Preparing for Marriage with NFP

Married couples should be able to enjoy the marriage bed any day, any time…or so I thought. As a practicing Catholic, I had heard about Natural Family Planning and while I agreed it was obviously better than contraception, like the pill or condoms, I had some reservations.

As a young adult, thinking about married life, I thought that as long as we were open to life, then we could have sex whenever we wanted to. I struggled with that a lot and finally, I reached out to a friend, Jackie Hollcraft, who teaches NFP, to talk with her about it. She helped me to realize that part of being married is having self-control and being able to not have sex so that we can truly enjoy the marital act and not take it for granted.

Once I was able to work out my concerns, I have had a fantastic experience with NFP. Working with my fiancé to understand the reasons behind NFP and how to use the Creighton model has been a blessing too. It has made us closer and has helped us to better understand what is going on with my body. Additionally, it has helped us identify some hormonal problems, and I am currently seeking medical help in diagnosing and treating these. Probably the hardest part about practicing NFP for me as I prepare for marriage, is the charting! My fiancé encourages me, and I have found it helps to clip my chart to my bathroom mirror.

As a young adult faced with an over sexualized society daily, I am so thankful that as a Church, we believe what we do about contraception because natural family planning truly has brought my fiancé and I closer to each other, closer to God, and closer to what it means to truly love sacrificially.