President Donald Trump rightfully noted, in a press conference last week announcing the White House’s new initiative on IVF, that the cost of pursuing treatment for infertility is a hurdle to those who would like to help raise the country’s declining birth rate. 

Many pro-lifers, and especially Catholics, rightly criticized the president for openly embracing IVF, which, while a boon to families seeking to expand their brood, can hardly be considered “pro-life,” for reasons many people smarter than me have already outlined.

But President Trump and the Department of Health and Human Services aren’t entirely off base when they speak about the overwhelming cost of pursuing treatment for infertility, even for those Catholics, like me, who would never (and did never) consider IVF. And given that the federal initiative isn’t a mandate at all, since it does not create a penalty for any group or company that doesn’t provide coverage for infertility treatments, it may be worth trying to push the White House in the right, thoroughly pro-life direction.

The president’s plan, while obviously imperfect, is a start. And I say this because, as someone who pursued “NaPro” fertility methods for eight years before finally becoming pregnant with our twins, the cost, headache and heartache is often very similar for those who pursue licit methods of handling their infertility as it is for those who pursue the IVF route, and a plan that helps moderate the cost of fertility-enhancing drugs and procedures could help infertile couples, Catholic and non-Catholic alike.

Fortunately, the response to the White House’s promotion of IVF as pro-life was swift and, in many cases, productive. Many of those in the “Make America Healthy Again” movement, or MAHA, were quick to point out that IVF isn’t the only option infertile couples have — and that it has its own problems. IVF is expensive, painful and often unsuccessful, and it isn’t covered by many insurance plans, leaving couples on the hook for tens of thousands of dollars. And that’s before you get into the ethical concerns involved in creating dozens of embryos — living humans — that will either be summarily discarded or remain on ice for eternity.

Catholics have pioneered NaPro Technology, or “Natural Procreative Technology,” which seeks to find the root causes of a couple’s infertility, remove or treat underlying conditions, and then enhance the body’s natural processes to achieve pregnancy. “NaPro” is a brand name that’s come to identify an entire industry, like Band-Aid or Kleenex, but suffice it to say, these programs are well-established and growing. 

I used a version of NaPro Technology to treat my infertility, which was the result of stage-4 endometriosis, a condition that is eerily similar to some cancers, in which endometrial cells travel from where they’re supposed to be to where they’re not, sometimes fusing organs and creating blockages. In turns, my endometriosis had fused my ovaries together, fused my uterus to my bowel, and blocked my fallopian tube, leading to the devastating loss of my unborn child (and nearly my own death). My wonderful doctor, who has since died, was a top-notch reproductive endocrinologist in Chicago before having a dramatic conversion to Catholicism and starting a practice to help women like me build Catholic families. Without his hard work and persistence over the course of eight long years, hundreds of injections and blood draws, dozens of ultrasounds, miscarriages and surgeries, my three kids simply wouldn’t be here. 

Despite all of its obvious faults and associated hardships, IVF is often seen as an “easy way” to parenthood, or at least a “quick way,” if not the “only way,” for some couples. When I noticed something might be wrong with my body, my regular OB-GYN never did any tests or considered the possibility of endometriosis; when my blood work came back deeming me “completely healthy,” she referred me directly to a fertility clinic. Despite our Catholic beliefs, we thought we’d at least hear the doctor out. The only thing the fertility clinic offered at that initial consultation, other than a $250 bill, was a brochure on financial plans. 

Seeing my Catholic “NaPro” doctor seemed like visiting a completely different world. I was trusted and listened to, and we weren’t immediately rushed into treatment — or, at least, not unnecessary treatment. Over the course of the next eight years, we worked as a team to figure out what was wrong and fix it, at least long enough to have a few babies.

While President Trump’s plan focuses almost entirely on IVF, it doesn’t completely leave out NaPro, but only because NaPro isn’t always what it seems, at least in Catholic circles. Like NFP, natural family planning, the “Catholic way” to handle procreation is often portrayed as simple, natural, a concert of modern technology and deep understanding of feminine reproductive processes. But like NPF, NaPro isn’t always sunshine and rainbows. Each female body is different, and while both work very well for some, they are difficult crosses to bear for many others. 

“What makes this hard makes you holy” isn’t always a great marketing tactic, especially for women staring blankly at charts and negative pregnancy tests, month after painful month. 

Charting your cycle is pretty easy; and, just like NFP, when those charts are clear and normal, NaPro works quickly and splendidly. It’s wonderful, but often not nearly as easy or natural as it’s often sold. Wellness influencers, who see NaPro as a “easy, natural” alternative to IVF, will also be sorely disappointed. It is neither easy nor always natural. And success isn’t guaranteed, as it isn’t in anything else in life.

For me, NaPro was years of trial and error, expensive drugs with sometimes awful side effects, painful procedures, and desperate prayer. It also didn’t really “solve” my infertility, at least not for long. My endometriosis came roaring back just a short 18 months after giving birth to my daughter, clogging up a fallopian tube and nearly killing me. 

Ultimately, much of NaPro is no different from IVF: Patients use many of the same medicines, like ovarian stimulators and “trigger shots” that help ensure ovulation; they just don’t do it at the level to which IVF patients do. 

The Church teaches that procreation cannot be separated from the marital act, full stop. The Church very specifically prohibits using donor eggs, uniting sperm and egg somewhere outside of the womb, creating and then discarding or freezing embryos that will never be used, and other technological violations of the marital act between spouses.

IVF is considered, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, to be “morally unacceptable” because it separates the marriage act from procreation and allows for “the domination of technology” over human life. During the pontificate of St. John Paul II, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith put it succinctly in Donum Vitae (Instruction on Respect for Human Life): “the gift of human life must be actualized in marriage through the specific and exclusive acts of husband and wife, in accordance with the laws inscribed in their persons and in their union.”

Instead of using complex technological means to achieve pregnancy, removing sperm and eggs from the spouses, uniting them in a separate location, growing them in petri dishes, and then implanting some of the highest quality embryos into the wife’s uterus, NaPro allows couples to use some available technology, like drugs for ovarian stimulation, to improve the natural marital act and increase the chances of achieving a pregnancy through the, well, more “standard” means.

Ovarian stimulators, which are around $1,500 per month or every other month, help to ensure a woman’s ovaries are creating mature follicles, but they can lead to bloating, pain, and the sort of emotional issues that often accompany parts of the female reproductive cycle. In IVF, they’re used at high dosage; in NaPro, they’re much more closely managed, but no less harsh on a woman’s body. Over the course of my treatment, I gave myself hundreds of injections — so many that I lost my fear of needles, in a weird type of exposure therapy.

Endometriosis cases, like mine, often involve a procedure called the hysterosalpingogram. In me, it wasn’t particularly problematic, but some women have described the procedure, which is expensive and sometimes not covered by insurance, as brutal. If endometriosis is suspected, many women opt to have excision surgery, which can be equally as painful, involves time off work, and involves a substantial recovery. Since endometriosis has only been acknowledged as a disease by the medical establishment for about the last half-century, some insurance companies still refuse to cover it, despite how painful and dangerous it is as a condition.

And then there are the miscarriages — the beacons of hope in darkness, snatched away just as they are discovered, at four, six, 10 weeks.

Many NaPro patients report success, but it’s not immediately clear what the success rate really is. “NaPro” is a brand that refers exclusively to a small, specific collection of medical providers, and since it has a much longer road to success than IVF’s, many who might have been success stories give up or discern a different path, for whatever reason. It also doesn’t address every type of infertility out there, certainly not age, or quantity and quality of eggs.

And that’s where President Trump’s plan could come in. Instead of pushing couples struggling with infertility automatically to IVF, it could encourage couples to seek more holistic treatment, push research into conditions at the heart of infertility like endometriosis and polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) and extend his schematic to allow for patients of all fertility care providers to access cheaper medications and insurance that includes procedures like excision surgery. 

Infertility is probably the most difficult cross I’ve ever had to bear, but I firmly believe that Catholics have the right idea when it comes to handling it: looking for the root cause and treating the whole human. And the White House could create a fantastic, truly pro-life policy that embraces these whole-human methods with just a bit more work.