night feedings by 6 months. The first one slept in my bed for about 5 months, the next one for about 2. Is that atypical for someone who uses NFP?

These disagreements go on amongst us Protestants, too, y'know. Although I would say that the majority of Protestants don't see anything wrong with contraception or sterilization; still, there are Quiver-Full folks among us, as well as NFP'ers.

Interestingly enough, most of the Protestant Quiver-fullers and NFP'ers that I have met are from the "younger generation" (which means "younger than me" - I'm 39). They also, at least in my church, seem to be getting married younger and having babies right away vs. my hedonistic Gen X cohort (myself included) who procrastinated as long as humanly possible.

Is the link between EBF and NFP an American thing? I learned NFP in Britain and no one ever mentioned ecological breast feeding to me.

Yeah. We ignored the ecological breast feeding thing... just charted. But, no, Rod, I don't think I ever found NFP to be insanely difficult, or more difficult than a hypothetical sex life Ought to Be. The most difficult part has been convincing our parents that we're not insane.

My favorite kind of party. I'm closer to the QF side of the equation. While my wife didn't attempt regimented EBF and didn't return to work, she regained fertility relatively quickly.

In the various debates and encounters I have had online on this issue, I've found quite a willingness to discuss dietary issues that complicate NFP and alternate methods. I have also found a rather zealous commitment that it can be done and enjoyable. Personally I think a lot of people would be a lot happier if they didn't worry so much about becoming pregnant. That sentiment seems kind of odd when they are constantly protesting that they are open to life, but a lot of people need a crudge to convince them that they are acting morally superior rather than just attempting to do the minimum.

John M.:

http://www.rtforum.org/lt/lt103.html

Oh, I forgot to mention we do have three kids.

We're Lutherans, but we went to NFP classes before we got married. I charted and learned a ton about my body and fertility. I was pretty gung-ho about it. That is, until we got married and my first fertile phase came upon us. There was no way I was going to abstain after all those years! So, we threw that out the window pretty fast. We agree more with the Orthodox viewpoint now. We see the Pill very differently than a condom. The Pill renders what God created to work in such a way, useless. A condom is simply a barrier. I like how Quinault puts it :-)

This is an excellent post for a Crunchy blog. I know most of our "crunchy" nature develops around family, and is driven by the mother:

1) allowing fertility to happen naturally
2) homebirths
3) breastfeeding until the child starts eating solids on his own
4) sleep with baby until weaned
5) raising healthy children in spite of doctors - avoiding medication and the medical industry whenever possible
6) cloth diapers
7) whole foods, zero edibile food-like substances
8) getting lots of exercise by walking/biking long distances, plus manual labor like digging and gardening - having kids walk/bike and work with adults
9) no tv
10) homeschool

I wanted to share this for anyone who might be starting to have kids, because it took us a while to work the bugs out and I wish somebody had told us the benefits back in the day.

By following this pattern, my wife (age 35) is now in better health six kids later than she was when she started (age 25). It's easy to see she is getting healthier, because the children are becoming spaced closer together as she gets older (the opposite of what is typical). Also, living naturally has allowed her to get lots of sleep and to have non-colicy and easygoing babies. We have not had a single health problem with any of the kids (the medical data shows prenatal diet and breastfeeding are critical here), and each additional kid adds no extra burden. If anything, less - many hands make light work.

I firmly believe most of the desire to avoid fertility comes from a diet, lifestyle, and culture that is simply not conducive to children and family, and thus well over 90% of difficulties with children could be avoided merely by fixing these things and sidestepping the culture. Iow, it's much easier to raise children in the Shire than in Isengard or Bree. Or even Rivendell. All the discussions about NFP make me tired, because the whole issue to my mind is really that children simply don't fit into our modern lifestyle. So we don't want 'em.

Coming from a Protestant perspective, I really (really!!!) don't understand the motivations behind NFP.

ISTM that righteousness comes from the heart rather than the specific practice. Therefore, among non-abortifacient methods, contraception is contraception, whether NFP or otherwise. That is to say, the attitude of the heart of a married couple is the same whether they are using NFP, the rhythym method or a barrier method. Each are an attempt by the couple to control their reproductive capacities, and each may miss blessings that would otherwise be bestowed upon them by God's Will.

I just don't get it.

Now that I've skimmed through the combox, I agree with John M.'s POV.

I'll try to be open-minded here, but NFP seems to be based on a technicality that abstinence-based contraception is okay.

Would we consider Onan a righteous man if he had engaged in NFP rather than withdrawal?

BTW, I have four children (wish I had more) and my wife breastfed all three for about a year each: I am a firm proponent of breastfeeding.

Kirk:

Let me try to explain. My wife and I also used NFP early on -- we were converts to the Catholic Church, and contraception was a big part of our conversion process in that it was partly through discovering that the Pill was an abortifacient, that we eventually ended up in the Catholic Church.

That said, we no longer use NFP at all but are ready, willing, and even eager to welcome a new child if God sees fit to bless us this way. (We have four children, so far.)

However, a pro-NFP position can be made by distinguishing the non-act of not having sexual intercourse, from the action of doing something to avoid pregnancy. In the first example, the NFP practitioners are not acting contrary to God's will, but are simply abstaining from having intercourse during certain well-timed periods of fertility. After all, there's no heavenly mandate as to how often you should have marital relations. In the second instance, the contraception practitioners are actively doing something with the hope of preventing the gift of a new child. In this view, NFP is a legitimate "non-act", while contraception is an illegitimate act.

All that said, I've come to the conclusion that except in cases where there is a truly dire health reason to avoid pregnancy, NFP is routinely over-used for what amounts to economic reasons. Children are expensive, and they can mean the loss of significant income in a two-income family, and so I believe that many people who use NFP are doing so illegitimately -- in the express hopes of preventing God's gift.

That's one reason we no longer promote or practice NFP.

We use NFP, but we don't talk about it much. The topic has a tendency to convene the famed Circular Catholic Firing Squad, posthaste.

I remember your OSV article about NFP, Rod, and I thought it was (and is) the best commentary about the downside of it. There's entirely too much happy-clappy about improved communication and whatnot that doesn't acknowledge the real stresses and struggles.

Yes, have seen the attitudes of "NFPteers" (as Red Cardigan calls them) undermine the main point when it comes to a Catholic understanding of marriage, fertility and responsible parenthood. (And I think Erin Manning offered the perfect explanation of WHY this kind of misplaced dogmatism has infected well-intentioned people in one of the comments above.)

I first learned how NFP works about 8 years ago from reading the old CCL materials written by the Kippleys. Though I appreciated the medical/scientific information presented, I take or took issue with several aspects of the way they present NFP:
1. There is no thoughtful explanation of why contraception is wrong -- basically, because the Church says so. I didn't understand the "why" until I read Love & Responsibility a few years later.
2. NFP is presented as a magic bullet for strengthening marriage and preventing divorce. More on that later.
3. The materials were written as if the economy of the 1960s were still in place: assuming that most couples could afford to live on one full time income, and among those who claimed they couldn't afford this, it was probably because they spent too much money on fancy home furnishings(!)
4. They present ecological breastfeeding and attachment parenting philosophies as moral imperatives, which has no basis in Church teaching.
5. By intertwining their personal preferences for EBF and attachment parenting with NFP, they undermine the message about NFP for anyone who disagrees with some or many of the principles of EBF and AP.
6. The intertwining of NFP with EBF and AP also tends to give young mothers who are truly seeking to be good Catholic mothers an unjustified guilt complex when they find that EBF and AP don't work well for some or all of their children.

So what was the result of me learning NFP from the old CCL/Kippley materials? I thought that, despite a lot of problems in our relationship, my boyfriend was good marriage material because he was willing to practice NFP upon getting married. But we had no guidance on how to use NFP appropriately because we both felt we couldn't trust the advice of people who thought children should share a bed with their parents and that buying an expensive dining room set was our main financial impediment, not student loans and soaring housing costs. Got married and...

It may be that NFP (versus no conscious family planning) can sometimes make a good marriage better. I can't attest to that. But it DEFINITELY makes a bad marriage worse. After two miserable years I was finally introduced to the BIG PICTURE on Catholic marriage when a friend gave me a copy of Love & Responsibility. But my spouse had no interest in making any effort to redeem the relationship, and so it ended up anulled. So much for NFP being "insurance" against divorce as its promoters claim.

So now that I am happily married, was open to life from the beginning, and am expecting a child after 13 months of marriage, what do I think of NFP? I think it is great that we have the medical knowledge to help couples prudently space children or halt having more children for serious medical or financial reasons, without contraceptives or complete abstinence. But I don't think it is good for newly married couples. The challenges of practicing NFP are a great strain on couples who are establishing their sexual relationship for the first time and otherwise figuring out how to mesh their lives together. Someone told me before I got married the first time, and I agree with her now: if you're not ready to start a family, you're not ready to get married.

I'm really glad to hear that CCL is now extracating the EBF and AP dogmatism from teaching NFP, and explaining it in terms of Theology of the Body instead of just "because the Church says so." This should give it a lot more credibility with young couples, and make it a useful guide to NFP that more accurately portrays the medical and emotional realities.

Whoa. I never realized this was such a hot topic. My husband and I took the CCL courses before we got married. I have always been thankful that we had that information at the start of our marriage. I have ecologically breastfed all of our children, and it has worked really well for us. As far as the spacing goes, I guess I'm on the other end of the spectrum in that my fertility doesn't normally come back for 1 1/2 - 2 years. However, it could be that the nursing tends to make me rather lean (thus delaying it further). Of my friends who breastfeed the same way, none of them go for such a long period of lactation amenorrhea. It was actually frustrating sometimes when I felt ready for another baby, but my body apparently didn't feel the same way.

As far as NFP being Catholic version of contraception, I learned that God gives us the fertile time and the infertile time and we can have sex in whichever we choose. If we choose the fertile time, we just have to be know that we might be having a baby later.

fbc wrote, "However, a pro-NFP position can be made by distinguishing the non-act of not having sexual intercourse, from the action of doing something to avoid pregnancy. In the first example, the NFP practitioners are not acting contrary to God's will, but are simply abstaining from having intercourse during certain well-timed periods of fertility. After all, there's no heavenly mandate as to how often you should have marital relations. In the second instance, the contraception practitioners are actively doing something with the hope of preventing the gift of a new child. In this view, NFP is a legitimate "non-act", while contraception is an illegitimate act."

fbc, I'm not buying this omission/commision distinction. If a couple consciously abstain from relations in order to avoid pregnancy, then they are engaging in contraception, just like those who use condoms.

"...the NFP practitioners are not acting contrary to God's will..." How can you say this?

mdavid, thanks for the compliment.

Assuming your citation of Popcak is accurate, it's just one more reason I don't put any stock in his opinions. Saying that a responsible person always controls fertility is like saying a responsible person keeps all their assets in a stable interest-bearing account. It is one thing to avoid irresponsible spending, and likewise I think people SHOULD avoid having more children in cases where that would put the mother's life in danger or they can't afford to provide even the most basic food and shelter. But many of the best uses of money involve risk-taking: investing in a new business or human capital. You don't know what will happen when you plunk down $50K on business start-up costs or a professional degree, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't do it if you at least have a reasonable prospect of success. Likewise, when you don't try to "control" your fertility, as long as you have a reasonable prospect of being able to handle another child (even if circumstances are less than "optimal"), you open yourself up to great opportunities for blessing.

I think that figuring out how to act in a way that is both prudent (i.e. "good stewardship") and trusting in providence is one of the toughest challenges in Christian life. If you try to "control" everything all the time, from finances to fertility, that is definitely not respectful of the truth about life and providence, and Christ is very explicit in His teachings against that. But prudence also demands some level of planning, work and self-control, and Christ was very explicit in commanding us to be good stewards of our talents too. Exactly WHAT prudence/stewardship demands, especially in the context of fertility, depends so much on individual circumstances: what kind of family support system exists? what kind of broader social support system? what are the personalities and talents of the individuals in the family? if a storm hits, who will suffer and how much? does this action or inaction put someone else at risk of serious harm, particularly someone who had no say in making the decision? what are the potential benefits of having another child? These questions have to be prayerfully and thoughtfully answered by each couple, according to their circumstances. I think in many cases prudence does NOT demand that they avoid or postpone pregnancy, but sometimes it will. One thing I think prudence NEVER demands is adherence to a one-size-fits-all model of spacing children.

kirk, If a couple consciously abstain from relations in order to avoid pregnancy, then they are engaging in contraception

Not by definition. Contraception is the prevention of conception through some act, not through some non-act.

Using your definition, I'm contracepting with every women I'm not having sex with today. Whoo Hoo! Wait till my wife finds out about this...

"...the NFP practitioners are not acting contrary to God's will..." How can you say this?

I think the theory goes that NFP is merely taking advantage of God's natural break in the fertility cycle, and the couple is still open to life if God chooses to have the woman fertile here. I'm not saying I buy this farm, I'm merely sharing what I keep hearing.

Isn't it funny how something like this would never have been spoken of years ago and yet now gets to be hotly debated as to which one is morally right and which group should be damned? I mean, was fertility regulation a topic of moral debate in the Church in 1500? 1750? 1900? And yet here today faithful Catholics kindly discuss or nastily debate how often each other should "do the deed." Is it going a bit too far? I mean, if neither side is using artificial contraception, couldn't the rest just be left up to the individual consciences of the family?

If Catholic mothers don't want to practice ecological breastfeeding, they certainly don't have to. It is a natural and healthy lifestyle, good for both baby and mom, but whether or not to practice it is certainly a prudential judgment.

If mothers would like support and encouragement in choosing this natural and healthy and moral lifestyle, they should read Sheila Kippley's newest book, Breastfeeding and Catholic Motherhood (as well as her older book Breastfeeding and Natural Child Spacing), and join the Catholic Nursing Mothers League (http://www.catholicbreastfeeding.org).

Well, Jennifer, I don't want to pick on Pam, above, but look at her words: "It is a natural and healthy lifestyle, good for both baby and mom, but whether or not to practice it is certainly a prudential judgment....If mothers would like support and encouragement in choosing this natural and healthy and moral lifestyle..."

We women tend to read between the lines a lot, even if we shouldn't. :) When I read, for instance, "natural and healthy and moral lifestyle," I tend to start wondering which other lifestyles, by contrast, are unnatural and unhealthy and immoral.

Now, as a Catholic, I know there *are* unnatural, unhealthy, and immoral ways of living--but I sure don't associate those words with, say, nursing on a schedule, bottle feeding, using the occasional pacifier, etc. So this is where the sense of being judged comes in--whether that's justified or not.

I am not Catholic, but seeing as the Catholic point of view holds that Humanae Vitae and the objection to contraception is part of the "natural law" that is supposed to weigh on everyone, thought I'd comment.

Freddy: Contraception is something that calls for a "cake and eat it" mentality, while periodic abstinance calls for a certain amount of sacrifice. Who would you respect more: someone who stuffs himself at lunch only to induce vomiting so he can eat a big dinner, or someone who foregoes lunch in order to enjoy that dinner?

Freddy, contracepted sex is not analogous to deliberate vomiting. That's about as insulting as making gay marriage analogous to sex with a dog.

mdavid, @ fbc: I'm curious what you would say to a certain wing of thought (say Gregory Popcak or Kathleen van Schaijik) arguing that to not use NFP tends to make one an irresponsible steward of their fertility.

I think the example Popcak gave once is that just like we should watch our money and use it wisely and not just go with the flow, the responsible person always controls their fertility. And, of course, the usual commentary about how NFP improves your relationship, is the best thing since sliced bread, etc. is always included here.

That's a point of view which I don't quite understand. Why should a couple "have" to use NFP? If they're willing to accept the baby that comes, what's the problem with having sex at the time which nature has provided (in many cases) for sex to be experienced at one of its peak times? (Pregnancy and menopause being the others, LOL.)

Similarly, when using NFP myself, I remember reading a fair amount of earnest stuff on how in your 40s and 50s it was "important" to keep using NFP. I went, Huh? and never bothered. Yes, there's a small chance of pregnancy, but as the years go on, it's pretty small indeed, and all the hormonal wackiness will make it such that a fair # of couples won't be having sex at all, given the "noise" in the woman's system.

goodguyex: The young couples for whom NFP is something of a bridge too far need to understand that if their family planning is mostly contraception they will probably get stuck in their ways and will never have NFP when it shines best, in their 30's. And besides, there may still be a few more advances possible with NFP development!

So the main thing is to get them to learn fertility monitoring and take small steps after they fail at straight NFP. Time is on their side and ultimately after several children and the right number of years they can become latex free.

Why do couples "need" NFP in their thirties? There are always some women who will have children until their 40s, but many women find that their fertility starts to significantly decline after 35. It may be that they don't even *need* to restrict themselves after that point. So there's a lot of pointless abstinence being urged on people.

For that matter, why should a couple (especially one without specific religious convictions) aim at becoming "latex free?" It seems to me that combining NFP with the occasional use of barriers at the fertile time would work well for many couples, and bring far more interested people into considering NFP.

My wife and I have taken a few hits in this discussion, so perhaps some clarification may be helpful.
Researchers have known for years that breastfeeding has some sort of influence on the return of fertility, but what researchers found in primitive cultures didn't seem to apply in Westernized cultures. So my wife did basic library research on what others had said and then did her own research. What she found was that mothers who followed the pattern that we called ecological breastfeeding experienced a significant delay of the return of fertility. She also found that each contemporary mother-substitute contributed, when used, to a reduced time of breastfeeding infertility. So it's not a matter of sin or virtue. It's simply a matter of human ecology. The more the baby suckles, the more likely it is that his suckling will postpone the return of fertility. This isn't a matter of religion or crunchiness. It's simply a matter of applied science.
Someone criticized us for not having explained why contraception is a moral evil. Since 1967 I have been putting forth the idea that the marriage act ought to be a renewal of the faith and love and trust and self-gift for better and for worse of the original marriage covenant. The body language of contraception says very clearly, "I take you for better but definitely NOT for the imagined worse of possible pregnancy." That makes it a contradiction of the marriage covenant and thus dishonest and immoral. Sorry if I didn't get that across in whatever of mine you read previously.
For further information, visit the NFP Resources at our website, www.NFPandmore.org . A free NFP "How-To" manual (100 pages) is available at this website and free charts.
John F. Kippley
NFP International

Thanks, Jennifer. Yes, I wrote that EBF is "a" natural, healthy and moral lifestyle. I didn't write that it is "the only" natural, healthy and moral lifestyle, although I am a strong advocate of the practice. I'd admittedly like to see many more women practice it and many more babies benefit from it. But I went on to say that whether or not to do so is a prudential judgment. If you can't say that something is natural, healthy and moral without "making" someone feel guilty who can't or doesn't want to practice it, how are you supposed to talk about it at all? I understand (having been one several times) how sensitive a new mother is to language and how worried she is about doing what's best for babies, and how many differing messages she receives about what is best and how stressful this all is. I am definitely not trying to make any feel judged or defensive.

There are lots of things that are natural and healthy and moral - many of which I do for my children and family and some of which I can't or don't want to do. But I don't feel that those who promote those natural, healthy and moral practices that I can't work out in my lifestyle or feel I don't want to practice should just keep their mouths shut so that I don't have to know about them and feel guilty if I can't work it out or think it's over-the-top or whatever. I like to know as much as I can about health, nature, and morality (which is one reason I like the Crunchy Con blog - it crosses the boundaries on a lot of issues and brings in thoughts and ideas that are typically associated with either the "left" or the "right" that are often not considered by the "other" side) - and then I process what I hear through my brain, consult my heart and my instincts (and my husband!) and pray about it.

Ecological breastfeeding works for a lot of families and it would work with a lot more if there were greater cultural understanding and support for it.

That's all the Catholic Nursing Mothers League is trying to provide. And at this point, we are one of the few groups or organizations where support and info about this practice are to be found, in a faith-based Catholic context. We're just getting off the ground, but we hope to be a good source of support and information for a lot of Catholic moms who are intersted - note that: just those moms who are INTERESTED -in finding it.

Pam, I didn't mean to come across as picking on you particularly. But where you wrote natural, healthy, moral, I've seen others write using superlatives: most natural, most healthy, most moral. And the writer of the post Rod quotes above said this: "No poor mother, especially a young mom having her first baby, should go into motherhood thinking that she has some sort of moral obligation to uphold the 7 commandments of ecological breastfeeding." which, to me, means that some of those presenting this information can get carried away and overly zealous, with the unintentional result of making mothers feel sick with guilt every time they have to put the baby down, whether in a crib, swing, or stroller.

Jennifer wrote "We, as a culture, don't want babies interfereing with our precious adult lives...Now I'm not saying that if you don't follow all 7 standards or do AP you are somehow morally deficient, but you have to admit that many "convenience" baby products are for the convenience of the parent (pacifiers, over used baby seats, swings, strollers, etc....).

It strikes me that this is a bit unfair. We, as a culture, have stopped living in community. We don't have extended families nearby anymore; we don't have grandmothers and single aunts under the same roof with mom and babies. I'll agree that a stroller is a poor substitute for an eager "Nana" who lives across the street (or across the hall), but *that*'s what this stuff is a substitute for, after all! If we look at those primitive communities we love to talk about, the first thing I tend to notice is that they are communities, and that no one is leaving a brand-new mom alone with a colicky baby in a tiny apartment for weeks on end. (And yes, exclusively-breastfed babies can be colicky.). Motherhood requires support, and not the kind you can get on the Internet or over the phone.

Our neighborhoods are like ghost towns during the weekday hours. A mom of a newborn can go days on end without hearing an adult voice other than her husband's, and by the time he's home from work she's frazzled and exhausted. That's a lot less natural than cribs (which, after all, are a major plot point of the medieval "Second Shepherd's Play," so not such a recent invention, btw.).

What I'm trying to say is that it's very hard to be a mother in an age that not only doesn't value motherhood, but that has removed most of the truly natural supports of it (in the form of extended family). We don't need to make it harder by increasing the mother's burden.

Erin,
I mostly agree with you ;) Our culture and lack of community is a problem. The solution? help those new mothers and support those new mothers--bring a meal, offer to hold the baby while mom showers, offer a shoulder to cry on, create mothers groups. Mothers who feel shut in at home need to also reach out and find that support if it isn't right there for them. I know I groused after the birth of my last baby because no one brought me any meals, but I never ASKED anyone to help out, lol, how did they know I would need it (they mistakingly think I have it all together since I have 6 children, lol WRONG)? Sometimes we have to create our own community and that does take effort, and reach out to that community when we need help and that effort is well worth it in the long run.

I do disagree that eco breastfeeding and AP are burdens--I do understand it might not work for everyone, or be the vision of parenthood they have -- and I have done both to varying degrees--it's not all or nothing. It's a different mindset than most current parenting models. I guess I don't fully understand "mother guilt"? We do what's best for our situation--why does having knowledge of the rules of eco breastfeeding have to lead to guilt. It's just a fact that more time at the breast equals a longer stretch of infertile time for most mothers--why is information bad? I think it's freeing. I know if I intro a pacifier because I have too much milk, then I need to monitor my fertility. If I have to offer suppliments because I must work, then I need to monitor my fertility. If I eco breastfeed and still notice signs of returning fertility, then I start monitoring. Knowledge is power.

I hope I'm making sense, it's been a long day. :)

We do what's best for our situation--why does having knowledge of the rules of eco breastfeeding have to lead to guilt.

It's not the knowledge that's the problem, but instead the guilt that is attached to women who choose not to do it or question its efficacy. Somehow you are a bad mother and, worse, a bad Catholic if you don't use it. You are somehow less a committed Catholic and mother if it doesn't work for you. That's a lot of pressure.

Har

I think the assertion that some Catholic moms would feel morally obligated to follow ecological breastfeeding guidelines is a straw dog. I have taught two different NFP methods (CCL and Creighton) and have never met these mothers. Also, it's an assertion which comes out of familiarity with just one method of NFP: CCL's. "Ecological breastfeeding" is not a term used by any other NFP program.

"That's a point of view which I don't quite understand. Why should a couple "have" to use NFP? If they're willing to accept the baby that comes, what's the problem with having sex at the time which nature has provided (in many cases) for sex to be experienced at one of its peak times? (Pregnancy and menopause being the others, LOL.)" Stefanie, above

Exactly. My husband and I are a practicing Catholic couple, parents to 10 children (2 in university, 2 in high school, 6 in elementary school). We're raising them on my husband's teacher's salary and my wages from working weekends in a group home. Yes, we're pretty broke, but we've got food on the table, a roof over our heads, we're clothed and shod. We just don't have money for extras. We have used NFP (believe it or not) to space pregnancies. It was necessary because though I exclusively breastfed all the kids (well, except for the one who was born prematurely at 26 weeks, though I pumped out what I could for her) I never practiced what you'd call EBF. I have no criticisms to make about people who use NFP to limit their family size to one, or two or four kids-- it's between them and God. I operate under the assumption that if they are devout enough to use NFP then they are certainly devout enough to prayerfully discern God's will for them and to make the decision to be as generous as possible according to their own circumstances, financial and otherwise.

By the same token, it was perfectly fine for us to make the prayerfully considered decision to allow ourselves to "throw caution to the wind" after a period of time on NFP, enjoy the love we have for each other, and accept and love the child that may result. We're married, for pete's sake. There is nothing wrong or sinful about that. When we were engaged, and in our subsequent experience as marriage prep course instructors as well as moderators for the diocesan instructors course, we found the whole emphasis of NFP instructors on the control and planning aspect to be a little excessive (which is possibly the root of the heavy emphasis on EBF in some places), to the point where couples were encouraged to plan their wedding date around the woman's cycle, as if it were that crucial to avoid the appearance of a baby in the first year of marriage, as if it were irresponsible to just go ahead and start a family even in less than ideal circumstances. Our own wedding date was during my most fertile time, and we made the decision to not to abstain, since the marriage would not have been consummated until we stopped abstaining, and it made sense to use to finish what we started at the ceremony. Again-- if a couple wishes to abstain on their honeymoon, or plan the wedding date around the woman's cycle, that's between them and God. But don't call me reckless because we didn't. And we soon learned that we couldn't plan so much anyway-- my first two pregnancies ended in miscarriage, so we went from being willing to accept a child in our first year of marriage to genuinely hoping for one, who did arrive a couple of months before our second anniversary.

There is no such thing as the proper way to practice NFP if one is following Church teaching and one's well-formed conscience, just like there is no moral imperative over how breastfeeding is accomplished or how much it is used. These things are opinionable matter.

Oops- sorry for the multiple posts-- wasn't meaning to look like a bully! I was having trouble with firefox's noscript software. Could you possibly remove the duplicates, Rod, if it's not too much trouble? I apologize.

Michelle M: By the same token, it was perfectly fine for us to make the prayerfully considered decision to allow ourselves to "throw caution to the wind" after a period of time on NFP, enjoy the love we have for each other, and accept and love the child that may result. We're married, for pete's sake. There is nothing wrong or sinful about that.

I hear you. For that matter, people can decide to use no birth control OR NFP, and then find that they wind up with only 2 or 3 children. People have this idea that if they don't rigidly control their fertility, they're going to *always* end up like "rabid rabbits." It doesn't always work that way. I went from fertility to natural menopause over the course of 15 years without any b.c. OR fertility awareness, and never got pregnant again after my last pregnancy. That's just how she rolls sometimes.

Children are not only wonderful blessings for their parents (most of the time, anyway), grandparents and other relatives, but also for all of society. The culture of a fertile/fecund community is quite different from that of a sterile community. The former is focused on children--playgrounds, parks, schools, bikeways, stores for kids clothing, toys, food, minivans, etc. The latter is focused on fancy restaurants, and material goods of limited practicality. The church attendance and crime rates are different. I believe that children are the answer to many of our culture's problems.