One of my goals this year is to read at least a book a month about a health topic in my quest to better understand my body and make it the best it can be. The first book I read won’t be helpful for everyone, but I enjoyed it. It was Taking Charge of Your Fertility.

I’m not about to turn into a blogger who write TMI posts or blogs about my sex life. That’s not my style since I’m a pretty modest girl, but I do want to share something my review of Taking Charge of Your Fertility because it has changed my life.

Why I Read Taking Charge of Your Fertility

I wish I had read this book months or years ago. Personally I never learned much – or anything really – about my body and how it works regarding my period and fertility. All I knew was every month or so my period came and though it sucked I just had to get through it. I learned all hygiene stuff and the very basics of why it happened but nothing beyond that. I suppose I didn’t need to but the fact that I didn’t learn that then meant I didn’t know it even in my 20s. Reading this book changed all that.

It’s surprising that I never learned much about my hormones or monthly cycles. (Shocking, really.) I remember as a teenager being diagnosed with PMDD [Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) is a condition in which a woman has severe depression symptoms, irritability, and tension before menstruation aka more severe PMS where I can't control getting super duper sad] and being  put on prozac to treat the symptoms until I decided I hated taking medication. Once I started exercising and eating healthier just to lose weight I noticed that it also reduced the PMDD symptoms and medication wasn’t as necessary anyway. Though the symptoms are still around they are tolerable and don’t completely disrupt my life.

Eventually I went on birth control pills because I knew that even though I was getting married I wasn’t wanting to become pregnant early on and wanted to get used them. This ending up being a horrible decision because in my case hormonal birth control pills increased the PMDD symptoms and almost literally made me insane. My history with depression combined with PMDD combined with birth control pills was a recipe for disaster. Crazy insane person disaster!! Much like when I stopped taking Prozac I realized again that I didn’t enjoy my quality of life so I stopped taking birth control. But that left me with a need to figure out something else for birth control.

The Basics of Taking Charge of Your Fertility

The interesting thing to me about the book Taking Charge of Your Fertility is that it is about understanding your body as a woman. This means it is useful either for those wanting to prevent or create a pregnancy. It is focused around the Fertility Awareness Method which involves a women tracking her cycle and changes in her body to know when she can and cannot get pregnant.

The book is broken into several sections that cover your period, your body, how to track your cycle, how to get pregnant, how to not get pregnant, basic womens’ health issues. The main part of the book is focused on learning how and why to track your monthly cycle as it is very important to both sets of goals. The book includes lots of examples and instructions and makes it easy. It also comes with a cd that has software that help you do this on your computer.

It teaches women the basics of fertility that we don’t learn anywhere else. It gives the knowledge and power to the reader and really builds confidence. After reading the book you can take your own fertility into your hands and know that you have a better chance at achieving what you want rather than just guessing.

My Thoughts on Taking Charge of Your Fertility

I’ll admit that this book made me feel stupid. I’m not sure why since I simply never had the opportunity to learn these things, but I definitely learned more in this class than I did in any school sex education (that was one awkward class that taught nothing) or doctors visits. After reading the book and putting into practice it’s method I feel much more confident about preventing and hopefully eventually becoming pregnant.

For me personally it also helped me better understand my body and the hormonal things that happen each month as well. I liked that the book works for both women trying to get pregnant and those trying to prevent it as well as giving lots of information important to all women. It’s a wonderful resource and a

Even if you don’t plan to use “natural birth control” or the Fertility Awareness Method that is described in the book I think this is a great read for anyone wanting to understand more about their body and the process of either achieving pregnancy or preventing it. I’d say it’s even a good read for either teenagers or moms of teenagers who want their kids to be more informed than most.

Obviously my review is positive. I’d give it 5 of 5 stars! ?????

You can buy Taking Charge of Your Fertility on Amazon or in your local bookstore. I got mine at Barnes & Noble (it’s less expensive online).

Book Review: Taking Charge of Your Fertility is a post from: A Merry Life! If you aren't reading it via RSS or on amerrylife.com it has been stolen!!

]]>