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Along with five other of my friends, Lindsay has decided to get hitched this summer. Therefore, our conversation went quickly from my stupid life stories, to her classes to…
Birth control!
Don’t most twenty-seven year old girls go to bars with “dragon” in their name, rows of picnic tables and soccer jerseys hanging from the ceiling, to talk about hormones? We do. And if you want to understand how we feel about this topic by equating us to a historical event it would go like this:
Characters:
Yep, I just equated my blog to the Washington Post, and yes, technically I am an “informant” to… “myself.”
Diving head first into this topic I have read many books and articles, spoken and corresponded with some incredible people who have great insight and wisdom. One question makes me have ten more questions and wanting to scream:
“Nobody realizes what is going on!”
“The pharmaceutical companies are against us!”
“That guy behind the bar looks a lot like Chuck Colson!”
I want to eventually address different birth control methods that are available, as well as how I think birth control can positively or negatively affect our relationships. But for now I want to take a look at the natural cycle of things relating to what man is and what man does.
A book called The Red Tent, which was written by a Jewish historian, tells the story of “unclean” women (due to their menstrual cycles) who are sent to the outskirts of the city. This was always odd when I read it in the Old Testament, but after reading this book, I realized what a sacred event this was.
Women didn’t have the convenience of tampons or Midol, so they had to stop working and simply lay on hay, sleep, eat, talk and laugh. As any female knows, when you are living in community with other women, you tend to get your periods at the same time. This became a place where women shared secrets, wisdom and where the young women had their “rights of passage” into womanhood.
Just like a mandatory Sabbath, there was rest, induced by the natural cycle of the female body. I can’t imagine how in tune the women must have been with their periods coming, when it was ending, and I would imagine, when they were fertile. I am not proposing that we throw the Midol out, but maybe we should at least stop and think about how our body was designed. What natural functions and cycles are telling us to rest, be still or heaven forbid listen to our body instead of popping a Midol and getting on with our oh-so-busy lives?
Think about it, on birth control, you are taking a pill or have a device in your body that is releasing hormones EVERY single day. If we were told we had to take a pill for the rest of our life, wouldn’t we be concerned about the side effects? Dr. Joseph P. Smith wrote to me last week saying “for every dollar spent on a drug in this country, there is a dollar spent on another drug to manage the side-effect.”
I don’t know if we can say that is always the case, but even if it is 50% true in the case of birth control, ESPECIALLY when there are alternatives that are just as effective, save money, keep the woman’s natural cycle in place and have no possible side effects, why are more people not informed?!?
This is where Deep Throat comes in. But I’ll save that for next week…
In the meantime, it seems important to look around and note nature’s natural ebb and flow. There are seasons for rest, growth, new life and even death. Where we see dysfunction, there is an irritant, messing up that order. Sometimes nature can adjust, evolve or compensate, but other times, all that is left is clarity in hindsight, with irreparable damages.
Question:
1) Instead of looking more at what man does and simply following because it works now, shouldn’t we look at what man is and think about the future effects of our current actions?
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Love and Respect (Now) is a division of Love and Respect. Please be considerate.
I am all for being mindful of what we're putting into our bodies (even "lady pee" – thank you Stephen Colbert). And I think it's important to ask questions when big companies are running the ship with a lot to lose.
But… I also know girls/women, myself included, who are so thankful for the pill for reasons besides not getting pregnant. Not every body is created the same, and maybe we're a small fraction of all women, but the pill can be GOOD. For some, it alleviates intense pain that causes nausea or worse, or takes care of problems with acne.
I will take responsibility for putting an extra amount of estrogen in the water stream, and perhaps a visit to a naturopath doctor would be a good first step in determining alternative treatments. And by the time I get married, I'll probably be ready to ditch the pill and have a kid. But in the meantime, I'm happy.
Just another side to the story…
i have to say i dont really have too many thoughts on this as birth control is not an active part of my life. first off bc of the obvious, iam a guy and secondly iam a single guy so it doesnt have as much of a direct impact on my life quite yet. Though I am thoroughly enjoying the engagement that is being brought up. .
the larger question at hand, which i think joy astutely addresses through birth control, is how in tune we are with how God created us.
"Just like a mandatory Sabbath, there was rest, induced by the natural cycle of the female body"
This is a really great observation that had never even occured to me. it is amazing to see some more of the reasons behind God creating humanity the way He did. I think it helps us be more open to other radical possibilities that we might not see and be more open to what he has intended for us.
so, i dont want to derail the conversation but do you think there is any natural occurence in men that pushes us to commune with one another? i cant think of one that is quite as apparent.
i definitely feel that drug companies are blinding us to many truths that need to be discovered about our bodies and how we live in them. Masking issues or artificially creating health to make us "feel" better but not actually be any healthier is something we should really reconsider and take a step back to get another possible prospective.
To start to answer your question I feel that we should indeed look at who man is, or perhaps more accurately, what man was made to be bc right now “what man is” probably shouldn’t be given too much heed. We do need to pay more attention to how God created our bodies to function perfectly on this earth.
We should most certainly not simply accept what works now and in the immediate future as prudent and wise. If we gave into everything that felt good or was pleasurable in the present there would be no foresight or an understanding about the larger context in which we would be participating in.
With little introspection we can see how that is folly…I think of plato and how he put forth that “reason” should rule over “spirit and appetite” and then we will be functioning properly. in my own estimation we will be closer to what God intended for us if we participate in this idea of how to function.
Kathy, I don’t want you to feel like iam coming down hard on all of birth control as your concerns and physical needs are completely legitimate and definitely need to be considered when approaching how birth control should be distributed and used.
this is zeph signing off…
*corinne thinks...
"What natural functions and cycles are telling us to rest, be still or heaven forbid listen to our body instead of popping a Midol and getting on with our oh-so-busy lives?"
Been having similar thoughts the last few months, intrigued by yours and happy you're exploring the topic, can't wait for more…
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