Chief Executive Mom

Visit me at my new website - anniecrawford.com I found the following information in Nancy Campbell's Be Fruitful and Multiply. I have a dignificant history of cancer in my family, so I take a personal interest in these statistics.

Reported in the "Science News", October 1992, by Kathy Facelmann and Malcolm C. Pike from the Southern California School of Medicine, "blames the epidemic rates of breast cancer and other female cancers on a fact of modern life: The average American woman starts menstruating at age 12 and typically gives birth to one or two infants. Pike estimates she will ovulate a whopping 450 times during her lifetime. By contrast, women who lived 200 years ago would have begun menstruating at age 17 and would have delivered and breastfed about eight babies. Thus our foremothers ovulated fewer than 150 times during their lives. Pike argues that pregnancy and lactation provide a crusial resting period for the ovaries, the female sex glands produce not only eggs, but also several powerful hormones, including estrogen and progesterone. Each month a woman's body readies itself for pregnancy. The ovaries secrete estrogen and progesterone, which tell the breast cells to begin dividing in preparation for milk production. In years past, women went through this cycle less frequently because they were more often pregnant or breastfeeding."

Women who have full pregnancy before the age of 18 have 1/3 the breast cancer risk of a woman whose first child is delayed until after age 30, or never has a child. One interesting angle on the breastfeeding issue is that the Tania women in Hong Kong, who traditionally only nurse with their right breast, have more cancer in their left breast. (Mark Renneker, M.D., "Understanding Cancer")

Peter Layde, M.D. reports [and my own OB/GYN has told me as well], "We found that women who breastfed a total of two years or more had nearly a third less breast cancer than women who did not breastfeed." . . . Studies also reveal that women who bear their first child before age 22 are less likely than others to develop ovarian cancer. Those who delay pregnancy have a higher risk of endometriosis. . . .

Someof this information seems a bit dated, does anyone have any more recent data to bring to the subject? In light of this, it makes me consider that to follow Paul's advice and example in 1 Cor. 7 takes an even greater act of faith for a woman. It also makes me curious if the increase in ovulation for non-childbearing women relates at all to menopause and the increased use of hormone therapy. Could menopause be worse if your hormone producers are so worn out by 450 ovulations? Just a speculation.

Campbell also cites information linking sterilization to a variety of health problems, including prostate cancer. She argues from 1 Cor. 12:20-24 and states, "If we cut out or destroy one member of the body, other members of the body will suffer. We cannot get away from the perfect way that God designed our bodies." I will not go nearly so far as Campbell does to say that sterilization is a sin, yet it is certainly "unnatural" and probably not without its negative effects. Campbell cites a study by H.J. Roberts contained in a book called Is Vasectomy Worth the Risk. I found his website here. Roberts seems to be an 'alternative' doctor best known for his studies on aspartame. In my google search of the major medical websites, all of them stated that the link between vasectomy and cancer is very slight if at all. I do not have the time to research this further at the moment, but the evidence seems inconclusive.

Concerning tubal ligation, Campbell cites Dr. Vicki Hufnagel who wrote No More Hysterectomies. Hufnagel states that tubal ligation destroys the blood supply to the ovaries, can raise the risk of endometriosis and increases blood pressure within the ovarian artery, creating a hormone imbalance. She claims that these effects lead to a greater likelihood of hysterectomy. I found information on Hufnagel and Tubal Ligation Syndrome here. Dr Hufnagel, however, was banned from practicing in California and New York and was listed on Full Canvas Jacket. It seems that her ban from practice did not have to do with her research which, at a glance, seems to have more credibility and support than that concerning vasectomy. Couples considering these procedures ought to personally investigate any possible risks involved when weighing their decisions.