What NFP did to me....

Let me introduce you to my "NFP Baby."

This is Ruthie.  Technically, this *was* Ruthie about a month ago, but it might be my most favourite picture taken of her so far in her short little life.   It just captures her personality so very well.

Ruthie's my NFP baby.  NFP, as in, Natural Family Planning.  You know, what people like to (wrongly) call "the rhythm method."   When most people talk about a NFP baby, they usually mean that they were trying to avoid getting pregnant and oops, God had other plans.  Not so much with this little girl.  She's here as a direct result of NFP, but not because of the fact that NFP failed.......nope.  NFP *worked* in her case.

I don't even mean that NFP worked in the case of diagnosing a medical problem and allowing someone to get pregnant, even though that's what most people mean when they say they used NFP to get pregnant, or the NFP "worked" for them to have a baby.

It's more than that.

NFP is so scary to so many people because of one main reason, I think.  It isn't because it doesn't work.  Statistically, NFP works.   If you don't want to get pregnant, there's a really high chance that you won't get pregnant, assuming that you're using the method correctly.  (side note:  birth control fails a lot, due to the fact that most people don't use it perfectly, too).   But what I think most people intuitively know about NFP - and why so many scoff at it - is that NFP works on more than just your reproductive system.  NFP works on your heart.

Almost exactly 6 years ago, I remember sitting in a rocking chair, singing a baby to sleep.  One who looked quite a bit like the baby in the picture above.  (It's kind of eerie, actually, how much my babies look alike).  I spent most of those nights rocking my little boy to sleep, trying to sing through tears.  Trying desperately to remember every little detail about him as a baby, about those sleepless nights, about rocking him to sleep.    Simultaneously relishing every coo and sleepy smile while mourning the idea of rocking future babies to sleep.

The weeks following his birth scared me.   A lot.   An emergency room visit just a few days postpartum where people are urgently trying to find the right medication combination to get you out of a situation that is apparently very dangerous (the word "stroke" was mentioned A LOT) will do that.   Being terrified to stand up and do even the simplest of household chores (empty the dishwasher, anyone?), while mothering a baby who is only a few days old (in addition to his two big brothers) leaves a mark on a person.  I felt like a ticking time bomb.

Eventually, my body decided to play nice again and I was able to live a normalish life.   Those first few weeks, though, had scarred me.   Convinced that it was "too dangerous" to attempt a future pregnancy, we decided that we needed to be "done."  

We'd always been Catholic, and had always known that the Church said that birth control was wrong, but what about what had just happened?   Wouldn't my risk of that happening again be too dangerous and surely, the Church would look the other way on this one?   I'd convinced myself that this was the case, and surely I could find a priest somewhere who would agree and would ease my conscience a bit.

But then we started reading.   Mike started researching more and more.  I started reading more and more about the risks associated with birth control (ummmm, strokes, anyone?) and realized that, after what I'd just been through, birth control wasn't the way to go, either.   

And then we learned about some really cool things happening in the Catholic world.  Namely, NaProTechnology.   I started to chart, and Mike and I watched as we were able to see pretty clear proof of just how unhealthy my body was.  We watched as I changed my diet and started exercising, or took various supplements, and my chart changed.  It started to look like it should have looked to begin with - the healthy chart of a woman in her early 30s.  

It was really quite overwhelming and awesome.

But wait, there's more!

NFP was "working" to bring me to a healthier me, physically. 

But what it was doing to me spiritually was equally fascinating. 

Natural Family Planning can be really hard at times.   When there are no synthetic hormones messing with your system, certain times of the month can be really challenging.  (All you NFPers out there are nodding in agreement, I can tell).  It's in these challenging times that NFP does its real, true work.   It knocks knocks knocks on the walls that you've built up around your heart and asks you over and over again to let God in.   

Each month, that knocking is there.  God's waiting for you to turn to Him and say, "What do YOU want from me right now?"   After awhile, once NFP has been hard at work on your heart, you'll find that gone is the "me" mentality.  It's not so much about what "I want" out of life anymore.  It's about what *we* want out of life (we being me, Mike, and God.  All three of us).   I stopped only looking in, but started looking UP.

Natural Family Planning works in a way that no statistic can measure, and that's why it's so terrifying to people.

NFP forces your heart to grow.   It's painful at times and yes, sometimes it can bring about something (cough cough someONE) that you never would have asked for on your own accord, but that's when you know that the real work is being done inside of you.

Ruthie wasn't supposed to be here.   Six years ago, I was rocking a baby to sleep and planning out when and how to sell the rocking chair.   I was staring down at a sleeping baby and thinking "This is my last time."

I sit here tonight, listening to her sigh in her sleep and feeling her hands fiddling with the medals on my chain (she loves to do this in her sleep, it's so cute!), and I can't help but mentally jump back in time and find myself holding back tears in a darkened nursery.

I'm holding back tears tonight, too.

Tears of gratefulness.  Tears of joy.  Tears of love.

NFP works.   That's why it's so scary.