Fertility, TTC & IVF
This is honouring the complex and challenging stories that unfold before the two lines appear and a beautiful, strong heartbeat stays.
The physical, mental and emotional load during this time is big. It shouldn’t be yours to carry alone. You deserve genuine support.
Genuine support ripples benefits through time - allowing you to emerge from this chapter feeling whole and strong.
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TTC, IVF, IUI, ICSI, luteal phase, BBT, fertile mucous.
You quickly realise fertility and conception is not as straight forward as what was taught in school.
It's instantly overwhelming, stressful and confusing. Overloaded by the volume of it all, over-thinking goes unchecked. There is an flavour of intensity here that doesn’t exist anywhere else. It occupies the space of a full-time job.
It's hard to exist in life outside the TTC bubble, but you somehow have to saddle both. Two worlds - one person. You’re split. Maintaining the facade at work - making excuses for the early morning blood test.
Every week brings a shift in priorities and emotional landscape. The changes that take place every 4 weeks can feel impossible to stay present to.
Trying to conceive (TTC) can be a huge life experience. We need to meet it and support it as such.
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Juggling fertility appointments and work. Juggling the lived experience of feeling stressed and knowing stress is ‘bad’.
Juggling identity and worth. Juggling the overthinking that’s disrupting your sleep and the knowledge that poor sleep is ‘bad’ for fertility.
Juggling mothering existing littles and trying to create another. Juggling the hope of a period that hasn’t yet arrived with the fear of allowing that hope to exist. Juggling work deadlines and heartbreak. Juggling masking your struggles by smiling at a Saturday afternoon baby shower.
Juggling competing needs creates a huge stress load.
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Babies and bumps are suddenly everywhere. You grit your teeth through more than you used to. Stress becomes a blanket that cloaks every decision you make.
Your quality of life is impacted.
The internal battle of not being able to ‘work harder’ in order to achieve this.
The physical, mental and emotional load become a breaking load to carry.
Confusion, frustration and new aches in places not previously known. Isolation, self-blame, shame and not enough-ness.
You can loose yourself in the pursuit. It can permeate your relationships and ability to connect with others.
Rollercoaster. Every woman uses this word to describe holding all these big and hard things.
As a society, we're failing to appropriately meet your needs while you walk this path.
You deserve genuine care, support and holding.
A supported fertility experience is possible. I’m doing my part to create it. And I’ve witnessed the beautiful difference it makes.
I offer to walk with you as your fertility support person.
To hold space for you as you navigate the intensity of trying to conceive. To encourage you to centre yourself amongst the uncertainty.
You’ll feel heard, held and strong. Together we’ll build skills and tools that will support you in this moment and continue to serve you in the big years to come.
I’m an acupuncturist, Chinese herbalist, doula, educator motherhood studies practitioner and peer support - all rolled into one.
I’m here to support you.
In Clinic, Online & Small Group Support
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Conducted via Zoom. Acupuncture and herbs won’t be possible, but all the other layers of support and holding are ready for you
Includes:
4 x 1hr Sessions (Online) spaced fortnightly or depending on need
Post Session Summary I’ll email a summary following our session together so you won't have to take notes. This may include: what to prioritise, tools and skills, things to delve into - book titles, podcasts, research articles, meditations, resources and referrals
Written Resources about aspects of support we cover so you can reflect further
Cost $600 paid prior to our first session
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More information about Online Support
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at Juno Specialists, Richmond
If you’d like support exploring what’s best for you, book a complimentary 20 minute Intro Call.
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I've held space for thousands of women navigating the stress, hope, fear, disappointment and cautious joy that can flow through any given menstrual / treatment cycle when trying to conceive.
For those in the 'two week wait' and those in the precarious window of early pregnancy on the background of previous loss. Those that are bleeding. Those setting alarms for trigger shots and meeting with specialists. Those picking up pieces and steeling themselves to try again.
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I’ve provided acupuncture, herbs, holistic care and support for women trying to conceive for 15 years.
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This means I’ve learned to understand, name and speak to the social and cultural dimensions of Motherhood. This lens around fertility and conception is groundbreaking.
This is a new framework of understanding and reducing the stress and pressure of trying to conceive. Helping you to slide expectations off your shoulders and allow yourself to own your experience fully.
I can make it easy to understand, practical to use and relevant to where you stand.
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I weave in the support and holding aspects of being a doula - offering a sense of nurturing often described as ‘mothering the mother’
I weave together layers of multifaceted care, education, awareness and support. I’m coming to you as both a peer with lived experience and as a practitioner with rich clinical experience.
I offer care and support that are tailored to your particular story so you’ll feel nurtured, resourced, educated and supported. Clear around priorities and able to plan for further along the path. So you’re seen, heard and held along every step of the way.
I Provide 6 Layers of Support:
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This involves space for:
Compassionate, active, non-judgemental listening to feel seen, heard and believed
to witness the significance of what you’re traversing
Space to feel less alone, to ask questions and have hard conversations
Space to be honest about what you’re feeling and allow your story to be voiced
Naming things you may feel - frustration and pain, shame and guilt, confusion and overwhelm, fear and vulnerability, shock and grief, exhaustion and emptiness, hopelessness and isolation
Compassion, reverence and gentle reframing of all you’re carrying. Allowing you can be lighter with your expectations of self
I am not a psychologist, or mental health counsellor. I can refer you to incredible professionals as needed.
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Conversations and resources about:
Cycle awareness / fertility tracking / IVF support - depending on where you're up to
Working with and supporting all the different phases of a menstrual / treatment cycle
Lifestyle modifications
Caring for yourself
Tools to calm your nervous system
Fostering inner compassion for when your inner voice gets nasty
Unpacking unhelpful (internalised, patriarchal) narratives to slide pressure and stress off your shoulders
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Effectively planning for the days, weeks and cycles ahead.
Together we will focus on:
Assessing the mental loads you’re carrying
What to prioritise, de-prioritise, offload
Scaffolding adequate care and support across cycles
Resetting expectations: humanising your capacity from a place of compassion and grace
Long-term planning: so you'll emerge from this chapter whole and strong
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Assisting you to reach for and scaffold adequate medical support
Sharing evidenced-based resources and other relevant materials: organisations, podcasts, groups
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As a qualified Chinese Medicine Practitioner In Home / In Clinic sessions involve Acupuncture and Chinese Herbal Medicine.
Individualised care is aimed at supporting the whole picture. We’ll address fertility as well as the broader context - periods, ovulation, pre-menstrual symptoms, sleep, digestion, pain, emotions, anxiety and stress.
I'll actively collaborate with your care team where appropriate.
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Getting your partner on board - what they can do to improve their fertility
Scaffolding support from your trusted social circle:
Letting friends know what’s happening and inviting them to actively support you
How to ask for help, what to ask for
Boundary setting - for those who keep asking when you're going to have kid
Navigating peoples reaction to your experience
The Perfect Mother Myth sets the standard for worth in motherhood
The Perfect Mother gets pregnant easily.
Conceives easily. Maintains the pregnancy with ease. She glows as her belly grows. Flowing into seamless, effortless mothering and shiny motherhood. And it’s a direct reflection of her worth.
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Anytime you deviate from The Perfect Mother things get uncomfortable. There’s a discomfort and unease you can’t quite name. In these situations, you’ll no doubt find that on many levels society will encourage you to invisiblise and internalise your experience. To silence yourself.
You’re standing in a shadow. Not quite right. A complex swirling of unnamed confusion. A struggle of to find your place, worth and identity.
When you fail to conceive easily you’ve deviated from The Perfect Mother script. The embedded messaging goes something like this: you’re failing before the ‘real tests’ of motherhood even arrive. Useless, worthless, not enough.
That voice will have you invalidating your own needs and sacrificing yourself.
That voice is not you. It’s patriarchal motherhood. And you’ll meet her again and again in all the tricky intersections of motherhood.
The Perfect Mother is an social construct. Motherhood Studies Sociologist Dr Sophie Brock taught me about her.
The Perfect Mother doesn’t exist. She’s a myth. An impossibility. We all fail to be her eventually. She’s designed to silence experiences that fall outside her perfection.
So. We make the myth and the impossibility of it all explicit. We make it visible. And in doing so it loosens the grip she had so we can claim our own way.
Our shoulders slide down as we melt the stress of trying to be her. We reframe shame and self-doubt and any sense of failure. We claim our truth and our worth. We stand strongly in our experiences and move forward from our own values.
Struggling to conceive reveals absolutely nothing about your worth and capacity to mother
I have worked with thousands of women trying to conceive, undergoing IVF, experiencing miscarriage, bleeding again when they felt for sure this cycle was different.
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’ve witnessed their courage and their softness. I’ve seen them meet the biggest moments and continue on.
I’ve watched so many of them go on to become the most incredible mothers and raise children. I’ve spoken to them as they mother 10 year olds and reflect back to the time they ever questioned their worth.
I want to explicitly name. Because I have the data to back it up. Struggling to conceive reveals absolutely nothing about your worth and capacity to mother.
The fact that it may take some time and support to get there reveals nothing about your ability to perform a mothering role.
Down the Track: The trap of performing better on the next task
No cohort of women put more pressure on themselves to birth better. To breastfeed. And to enjoy every moment of motherhood.
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In clinic I have watched those navigating motherhood after fertility issues for over 15 years. I have witnessed the weight and lingering presence of fertility struggles long after a successful conception.
When conception has been taken from your timing and your control, it can be tempting to achieve perfection and smoothness in the challenges that follow.
Once you arrive in motherhood, it’s not an even playing field. The Perfect Mother Myth enforced double time for those who’ve had to work to conceive. Prove yourself.
This powerful social construct creates huge pressure. To redeem and reclaim your story. To perform better on the next task.
It’a trap.
The Perfect Birth is a trap - especially given providers manage women with a history of IVF or recurrent miscarriage differently.
Smooth and effortless breastfeeding is a trap.
Feeling only ever grateful for the experience mothering is a trap.
Because the reality is - mess and hard things are a part of this ride for everyone.
Compassion and grace are needed to allow things to be as they are. Support and encouragement are needed to hold space and help you navigate with tenderness.
Pregnancy, birth and mothering in the context of a long conception path is unique experience that requires intentional support and holding.
My wish is that once we cross paths, you remember what that feels like. That you count me as a member of your support team. So that if you ever find yourself struggling with the load - months or even years down the track, you remember the safety and nourishment from our time together, and feel confident and comfortable to draw that support back towards you.
I’m Amy O’Brien.
I am here to rewrite the story of the pathway into motherhood.
To shed light on it all. To stand alongside you in strength. To offer what I’ve learned and cultivated from both my lived and professional clinical experiences.
I’ll hold space, educate and help you prioritise and plan so your experience is as cocooned and supported as possible. So you emerge from this experience feeling held and ready for what comes next. Because what comes next is a chapter we really want you feeling ready, resourced and strong for.
Important Note: I am not a GP, Psychologist or counsellor.
I cannot provide medical care or comprehensive psychological support.
I will always be clear around my scope of practice and refer to appropriate services for whole person care.
Every person I work with will receive information about helplines, community organisation and escalation points for care providers who support pregnancy sickness.