Become Who You Are
What’s the meaning and purpose of my life? What is my true identity? Why were we created male and female? How do I find happiness, joy and peace? How do I find love that lasts, forever? These are the timeless questions of the human heart. Join Jack Rigert and his guests for lively insights, reading the signs of our times through the lens of Catholic Teaching and the insights of Saint John Paul ll to guide us.
Saint Catherine of Siena said "Become who you are and you would set the world on fire".
Become Who You Are
#605 Top Reasons To Get Off Birth Control: With Natural Womanhood CEO Gerard Migeon
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Gerard Migeon, CEO of Natural Womanhood, takes us on a compelling journey through the world of fertility awareness and women's health that challenges conventional wisdom about birth control and reproductive healthcare. What began as a personal awakening when he returned to his Catholic faith evolved into a mission to fill the knowledge gap around natural approaches to family planning and women's health.
The conversation reveals how the medical system routinely prescribes hormonal contraceptives as a one-size-fits-all solution for everything from irregular periods to serious conditions like endometriosis. This approach masks symptoms rather than addressing root causes, often delaying proper diagnosis by years and creating cascading health problems.
Particularly fascinating is the discussion about relationship dynamics. Couples who practice natural family planning report deeper communication, mutual trust, and even stronger physical intimacy.
Ready to discover what your body is trying to tell you?
Visit https://naturalwomanhood.org/
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I'm excited to be with Gerard Mijon. I was going to make sure that I say your French name properly, Gerard. It's such a pleasure to have you. Thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker 2:My pleasure Great to be here with you, Jack.
Speaker 1:Well, john Paul II Renewal Center, gerard, we do a lot of work with young people, a lot of work with engaged people. You know we have the Maha movement coming on now, right, make America healthy again. Young people are waking up. It's really something More than men, more than men so far, but but I think the women are going to be following them. This I'm talking about generation z high school up until, say, 27, 28. They're seeing something's wrong, right, if something's wrong with big pharma, the big medicine. Somebody's worried about money more than they are about my body, and they're really exploring things.
Speaker 1:So, anyways, the way I found you and Gerard is the CEO of Natural Womanhood, and what an amazing resource. I got on there because I read this article called 10 Reasons to Consider Getting Off Birth Control and Starting Fertility Awareness, and so, as I'm poking around, I go holy moly, all those questions that these young people are asking me. You have it there, gerard. So tell us a little bit about natural womanhood, how you got started, and then I want to dive in and talk about some of these, really some of these questions about women's cycles, why they really need to look at coming back into this natural. Our bodies are just incredible, and somehow we've gotten away from understanding our own bodies, gerard. So, hey, it's great to be with you.
Speaker 1:We'll be right back with Gerard, but I want to introduce our sponsor for today's show AIM Utility Advisors, owned and operated by the Lally family, who are local Catholic friends and supporters of our work here at the John Paul II Renewal Center and everything that's true, good and beautiful. So is your business prepared for the increased energy prices starting in June of 2025? Aim Utility Advisors is a family-owned energy brokerage and consultancy company that has been helping small and medium businesses reduce energy costs for over 30 years. Aim will put together a straightforward savings plan tailored to your business needs. Aim operates without a quota, so you can request a no-pressure cost analysis for free right through their website, which is aimenergygroupcom. That's aimenergygroupcom. That's aimenergygroupcom. See the show notes from my friend TJ Lawley's direct number and tell him that Jack said hello.
Speaker 2:Great to be here too. Thank you, jack. So natural womanhood exists. Because when I came back to the Catholic faith, I grew up Catholic, left the church, got married, had our children and then came back to the Catholic church and my wife, who is not Catholic, was reading about it. Like, hey, what am I getting into with my husband becoming Catholic? And one night she's reading this book. I forgot what it was. But it's like if you're contraceptive, you're not supposed to take communion. And I'm like, oh, nobody told us. You know we had already our marriage convalidated and everything. It's like, wow, we need to find out.
Speaker 2:So did some research came across theology of the body, christopher West. That was in 2007. Christopher West came to San Antonio that year. I was like, wow, this is amazing. Christopher West came to San Antonio that year. I was like, wow, this is amazing.
Speaker 2:Never, never, anyone has talked to us about, or me about, this in that way. Like you know how our bodies are God's design and they're good and sexuality is good, but there's a way of approaching it and all that. And so learn about natural family planning. And was your wife there, just out of curiosity? Yeah, at the christopher west presentation. Yes, yeah, you were both there.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah and so so it's, you know, it was kind of late in our marriage, our, our children were, you know, teens and and so getting on the bandwagon of nfp was kind of late for us. But but when I was really big for me was in the following years I started to know people who were using NFP for the beginning of their marriage and I was like this is amazing, right, the way that I could tell there was some intimacy, some connections and mutual trust, which I later validated with research. It's like, yeah, there's something really special about this, but how come nobody really seems to know about it? How come this is not more prevalent? And I came to realize that there was really this knowledge gap. There was really a big misunderstanding of what natural family planning is, what it does for for couples, what it the effectiveness, you know that it's a scientific knowledge.
Speaker 2:It's not just something like the church is trying to to push down your throat because they want to control you and you have to. You know very large families. It's actually very scientific, very good for house, very good for marriages, and so that's when the inspiration came to me, and my background is business administration and I studied that and I worked a lot in nonprofit and marketing nonprofit management, so I thought maybe that's what God is calling me, and then somebody pushed me. It's like you go ahead and start doing it, start it, and so, in 2012, incorporated natural womanhood as a non-profit with the idea that the, you know, to fill this knowledge gap about not just natural family planning, but really a you know, cycle cycle health as well and fertility health.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of great information and great content that needed to be communicated to the public. And then about teaching young women, you know, body literacy. That's a huge gap. So really now we are the magazine, the online magazine of fertility awareness and women's health, with the idea that our job is to change the culture by changing the way women think about themselves, and it's really you know, we're not religious, okay, so that our content is really for anyone, because we, that's something I from the get-go I like. No, this is, this is good stuff, good science now.
Speaker 1:Now, let me just stop you there for a second. When you say we're not religious now, you're not talking about yourself personally, you're talking about the, the magazine.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, I'm catholic, I mean I practice, yes, yes, and I, I knew that, I just wanted to if people are listening.
Speaker 1:Uh, I wanted them to understand.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah yeah, thank you for mentioning that yeah, I said so and, and you know, a lot of people are most our team are also have the same view, you know, and a catholic view, you know, the human body and and and human life and and and marriage, right, so so it's, but it doesn't have to be in our content, because where we see our ourselves is the theology of the body applied. It's like, okay, how do you live this?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, exactly, and theology is really good and Christopher West and all those like your work and stuff has been very good. But the question, the next step, is how do we help couples, how do we help moms teach their daughters you know the truths about our body? How do we help teenagers have a better understanding of their child? That aligns with this, you know, view of the world and view of the human person.
Speaker 1:See what you're saying here and don't lose your train of thought because you're on a great roll right now. And don't lose your train of thought because you're on a great roll right now. But it's so important what you're saying right now, because what we find and the more we dig into God's plan for human sexuality, the more we see this is just a great way to live, and I think your approach is wonderful, because, at the end of the day, somebody says, hey, this is a Catholic thing or a Christian thing or whatever. No, this is a natural body, how to function, how your body functions, how to understand it and even how to get healthier. Right, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, you know it's funny. When we started, one of the first books I read was a book. No, it's going to escape me. Anyway, it was a good this very pro-choice young woman who was criticizing the pill, right, and she's a, she's a strong feminist, and she said like no, the pill is wrong for us, right. And I was like women are waking up.
Speaker 2:Okay, women are waking up to like there's a problem with the pill on across the board, regardless of their face, regardless of their politics that's right, you know there is a sense of like we've been sold a bill of good, that's, you know, it's not working out for us and it's actually hurting and and their her you know her description were very clear that there are issues. And since we started we've read so many stories and we know so many issues with the pill and now we have on our website, like the largest depository or library, articles explaining all the side effects, all the risks of birth control.
Speaker 1:right, Well, you know, I used to work the West Coast, yeah, and very liberal right Washington State, oregon, and I was meeting more and more people there, more and more women, that were looking at natural family planning and these things that you're talking about here, just because they didn't want the chemicals in their body. They knew it didn't make them feel good. They knew that they didn't want the chemicals in the water. They were worried about all these environmental things too. It was amazing to me, actually, they were coming around.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, exactly. And so for us, the key was how do we help these women right to the next step? So it's fine. Yeah, there are indeed problems with the pill, with IUDs, with Depo-Porea all these things are actually pretty harmful. But how do we? What else can you do, right? And so helping them find out the method.
Speaker 2:And we don't speak about one method, because we believe that women need to have the choice, they need to have options, because creighton may not work for everyone, or symptom thermal couple, couple weeks, you know they all those methods are are very good in themselves, but they may not work for everybody out of the at the same time, like so, postpartum women may prefer use a market method for, for example, versus, you know, creighton or whatever Right.
Speaker 2:So so the idea was bringing people who are looking to learn more, to know the 10 reasons why, you know, to get off birth control and and and and to use fertility awareness instead, and then then find teachers. So we have on our website, we have a very large directory of NFB teachers, or fertility awareness teachers. We have a directory of doctors who can treat women who have issues from infertility, endometriosis and PCOS for the root cause. So that's another big thing, and we're going to hear a lot more about this in the next few years, because there are things going on where efforts are made to promote what we call restorative reproductive health. So typically today, if you're a young woman, or even like actually 14-year-old, and you go to the doctor and you have irregular cycles, cramps, serious issues with it, what does the doctor do?
Speaker 1:He puts you on a pill.
Speaker 2:Puts you on a pill, and so the job of the doctor is to find the right pill that's going to work the best for you. But it's not a solution. It puts you on a very strong hormonal, your product. Medication that affects not just your reproductive cycle but other parts of your body has a lot of side effect, from depression to really, you know issues with cardio health issues or risk of cancer, especially for young women before they get their first pregnancy, and also so yeah.
Speaker 1:So this is important for people to understand, if they don't already that when you go on the pill and they tried to put, I remember my youngest daughter, who's a doctor, a medical doctor now when she was a young girl, they wanted to put her on the pill right away and the reality is it masks the underlying health issues.
Speaker 1:So a lot of times they don't dig in to see what is going on there and and the flip side of this as I'm sure you would have brought it up, gerard is that when people are infertile, when they're trying to find ways to to have a baby, these methods that you're talking about, the creighton methods, etc. They actually help you if you you know to use them from a fertility standpoint. And the same thing, we, we, we. I'm in chicago, so chicago is the ivf capital of the world, right?
Speaker 2:oh is it and the problem.
Speaker 1:they put you on again. They put you on these fertility treatments and they don't dig into the actual root cause of what's going on in a woman's body, right and this is very, you know, very important to understand what is going on with your cycle, your body. Do I have underlying health issues and they don't even look.
Speaker 2:And so that's why the whole body of science that's called restorative reproductive medicine is something we have an entire section about it as well. I said it's very important because, as a result of what we just described, it takes about eight years for a young woman to be diagnosed with endometriosis, from the time she starts having symptoms and we have a wonderful if any of your listeners have this issue.
Speaker 2:We have a wonderful podcast about a young woman who went to Princeton University, suffered enormously until she finally found one of those doctors who could really treat the endometriosis one of those doctors who could really treat the endometriosis and so it changed their life right. So this is really another part of this is, I would say, that women's health as it's practiced today has really overlooked the reality, not done their homework, basically where organizations like Cretins or FEM or Neo Fertility so there are groups that have really done a lot of research to do what we just talked about. You know, how do we treat someone with endometriosis, how do we treat someone with PCOS? How do we help someone with hormonal imbalance that causes infertility? So, in a way that really holistically take care of the root causes of these issues, and so it's really critical. It's really important to let people know that and, again, find the right doctors and, you know, to go on naturalwomenhoodorg. They will.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's amazing too. Not only can women get healthier, but you know, I had Dr Hilgers, you know them, probably NAPRO. That started really the Creighton model, and then now they're NAPRO doctors, which you have listed on your website, some of the Creighton practitioners and NAPRO doctors and so I said, well, why aren't more people practicing? They said, well, because it's not as much money. I said, you know, we're in here because we really care about women's health. We don't. You know, it's much more money to prescribe a pill to somebody to put them through all these procedures. Let's talk about fertility. You know a woman's trying to get pregnant or a couple's trying to get pregnant. You know these doctors are not doing this for the money. They're doing it because they really care about people. The Napro doctors that I'm meeting, gerard, are compassionate, really care about their patients.
Speaker 1:It's a different mindset, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, definitely. I mean the typical OBGYN visit will be, for the pill will be seven, 10 minutes, right, and then to really have a conversation about what's going on. It's going to much more expensive and the reality is that these doctors need to be paid, I mean, like if we want this to work we want this to you know, to to be expanded.
Speaker 2:They have to be so. So there are, there are efforts in the industry absolutely to to to get more, especially among I mean capitalization, to start right, not just them, but so so insurance really take better consideration of these approaches and understand better, and so it's very important that, in the way that insurance reimbursed those treatments which cause-.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm glad you brought that up.
Speaker 2:You know that they're very and thank God for all those doctors that have sacrificed, you know, in the past 30 years to go spend two years to learn about this at, you know, with Dr Hilger, and and practice it. I mean there are, there are quite a big group of them already and thank God for them, because I know that it's it's a sacrifice, it's it's not as easy, but but I think we, I think we're hopefully we'll get to the stage where it's just more common and the right way to go.
Speaker 1:I hope you're right.
Speaker 2:I think that's going to happen, so it's very exciting.
Speaker 1:So tell me now, are you finding a certain demographic Gerard that's really starting to come to you? Is there a certain, you know, age group? Are you starting to see some of these young, some of these young people's uh, wake up? Or you know what are you finding out there?
Speaker 2:yeah, I, I don't say that it's overwhelming.
Speaker 2:Like you know, we have all these young people no, you're right, it's slowly it's slowly, but what what we see is to us is critical is is is really teaching young women to know their bodies right. That's where we started, and you know when, when we try to help women that already are pregnant and they want to have an abortion, for example, like it's it's really late. Or or you know young women who have never heard of natural family planning and you're going to start telling them at marriage prep.
Speaker 2:You know, you might change some parts, or it might be later, but it's late. So, really, the key is to have a proper education of young women at the time of puberty. All right, and so the challenge, though, is that moms have not been prepared for that. So the challenge, though, is that moms have not been prepared for that. They don't necessarily A. Even if they're charting, charting is still different. Charting for natural family planning is different from really the way a young woman should be educated, and so there are challenges with that. And when we did research, we interviewed a lot of moms. It's like, yeah, my mom never talked to me about it, or it was even taboo, or had all this shame about it, or you know, et cetera.
Speaker 2:So it's difficult to help mom have this conversation and teach the proper science so that the daughter at the age of 10, 12, even 8. Sometimes it depends on the mom and the daughters, but it's early to have a conversation to explain what's going on, what is puberty, what's going to happen, how to take care of your house, how to take care of your cycle, in a way that you know you lessen those issues that are normal, what's normal, what's not normal, when to see a doctor, what?
Speaker 1:what is the right you know is a doctor who's going to really help you with that all that and, and let me just say that, so, so, this period, genius, right, the parents guide, smart guide to puberty yeah very, very important and and we have a I hate to even call it program because it's really not a program, but we it's, it's called love ed and we what we do is is we have dad take his, his young boy 10 years old, you know when they're in puberty, and again before they go to high school.
Speaker 1:So two times right. And we, we work with them together and and and, really to open this up and the same thing mom brings their little girl and we do two things, gerard right. So we, we talk about their body changing and love what is love.
Speaker 1:So we're doing a little something different and then we want to bond them with their mother right, but they still have a lot of questions. I'm very interested in your program, a period genius, because this is going to be a compliment, I really feel, a great compliment to what we're doing, because we can't do everything right. We're but but but the beauty that we see when, when a when a mom takes her 10 year old girl. They're very awkward sometimes. They haven't talked about these things right of course they are.
Speaker 1:We have with them for an hour and a half, two hours. We show them a couple videos, we have a discussion in between with the mom and the little girl off to the side, and then they come back to a group right when they are on the way out after two hours now with questions and stuff. They are crying, they're very emotional, hugging each other, talking, and it's so beautiful. But we want to continue and I think your program Period Genius that parents got.
Speaker 2:I think that's going to be the perfect thing for us to share with them. I I believe I mean this is I don't know what's in your program, but our program really goes deeper into typically than sounds like it right into the science and and explaining what's going on with the body and the health side and and all these things that are really you're gonna help practically mom and daughters manage this time right.
Speaker 2:And again same as yours. Like our goal was. We want mom and daughter to connect, to have mutual trust in this area, because otherwise what happens is that daughter feels shame, feels lack of confidence, pain, and where is she going to get help? She's going to get help with her peers online and a lot of things that are not really positive. Right what you're saying?
Speaker 1:and I don't mean to interrupt, but I want people to really absorb what you're saying, because when we meet these kids, all the time the culture and the government, schools are nefarious. Right now they will tell a little girl nine years old, eight years old, nine years old, ten years old, when you're not comfortable with your body, maybe it's because you're in the wrong body, maybe this, maybe that it's amazing.
Speaker 1:It's amazing what they're doing Then they're showing them pornography at these early ages, all these things. Well, you can't stop everything, right, we have to fill them. We have to fill them, we have to have a relationship with parents and we have to fill them with what's true, good and beautiful the beauty of their body, the beauty of their sexuality. I mean, what you're talking about is so important, right? Every family should be doing this, you know.
Speaker 2:It's very critical and you were talking about, you know, gender issues. I mean, if you heard Chloe Cole, she testified in front of the Congress about her experience, you know, becoming a transgender. So she's a young woman, she's, I think, think 19 or 20 now, but she when she was 12, you know, puberty happened and she felt terrible about her body and she was really anxious about the way boys were starting looking to look at her and she's I hear this all the time.
Speaker 2:I hear it all the time exactly, and so so this, this, like I want to become a boy. It's much more comfortable and it's terrible, right. What happened after that is tragic, right. So she got on the medication, then she had surgery, and then you know.
Speaker 1:She had. For those people that don't know, Chloe Cole. We've talked about her on our show a number of times, but she had her breast removed and I mean amazing, right, you know her bodily changes and she's very open about speaking of those things. And so we call these people, of course, these young people, detransitioners, and there are many, many of them, aren't they? And we have to. This is an important way to combat this, isn't it? Just by educating, by educating them.
Speaker 1:Last thing I want to just say is we meet a lot of beyond girls in high school when we give high school retreats and stuff. Gerard, that their moms never talked to them about this and the first time they had a period they didn't even know what it was. I mean, that's kind of sad, isn't it?
Speaker 2:yeah, no, I, I think it's not just, it's traumatic, I think it's dramatic it's really it's a dramatic thing because it it creates a this, this. So young women today really want to have a you know, a front that my life is in control and they cannot control what's inside, so they're gonna try to control everything else, right?
Speaker 1:and it's normal.
Speaker 2:I mean like we I did that as a teenager. I'm like, oh my, what's going on with my body, what's going in my heart? And I want to look cool, and so I did things cool, right, uh, very natural, very normal, you know so, so normal.
Speaker 2:So we're not condemning that it's like, but nobody, somebody needs to reach out to them like you're doing, you know, with moms and recreate that bonding so that those girls become confident it's okay to be who I am. It's okay to be me right, my body is good. There are issues, there are difficulties. It's not always easy, but I understand what's going on, I understand why it's going on and I know what to do if it's, you know, to such a point that I can't sleep at night, and I have, you know, I miss three days of school because of my period, right? So there are things that can be done to to restore that without getting on a pill, you know, if they get on the pill.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's the funnel. Oh, that's our medical system, right? Medical system, like, get on the pill and then you're, you're into the I'll call that a funnel, the medical funnel which you know is going to have intervention after intervention. So you could be, you know, oh, okay, I'm depressed now. Well, let's, let's put you on this anti-depressant anxiety, right?
Speaker 1:they ended up on multiple medications right multiple medications and then your sexual activity.
Speaker 2:Now I want to say something about apps, because we're talking about apps, you know we we want young women to and they're very likely to get on a cycle app right? You heard of those period apps and all that. I want to encourage parents to really help their daughters to choose the right app, not because, oh, it's going to be more scientific or not. The idea is not to help those young women have birth control to the app, but it's good to use an app to know their bodies, but some of the apps are going to encourage them to have sex or have abortion. So be very discerning about what's behind the app. There's usually a lot of content, information. Some of it is good, some of it is good, some of it is not. So we recommend fem health. So it's a. It's an app that was developed I don't know, probably about 10 years ago. You know solid. You know the. The people behind it are are very solid group in term of understanding of who women are and and you said femme right, and if, is that with two m's?
Speaker 2:yeah, it was two m f e m. Yeah, I mean, it's not the only one. There's now a couple to couple league came up with a nap and it's peak day also, so peak day is also an option, that's just spell that jar where you peak p e aA-Y like a day PEAK is like the peak sign Couple to Couple League has been more focused on couples natural family planning, but their app can be used for younger women and so they include different signs. So those are our two.
Speaker 1:And if they go to your website right, which is a natural womanhoodorg, can they? They can find this information on your right, because I think when I started to poke around, I mean I I didn't have time to to probably go through even one tenth the material and I was going through pretty and I'm used to going through this stuff you know, yeah, we have about 800 plus articles.
Speaker 2:I mean, we produce three articles a week on all this.
Speaker 1:But it's very well organized so people can find the drop-down boxes. It's very well organized. As far as help say, I need questions and stuff answered if I go on there, do you provide that too too?
Speaker 2:we do have a guidance program, so it's volunteers that are nfp teachers that you can, by going on our website and and under, get help. There is a free we'll call it your counseling session. Basically it's, it's helping women or couples kind of have a better understanding of the problem. Not, it's not, you know, medical care, it's not how. It's just helping people figure out. Okay, this is really what the problem you're really looking at and what to do next. Okay, and so so it's free, and yeah, it's, it's available on our website and so it's free and yeah, it's available on our website.
Speaker 1:Now let me ask you this. Now I'm going to switch gears just a little bit. So we're talking to engaged couples today. You know the men want to know how will this affect them, how will it affect not only their marriage. But is this a lot of work for me? I mean, it's much easier. She just takes the pill, I don't even worry about it. What reason would you give that young man, gerard, to say take a look at what we're talking about here. What are the reasons?
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, the first reason is the health of your wife, right? Well, the first reason is the health of your wife right it's.
Speaker 2:I mean, look at and that's something we have marriage groups. Now we started piloting some groups to support groups for marriage couples that want to use NFP and we have one of the talks that's actually the article you were mentioning we use that as a discussion point that men are like wow, now I really understand why I should have my wife on the pill, right. It's like if you look at the stuff, it's it's bad, all right, since it is too many issues, too too many risks with that. So that's that would be to me the first reason is you love your wife, yeah, and and be, healthy and and to you know, have mentally, physically, even spiritually I would say
Speaker 2:now, if you're catholic and you're spiritually, it's like, even above that, right, it's like, okay, god's design, like we gotta, we gotta trust you know that that he's that his teaching. But there's definitely a health side to this. The second thing is it's good for your marriage. So when you have to use NFB, when you use NFB, right, you have to abstain. If you have prayed about, you know whether you are going to have more children or not at this point of your marriage and your life and you have to discern that with your wife. So you are both in charge of you have conversations and you are both in charge of natural you know other family planning question, which is very different from when your wife's on the pill.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's our experience as a married couple. Right, my wife, we use contraception. We we didn't have the conversation. Right, we have our two kids and then we kind of stopped the conversation. It's done. And that's terrible, because then you wake up 15 years later when I came back to Calhoun Church I said, hey, maybe we should try and it was too late, but it's like….
Speaker 1:I had the same experience. Wait a minute. I had the same experience.
Speaker 2:What happened there? We didn't think, and so….
Speaker 1:So, gerard, I, I, I just add this you know, when I speak to young guys, you're right on. When I speak to young couples, that and you mentioned it earlier when we first were coming on today that there's an intimacy there. There's something special that happens when, when you're not using contraception, it's the way a man looks at his wife. You know, you, you would think you would think that this conversation is, is is awkward, and I got to talk to her about that and it's the opposite. And and the guys say, when you're making love to a woman, that's natural and she wants to be there and you want to be there it's because you, you, you, you looked at her in a different way, right it? It wasn't just kind of this wham-bam, thank you, ma'am type of a thing that we do mindlessly as men.
Speaker 1:Something changes in your heart and you see a woman differently. She recognizes that and she actually opens herself to you more Honest, to goodness. They tell me that their, their, their sexual, their sexual life is is better than their, their friends that are contraceptive. You know, there's a, it's a beauty of, of, of our sexuality. And the last thing, you'll probably bring this up, but when a woman is on the pill. She, she actually is not as aroused as as normal it's. It's actually is not as aroused as normal. It's amazing right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the pill can cause libido issues, definitely. I mean, it's established by studies and so on. But yeah, so what you're talking about, we actually did a study. I did a research study, interviewed almost 40 couples about their experience with NFP and learning about it or not learning about it. You know covering it and it's on our website at the bottom. It's called an NFP study 2022. So people are interested, they can, they can read it and but it's really, it's really beautiful to hear a couple speak about it. So there's a lot to say, but the but for the husband. I wanted to say something.
Speaker 1:It's like it's not easy right.
Speaker 2:So we have to learn self-control, we have to learn to love our wives, at times in a different way, and you know, it doesn't happen. It's going to happen for multiple reasons, right, it's not just because, okay, you know she's fertile right now. We're going gonna avoid sex. I mean, it's, it's their, you know, time of menopause can happen. I mean, think all kinds of reasons that you know. We just gotta control ourself and still love our wife. Yeah, you know, and in, in, physically and and, you know, in an embracing way, once we kind of see her, like you said, how we see our wife. It helps us with that. I think I'm thinking of our Christian brothers, like non-Catholics, and how they struggle with this idea, like, well, you know, and if it's like contraception, you avoid. Well, no, because the man's part is, is, is different, the man, the woman is also much more in herself, you know, giving of herself and and open to, to the husband. Because through this, this communication and it's, you know, there's, there's something that makes this relationship creates, this relationship that opens up.
Speaker 2:Well, I want to say like, actually, there's something about the pill that makes us more self-centered in the, in the sex act, and it's and it's not. I I cannot really explain it. I think there's a, there's something spiritual, there's something physical, there's something mental about it but it makes us more turn toward ourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and consciously. I mean I know the couples who use contraception love each other. I mean I like beautiful, you know, marriage. I have many friends who are not catholic, that you know, and but there's something there that yeah that they may not realize right and and so the gift that nf provides I've heard it among those couples I've interviewed is very powerful.
Speaker 2:One example I think about a lot is this couple who had multiple children and then they lost a child and it's very difficult I've heard that story from others but they were using NFP and the grief time was different for the man and the woman and so the, you know it, the, the, the wife, it took him, the man about, you know, six months to, to, to really kind of come back and and and the wife explained I was talking to the wife, explained I was talking to the wife and she said, like NFB is what helped us reconnect. It was very powerful to have that in our life, in our marriage, and a lot of couples divorce when they lose a child, as you know right, it's such a huge trauma, but having this level of connection through NFP really helped this couple overcome that death.
Speaker 1:So that was a previous relationship that they had built up previous to losing the child.
Speaker 2:Right, but they had been using NFP all their marriage and when that loss happened, that connection they had built through NFP helped them reconnect. Yeah, that's beautiful. And take their marriage.
Speaker 1:Yeah, hard and beautiful at the same time, and so these witness stories of these couples are on your website.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a head study. Yeah, it's at the bottom of the website.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember I saw it and I thought I have to go back and look at that. I won't get into the whole thing right now, but we were only supposed to have one child and the placenta had grown into the uterine wall and it ripped and hemorrhaging and blah, blah, blah. So anyways, we ended up with three other children. One of them was miscarried, so three. But then finally the doctors had me so nervous that we're going to lose my wife and everything. Blah, blah, blah. This is before I came back. Really, I was Catholic. Like you left the church for a long time. I was a non-practicing Catholic. My wife was a non-practicing Methodist. When we got married.
Speaker 1:But, anyways, we have our tubes tied at the fourth child and within a year we were talking about separation and possible divorce. I mean it was amazing and something changed within our intimacy. My wife recognized it. It gets back to the point you were making. This reminded me of it when you said it's hard to explain, but something happened.
Speaker 1:I still, you know, I didn't feel like it was that much different. But now, looking back, right after this, you realize, yeah, something changed. I became more selfish. My wife recognized that. It hurt my ego. Then we start to talk. You know, we start to slowly fall apart. And you're exactly right, and we talked about it later. If we wouldn't have done that, we wouldn't have lost that conversation, that closeness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks for sharing that.
Speaker 1:Amazing. So, as we wind down here a little bit, people are going to go out on your website and if they have questions about I want to get back to this because I know that you tried to skirt this a little bit but I'm going to try to get you to at least recommend, because some couples will say to me Jack, there's a number of methods out there. I understand the crate Look, I never charted right and my wife didn't either, because of different one of the reasons I just brought up. But the Creighton model is difficult, like you said. I mean, it takes a little bit of work right of charting every day. I mean there's benefits there.
Speaker 1:But yet, you know, I tend to recommend it to people if they just come to me because of my familiarity with the Hilgers work and Napro technology and all their great work. But if somebody comes to you and I know you said, hey, we're going to present a number of different ways and not everything works all the time, is there some place that you would start personally, because people got to start somewhere, gerard, when they're looking into natural family planning and to these methods, I you know they get confused and sometimes they'll just say you know what. I don't have time to deal with all this, but if we can give them, can they?
Speaker 1:can you at least say, hey, I would start here and then, if that doesn't work, go somewhere else?
Speaker 2:Or is that putting you in a box and I don't want to put you in a box, and I don't want to put you in a box. No, I think I mean one thing, that I mean we, you know, go on our website and actually we have a section on our that's for engaged couples and we have a quiz that helps you decide, and we have a guide and so on, but I will also say that what's really important is good support.
Speaker 2:So if there is someone you know in your community, at your church, at your parish, that you feel like, okay, this is a person I feel good to help me, all right, use work with that person. So don't do it alone, right, learn from a teacher, because it's already hard to you know to do it. Well, you know understand when, to have a better understanding of when the the fertile window is. You know there are the mucus sign.
Speaker 2:You have to learn to read that and you you know how the temperature works if you use the temperature. So find a good teacher and and and work with her to learn. I think that would be probably the first step. Where's the?
Speaker 1:best. It could be a business teacher.
Speaker 2:It could be couple-to-couple league. I mean, couple-to-couple league is nice because they have couples teaching, so you have the husbands as support as well. But it's not the only you know there. There are things that your creatine, I think is very rigorous, and that's why it's maybe a little more difficult, but it's very rigorous, especially if you have cycle health issues.
Speaker 2:It's a good approach, right? Because they're going to be very scientific in the way you chart your cycle and and and. But now doctors will be able most doctors will be able to read a symptom or chart and as well as a creatinine chart, but anyway, they yeah so so that's, that would be my answer to the to your question, I guess yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So do you think there's enough people around? You know, when I'm looking as a young couple and I'm looking out to find someone to walk with me right in this journey, like you said, do I start at the diocese? Do I ask a parish? What do you recommend?
Speaker 2:I think most dioceses have now offices and lists of teachers. Our directory has tons of people but we don't have all the methods. I mean we have. The directory has a good number of people. I think there are enough people. I think I mean there could be more and I think it's growing, but there are. There are quite a good number of of teachers and they're not, you know, busy full time. All of them, the. There are also options to to learn online, to have you know people who are connect through video. Your audience must know my catholic doctor. I don't know if you've ever talked to them or spoken. It's a good place to go to to find Catholic so NFP teachers as well as doctors, catholic doctors it's mycatholicdoctorcom.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:It's a good place to also find support.
Speaker 1:All right and your contact information? The best way to contact you and the people at your organization, go online at naturalwomanhoodorg. Anything else you want to leave us with?
Speaker 2:No, I think thank you for what you're doing. I think like you said, we're kind of walking on the, on the shoulders of the theology of the body but also the work of all. These are a great organization. That been for the past 40 years, you know, staying, staying in the fight to, to promote natural family planning, all the couples who use it. We also have now I didn't mention it a program for students college students that are clubs.
Speaker 2:So we just finished the recruiting, but we're going to have 25 to 30 clubs next year all over the US. Oh wow, it's called Psycho Mindfulness Clubs. So a lot of exciting things, I think. Yeah, there's a lot going on, but a lot of good things, good changes are happening. And we're very, very pleased and very, very, very blessed to be part of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I think you guys are doing incredible work. I really suggest everybody. I think if you get to their website, to Gerard's website, naturalwomanhoodorg, you're going to find a proliferative information there, well-organized, like I said. You have some videos and stuff. There's some wonderful articles. So, look, I look forward to keeping an eye on you and to promoting your work, because it fits into really this whole health movement that we're seeing. You know, people know something's wrong and they want to get healthy. So God bless you, gerard. Thank you so much for being on. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Jack.
Speaker 1:I want to remind everybody that we've been putting the video podcast up on Rumble and we just started putting them up on YouTube. Look in the show notes and find us. And I also want to thank our sponsor. You know demand for electricity and natural gas is growing tremendously across the nation. Is your business prepared for the resulting cost increase of 15% or more in the coming years? As a local family-owned energy broker and consultant, aim Utility Advisors has been helping small and medium businesses reduce energy costs for over 30 years, and AIM is going to leverage these decades of experience with leading market analytics to produce a straightforward savings plan tailored to your business needs. Aim operates without a quota. You can request a no-pressure cost analysis for free through their website, which is aimenergygroupcom. That's AIM, as in A-I-M energygroupcom. See the show notes for my friend TJ Lawley's direct number and for more information. Hey, thanks everyone. Thanks for joining us today. Talk to you again soon. Bye-bye.