Teaching Teens Fertility Awareness
— Posted by Annie (March 24, 2007 at 8:33 am)
There was an interesting article in the Washington Post the other day on whether or not teen aged girls should be taught about their fertility. It seems like both sides are afraid to teach Fertility Awareness (also known as Natural Family Planning or NFP). Those in favor of “comprehensive sex ed” say it’s too complicated and teens won’t follow through. Teens would rely on only part of the method and not be fully “protected.” (Funny – we say the same thing when it comes to teens and birth control – teens won’t follow through). The abstinence-only folks think that it will cause teens to become sexually active since they will now know when to avoid sex to avoid pregnancy.
But as one of the commentator noted on Fructus Ventris where I first saw the article, “Why does everything have to be about sex?” I agree. It’s a basic fact of biology that I think young women should be taught. How can you teach young women about menstruation and leave her fertility out of the picture? A girl’s cycle doesn’t make any sense without the fertile phase. Sure, a young woman could use this information to avoid pregnancy, but I would guess she’s most likely sexually active anyway.
Ideally it would be best to teach Fertility Awareness in the context of respect for sex, but I don’t think that’s absolutely necessary. Again, it’s basic biology. Perhaps learning about how the reproductive system works would bring about a better understanding of the nature of sex to some degree. I don’t think we can be afraid to teach something good because it could possibly be abused.
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Sunnyday says:
It’s a legitimate concern but it’s worth remembering that teaching fertility awareness is (or ought to be) education in life and love, not just about the workings of the human body. This is a great opportunity to teach them about relationships and sex in the context of love, marriage, God’s design.
The knowledge of fertility awareness may be abused, but I agree with you Annie — that’s no reason not to educate people about it.
Comment posted March 24th, 2007 at 6:37 pm
Young Christian Woman says:
I agree it should be taught. It could help girls recognize problems with their bodies, if were any. Now the only way that many women find out about reproductive disorders, generally, is trying to get pregnant and failing, but many of these affect other aspects of health as well.
The concepts behind evolution are complicated, and so is birth control in its many forms, and many other things that teenagers are required to learn about.
Comment posted March 25th, 2007 at 5:18 am
Michael-2 says:
Yes, let us go for it. As the Billings people say this is “knowledge every woman should have”. It could be used to increase promiscuity but I can see that it could help some young ladies in another way. They will know when most to avoid “vulnerable times and situations” not just because they could become pregnant, but also because for many women this fertile time leading up to ovulation is the time when they are most interested in the opposite sex. So in observing both their body and they mind they will see how their full anatomy is trying to make itself pregnant. I am not a woman but if they want to be chaste this could give them warning signs and so they could avoid the more tempting situations at these times; or so it looks that way to me.
Comment posted March 27th, 2007 at 8:02 am