Dear Agatha,
Within a decade of my marriage, I have had seven children because of my husband is opposed to birth control pills and devices.
According to him, being a Catholic, using any form of birth control would be going against his faith.
I almost died during the birth of my last child prompting the doctor to warn me against any attempt at getting pregnant again. He was even called and warned not to allow me get pregnant again if he valued my life.
The doctor advised us on the different birth control methods we could use. He told him that if he didn’t want me using any of the ones he explained; he could use condom because it has no effect whateversoever on any of us. He recommended this after my husband argued against every method he suggested for us.
When he was told I could die if I attempted to have another child, he grudgingly agreed to condom.
I didn’t know it was just a trick to escape from the prying eyes of the doctor.
My last child is now four months old. Apart from me not being ready because of the emotional stress I went through during this particularly difficult birth, my husband wants to resume sex without any form of protection.
When I reminded him of the danger to my health; he replied that his mother gave birth to 11 children without any consequence to her health.
He said, being the only son of his mother, he intends having enough children to make her happy. Already I have four boys. He said he wants two more boys to make his sons six.
What is upsetting me the most is his insensitivity to my health. He doesn’t care about me at all. He makes me feel as if my only usefulness in his life is to make babies for him.
He has forgotten that I have a job to keep. Although I am a civil servant, the reason I have not been sacked as a result of my incessant maternity leaves, but it is also affecting my career as a public relations officer to my ministry.
My husband isn’t behaving as an educated man at all; he is a director in the federal civil service.
He reported me to our parish priest who rather than reprimand him on his unreasonable demand told me that the only form of birth controls recognized by the church were the billing or withdrawal methods. My argument that these methods don’t work for me wasn’t even considered.
The way it is, there is no way I can sleep with him without any form of protection. The reason I am writing you is to ask if it is alright if I go outside him to insert a birth control that I feel is good for me.
Josephine.
Dear Josephine,
Your situation is very complex. Frankly, you cannot find a solution to this problem outside your husband. Granted it is your life and body that are at stake here, to go against his will and adopt a form of birth control will only worsen the situation between the two of you.
No matter how unreasonable his demands are, don’t be tempted to, unless you resolve the problem between the two of you because he could easily accuse you of infidelity or disobeying his orders.
The only way out of it, is to use the medical report by the doctor to convince the church that you need protection too. There is no church that will willingly offer the life of its member to death just to preserve a doctrine. Once the church knows of the medical implication to your health, I’m sure they will find a way around the problem.
If the priest is adamant, report him to a higher authority vested with the power to take a decisive decision on the matter. Back up your position with the medical reports given you by the doctor. If possible, get the doctor to come with you to explain why it is important you prevent against another pregnancy. It is also important you ask the church what would happen if your subsequent pregnancies produce girls instead of the boys he wants. Let him explain to the church when it would be enough if the boys don’t come early. The essence of this question is to expose the folly of his desires.
Only God determines the gender of a child despite claims by scientists that a particular position adopted by a couple can produce the desired gender.
Beyond that, you might need to also report the matter to his family as well as yours. This is because of the danger to your life. You have to know where he is getting the idea from. The kind of remarks his mother makes concerning the matter or attitude she puts up, will tell you where he is getting the idea from. If his mother is the one putting such idea into his head, go and meet her to explain what the doctor said the last time you had a child.
Explain in clear terms the verdict of the doctor concerning your life. If possible too, let the doctor come to explain to your mother-in-law why she should plead with her son to allow you use birth control.
Explain the consequences of leaving all your seven children behind should you die as a result of going through another childbirth. This is to make her think beyond the issue of her, having more grandsons, to how she would manage with seven children who are less than ten years old.
Blinded by her desire to have more grandsons, she may not have considered or thought that far. Besides, her son may not have told her about your health condition if you get pregnant again. Being a mother and woman, she may not support anything that would kill you.
But if she too refuses to listen to you, hand over the matter to your family who will definitely know what to do about it.
In the meantime; there is the need for you and your husband to discuss the situation between the two of you. From his attitude, it is absolutely clear things are not normal in your marriage. For a man to insist on his wife having another child so soon after he was warned by the doctor not to allow her get pregnant tells a story of so many things wrong in your marriage.
No loving man would send his wife on such a journey of no return. So what is wrong in your relationship to make him this callous and unthinking about the health implications to you?
Has he always been this unreasonable and unfeeling for your health and welfare? How many children did you both agree on before you two got married? Has he always made his desire to have so many children known to you? I ask these particular questions because such passion to bless his mother with six grandsons certainly wouldn’t have started today. He must have mentioned it while you were both dating. The fact that you didn’t think of protesting when you kept getting pregnant for the seven children you now have within a period of ten years, shows that you also weren’t thinking of your health and wanted to meet up with the targets you both set for yourselves.
To be candid, would you have gone ahead to have more children if the issue of your health didn’t arise?
Also, didn’t you realize the nature of your man before you agreed to marry him? Chances are you did but thought you could change him; a mistake many women often make in their bid to get married.
Whatever the issues are, you can no longer pretend all is well in your marriage when it is so obvious that your marriage needs counsel and all the help to reset it for success.
This is the time for you to appeal for help from the church and your family in your quest to right those things that have gone wrong. The problem of birth control is only a smoke screen for the real issues which I think you are aware of but, too timid to address with all the seriousness required to make this marriage work.
Until you make that decision to face, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in your union; another woman may just become the one to care for your children, after your death.
Think about it!
Good luck.
