Catholic Cysters Corner Part II - Page 3

KellyAhrens · 01-21-2009, 05:23 PM

Hi...Ive been on this site a while an just stumbled across this thread =) I am also a life long catholic! Found out I had PCOS in Aug of last year.

Ashleystar · 01-22-2009, 05:21 PM

Hi,

Was just thinking about angels and guardian angels. Do any of you have any angelic experiences?

I have experienced protection and love from mine when I have asked them to help me. I know my mum also has Archangel Michael as her guardian.

Would love to know if you would like to share xx

Ashleystar · 01-31-2009, 02:14 PM

Hey,

We were talking about Saints a bit ago. My dad just told me he suddenly thought of Saint Anthony - his mother prayed to him constantly. There's a website where you can write your prayer intentions to the friars at S. Anthony's basilica in Padua, Italy, and they will pray on your behalf. www.carosantantonio.com

Hope this helps xx

tigir · 02-02-2009, 05:17 PM

WOW!!! I have some catching up to do! LOL

I hope everyone had a good Christmas and welcome to all the newbies!!!

On the issue of Popes...which ones were you referring to in the early Church who were more concerned with $$$? I think it is good to remember that Popes are still human and the only time they are infallible is when teaching on faith & morals - and then only when it isn't contradictory to Tradition & scripture. They can make mistakes and bad decisions like the rest of us which is why they need our prayers - I am sure it must be a difficult calling at times. And for all the ones who may have taken advantage of their position, there are still many Holy ones.

I have to remind myself to "hold fast to Tradition" and to live my Faith no matter what anyone else is doing/saying, even when hypocrisy abounds - not easy sometimes.

It is not so important what they are doing, it is what *I* do that matters in the end - I won't be judged by their merits, but my own, so I better be on top of it no matter how steep the climb! Hope that makes sense, I have little ones begging for attention so I my mind may have wandered in the middle of my thoughts. LOL

I don't know about everyone else, but I am really looking forward to Lent! I will try to be on here more beforehand as I try to give my computer up as much as I can during Lent. Hope everyone is well!

gmwilliams1 · 02-17-2009, 10:46 PM

Hello fellow Catholic Cysters,
Just marking my spot. Love this thread.

Ceebee · 02-18-2009, 02:54 PM

Hello all my Catholic Cysters.

I love this thread. Such beautiful words of encouragement. I was diagnosed w/PCO 10 years ago. It is so nice to know that there are other cysters like me.

"When you are down to nothing...God is up to something."

Novgirl · 02-18-2009, 04:20 PM

Hello Cysters - glad I stumbled upon this thread.

What is everyone giving up for Lent? I really want to find something worthy of sacrifice this year.... suggestions?

Ceebee · 02-18-2009, 05:58 PM

[QUOTE What is everyone giving up for Lent? I really want to find something worthy of sacrifice this year.... suggestions?[/quote]

We are teaching the kids at CCD that they don't have to give up anything. They could maybe pray the rosary everyday or do a good deed everyday. I heard one catechists talking about going to mass everyday. I'm thinking of praying the rosary every day.

Novgirl · 02-19-2009, 10:05 AM

Great idea Ceebee! Thanks!

tigir · 02-20-2009, 09:23 PM

Welcome Gina, Ceebee & Novgirl!!!

I am giving up SC & Facebook for Lent. I try to stay out of the world as much as possible during that time. Any sacrifice I can make is a good one.

I am also striving for 15 decades of the Rosary per day, I really need to get my prayer life back on track! There is so much to pray for these days, especially in my life and others who are close to me.

anselmi · 03-05-2009, 12:53 PM

Hello, I'm new to the website and I just wanted to introduce myself.
I have been a Catholic my entire life and love it! I got married on 9.12.08. I started charting because I knew there was something wrong with my cycles in '06. I use the Creighton method and have had a laparoscopy done by Dr. Hilgers at the Pope Paul VI institute May 2007. He found I did have PCOD, endometriosis, and a uterine infection. Also, my prolactin levels were high, I have insulin resistance, and I have hypothyroidisim. I was treated for the infection, prolactin levels and hypothyroidisim. The sad part is that I was never diagnosed with this when I was younger because I am not overweight and I don't have excess hair. My husband and I were told to start TTC soon because of my condition. So we are going to start trying in April. I had to start taking progesterone shots last month because it took me over three months to have a period. Dr. Hilgers told me I needed to take clomid when we start trying, which we will do in June. I was also told that if we cannot get pregnant on the clomid (after 6 months of trying) then I will have to go back to Dr. Hilgers for the wedge resection. Well thats my PCOS diagnosis in a nut shell...I am so glad to be joining this site and especially to be able to talk to other Catholics that do not believe in unnatural methods for getting pregnant. Every place I look, I find women that are using invitro to get pregnant...and it is a road I will never take.

I really hope all of you have great insight to all of this because the TTC is going to be new to me and so is the clomid and such. Any advice, please give it I would love the feedback!

oldhousegirl · 03-06-2009, 02:12 AM

I just want to be clear that am I a lifelong Catholic and went through IVF. I even donated my extra embryos to stem cell research (well, I didn't have any extras, sadly, but I did sign the paperwork in anticipation).

Not that I asked their permission, but I did have the full support of my priests and of numerous friends of mine who are nuns (very old, Irish nuns at that). I was on my Parish Council during that time, and everyone prayed for us. My husband and I teach pre-Cana and share our experiences with IVF with the class.

I wanted to share this so that all Catholics feel comfortable in this forum. I can very well understand the decision not to undergo ARTs and respect those decisions as well.

Novgirl · 03-06-2009, 11:06 AM

Hey Amanda - welcome!

I have a question that is in the genuine spirit of curiosity and wanting to know more about my faith...

So, why is it that IVF is 'unnatural' but taking drugs to force ovulation isn't?

I can totally understand why people wouldn't want any medical intervention when TTC and I can totally understand why people would be open to any option available to them... But I don't understand why and based on what you can pick and choose which you support.

Can you give me some more insight into this?

Oldhousegirl - thanks for your post. You're right - ALL Catholics are welcome here. :o)

anselmi · 03-06-2009, 11:37 AM

I know this is going to bring up a lot of controversy and I hope no one gets offended by this. But I want everyone to know that this is the teachings of our Roman Catholic Church and it is our job to spread the word to keep others souls along with ours out of danger of sin. This whole discussion is based on the mere fact that life begins at conception, a basic principal of our catholic faith. If you truly believe in that statement then you will believe that IVF is truly wrong. I know that every woman on here desires to be a mother, I completely understand. But I do not want to go against the teachings of the church to have a child. There are other ways to have children. I hope you read this all the way through. I apologize if the discussion below is choppy or not well put together, I’m kinda in a hurry.

I am sorry but I cannot agree with your teaching of IVF. The Catholic church believes in the natural form of conception. I am not sure how you got a priest and nuns to give you their permission. Here are some articles I would like to share with you. It is important to understand our faith and teach it to the youth of today properly.

This is an article that came from the Vatican...
In its most authoritative declaration on bio-ethics for more than 20 years, the Vatican yesterday reinforced its hostility to a wide range of techniques and treatments that have become available in recent decades. They included IVF, embryonic stem cell research, the morning-after pill and the contraceptive drug mifepristone.
A 36-page document endorsed by Pope Benedict XVI stopped short of declaring that human embryos were people. The pope's chief adviser on bio-ethical issues, Monsignor Rino Fisichella, told a press conference that such a declaration would have embroiled the Vatican in a "very complex philosophical debate".
But he said, the document fully backed the idea that a human embryo had the "dignity typical of a person".
And he noted this was an "advance" on the position taken in the Vatican's last high-level pronouncement, its 1987 instruction entitled Donum Vitae (The Gift of Life).
The formulation in its latest document, Dignitas Personae (The Dignity of the Person), comes close to equating with murder such practices as the destruction of defective embryos in IVF.
On one issue - what to do with frozen, "orphan" embryos - the Vatican admitted it was flummoxed. Dignitas Personae rules out every apparent solution: their destruction, their donation to infertile couples and their use for therapeutic or experimental purposes.
It said that proposals for the adoption of unwanted embryos were "praiseworthy in intention", but fraught with problems.
Fisichella's predecessor as president of the Pontifical Pro-life Academy, Monsignor Elio Sgreccia, said: "Our basic advice is that the freezing [of the embryos] ought not to be done." It created "a blind alley"; a situation "the correction of which implies another mistake".
But neither he nor any of the other Vatican officials at the presentation would venture an opinion on what they considered the lesser evil.
The document otherwise restates the Catholic church's opposition to abortifacient forms of contraception, or those it regards as such. These include the world's most widely used method of reversible contraception, the intrauterine device (IUD) or coil.
Dignitas Personae said most forms of artificial fertilisation were "to be excluded" on the grounds that they replaced "the conjugal act" as a means of reproduction. And it said pre-implantation diagnosis during IVF, in which embryos are examined for defects or to determine gender or other characteristics, was "shameful and utterly reprehensible".
Saying life was sacred from the moment of conception to the moment of natural death, the document also defended the Catholic church's right to intervene on such matters.
It accepted, however, that Catholic parents, especially in the US, might have no alternative to having their children inoculated with vaccines produced with cells from aborted foetuses.
It also stressed that the Catholic church did not oppose the use by researchers of adult stem cells.

Here is another great one...from http://www.catholicinsight.com/online/church/vatican/article_475.shtml
Catholic Church teaching
A human being comes into existence at the moment of fertilization of an oocyte (ovum) by a sperm. This fact has been recognized by the science of Human Embryology since 1883, and is still acknowledged today. The Church teaches that a human being must be respected-as a person-from the very first instant of his existence as a human being, and therefore, from that same moment, his rights as a person must be recognized among which in the first place, is the inviolable right of every innocent human being to life. The Church also teaches that from the moral point of view a truly responsible procreation vis-à-vis the unborn child, must be the fruit of marriage.
Pope Paul VI has taught that there is an "inseparable connection, willed by God, and unable to be broken by man on his own initiative, between the two meanings of the conjugal act: the unitive meaning and the procreative meaning."
IVF violates the rights of the child: it deprives him of his filial relationship with his parental origins and can hinder the maturing of his personality. It objectively deprives conjugal fruitfulness of its unity and integrity, it brings about and manifests a rupture between genetic parenthood, gestational parenthood, and responsibility for upbringing. This threat to the unity and stability of the family is a source of dissension, disorder, and injustice in the whole of social life.
What about research on a human embryo?
The Church teaches that medical research must refrain from operations on live embryos, unless there is moral certainty of not causing harm to the life or integrity of the unborn child and mother, and on condition that the parents have given free and informed consent to the procedure. Since stem cell research on human embryos, in practice, invariably causes the death of those embryos, it too stands condemned.
In summary, the Catholic Church condemns as gravely evil acts, both IVF in and of itself, and stem cell research performed on IVF embryos.

I am a patient of Dr. Hilgers at Pope Paul Vi institute in Omaha, Ne, and to answer NOVgirl's question about ovulation...first of all from my experience, medicine like clomid is very mild, correct me if I’m wrong, in the fact that it only produces one maybe two eggs in a cycle compared to others. Others, like the ones used in IVF, produce many eggs in your ovaries. Also, the teaching in the catholic church is basic when it comes to conception. Conception is a loving act between a man and a woman where their love, love making, ends in life. IVF is the man made way of extracting eggs and creating embryos in the petri dish. Once there are many ebryos created, in the catholic church's eyes these are human beings, they are implanted back in to the women. Then hopefully one or two will take and the rest are passed. The past embryos are, sorry to be crude, killed when they don't implant in the woman. This is exactly the same as having an abortion. You are abandoning what is defined to the catholic church as a human life with a soul. The catechism says: 2274 Since it must be treated from conception as a person, the embryo must be defended in its integrity, cared for, and healed, as far as possible, like any other human being.

As for donating the embryos, same thing applies because you are taking a human life and donating it to science to be killed. This should be easier for PCOS women to understand because it is difficult for us to conceive and we have such a desire for children. Do you want to know that while you are praying to God to be blessed with a child there are other children out there that have been abandoned and donated to research by their parents.

Please, I would love to have a discussion about this. This isn’t a personal attack on any one of you beautiful women, it is merely a challenge for you to understand the beliefs of the catholic church so that you can share it with others. And so you can not put your own souls at risk of sin.

Novgirl · 03-06-2009, 12:44 PM

Thanks for all the info Amanda.

I appreciate that your stance is supported. I can't say that I agree but I respect everyone for their right to make their own choices.

I suppose if your argument is around the fact that IVF a) results in 'aborted' embryo's and b) creates children that aren't the result of love making then your choice to use Clomid makes sense.

I kind of see it as hypocritical though... I think that if you believe that conception should be 100% a 'natural' act that you shouldn't be willing to intervene the process - even with a 'mild' drug.

Anyhoo - good luck w/ your TTC & thanks again for sharing all that info.