THE BIG CHANGE

In 2005 they had begun asking questions like “Would you consider sleeping with someone on the first date?” Compared to 2005, in 2016 every single demographic group was more likely to say “no”. Heterosexual women were the statistical leaders with 25% being less likely to say yes. When they were asked, “Would you date someone just for sex?” again, every single demographic group said no more than in 2005. There was an overall drop of 10% in 11 years.

More evidence that agrees with this trend is a large US national research study of over 3000 young adults and high school students that was released in 2017 by Harvard University. Its findings were that a large majority of young adults are overestimating how many other young people are hooking up. This study also showed that 85% of young adults would prefer other options over hooking up, such as hanging out with friends or having sex within a committed relationship.

THE COLLEGE SCENE

From the hookup culture frontlines, the colleges, more evidence of women’s true desires surface. In a study of 832 college students, only 26% of women, but a full 50% of men reported feeling positive after hookup. Of the same 832 students 49% of women and 26% of men had a negative reaction after hooking up.

In research on specifically 152 college women only, 74% had either few or some regrets after a hookup; 61% had a few regrets 23% had no regrets, 13% had some regrets and 3% had many regrets. In a related study, college women’s, but not college men’s depression symptoms increased as their number of sexual partners in a year increased.

In yet another study focused on college students the authors found that 78% of college students overestimated others comfort with hookup behaviors, with men especially overestimating women’s comfort with hookups.

COLLATERAL DAMAGE

Moving our examination to the young adult bar scene, in a study of 169 sexually active women and men in singles bars, only 32% of men said that they would feel guilty about having intercourse with someone they had just met compared to 72% of women. Complicating matters further, in a study of 118 freshman female college students, participants shared that in 64% of cases hookups followed alcohol use. The average number of drinks in these encounters was three. This combination of binge drinking in order to numb the feelings of impersonal sex has become characteristic of many college campuses.

Most upsetting of all is the relationship of hookup culture with sexual assault. In a study of 178 college men and women, the participants revealed that most of their experiences with unwanted sex occurred while engaged in a hookup. As a matter of fact, 78% took place during a hookup, 14% during an ongoing relationship, and 8% on a date. It can be seen that in reality, hookup culture in many cases enables rape culture. No woman I’ve known or even heard of would ever choose to have to suffer through this!

So, the picture is pretty clear that this common sexual pattern that people are enduring in the Western world has many profound downsides, and that is particularly true for women. So, what do women really want? From both my personal experience and extensive research I have found that a large majority of women want to return to a world where there is commonly a relationship of love and respect between men and women. This entails returning to a culture where sex is reserved for his proper place: marriage.

BACK TO ROMANCE!

Women express to me that they like it when a man displays chivalry toward them. They like to be treated like a lady. This is why Jane Austen books and movies are so popular with women. They want to return to traditional courtship, traditional marriage, and traditional family. In other words, they want the kind of life that they see their great-grandparents and grandparents in many cases had. In a phrase, they want to get back to romance. That’s why there is a ROMANCE REVOLT taking shape across Western societies.

What is the foundation of this? Well, I believe it goes back to the beginning of human history. From the very start God made human females one-man women.

“Your desire will be for your husband”

Genesis 3:16 CSB

What do women really want this Valentine’s Day? Their God-given, innate nature compels them want to get back to romance!

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A CHRISTIAN DISTINCTIVE

Contrastingly, at Christmas we begin to think of giving gifts and receiving gifts to and from our loved ones. Sometimes we don’t realize the value of the gift of sex in a loving monogamous relationship that we share with the love of our life, our spouse. An outstanding hallmark of Christianity from the beginning has been monogamous marriage. Christians stood out within their communities because of it. It has also stood the test of time and there are so many benefits to sex within monogamous marriage. Let’s take a look at some of them.

First of all, sex is a great releaser of stress. Sex within marriage doesn’t carry all of the negative baggage that sex previous to, or otherwise outside of marriage carries like guilty feelings, regret, worry about STI’s or an unwanted pregnancy with someone who is not your spouse.

BENEFITS ON MANY LEVELS

Sex within marriage leads to greater and greater levels of intimacy. You get to know each other better and better in a way that no one else on earth does. This helps develop a trust relationship that is sure and steady. In happy marriages this can have interesting physical benefits. Happily married couples blood pressures drop when they sleep together. Their heartbeats synchronize as well. Their hearts literally beat as one because of the assurance that they have that their spouse loves them absolutely and has their back at all times.

The physical contact involved in this helps us to bond more strongly all of the time. There are endorphin receptors throughout the skin covering of the body and they react to intimate and loving touch, which generates endogenous (or internal) endorphins, a kind of super relaxant. Hugs contribute to this, and married couples are encouraged to hug each other at least eight times per day.

LIFE LENGTHENING AND ENHANCING

Another great benefit of married sex is that it is antiaging. Cells in the body that are anti-inflammatory are released during sexual activity. This helps the body to be able to repair more effectively and seems to be a built-in way that the wellness and well-being of the married couple is enhanced.

Sex within marriage raises our immune system by causing the release of an antibody called immunoglobin A. This helps protect our bodies against invasive bacteria and viruses. A lifelong marriage is a very holistic stabilizing factor physiologically for a couple.

SLEEP LIKE A HUSBAND AND WIFE

An awesome married sex life helps us to sleep better because oxytocin is released substantially after orgasm. Cuddling afterwards and going to sleep is very natural and healthy. It helps us to have healthier looking skin as it promotes blood circulation, and it even helps women to have lighter periods. Many women have cramps during their monthly period, and regular sex to orgasm can make a difference through frequent uterine contractions that help expel toxins and tissues.

Sex within marriage raises our moods and gives us a more positive outlook on our spouse. If we are reflective we see that it’s benefits go far beyond immediate pleasure. When we look at the physical and spiritual fruits of our married sexual relationship: our children and grandchildren, it is obvious that this is definitely one of God’s most important gifts to us. After all, his first words to humanity were to go forth and multiply. As they say, this is the gift that keeps on giving as we experience one wonderful and memorable Christmas after another, year after year, and decade after decade.

GOD’S WAY IS ALWAYS THE BEST WAY

Married sex is a wonderful example of men and women displaying consistency, intentionality, and most of all faithfulness. This is what God intended for humans and without doubt, it is best for us. As noted above, it pays dividends multi-generationally to a family and then to all of the lives that a family influences in their lifetime. As we have seen before, it is always in our best interests to do things God’s way. Profound and magnificent blessings follow in that pathway. One path leads to death, the other path leads to life. Let’s choose life!

Marriage is to be honored by all and the marriage bed kept undefiled, because God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterers.

Hebrews 13:4 CSB

Sources: Importance of Sex in Marriage: 15 Physical & Psychological Benefits

5 Reasons Sex Within A Marriage is the Best Sex You Will Ever Have

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Some of these young people who had done this in some cases for over a year seem to be some of the most well-adjusted and mature young adults that I had ever had the honor to work with. With their choice to do this they had absolutely demonstrated consistency, intentionality, and faithfulness to their Christian beliefs. They seem to be very happy and in control of themselves after having taken their impulses under control and lived a life that was the polar opposite of most of their college friends for an extended period of time.

GOOD CLEAN FUN

One of their characteristics that really stood out was the way that when we were all in a group, we would all be laughing about some of the funniest morally clean things that happened to them on their journeys that I could imagine. There was something just really good about being able to laugh about these things that happened that demonstrated their strong commitment to ethics and morality but were at the same time, sidesplittingly funny circumstances among these young adults who were now in couples and navigating relationships. It was the old expression “just clean fun!”

I made a mental note of this, and beyond a strong admiration of what they had demonstrated, did not give it much more thought. That is, until my research brought me upon the concept of dopamine depletion. This is a widespread phenomenon in our 21^st century society. Basically, the problem is that as outlined in earlier posts, our lives do not match up very well with the lives of our ancestors. Here, we are having too many hedonistic pleasurable experiences in close succession and chronically. Our ancestors had very few of them and had to work very hard to get them.

MODERN DOPAMINE SPIKING LIFESTYLE

What am I talking about here? Well for one thing the way we typically eat. For example, the amount of sugar we consume per day now compared to the past. In 1700, the average intake of sugar per day was about 5 g. By 2009 the average had risen to 227 g per day. Sweet tastes spike dopamine levels. Every time dopamine spikes it crashes and lowers the baseline level. Eventually this leads to depression and the need to eat more and more sugar to get the same pleasurable high.

The same thing happens with sex. Hookup culture with its continuous casual sex to orgasm does the same thing to dopamine except more extremely. The same is true of porn use. Again, this is not Natural Lifestyle Matching in any way. Hookup culture and porn use can be looked at as behavioral addictions that are dopamine depleting. The dating abstinence that I have witnessed from the young adults I’ve had the honor of working with this year has the opposite effect. It is dopamine replenishing.

JUNK FOOD AND JUNK SEX

So, a hedonistic lifestyle, whether it be in the area of eating or the area of sex, is destructive to humans. One way we can think about it is that neither Junk Food nor Junk Sex is good for us. The Bible speaks to this:

“If you find honey eat just enough-too much of it and you will vomit.”

Proverbs 25:16 NIV

“Treat older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.”

1 Timothy 5:1-2

          This clean, biblical approach to life allows us to relate to each other with a clean conscience and really become good friends that can have a great time together. When I saw these young adult women and men relating to each other in this way, it made me and them laugh!

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SEX DRIVE DIFFERENCES

When it comes to sexuality, as we have seen in earlier posts, men and women are profoundly different. One of the greatest areas of difference is in the ease of the ability to arouse one sex versus the other. It should be clear by now to anyone who is been reading these posts that is generally much more challenging for women to become aroused than for men. There are many factors that contribute, for instance the comparative levels of testosterone. The women with the highest testosterone levels register 75 ng/dL while the lowest men register 200 ng/dL. When graphing female versus male testosterone levels, they are not even on the same graph. This differs from height for example where some women are taller than some men.

Another reason for this difference in arousal/sexual response potential is brain anatomy. We should remember that the sexual pursuit area of males brains is 2 ½ times larger than females. It is also packed with twice the density of neurons in these areas as the female brain. One other factor that makes typical young men supercharged sexually is that these brain areas are sensitive and react to testosterone levels. Yet another factor comparatively dampening female sex drive is the fact that females have much higher levels of sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG). SHBG binds to hormones and makes them incapable of making changes to the cells. This means that only what is called free testosterone can have these stimulating effects. Some women have 13 times more SHBG than men.

WOMEN’S SEX DRIVE CHALLENGES

For all of these reasons it can easily be seen why most women have a much lower sex drive than men. As a matter of fact, Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder or female sexual interest/arousal disorder is the most common sexual disorder in women. There is one more complicating factor with women as well. Their sex drives are strongly related to their ovulatory cycles. Their levels of estrogen and testosterone increase greatly before and through their ovulation but especially in the five or six days prior to ovulation. As estrogen and testosterone decline in the days after ovulation progesterone rises to take their place and it has more of a sedating effect.

US CLUELESS HUSBANDS

For many husbands (including me previously) who have no idea or knowledge about all of this about their wives, and their sex drives, it can prove to be very mysterious and possibly even frustrating. I am encouraging husbands to get educated on their wives’ sexuality and put that education to good use in helping her to reach satisfaction as well.

A couple of other characteristics that are important for husbands to know is that the pelvis of their wife is unique among women in how it is innervated. The various parts of her sexual organs have differing nerve wiring proportionally from other women which makes their sexual anatomy unique to them, like a thumbprint. Without getting too explicit this means that husbands need to get to know their wives intimately and learn what stimulates them and what doesn’t. Additionally, a wife’s autonomic nervous system (ANS) has to be able to relax fully in order for her to reach climax. All of this biology screams for marriage and monogamy for humans and against hooking up and promiscuity, especially from a female perspective! There is very little chance that a woman will reach satisfaction through casual sex and the research supports that.

GOD’S DESIGN FOR SACRIFICIAL MARRIAGE

Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.

Ephesians 5:25 CSB

To conclude, God has designed the marital act to take place in the context of a loving, lifelong committed relationship between a man and a woman. In this trust relationship a married couple can practice the marital act over and over again with more and more intimacy. Married love is not about instant gratification and what we (especially men) get out of it. It is the kind of love that is modeled throughout the Bible and especially by Christ in his sacrificial love for us. This is obviously a tiny sacrifice compared to Christ’s but an important one for the health of our marriages. Husbands, with mindful and intentional practice with our wives, we can provide them with the same kind of satisfaction we achieve each time they unite with us in the blessed marital act. They will be happier, and we all know the saying “when Mama is happy everybody’s happy!”

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ROMANCE LOWERS TESTOSTERONE

It is extremely important that most young people get on a pathway that is going to lead to a happy and a lifelong marriage, for their safety and well-being sake, and this is especially important for males. Excess testosterone is the root of many young men’s physical, emotional, and mental problems. When a man romantically commits to a woman his testosterone drops. If they get married, it drops further. If the couple then has children his testosterone will drop even further. In some research fathers have shown testosterone levels that are 50% lower than unmarried men with no children. As we learned in Part 1, constant high testosterone levels are bad for any species of God’s creation. An example cited was deer who only have high testosterone and antlers during the fall rut each year.

In the past 60 years there have been forces in our society that have tried to push us away from a culture where premarital chastity was honored and reinforced by societal norms. In 1960 for instance, in our 20 to 29-year-old population, there were three times more that were married. For that matter in 1960, 75% of all of those over 18 and older were married. One other telling statistic is that in 1960, 5% of children were born out of wedlock. By 2010, 40% of our children were being born without the benefit of their parents being married.

FATHER PRESENCE IS HUGE

This situation where more and more of our children are growing up in homes headed mostly by single mothers (many of whom are doing a heroic job) is helping to lead to many of the negative social situations in our society. Children need both parents as strong role models. Because of the explosion of testosterone at puberty, especially at ages 13–15, during which it increases 30 times their boyhood levels, the need of males for strong male role models in their father’s is imperative. If they don’t experience it, then often times they will look for it elsewhere. The females in the family, and especially sisters, also provide important lessons on what girls behavior is like in everyday life. Young men whose first experience with similar age females is dating often do not know how to relate to them and are scared to even try. The family is God’s relationship training ground.

MARVELOUS AND MAGNIFICENT MARRIAGE TO THE RESCUE!

For all of these and many more reasons Marvelous and Magnificent Marriage acts as excellent therapy for Testosterone Trap Trauma and provides safety for the Male Danger Zone. Marriage is Testosterone Trap Therapy for males. It protects them from the Male Danger Zone through the aforementioned lowering of their testosterone levels, but it also focuses them on good things. Marriage molds men into producers, providers, and savers. Married men are more committed to the workforce, they have fewer addictions, they commit less crime, and they are less likely to become crime victims themselves. They also have better health and are less prone to accidents.

Then the Lord God said, it is not good for man to be alone, I will make a helper corresponding to him. Genesis 2:18 CSB

In Genesis we read that God recognized that it is not good for man to be alone. Being married helps a man on so many different levels. Brides bring with them into the marriage a natural ability to create and maintain social networks. Husband’s benefit from this mightily. When divorce happens that network generally goes with the wife. The result of this and many other factors makes married men have better immune systems, have lower levels of depression and stress, less likely to commit suicide or murder. In fact, married men are 250% less likely to die prematurely then divorced men from all causes! This is a great example of Natural Lifestyle Matching because this pattern of young men and young women finding each other, falling in love, getting married and having a family has repeated itself for thousands of generations.

Even so, some young men having escaped the Testosterone Trap earlier, have a tendency over time to seek extramarital relationships. God’s wise design for Marvelous and Magnificent Marriage with all its benefits stands the test of time though. Males would do well to keep the wisdom of the Bible as their unfailing guide for their lives.

Let your fountain be blessed and take pleasure in the wife of your youth. A loving deer, a graceful doe-let her breasts always satisfy you; be lost in her love forever. Proverbs 5:18-19 CSB

As our Creator, God knows us, and especially our challenges, so well.

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Testosterone Trap Trauma is related to marriage in that marriage solves a lot of the problems brought on by boys and young men living through the Testosterone Trap period in their lives. This is the time in a boy and then young man’s life, generally between ages 15 and 25 when they will experience the highest testosterone levels in their lives. Testosterone causes a great deal of acting out on the part of young males in this age group. Much of it is meant to be impressive to members of the opposite sex.

YOUNG AND RECKLESS MALES

It leads to a high level of risk-taking and sometimes life-threatening situations. Even before this adolescent time frame, because of the influence of testosterone on male brains before birth, boys experience near drowning nearly twice as frequently as girls and die from drowning four times as frequently as girls. For every girl that gets seriously burned by fire, three boys sustain similar burns, boys are injured and killed more frequently than girls while riding bikes, on playground equipment, and during sports activities. For every girl who is injured on playground, four boys are.

MALE DANGER ZONE 15-25

During the 15 to 25-year-old time phase of life that I call The Danger Zone, males have approximately a four times greater chance of death by homicide, suicide, drug overdose, and car accident than females of the same age. Most of this violence is practiced against males in the same age group. Men killing men occurs 30 to 50 times more often than women killing women. Males murdering other males occurs most from ages 18 to 25 and more frequently in unmarried rather than married men. Around two thirds of males killing males results from social conflict rather than crime. And here’s a very important point, more than half of these murders are related to status competition.

When young males get into a competition with each other their testosterone rises. It also rises when they are around attractive females. This is most especially true if the young men are not romantically committed to anyone. The winner of the competition continues to experience his testosterone rising and the loser experiences a drop. This unfortunate scenario plays out in gangs in cities around the world. The gangs provide a substitute for the family that the young man is missing coming from. There are very few positive male role models in many of these young men’s lives. This situation is a recipe for disaster for many of our young men. Also, think of the tragedy of school shootings. What percentage of the shooters are males 15 to 25 years old? I think we all know the answer to that question already. Having a place that boys and young men can call home and a traditional family is a huge advantage!

EXCESS TESTOSTERONE PHYSICALLY UNHEALTHY

Not only is excess testosterone bad for young men behaviorally, continued high levels of it is bad for them physiologically as well. Across God’s creation, male creatures only carry high levels of testosterone during their mating season. For instance, in the fall male deer sport antlers with which to fight other male deer in order to display dominance and be able to mate with the females in the herd. As soon as mating season is over their testosterone levels drop and they shed their antlers.

Testosterone it turns out, is an immune system suppressive hormone. A male creature has to be very fit and healthy to have even temporary high levels of it. Estrogen on the other hand is an immune enhancing hormone. That is one of the reasons that human females on average outlive males. This overall picture of male-focused harm is what I have named Testosterone Trap Trauma. Like Natural Lifestyle Matching, most people are unaware of this phenomenon to their detriment.

GOD’S REMEDIES

Fortunately, our maker God knows all about how we are made and how we function. In Part 2 we are going to learn about His wise instructions to young men in these areas. For right now, I will point out that Proverbs chapters 5 through 7 illuminates much wisdom that is focused on and communicated to young men in this area specifically. I am not aware of any other similar instructions given to young adult females in the Bible about their sexuality.

“Though the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey and her words are smoother than oil, in the end she is bitter as wormwood and as sharp as a double-edged sword” Proverbs 5: 3-4 CSB

At your convenience, please read those chapters of Proverbs and I believe you will see what I mean. We will also see in Part 2 how Marvelous and Magnificent Marriage, as God designed it, helps solve many of these self-destructive problems.

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It is definitely an important part of Natural Lifestyle Matching. Science tells us that in prehistoric times our ancestors pair bonded, or what we now call married. This was crucial for humanity. Please let me explain.

THE STORY OF US

The typical female young adult requires a minimum of 1800 calories per day for her basal metabolic needs. When she gets pregnant, she requires an average of about 500 more per day which puts her at 2300. Altogether, it requires around 74,000 extra calories for a woman to produce a baby! Also, after the baby is born, she requires about 500 extra calories per day to be able to nurse the baby. In those ancient times, it could be around three years of nursing before the baby was weaned.

In our world today that is loaded with food-like substances that are high in calories and low in nutrients 2300 calories doesn’t sound like very much. We must remember though that during these times humans were often having to walk up to 12 miles a day and procure food like roots by lifting heavy boulders and foraging around all day. Then they would have to chew for hours to get a little nourishment from the raw fibrous vegetation.

It wasn’t just any old calories that the woman needed for her body to create a healthy new human being either. Much of the baby’s brain is made up of omega-3 fatty acids so her diet needed to include a good deal of that. Also, there was a need during the pregnancy for high levels of iron which is a key to oxygen transport to the explosively growing baby’s brain, and energy and protein rich food.  The husband going and hunting animals for these purposes fit very well during this time period where animals lived naturally and grazed on omega-3 rich grasses. During this time of pregnancy, she could continue to gather vegetables etc. which was extremely important for the well-being of the couple because hunting was not always reliably successful. Also, as this baby became a young child and the next one came along they could continue the process over and over until she reached menopause.

MARRIAGE AND HUMAN EXCEPTIONALISM

For many other species, some of them even closely genetically related to humans, this was not the case at all. They mated and still are mating promiscuously, and the female was just on her own after she got pregnant. There was no calorie surplus and specialized nutrient surplus for those species from the husband-wife provisioning. In God’s intelligent design, only humans have been created with brains that are proportionally three times bigger than any other primate and five times bigger than any other species of animal. Looking back scientifically, the key to this has been the human mutually supportive marital relationship.

“A man will leave his father and mother and the two will become one flesh”

This is scientific evidence is corroborated in the Bible in, amongst other places, Mark 10:6-8 CSB where it says “But from the beginning of creation God made them male and female. For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and the two will become one flesh”. Mutually self-sacrificing, committed, lifelong love was built into humanity from the beginning and was ordained by God. God also reinforces this further in His word by illustrating the relationship of the Trinity to humans. He calls the church the bride of Christ. There is a wedding of Adam and Eve in the beginning of human history and another wedding of Christ and the church at the end of history.

FEMALE SEX IQ

The science shows that human females especially have this positive marital instinct, and I would characterize it as intelligence as well. Many of us overlook God’s instructions for living to Eve in Genesis 3:16 CSB where he endows her and womankind future females with this innate drive. He says, “Your desire will be for your husband”. This is the glue that strengthens and empowers many marriages, families, and therefore societies in their quests for success.

Speaking of success, in the next several posts we are going to be illuminating how the Natural Lifestyle Match of marriage benefits both females and males in so many different ways. To finish off here though I would like to leave you with the recent research called the Success Sequence. It has been discovered that if young people will lifestyle match their predecessors as recently as the 1960s and 70s and graduate from either high school or college, get a job, get married, and then have children, in that order, they have a 97% chance of being financially successful.

MUCH MORE TO COME

We will discuss this mutually life-giving, complementary relationship and Natural Lifestyle Match between a man and a woman with its plethora of wellness benefits for both much more in upcoming posts.

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NATURAL FITNESS AND NUTRITION

My mother grew up starting her day with chores like hand pumping 100 gallons of water for the cattle she had to walk to retrieve each morning from the other end of their 80 acres, carrying water into the house for use there and then out, milking the cows, gathering eggs, and many other tasks. She then went to school where she had PE and sports. When she returned home, she had many of the same chores to repeat.

Her life was full of exertion and my dad’s was even more strenuous with dawn to dusk cotton picking for one dollar a day. They ate natural, whole foods that they mostly raised themselves and harvested and butchered. You could say their lives literally consisted of a strenuous, laboring style workout combined with very clean eating. They lived a lifestyle that was much closer to our ancestors Natural Lifestyle that stretches, without much change in natural exertion, back to prehistoric times.

“A worker’s appetite works for him because his hunger drives him on” Proverbs 16:26 CSB

My lifestyle as a youth in contrast consisted of very little physical activity and a great deal more soda pop drinking etc. up until seventh grade. Then my middle school PE teacher, who doubled as the football and baseball coach made me a deal. If I could do one pull up by the end of the semester, I would not fail PE. My father who was a steelworker built me a pull-up bar out of pipe on the shed that he worked his second job in welding at the back of our property.

“If you find honey, eat only what you need; otherwise you’ll get sick from it and vomit” Proverbs 25:16 CSB

 I struggled for three weeks to be able to finally do one pull up. Do you know what I discovered after I got one? Three came a lot easier than one did. My whole life changed. I started running around the blocks in our neighborhood and tried to go faster each time. I didn’t know what I was doing but it all worked out because I became driven to exercise and eat well and became successful in both PE and athletics.

NATURAL LIFESTYLE MATCHING

This is where I began to study the biochemistry of healthy lifestyles versus unhealthy lifestyles. I have not ever stopped. What I’ve discovered is that trying to live a Natural Lifestyle Match leads to the best wellness outcomes on almost every level. What do I mean by this? Science has discovered the importance of the natural circadian rhythm of being exposed consistently to bright light during the day and to darkness at night as well as the natural vegetation outdoors which give off oxygen. With all of our screen use many of us are destroying this rhythm. Relatedly, it has been discovered that eating should align with the active daylight hours. Most importantly along the way I also discovered that the truths of the Bible align with this wisdom as I have alluded to with the Scripture inserts. The most recent example is the realization of the value of fasting, since our ancestors had periods of time they didn’t have food.

There are many other examples that we will explore but for now the one I want to emphasize is the Natural Lifestyle Match of traditional courtship, marriage, and family. God designed humans for marriage and the family that the sexual integrity of the bond produces. Again, natural, and social science agree. Jesus said in Matthew 19:5 that “for this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh” CSB. As we explored in the previous two posts, He also created a Natural Lifestyle with regard to the birth of children and the health benefits that accrue from that, especially for women.

NATURAL LIFESTYLE MARRIAGE BENEFITS

Both sexes benefit from creating a Natural Lifestyle Match in the area of lifelong marriage. Being married significantly reduces your chances of hospitalization, need for surgery, dying after bypass surgery, getting pneumonia, getting rheumatoid arthritis, gum disease, viral infection, dementia, clinical depression, heart attack, cancer, being jailed, being murdered, being killed in a car wreck, and committing suicide.

We are going to talk much more about this powerful insight but for now let’s just summarize by saying that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and the wisdom of the Bible brings wholistic human wellness.

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To begin with, sexually active women are about twice as likely to get an STD as are sexually active men. The skin of the vagina is thinner than the skin of the penis and is easier for pathogens to penetrate. Also, the environment of the vagina being continuously moist and warm is much more receptive to bacteria etc. This is the reason that women get yeast infections so easily. The anatomy of women’s pelvises makes detecting STI’s difficult and since many of them are asymptomatic, years can go by before they are detected. By this time many have Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID) which can make them unable to have babies.

THE FRUITS OF THE SEXUAL REVOLUTION

STDs hit their highest rate ever beginning in 2015 and have continued to rise. One in four sexually active teenagers have an STD, and by the time they are 25 years old, one in two will have one. Some of them, for instance gonorrhea, have been treated so much in the population that they are becoming antibiotic resistant.

These are just the beginning of the downsides of a culture that pushes our young people away from traditional courtship, marriage, and family. Women’s reproductive cancers have become epidemic over the last 100 years. As a matter of fact, breast cancer became the number one cancer diagnosis in the world in December 2020. At that point it surpassed lung cancer, the long-time champion at killing. We should remember that 99% of people diagnosed with breast cancer are female. Experts estimate that 21st-century women are suffering breast cancer at a rate that is 100 times greater than ancestral women. More on the causes in a bit.

“21st-century women are suffering breast cancer at a rate that is 100 times greater than ancestral women”

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

Women’s reproductive cancers as a whole are deadlier than men’s reproductive cancers. As an example, the number of new prostate and breast cancers are pretty much equal, but women are about 45% more likely to die from their disease. Some other important scientific and medical knowledge all young females should be aware of is that their sexual lifestyle greatly influences whether or not they will develop reproductive cancers.

Starting from the outside of a female’s sexual anatomy and working in, the risk of vaginal and cervical cancer is increased by becoming sexually active at a young age, and multi-partner sexual activities. Uterine and ovarian cancers are increased by none or low numbers of pregnancies, and older age at the time of becoming pregnant. Breast cancer risk is raised by delayed childbearing, and fewer pregnancies. Uterine ovarian and breast cancer risk is also raised by none or little breast-feeding. Breast cancer risk is raised by early term abortion. Finally, a recent study has shown that the risk of all women’s cancers is raised by 91% for women who have had 10 or more sexual partners!

A LIFESTYLE UNLIKE OUR ANCESTORS

Much of the greater cancer risk can be attributed to the fact that we live a very unnatural lifestyle that is so different from our ancestor’s. Females in the past, when they became fully sexually mature around 19 or 20, got married and soon got pregnant. Because they breast-fed long-term, which again is good for them and the baby, their cycles did not restart until they weaned the baby at about age 3. At that point they became fertile and often became pregnant again. Currently women breast-feed if at all, for less than a year.

“Much of the greater cancer risk can be attributed to the fact that we live a very unnatural lifestyle”

This process repeated itself again and again especially during the ages from 19 to 29 which is women’s peak fertility and then declined in their early 40s. Because they were continuously either pregnant or nursing, they ended up having only about 160 lifetime menstrual cycles versus the 450 modern women have. Each time an egg follicle ripens and bursts in the ovary to begin ovulation a tear and scarring is created in the ovary. Also, every time a woman has a cycle the cells in her breasts change. Both of these circumstances raise the chances of a cancerous mutation when they happen repeatedly. In later posts we will learn the value of what I have named Natural Lifestyle Matching.

BIBLICAL GUARDRAILS 2.0

It turns out that God has created a physiology in women that is greatly protective if they live a certain kind of lifestyle. The picture looks something like this: getting married relatively early, having babies early, having several, and nursing each of them for an extended period of time. Remember the very first thing God said to Adam and Eve in the garden in Genesis 1:28 was “be fruitful and multiply”. Like all of God’s other words of wisdom – they are words to live by!

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“The wide-ranging effects of hormonal birth control on women”

This professional told her that both the hormonal birth control pill and SSRI antidepressants can affect women’s sex drives. He advised her to consult with her physician to see what they would recommend. The doctor recommended that she go off the pill and see what happened. When she did, she found that her libido returned. (Don’t ever go off or on any medication without first consulting your physician).

A BITTER PILL TO SWALLLOW

Knowing about this incident led me to study the effects of hormonal birth control (the pill, IUD, patch etc.) I was shocked at much of what I learned. It turns out that hormonal forms of birth control can have wide ranging effects on women. Because it changes women’s hormones it can change their sense of who they are. This should not be surprising to many of us who have a fitness background because at some point we have probably seen the change in personality in men on anabolic steroids, which are versions of male hormones.

In class, when I taught about the importance of hormones, I would label the lesson on the board “Hormones R’ Us”. It is obvious that our bodies are strongly shaped by our hormones but is becoming more and more clear that our minds and personalities are strongly affected by them as well. They help create the usual way that we feel from day to day, without us realizing it consciously. The pill can literally change the structure and function of women’s brains.

LOSING ALL THEIR HIGHS AND LOWS

One particular change in the brain that hormonal birth control makes is that women who are on it don’t have the natural cortisol rise that people experience in response to stress. This sounds like it would be a good thing, but we have to remember that stress comes in both good and bad circumstances. It can be caused by positive, exciting things along with the customary aggravating things we typically think of as stressful.

DEPRESSING CIRCUMSTANCES

One other major area that the pill affects is who women find themselves attracted to. Research has shown that women on hormonal birth control find men with less masculine faces and bodies more attractive than do those who are naturally cycling. In our current sexualized culture this sets up the potential for disaster when a woman in an unmarried couple is on the pill, in a few years they get married and she goes off the pill in order to have children. She then discovers she is no longer .attracted to her husband!

This obviously can be catastrophic but there might even be worse effects of hormonal birth control. Other recent research is showing that hormonal birth control can greatly increase women’s risk of depression. This is particularly true for younger women aged 15 – 19. This is especially true with regard to non-oral hormonal birth control like the IUD, patch, and vaginal ring. This can lead to increased risk of women’s suicide. Research found that females on hormonal contraceptives were twice as likely to have attempted suicide, and three times as likely to have been successful.

With this many potential negative effects, I have to ask what percentage of US women are on hormonal birth control? The answer is that around 25% of women ages 15 – 49 are currently taking hormonal birth control of some type. Many times, I believe that the motivation of a woman to be on the pill is because she is not married or even in a committed relationship. Her desire to not become pregnant and possibly have no one to help her with the birth and the raising of the child is very understandable. So many young women these days find themselves in this situation!

BIBLICAL GUARDRAILS

What does God’s word the Bible teach us about all of this? To start with, the very first thing that God ever said to Adam and Eve in Genesis 1:28 was to “be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth”. From this we can see that reproductive-related sexuality is very important to Him. Whenever my earthly boss begins giving me instructions, I always pay close attention to the first thing he mentions and considers it job #1. As always though his words throughout the Bible provide guardrails for our lives. In 1st Corinthians 6:18 he says “Flee sexual immorality! Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body.” So much human tragedy can be avoided if we will just live by his word! We will examine these wise and beneficial guardrails further in Part Two of She’s Quite the Pill.

QUESTIONS FOR PERSONAL REFLECTION AND GROUP DISCUSSION

1. Were you aware of these possible effects of hormonal birth control? If not, why do you think you were unaware?

2. What does the Bible say about premarital sex (fornication) and extramarital (adultery) sex? Do you think that hormonal birth control helps to enable these lifestyles?

3. Are there other options for married couples who want to limit the size of their family besides hormonal birth control?

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