Getting Your Partner on Board With Fertility Awareness (Episode 405)

Full Transcript: Episode 405

Lisa Hendrickson-Jack:

Welcome to the Fertility Friday podcast, your source for information about the fertility awareness method and all things fertility. I’m your host, Lisa Hendrickson-Jack. I’m the author of the fifth vital sign and the fertility awareness mastery charting journal. I’m a certified fertility awareness educator and holistic reproductive health practitioner with nearly 20 years of experience teaching women to connect to their fifth vital sign through menstrual cycle charting, balancing hormonal health, and optimizing the menstrual cycle without hormones. I’m outspoken about hormonal birth control and its impact on fertility and overall health because you have the right to know how your body works and how artificial hormones disrupt that natural process. I teach women’s health professionals how to utilize the menstrual cycle as a vital sign in their practices and I host live coaching programs to help you achieve optimal fertility and health because it’s important to have healthy menstrual cycles regardless of whether or not you want to have babies. I’m also a wife and mother of two beautiful boys. I know I’m a busy girl but I managed to fit it all in. This podcast is designed to empower you to take full control of your cycles, your fertility, and your overall health. And I’m so excited that you’re here with me today.

Today, I’m sharing the last installment of my birth control series and in today’s episode, we are going to be diving into some of the things that you can do to get your partner on board with charting. Of course, one of the main parts of being successful with fertility awareness methods is to have your partner’s support — not just emotional support, but to have your partner willing to actually modify his behavior during the fertile window, for you to figure something out in terms of how you’re going to manage that time. And that really involves his participation and acceptance of this method.

And so this can be looked at as a positive or a negative, depending on your perspective. So again, this is one of the reasons why fertility awareness-based methods are not necessarily going to be suitable for everybody, because there are women in relationships with men who are not willing to modify their behavior at all. And so in that case, a fertility awareness-based method where you are fertile for a period of time each cycle may not be an option at all, actually. And so that again can be looked at as a negative. And I think depending on the person’s perspective, or the type of population that a professional is working with, they might look at that as kind of like a big negative, a big con for the method. But many people look at it as a positive.

And I know in my life and relationships, I have found it to be positive because it really forces you to put the topic of managing your fertility front and center. So if you’re not on contraception and you’re using fertility awareness, then that means there are parts of the cycle where you can get pregnant. And so you have to talk about it. You have to talk about that possibility. You have to talk about how you’re going to manage the fertile window. Your partner does have to kind of understand what’s going on and be okay with it, basically.

And the challenge is that for most people, fertility awareness is not something that they’re used to. It’s not something that they’re familiar with. For most of us, until we discover it, we’re kind of completely in the dark about this option. And so that makes perfect sense that most of our partners also don’t know about it. Now, of course, sometimes it’s the opposite. I’ve had a number of clients who end up finding out about my podcast or joining my programs because their partner put them onto it. So it’s not always the case. But I think the majority of the time, you know, you’re introducing this to your partner.

And so in order to be successful using fertility awareness as a birth control method, you do need the buy-in of your partner. You do need to have that participation and that acceptance. And the good thing is that it doesn’t have to look one way or another. So I have some clients whose partners are really, really involved, even helping them to chart and note their signs and symptoms. And other partners who — it’s just they understand it, they’re comfortable enough, and all they really need is that heads up of when you’re in the fertile window and when you’re not. And of course that communication is very important.

So yeah, today’s episode is all about just brainstorming some of these strategies that can be really helpful to help familiarize your partner with fertility awareness and to help him kind of get on board with it. And I suppose the good news is that what I found in the work I’ve done over all these years is that the majority of the time, the male partners are actually quite open to it. And generally overall, of course there’s a bit of nervousness — does it work, could it be effective, etc., to varying degrees. But ultimately I think that when it comes to health, your emotional health, your physical health, your cycle health, all of those things, I feel like for the most part our partners are really wanting to support us in feeling great. And I think for not all, but for some women, fertility awareness is really what they’re going to after having a negative experience on contraception. So I feel like from that perspective, from the perspective of health, many partners are actually quite happy that you’ve found something that works for you. So with that said, let’s go ahead and jump into today’s episode.

All right, so let’s jump into how to talk about fertility awareness with your partner and how to really gently encourage your partner to get on board when you’ve decided that you want to start charting your cycles, and especially when you are wanting to transition into using fertility awareness for birth control. I feel like it’s a much different conversation when you’re using fertility awareness to conceive, because it doesn’t change his behavior — it doesn’t really change your sexual behavior other than the timing of it. But when you’re transitioning to using fertility awareness as a birth control method, especially as your primary birth control method, all of a sudden his behavior likely is going to have to change. And that is really where this conversation, the negotiation, and the understanding of all of this comes into play.

So I’m going to share some points with you that I found over the years that can be helpful, but also to dispel some myths. So the first thing I would say — number one — is to be clear with your partner about why you want to use fertility awareness. And I think that helps to move the conversation into a really human place, because your partner is a person who cares about you a lot, or they wouldn’t be your partner. And so I think having this conversation and really grounding it in terms of why — like, why is this important to you? Why is it important to you now? You know, we were fine before, we were kind of doing our thing. Why is this something that has come up for you? Why is it important to you, and also why now?

And so there’s a lot of different reasons and those reasons are going to be different for every woman. So for example, you could have experienced side effects on hormonal birth control and perhaps you didn’t necessarily know that the birth control was responsible for those side effects. But after learning more about it and hearing women’s experiences on it, all of a sudden you realize that some of those effects that you had been experiencing were caused by it.

So if it’s related to the side effects — so in this conversation, we’ll be talking primarily about heterosexual relationships, so when you’re partnered to a man. When you’re partnered to a man, then there’s all of these implications of sex. You can become pregnant from sex, and all those types of things, and he would have to modify his behavior. So in that scenario, my experience working with women has been a really positive one. And if anything, what I always joke with my clients is that working in this field has given me a newfound appreciation for men. Men often get a bad rap for not being super supportive, or whatever stereotypes we have in our head about these types of things. From what I’ve seen, the vast majority of the women that I work with, their partners are incredibly supportive and first and foremost really love them and want them to be healthy and happy. They just want their wonderful, lovely partners to be happy and healthy.

And so if they discover that there’s something that they’re taking that could have a negative impact on their health or their fertility, they’re often the first ones to say, get off of it. And I’ve spoken to many women who — it wasn’t even their idea to use fertility awareness, it was actually their partner’s idea, because their partners were really concerned about the negative effects on the hormones and the side effects, and of course their potential future children with this person.

So I feel like to be really clear on the why. The side effects aren’t necessarily the only reason. Not all women have the experience of negative side effects. Many women use hormonal birth control and don’t report any noticeable side effects. But it could be for different reasons. Perhaps you’ve just been on it for so long and you’re ready to not be. Perhaps you’re in a stable relationship and you just feel like you’re not at the point anymore where you have to approach birth control in the same way as you did before. Maybe you’ve been on a health kick. Maybe you’ve been exercising and eating healthy, and you realize that this is one of the other things that you could do to really optimize your natural hormone balance. Maybe you do know that you want to plan for pregnancy in the future. So maybe you and your partner already know that you want to have a baby next year, or two years from now, or five years from now — but maybe you know already that you plan to have babies with this person and you really want to find ways to preserve your fertility.

Whatever the reason is — whether I’ve said it or not — I feel like this is a really great time to have one of those adult conversations with your partner in a really loving way and just express why this is important to you. Because it’s important enough if you’re thinking about transitioning — it’s important enough for you to actually make that change. So there must be a reason. And so sharing that with your partner in a really honest and open way can help, because then it’s not this kind of thing in the air. You’re actually saying, this is really why it’s important to me.

Okay, so number two, learn the method for yourself. That’s really, really important. So one of the challenges that many of my clients have shared with me when they’re trying to talk about it is they want to talk about it in a smart way — like, you want to be confident about what you’re saying. But when you don’t know the information yourself yet well, it’s harder for you to come across in a confident way. So fertility awareness isn’t necessarily mainstream. It’s definitely a lot more common than when I was growing up and when I was a young woman in my early 20s. But even still, many practitioners will still advise against it, calling it the rhythm method and suggesting it’s ineffective. And so there’s still overall very little knowledge and awareness about fertility awareness.

So you can’t necessarily expect your partner to just jump on board right away, because understandably your partner may be skeptical. So before you try to get your partner on board, it’s really helpful for you to take the time to really understand and learn it for yourself. And what I always talk about on the podcast is that if you’re planning to use fertility awareness as your primary birth control method and you’re serious about it — like you want to be successful, you really want to minimize the chance of an unplanned pregnancy — you do have to take the necessary time to learn it. So it’s something that you should take seriously, kind of like learning to drive or learning any other skill. Inform yourself first so that you can talk about it confidently.

Okay, number three — find out how much your partner wants to be involved. And so as you learn the method for yourself, as you start trying to figure out what it’s going to look like in your relationship, you know — how are you going to manage the fact that you’re not on birth control and there is now this possibility of pregnancy every month? And there always has to be that understanding that there is always a chance of pregnancy. So whether you’re on the pill or not — women get pregnant on the pill. The efficacy rate of the pill is about 99%, but the typical use is closer to 91, 92%, for example.

So when you’re transitioning to fertility awareness and having that conversation — recognizing that there’s this very real chance of conceiving — you kind of have to figure out how much your partner wants to be involved. My experience working with women is that their partners are typically quite supportive and open. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that every single partner is going to want to hear everything about it. Every single person isn’t necessarily going to be writing down your basal body temperature for you on your chart every day. So it’s really helpful to figure out how much your partner actually wants to be involved.

So you may be surprised — maybe your partner really does want to get involved. So that example of recording the BBT — that’s a real example. One of my clients would take her temperature in the morning and her partner would actually write it down for her. Several of my clients have opted for paper charting. They’ll fill out their information every day and perhaps leave it on their nightstand, or even post it up on a wall somewhere in their home, and their partner can actually look at it and see where they are in their cycle. That works for some relationships where your partner actually wants to play an active role. But then there’s the other side of the spectrum where your partner doesn’t necessarily need to see the chart itself or the play-by-plays, but perhaps they just want to have a sense of where you are in your cycle and kind of on a situation basis — is today a good day or not.

Having those conversations and getting a sense of how involved your partner wants to be is helpful, because your partner can be supportive and involved and help you with this process without necessarily knowing every single detail. This is one of the benefits of fertility awareness because you can’t necessarily avoid conversations. All of a sudden you’re having conversations about how to manage your fertility — what would we do if the condom broke during my fertile window and I were to get pregnant? These are the adult conversations, frankly, that everybody should be having regardless of what type of birth control method they’re on.

Okay, number four — take a class. So you won’t be surprised to hear me suggest that. But taking a class can be a really helpful thing for a number of reasons. The first thing is that it actually makes it official — like it’s an actual legitimate thing that you’re doing. You’re paying money for something, you’re hiring a professional essentially to provide you with information about a specific birth control method. So I think there are a couple of things that happen when you take a class. One, all of a sudden your partner kind of pays attention — they’re like, oh, this is a legitimate actual real thing.

If you are able to involve your partner in that process — so for example, if you purchase a course and your partner is able to watch some of those videos or read a part of the book if they want to — this comes down to how involved your partner wants to be. But many women may be surprised that their partners do want to read and understand it for themselves. One of the things I hear a lot from my clients is, my partner has a super scientific job and so he’s super skeptical about this. He wants to see the research. So taking a class, making it official — and to the caveat as well — it’s really important to find a certified educator, someone who has actually taken training. There are many different methods of fertility awareness charting, so going to somebody who has actually taken the time to obtain a proper certification, meaning they were trained in a specific method by a specific organization, is really important.

I’ve had many of my clients respond to me like, wow, my partner was really impressed. He was like, you’re meeting with her again — this is a legitimate thing. This is really involved. I see that you’re really taking this seriously. And so just by your attitude around it, the fact that you’re taking it seriously and really informing yourself, that kind of raises the level of what you’re doing in many ways. And one of the other aspects of it is that when you take a class, you yourself are much, much more informed. So when your partner has a question, you’re not sitting there saying, I don’t know, and then feeling the pressure of bringing this new method and feeling like if it doesn’t work, it’s my fault because this was my idea.

All right, number five — decide on the lingo that you’re going to use to communicate when you’re fertile or infertile. When you’re in a relationship with someone for a long time, it’s not like you’re going to sit down and have a formal conversation every time you want to have sex. So between you and your partner, there might be something that you can do — just a thing that would make sense for you to really clearly indicate which days of your cycle are fertile or not, or whether tonight is a night with no protection or whatever the case. Some of my clients will have their charts up on the wall, and perhaps they’ll put a certain color on the chart when it’s time to go, so their partner will know. Something else might just be a word you have or the way you talk about it. I might say something like, if you want to make a baby tonight, tonight would be the night. I’d make a joke about it. But either way, it’s clear.

All right, number six — and this is super important — don’t be wishy-washy. Be really clear in your communication and be really honest if you forget a day or if you’re unsure of what’s going on. This goes back to that idea of the pressure all being on you. Fertility awareness is not something that you should be organizing your life around. It shouldn’t be something that’s a burden to you. If you’re going to use fertility awareness for the long term and be successful with it, it’s something that has to fit into your life. We’re human beings and life happens. Sometimes you travel, sometimes you forget your thermometer. So you have to recognize that it’s never going to be 100% perfect forever.

If you have a situation where you’ve missed a day, don’t be wishy-washy with your partner — be really, really clear about what’s happening and be honest. That will help to build your partner’s confidence in the method and also in you, so that you both have a sense that you’re fully aware of everything that’s happening and that you can trust each other and trust the method. And these are conversations you have to have — like, what is your risk tolerance? Where do you fall on the spectrum? Are you at a zero — like, no pregnancies at all? Are you at a ten — I wanted a pregnancy yesterday? Are you somewhere in the middle? What would happen if you got pregnant? These things can change in the moment, but these are conversations that you need to have so that you’re really clear in your communication with your partner.

Okay, so number seven — have a conversation about how to manage your fertile window. What are you going to do when you’re fertile? What are you going to do when the mucus is flowing? How are you going to handle that? When you’re on hormonal birth control, that often saves couples from using barrier methods like condoms. And it’s no secret that a lot of people do not like condoms. Condoms aren’t the only way to manage the fertile window, but you have to figure out how you’re going to do that, and you have to try to come to some sort of agreement or understanding that is acceptable to both parties.

The only time that your chosen barrier method can fail is in your fertile window, because that is the only point in your cycle when you can get pregnant. So when you choose to have sex in your fertile window with the intention of avoiding pregnancy, you have to really be clear on what perfect use is. And you also have to know that when you have sex in your fertile window using a barrier or other type of birth control method, you’re relying on the effectiveness of that particular method. Many women aren’t comfortable having sex in their fertile window even with protection because they’re at the zero end of the spectrum and they don’t want to conceive. And so if that’s the case, you may consider alternative intimacy options. But either way, you need to have that conversation about what you’re comfortable with, how you’re going to manage it, and what that’s going to look like for both of you — and this would be a good conversation to have before you’re in the moment.

All right, so number eight — share the science with skeptical partners. There is a lot of scientific evidence and research to back up fertility awareness. Studies have been done to demonstrate the efficacy of these methods. In particular, the most rigorous studies not only tested the effectiveness but also ensured that the participants fully understood the method by having them learn from trained teachers who were certified in a particular method of fertility awareness charting. So keeping in mind that the statistics are based on women who are informed and who really knew what they were doing and were following the method.

There is a difference between using the method correctly — when you’re using the method correctly, the symptothermal method, so combining your cervical mucus observations with your cervical position and basal body temperature, has been shown to be up to 99.4% effective as a way to prevent pregnancy naturally. And that is when the method is used correctly by women who were trained by instructors teaching a very particular method. So the method itself is highly effective. But of course, if you yourself have not taken the time to learn the method, the typical use statistics can be quite a bit lower, depending on how well you understand what you’re doing and what your intentions are.

So share the science with skeptical partners. Many of my clients have partners who have a big science background and want to see the research. Fortunately, there is research — so it’s not like you have to take someone’s word for it. You can actually have an adult discussion about it.

Number nine — share the benefits of using fertility awareness. Talk about the benefits of it. Going back to the why part — whatever the reason why you wanted to do it, whether it’s that you were having side effects, whether it’s that you used hormonal birth control and lost your libido and sex was painful or you weren’t even that interested in it and you didn’t even notice until you came off of it — and all of a sudden you had this crazy sex drive. Many, many women come off of hormonal birth control and gradually regain their libido and actually have a newfound love and appreciation and enjoyment of sex. Not only do many women regain their libido or experience an increase in libido, but many women will find an increase in actual sexual satisfaction as well.

That is a really big deal. And it terrifies me how many women have been robbed of their full sexual experience on hormonal birth control. When I talk about the side effects of the pill, there’s a lot of research that shows the physiological side effects. So whether or not you perceived any effects, there were specific effects on every single woman who uses hormonal birth control — particularly combined contraceptives that contain synthetic estrogen and synthetic progesterone. For example, all women who use combination hormonal birth control with that combination of synthetic estrogen and progesterone experience a severe drop in testosterone — up to even a quarter of what is typical in a woman who’s not taking hormonal birth control. A significant drop in free testosterone levels, which for many women affects their libido, their enjoyment, and their sexual satisfaction. And for some women, it even causes sex to be uncomfortable or even painful.

One of the benefits that many women experience when coming off of birth control — sometimes it takes a little bit longer for the libido to return, sometimes it returns more quickly — but it’s that full sexual experience, full libido. And that benefits your partner too, because if you have a renewed libido and your interest in sex is increasing, that’s going to benefit both of you.

And then of course another benefit would be preserving natural fertility. By using a non-hormonal method that does not interfere with your menstrual cycle or your natural hormone production, you are in a way preserving your natural fertility, and you’re allowing your cycles to normalize post birth control, so that when you’re ready to conceive, you’re more likely to just do that when it’s time. Hormonal birth control methods are associated with a temporary delay in the return of your normal fertility, which means there is a period of time where your fertility is suppressed. And that period can last anywhere from six months to 18 months or more. And you don’t necessarily know how long it’s going to last for you.

All right, now number ten — we made it all the way to the last point. Be patient. It’ll take time for your partner to be comfortable. When I’m teaching women to chart their cycles, there’s a natural progression we go through. It takes some time before we actually feel completely confident in the method. In my experience, when you’re actually working with a trained instructor, it can take anywhere from one to three cycles for you to really gain that confidence. The real learning takes place when you actually chart — when you actually check your mucus, try to figure out what you’re seeing, write it down, try to figure out how to identify when ovulation is in your cycle, and try to figure out how to confirm the length of your luteal phase. Just by actually doing the work — that’s how you learn.

So if you are going to take a little bit of time to become fully confident in the method and comfortable using it, then you have to expect that your partner will as well. This is just a natural part of this process. And so if you want your partner to just be on board immediately, and it’s frustrating you that it’s taking your partner some time to be comfortable — just remember that it is normal. This is a new thing. With any new thing, it’s normal to have some skepticism around it, it’s normal to have questions, it’s normal to be concerned, it’s normal to have doubts and fears.

And so just like you have these feelings, your partner is going to have these feelings as well. Recognizing that this is a normal stage of the process and being patient and kind, and really taking the time to think about the other nine steps we went through — finding ways to educate your partner, helping your partner to feel more comfortable and confident, legitimizing the method in various ways, and just taking the necessary time to introduce your partner into this kind of new way of thinking about fertility, the menstrual cycle, the body, and birth control — this is a completely new area. Recognize that it will take time.

But I also want to remind you that in my experience, the vast majority of women I see, their partners are quite open to it. Sometimes it takes them a little bit of time to come around. And sometimes even if your partner gets it, other friends or family members will completely not be on board at all. And so just recognizing that this is a process and between you and your partner, it’s up to both of you to figure out what’s going to work best for you.

Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed today’s episode, please share it with a friend. You’ll find the show notes page for today’s episode over at fertilityfriday.com/405. I hope you have a wonderful week, weekend, whenever you’re tuning into the show. And of course, as always, until next time — be well and happy charting.