What’s Your Fertility Plan?

Your Fertility Plan with Sage King from Fertile Ground Health Group

It can be quite overwhelming for any individual or couple to decide if their family plan includes children, let alone go one step further and reach out for support to optimise or facilitate fertility. These decisions can be even more complex for those who fall outside of the mainstream heteronormative, coupled, gender binary. 

Fertility plan – where to start?

Knowing when you want to have children is key to where you can choose to start on this journey. Does your family plan include children within the next 3-12 months? Did you know that preconception care takes a minimum of three months to positively influence reproductive health,  including egg quality? 

One of our expert fertility naturopaths, Sage King, has written a 6-part series to help individuals and couples of all gender identities and sexual orientations confidently navigate their fertility journey and create their own fertility plan. This series is inclusive of everything from preconception pathology screening, naturopathic preconception considerations, how to enhance your fertility naturally, to egg freezing, intrauterine insemination (IU) and In vitro fertilisation (IVF). Sage will be taking a deep-dive in how you can optimise your fertility outcomes.

What you’ll learn in this free 6-part article series

Part One: Identify Your Unique & Individual Needs

  • Individual considerations
  • Couple considerations
  • Sperm donor considerations

Part Two: Do You Need Preconception Screening?

  • Understanding your optimal preconception window
  • GP preconception screening
  • Your functional preconception assessment options
  • Naturopathic preconception considerations
  • PCOS, Endometriosis and the impacts on fertility

Part Three: Enhance Your Fertility Naturally

  • Eating for your fertility
  • Exercising for your fertility
  • Stress management
  • Enhancing sleep quality for your fertility
  • Endocrine disrupting chemicals and why you should avoid them

Part Four: Is Egg Freezing for You?

  • Age and egg freezing – what’s the go?
  • Understanding the egg freezing process
  • How to access Naturopathic support for egg freezing

Part Five: What is IUI & do I qualify?

  • What is intrauterine insemination?
  • Is IUI for you?
  • Natural vs. medicated cycle
  • Importance of collaborative care
  • Naturopathic support options for IUI

Part Six: Your Guide to IVF

  • What is IVF?
  • Is IVF for you?
  • Importance of collaborative care
  • Naturopathic support options for IVF

Are you single? In a couple? Do you wish to use your own eggs, or do you want to carry using your partner’s eggs, or vice versa? Do you have a known sperm donor, or will you use clinic-recruited donor sperm? Perhaps a child is not in your short-term plans but you wish to freeze your eggs for peace of mind down the track – there is great information here for you too. 

Register to receive notification as each article in this 6 part series is released. Sage is dedicated to helping you identify your unique and individual needs, as well as to provide you with the information you need to feel more informed, more confident on how to best navigate your situation, and most importantly helping you feel fully supported on your fertility journey.

Bonus Preconception Q&As with Sage online

Get your questions answered by joining our closed Create a Fertile Life Facebook group. Submit your questions in this group and Sage will answer.

Creating A Calm and Supportive IVF Embryo Transfer Day

By Amy O’Brien, FGHG Acupuncturist and Chinese Herbal Medicine practitioner

Working at Fertile Ground as an Acupuncturist there is a lot of opportunity to understand how women are feeling on the day of their embryo transfer. We treat with acupuncture once or twice on the day of transfer, and there is a real wisdom in the instant feedback of what women share about their experience of this day.

The things they are glad that they put in place, and the things they wish they had done differently. The emotions and physical terrain they’re navigating, and what’s helping their head, their heart and their body. The ways they feel isolated, or vulnerable or scared or hopeful. Things they might believe are true only for them, but which largely apply to majority of women in a similar circumstance.

IVF is such a big process. Often overwhelming, and often a case of taking things one day at a time. And yet, when it comes to embryo transfer, it can be really quite useful to plan ahead a little too.

For example, almost every woman who tries to work on the day of their embryo transfer, and around their acupuncture appointments, inevitably says ‘Gosh, I really should have just taken the day off. It would have made things easier.’ So for a woman approaching her first transfer, this is really useful to know!

And for women who have experienced an embryo transfer before, and is preparing for another, this can be a great opportunity to up level self care and self compassion on this day.

We don’t know what we don’t know, so let me offer up some insight from the collective experience of embryo transfer day.

Here’s a list of things that you might just find useful to implement on the day of your embryo transfer. It’s packed with insight I have gained since the day I first offered Acupuncture on the day of transfer at Fertile Ground, eleven years ago.

These are all relatively easy to implement. Relevant for all kinds of cycles. And focus on navigating a day that is not only stacked to improve outcomes, but to care for the beautiful human you are, too.

All the best for your cycle, and we look forward to supporting you along the way.

LINK:

https://www.thewrittenelixir.com/post/embryo-transfer-day

 

Amy O’Brien, FGHG Acupuncturist and Chinese Herbal Medicine practitioner, and creator of The Written Elixir

Amy facilitates a space where people feel confident to explore their health challenges. She recognises how anxiety, insomnia, digestive and sleep disorders can hop along for the ride when lovely women are grappling with issues surrounding their cycles, fertility and pregnancy. Amy is comfortable treating all aspects of women’s health including period problems, cycle irregularities, preconception, fertility and pregnancy care.