For Molly Hobbs, a sophomore at Bellarmine University, women’s fertility is a common topic of conversation.
“My mom teaches natural family planning, so it was something talked about in my house,” she said in a recent interview.
Natural family planning, abbreviated as NFP, is a way of naturally regulating birth — seeking to achieve or postpone pregnancy — by monitoring a woman’s biological markers of fertility.
“My mom teaches natural family planning, so it was something talked about in my house. I had the false perception that it was just a normal thing for everybody. . . It’s this thing that nobody really talks about.”
— Molly Hobbs
It wasn’t until college that she realized others may not have had the same experience — and that many college-aged women lack a basic understanding of how their bodies function.
“I had the false perception that it was just a normal thing for everybody,” but “it’s this thing that nobody really talks about,” said Hobbs, who is studying nursing.
Seeing a need at Bellarmine, she signed up to become a leader of a “Cycle Mindfulness Club” — a peer-led initiative that has 17 clubs around the country. Ten female students joined the local chapter and they have met for an hour each week since September of 2024.
The clubs, which are free to join, rely on resources from Natural Womanhood, a non-profit fertility awareness organization that promotes alternatives to contraception. Contraception, an artificial means of blocking conception, runs contrary to the teachings of the Catholic Church. NFP, which helps women discern when they are and are not naturally fertile, conforms to the teachings of the church.
The club’s mission is “to bridge the knowledge gap between what we know scientifically (about women’s health) and what women know about their bodies,” said Hobbs. Many female students don’t know the phases in a woman’s cycle, the hormones involved or what biological markers are typical or abnormal, she said.
In weekly meetings, the students learn how to chart their cycles using biological markers, what hormones are involved in a cycle and how their cycles affect their daily lives, said Hobbs.
The women also “have an opportunity to share their own experiences, concerns or struggles” in the group setting. “It’s something we all have had questions or concerns about,” she said.
Ellie Riddle, a freshman at Bellarmine, said the group is filling a need. The only time women are given fertility education is in health class in middle school, she said in a recent interview. At that time, “You either don’t care or you’re snickering too much to actually listen,” she said.
Learning more about the female body “at an age where you care, where it is a little more relevant to your near future” is helpful, she said.
Riddle said she’s also benefitted from the fellowship among the participants. The group views fertility from “a perspective of sanctity of the body,” said Riddle.
The club helps women reframe their health as a gift, rather than a burden, Hobbs added. “In high school, I saw my cycle as a burden.”
Now, she sees it as “a gift and a sign that you can bear life,” she said. “Helping other people see that is what led me to start it.”
The club does not offer formal instruction for using NFP, which is designed for married women and couples. But it sets the framework for those who wish to learn an NFP method during marriage preparation, Hobbs said.
“It can be overwhelming” for women to learn how to use NFP in the months prior to marriage if they “have to learn their body for the first time,” she said. “That’s a lot. Just having the knowledge of how to chart your cycle can make that easier to navigate.”
The club also encourages women to learn about how birth control affects the body, and what side effects it can cause, said Hobbs. When women hear the facts, she added, they are likely to reconsider using birth control.
“We present the facts and let women decide for themselves. … They are like, ‘I wish I had known that sooner,’ ” she added.
