75. Beyond the Myths: Fertility Awareness Methods

In this episode, Dr. Monica Minjeur dispels five common myths about fertility awareness methods (FAMs). From clearing up misconceptions about the rhythm method to highlighting how FAMs can work for irregular cycles, this episode is packed with evidence-based insights. Learn how modern science makes FAMs highly effective, empowering tools for fertility and health tracking. Tune in to take charge of your reproductive health!  

Transcript

Monica: 0:01

Before we get into the episode today, I want to make sure you know about my free discovery calls. If you are interested in learning how the medical services I provide would be a good fit for you, go to our website, radiantclinic. com and click on the link that says book free discovery call. You can choose a time to chat with me about our process and how I can help you achieve your menstrual cycle and fertility goals. I'm looking forward to visiting more with you soon. And now onto the episode. Welcome back to Cycle Wisdom, where we empower women to restore natural menstrual cycles to improve health and promote fertility. I'm your host, Dr. Monica Minjeur, and I'm so glad you're listening today. As we start off this new year, I am going through an educational series to dispel some of the common myths that are out there in the world in regards to women's health and restorative reproductive medicine. Today's focus will be all about fertility awareness based methods. Now, if you think fertility awareness methods are just a modern twist on the outdated rhythm method that your grandma used, think again. Today, we're going to be busting five common myths about fertility awareness methods that hold so many women back from using these empowering tools that can help you to take charge of your health and fertility. In today's episode, I'm going to be debunking these common myths and misconceptions and show you why fertility awareness methods are so much more than you might think. So let's get started with myth number one, and this is Fertility awareness methods are just the rhythm method. Now, this dates back to understanding, first of all, what the rhythm method is. So, the rhythm method was actually created way back in 1930. So, that's almost a hundred years ago. And this relied on counting days and, quite honestly, just kind of guessing it when your fertility is. Now, the rhythm method is based on the assumption that you have a normal cycle every month and what normal means is that your cycle is happening every 28 days you have a bleed and that you are ovulating on day 14. Now, we know that modern fertility awareness methods rely on many different daily biomarkers, things like tracking your cervical mucus. Basal body temperature, hormone levels, urinary metabolites, all of these things which can pinpoint in real time what's actually going on with your fertility. When we look at the science of things, the rhythm method being so outdated just really relied on this whole notion that everything 28 day cycle. And the reality is that most of the times women are not going to fall on that exact cycle. day 14 of ovulation. Now this does occur in women that have normal cycles about 30 to 40 percent of the time, but the other percentages of the time, you're not going to ovulate exactly on day 14. And so it makes it a much less effective method to utilize, especially if you are trying to avoid a pregnancy. So how do fertility awareness methods work currently? Now, there's been decades of research done in this past hundred years that really allow us to break down reproductive physiology and use objective data in order to meet the needs of each individual that's using them. So many of the newer methods that are out there, from Billings to Creighton model to Neofertility and FEM and Symptothermal method. All of these rely on utilization of different biomarkers that you are seeing from day to day rather than just looking at a calendar. So myth number one debunked, fertility awareness is just the rhythm method reimagined. In fact, fertility awareness methods are not a one size fits all. You are able to customize your method and this is grounded in modern science. It's not outdated guesswork. Myth number two. Fertility awareness methods are ineffective at preventing pregnancy. Now there's a common misconception out there that these methods are unreliable and ineffective compared to other forms of contraception. And unfortunately, I will have to take part of the blame for this. For the medical profession. Many of us throughout our medical school career are taught that fertility awareness methods are the same as these rhythm methods, and we are told they are very ineffective. In fact, we know that many times the rhythm method has been shown to be only about 70 percent effective at preventing pregnancy. which means that even if you're following the guidelines for this method, about 30 percent of the time you're going to get pregnant if you weren't intending to do so. And so unfortunately, because this rhythm method is oftentimes what is taught as fertility awareness in many medical schools, that is oftentimes the education that doctors receive, and therefore that's oftentimes the education that they pass on to their patients down the road. So the reality is, is that these more modern methods are very, very effective at preventing pregnancy. In fact, many of them approach an effective rate of about 95 to 99 percent for preventing pregnancy if that's your intention to do so. For comparison's sake, the oral birth control pill is about the same efficacy if you are using it perfectly, meaning you're taking it at exact the same time every day. It approaches about 95 percent effectiveness at pregnancy prevention. However, I do want to call out one piece with this is that just like with any other method, you can have incorrect use or inconsistent use, and you may have people in your life that you know of that say they're using fertility awareness. But if they aren't actually following the guidelines every day, if they're not actually making their observations and actually utilizing the method, then that would be user error. That does not necessarily mean that the method itself is ineffective. So, let's compare for a second a couple of numbers. There are also pieces to look at in regards to typical use versus perfect use. And so what this means is typical use is the average person that's using one of these methods. And so some of these methods will say they have about 88 to 89 percent. typical use. Now, that can be pretty common, meaning maybe I didn't make an observation today, or maybe my observation wasn't complete versus perfect use, meaning I am making 100 percent of my observations. I have a serious reason that I want to try and avoid a pregnancy. And then these methods can be up to 99 percent effective. One of the other big wins that we've had in the past few decades is the ability to add on and utilize. apps and other resources to help women in tracking their cycles accurately, which also will reduce errors. One final note is that oftentimes when there are medical studies looked at women who are utilizing fertility awareness methods, they don't necessarily take into account if a woman was using the method that particular cycle in order to avoid a pregnancy or in order to try to conceive. And so this makes it really difficult then for a research study to say, well, what was the actual intention of the user at the time? As opposed to, if somebody is on hormonal birth control and they are using it to avoid pregnancy, the intention is to avoid pregnancy every single cycle. One of the beautiful things about fertility awareness methods are that you can change your intention. And so if a research study doesn't take this into account, it can actually make those numbers look a whole lot worse, which is oftentimes why we see the research is skewed in favor of saying, hey, fertility awareness methods may not be effective. You now know fertility awareness methods can be highly effective when used correctly, even surpassing the efficacy of oral birth control pills. This empowers women to either try and avoid a pregnancy or try to conceive naturally each cycle with confidence. Myth number three. Fertility awareness methods are only for avoiding pregnancy. Now, many couples do learn a fertility awareness method in order to avoid pregnancy, but that's only one part of the story. Specifically in the world of restorative reproductive medicine, we use these fertility awareness methods in order to help women try to conceive by identifying the most fertile days in their cycle. This becomes incredibly useful for couples who may be struggling with subfertility or just trying to time things appropriately. Another great use for fertility awareness methods is monitoring your health. You've heard me talk a lot on the podcast about how your menstrual cycle and that sign of ovulation is really another vital sign. By observing the biomarkers that you see and identify, this helps to provide insights into your overall health. Things like irregular cycles, hormone imbalances, thyroid issues, and other menstrual conditions like PCOS. or endometriosis can all be evaluated and determined and figured out through charting your cycles with a fertility awareness method. In fact, I have a story about a client that we recently saw who came to us just for charting instruction. She just wanted to know how to track her cycles because she thought it was something that was interesting. And one of the things that her charting instructor was able to pick up was that she actually had a really short luteal phase. Now, if she had just been looking at the timing of her cycles from one menstrual period to the next, she was at about 30 days, and so things seemed to be normal for her. However, once she started to see when she was ovulating, which was somewhat later in her cycle, we found this short luteal phase, so again, from the time she ovulated until her next cycle. period began. And in her case, it was only about seven or eight days. And what we know is, is that a short luteal phase can cause increased chances of miscarriage when it's time to become pregnant. And so by identifying this early on, she was able to come and see me for medical evaluation and treatment. So we were able to manage what was going on with that short luteal phase, help to get it back to a normal length. So that when she did eventually try to go on to conceive a pregnancy, that she didn't have to worry about miscarriage because we had corrected the underlying abnormality from the start. So again, fertility awareness methods are not just for avoiding pregnancy. They can be a powerful tool to understand your body, to try and conceive, and even to uncover underlying health conditions completely separate from just fertility itself. Myth number four. Fertility awareness methods are too complicated or maybe inconvenient. Many people believe that fertility awareness methods are too hard to learn or they require too much effort or time for the average person. Now I will admit that there is a learning curve up front. However, many of the methods have certified instructors. online courses, apps, books, guides, all sorts of things to guide a woman and a couple as far as how to utilize these fertility awareness methods effectively. Once these systems are learned, most fertility awareness take less than a few minutes each day to track the biomarkers like cervical mucus or basal body temperature. In fact, fertility awareness methods can be tailored to fit the needs of any woman. individual, whether you are a working professional, a busy mom, a high school or college age student, or anywhere along the spectrum, you can learn how to fit this into your daily habits. The other amazing thing we know is, is that it does not depend upon what level of health literacy you have, or even if you are able to read or write, if you can still learn how to make an observation of your own body. you can learn a fertility awareness method. The last point I'd like to make along with this is that when we look at the cost comparison of learning a fertility awareness method versus the long term use of either contraceptives or fertility treatments like IVF, overall, fertility awareness methods are far less expensive in the long run, plus we're able to minimize side effects that can come from these other uses like contraception or artificial reproductive technologies. So, fertility awareness methods are accessible, they are simple, and they can be adapted to any lifestyle. With the right resources, training, and time, it can become second nature to make these observations and just make it a part of your daily routine. Myth number five. Fertility awareness methods can't work. for women with irregular cycles. Now, oftentimes we hear that women with irregular cycles think that fertility awareness methods are not an option for them. You know, they may have tried an app that just didn't seem to time things appropriately. And the reality is, is that so many of these are, again, based on the RITHA method that has that assumption. that you're having a regular 28 day cycle. However, just because you have irregular cycles does not mean that your fertility, your biomarkers, and your ovulation are unable to be tracked. In fact, biomarkers like cervical mucus and hormone testing work regardless of your cycle length or regularity. Conditions like PCOS, thyroid imbalance. Breastfeeding, amenorrhea, irregular cycles, all of these can be accommodated by fertility awareness methods. As I mentioned earlier in this episode, fertility awareness methods that are modern are designed to be flexible and responsive to each woman's unique cycle patterns. Great example is that a woman with irregular cycles wouldn't want to use rhythm method in order to track her cycles. But she may find great benefit from using a method like Neofertility or a Creighton model in order to track cervical mucus. Perhaps she would utilize Marquette method or a Symptothermal method or FEM to add in that extra layer of either hormone testing via urine strips or temperature in order to be able to identify what exactly is going on with her cycles. So there is always a fertility awareness method out there that can work for you, but it doesn't mean that all of the methods are going to work equally. Even with irregular cycles, fertility awareness methods can empower you to track your fertility and your health very effectively. So here's our summary from today. Number one, fertility awareness methods are just the rhythm method. False. They are based in modern science with new advances. Number two, fertility awareness methods are ineffective at preventing pregnancy. False. They are highly effective when used properly and even better than oral birth control pills in most cases. Number three, fertility awareness methods are only for avoiding pregnancy. False. They can be used as tools for health, fertility, and solving problems for other menstrual concerns. Number four, fertility awareness methods are too complicated or inconvenient. False. They can be simple with the right support and knowing there is a learning curve, but you can get to the point of having less than one minute of observations daily. And number five, fertility awareness methods don't work for women with irregular cycles. False. Different methods can be adaptable to any cycle pattern. Now, if you've been hesitant to explore fertility awareness methods, Or want to learn more about how they can transform your health and fertility, visit our website or schedule a consultation today. It's time to take control of your reproductive health with evidence based empowering tools. Fertility awareness methods are not just about fertility. They're about understanding and honoring your body. Thanks for tuning in today to help me change the narrative around women's health. By debunking one myth at a time. If you're ready to work with our elite team of healthcare professionals, go to our website, radiantclinic. com, to schedule a free discovery call with me and learn more about our package based pricing for comprehensive care. We are currently able to see people for in person appointments in our Cedar Rapids, Iowa clinic. Or can arrange for a telehealth visit if you live in the states of Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, and Michigan, and more states coming soon. Thank you so much for listening to this episode. Please share this podcast with someone in your life who would benefit from our services. Remember to subscribe to this podcast for more empowering content that I look forward to sharing with you on our next episode of Cycle Wisdom.