Natural & Harmless Birth Control Methods Every Woman Should Know
These two natural birth control methods don’t involve the use of barriers like diaphragms or condoms or the use of chemicals such as spermicides, oral contraceptive pills, “emergency contraceptives,” or abortifacient birth control drugs. Unlike all those methods, the methods described below are completely natural and completely safe for the woman, the man, and any children they may conceive.
1. Natural Family Planning (or NFP)
This method of birth control teaches you to identify the time of fertility (often lasting 7 to 10 days) in a menstrual cycle. To avoid pregnancy a couple abstains from intercourse during this time.
There are several natural methods of birth control in which a woman detects the signs of fertility in certain natural changes that occur in each menstrual cycle. Get more information on birth control here. In order to determine the time of fertility, three methods can be used:
1. The Mucus Method in which a woman charts characteristics of her cervical mucus.
2. The Temperature Method in which a woman charts her body temperature upon waking. Her temperature is relatively low around the time of ovulation. Then three successive days of elevated temperature indicate that the time of fertility has ended.
3. The Sympto-Thermal Method in which a woman charts both cervical mucus characteristics and body temperature upon waking.
2. Lactational Amenorrhea Method (or LAM)
This method can only be used by a woman who is breastfeeding a newborn child. Breastfeeding several hours a day maintains the mother’s body in a state of infertility. Fertility may return after 6 months, but often does not return until around 1 year.
Birth Control Methods that Cause Abortions
1. The Pill – Progesterone only, low dose combination pills
The Physician’s Desk Reference lists the above hormonal contraceptives as having three mechanisms of action: 1) Prevent ovulation, 2) Thicken the cervical mucus to prevent sperm from entering the uterus and fallopian tube, and 3) Alter the lining of the uterus so implantation cannot take place. The third action, if and when it occurs, is abortifacient since in this case a new human being has been created but this human being is killed because she is prevented from receiving the nourishment provided by her mother’s uterine wall). Although pro-life physicians continue to debate if and how often hormonal contraceptives interfere with the implantation of an embryo, it is important to educate ourselves and our clients about this potential action of the Pill. Those who seek to protect the sanctity of human life from the point of fertilization should be cautious about taking any drug that could end the developing child’s life.
For more information:
Does the Birth Control Pill Cause Abortions?
The Pill: Contraceptive or Abortifacient?
2. Morning after pill
Large doses of existing birth control pills (or another drug levonorgestrel, known as Plan B) are given up to 72 hours after intercourse to attempt to prevent the implantation of the embryo. A second dose is given 12 hours after the first one. The action of these large doses of hormonal birth control pills works to prevent ovulation and/or fertilization.
3. Norplant
This implant is placed under the skin of the arm for up to a 5 year period. The progesterone hormone’s effect is to suppress ovulation, but after 2 years, there is a greater chance of break-through ovulation and fertilization. The hormone may then prevent implantation of the embryo.
4. Depo-Provera
This Progesterone (hormone) derivative is injected every 3 months to prevent a woman from ovulating, but it also alters the uterine lining. Break-through ovulation and fertilization may occur, though less frequently than with Norplant. The drug may then prevent implantation of the embryo.
5. RU-486
When a woman is given RU-486 (also called mifepristone), it kills her baby by interfering with progesterone, the hormone that keeps the baby implanted in the wall of the mother’s uterus. Two days later, the woman returns to the clinic to receive a prostaglandin drug that induces labor and expels the dead embryo. (RU-486 is used until 7 weeks after the first day of a mother’s last menstrual period.) If the baby hasn’t been expelled by the time the woman makes her third visit to the doctor, she will require a surgical abortion procedure (5-8% likelihood). Raymond, Klein & Dumble, the pro-abortion authors of RU486 Misconceptions, Myths and Morals (IWT Pub, 1991) stress that RU-486 is not safe for women and list the following contraindications (reasons a person should not take RU-486): under age 18 or over age 35; menstrual irregularities; history of fibroids, abnormal menstrual bleeding or endometriosis, cervical incompetence, previous abortion, or abnormal pregnancies; pelvic inflammatory disease; recent use of IUD or the pill (3 months).
6. Methotrexate & Misoprostol
Two drugs that were developed for cancer treatment (methotrexate) and ulcer treatment (misoprostol) are now being used in combination to kill babies. Methotrexate is used to poison the baby and then misoprostol empties the uterus of the baby. Keep in mind that methotrexate is a chemotherapy drug with the potential for serious toxicity, which can result in the death of the mother as well as the baby. (“Methotrexate & Misoprostol to Terminate Early Pregnancy,” R. Hausknecht, New England Journal of Medicine, vol. 333, no. 9, Aug 31, 1995, p. 537; “Methotrexate & Misoprostol,” M. Creinin et al., JAMA, Oct 19, 1994)