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in essence quite simple and actually very close to themselves. It has diverted lay people away from gaining the answers they need
I also happen to think that women (mothers in particular) have been lax in communicating this knowledge, and have too frequently delegated that responsibility to outsiders and so-called experts, a fault we should resolve not to repeat with our own daughters.
It may well be that many external influences have helped to make us ignorant, distrustful, even fearful of our own bodies, but the third and greatest contributing factor to any state of ignorance is that we ourselves have failed to want to know. If the information is out there – or more accurately within us – and we have not been in search of it, who’s fault is that? But rather than identifying causes and attaching blame, I am far more into turning women onto what they can do, now, for themselves, to change all that.
Once we have that spark which makes us want to know, and that motivation to begin, utilising that knowledge for self empowerment becomes easy and incredibly productive. In short, with a little bit of reading followed by some personal observation and experimentation, the answers are really only as far away as your vagina and your own brain!
Natural fertility awareness is a way of inte-grating all the signs and symptoms that every woman has at her disposal to understand and manage her fertility, either for the purposes of conception, contraception, or just all round reproductive health. It combines several systems, some ancient and some more modern. Lunar Fertility
In the 1950’s a Czechoslovakian psychiatrist, Dr Eugene Jonas, combined his interest in astrology with his work helping Catholic women who were using the “rhythm” or “calendar” method (see page 115) as a (fairly unsuccessful) form of contraception. He understood the effects the moon and its cycle had on many aspects of earthly life: the tides, plants and the breeding cycles of many animals. He postulated that the moon’s cycle (also about 29.5 days) may also have an effect on a woman’s fertility cycle of women.
He then researched the ancient cultures that were known to have a
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sophisticated understanding of astronomy and astrology and came upon references to a woman’s cycle being controlled by the phases of the moon. He reasoned that because women don’t all cycle together at the same phase of the moon each month, yet they do cycle for the same duration as a lunar month, there must be some individual factor governing their fertility cycle.
In combination with a gynaecologist Dr Kurt Rechnitz, Jonas realised that a spontaneous ovulation was occurring at a particular phase of the moon in each woman – which also explained why there were so many unexpected pregnancies with the basic rhythm method. Through astronomical calculations they figured out that these spontaneous ovulations were occurring at exactly the same phase of the moon in which the woman was born.
Jonas began testing this theory, getting women to abstain during the peak of their lunar cycle as well as at the rhythm method time of ovulation. Popularity in his system grew and it was tested on many thousands of women with a 98.5% success rate – brought up from 65% which was the best results attained by the rhythm method alone.
These discoveries were an important stage in the renaissance of natural fertility and contracep-tion practice. By calculating one’s natal lunar angle, (that is the angle between the moon and the earth at time of birth) and by calculating that into the future, each woman then has an accurate record of her particular times of lunar ovulation.
Deep dark sister
pull me under
down into the red sea of dreams
wash me
flood me
empty me out
then together we will fill
again. Mucus Observations
In the 1960’s, Australian doctors Evelyn and John Billings began their work of looking for an effective and fully natural contraceptive method as a response to global over-population and the moral conflicts arising from the newly developed hormonal and termination methods of contracep-tion. They investigated the relationship between a woman’s fertility and the changes in her vaginal mucus secretions and found that, in combination with the long established (but pretty unreliable) rhythm method, contraceptive reliability could be increased up to 98%. |
