Own Your Fertility: Science, Choice, and the Clock with Jaime Knopman

Is your "biological clock" a source of anxiety or a tool for empowerment? In this episode, Erica Rooney sits down with Dr. Jaime Knopman, a leading reproductive endocrinologist, to dismantle the myths and shame surrounding women's health.

Dr. Knopman challenges the "just relax" narrative, explains the cold hard facts about egg quality in your 30s, and shares why reproductive choice is the ultimate power move for the modern ambitious woman. If you've ever felt behind or overwhelmed by the "shoulds" of motherhood, this conversation will help you reclaim your timeline.

Inside the Episode:

• The 32-Year-Old Reality Check: Why your period doesn't always equal fertility and the data every woman needs to know sooner rather than later.
• Reframing Infertility: Moving away from shame and understanding the medical truth that "willpower" can't fix.
• The "Reproductive Pivot": How egg freezing changes the way women date, work, and plan for their future selves.
• Corporate Advocacy: How to talk to HR about modernizing your benefits to include fertility support.
• Resilience in Health: Dealing with bad medical news and finding the strength to "get back up" when life knocks you down.

🔗 Resources:

• Pre-order Dr. Jaime Knopman’s book: Own Your Fertility.
• Follow Dr. Jaime on Instagram @dr_jaimeknopman.
• Connect with Erica Rooney on LinkedIn.

RESOURCES & LINKS

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Transcript

Erica: [00:00:00] Okay. Welcome to the Glass Ceilings and Sticky Floor podcast. The podcast where we get real about the challenges women face in work, life and leadership. I'm your host, Erica Rooney, HR executive, keynote speaker and executive coach, and I'm on a mission to get more women into positions of power and keep them there.

Erica: This is the space where we call it the paradoxes. Being told to lean in, but not too far to speak up, but not too loudly. Be ambitious, but not too ambitious. Does that sound familiar? Yeah. We're over all that here. We break down the sticky floors that keep us stuck from imposter syndrome and perfectionism to burn out and fear and give you real strategies to shatter those glass ceilings once and for all.

Erica: So if you are ready to rewrite the rules, own your power, and take your career and life to the next level. You're in the right place. All right, y'all. Today's guest is tackling the core problem that hits every ambitious woman facing her thirties, that paralyzing [00:01:00] fear and all of the misinformation out there around her biological clock.

Erica: Exactly. I know y'all are gonna be so interested in this. Now Jamie is giving women the science and the strategic plan to take charge of their bodies and their future. This is Dr. Jamie Notman and she is a highly, highly respected, board certified reproductive endocrinologist, and the director of Fertility Preservation at CCRM, fertility of New York, y'all.

Erica: This woman is known for her honest, no nonsense approach, and she's dedicated to demystifying IVF egg freezing and surrogacy. Now she's also an author, okay? So it's not like she's not doing enough already, but she's also an author of the book, own Your Fertility From Egg Freezing to Surrogacy, how To Take Charge Of Your Body and Your Future.

Erica: So I think that's super awesome. Books like that didn't exist for me in my thirties. So Dr. Nauman, welcome to the podcast. I know you also, I wanna say this too, I don't wanna forget that you're the medical director of Chick Mission, which is [00:02:00] a nonprofit helping young adult cancer patients. With fertility challenges.

Erica: So girl, you out here doing the most? Welcome to the podcast. How you found time for me today? I don't know.

Jaime: Thank you for having me. That's very nice introduction. I, I appreciate all the kind words.

Erica: I love it. Well, you're out there doing the most. I would love to just hear like a quick background. Did you know you always wanted to be in infertility or did you just kind of fall into that by chance?

Jaime: Yeah, no, I always, I knew I wanted to be a doctor since I was in the second grade. I tell this story as sort of lame but true. I read a book about Elizabeth Blackwell, the first female physician, and I was like, oh, I wanna be a doctor. Um, I was pretty linear in my path. Like I went to undergrad, I was like, I'm gonna meet, you know, b take the MCATs, do all that sort of stuff.

Jaime: I worked for a year after undergraduate at Memorial Sloan Kettering in the breast center, and I thought I wanted to be a breast surgeon and help women who had cancer. When I got to medical school, I realized I really wanted to [00:03:00] focus on women's health and actually liked the field of ob, GYN. Because that was where I felt I could do it even more.

Jaime: And then once I was in an ob GN residency, I was fascinated by hormones and fertility and found myself in a fertility fellowship after that. Uh, and so that's where I got there.

Erica: I love this 'cause like fertility and hormones, I mean, they're having a moment right now. Menopause.

Jaime: Yeah.

Erica: I am hearing now more than ever the anger around the lack of information on women's health. Do you see that as well?

Jaime: A hundred percent. You know, I, I say like when we were residents, I saw a bunch of my co-residents this weekend. We never learned about menopause. Nobody taught us, right? And now we talk about perimenopause and menopause all the time. So it's really changed. And listen, I graduated residency I guessed almost 20 years ago, but, but we have seen dramatic changes in what we teach our young residents.

Erica: Hmm. That's good to know. I like that. [00:04:00] Okay, so one thing that I know you talk about a lot is the emotions and the feelings that come around this whole biological clock, right? The anxiety, the misinformation, the shame. And I think a lot of women probably see this whole biological clock as a sticky floor of some kind.

Erica: That holds 'em back in a lot of ways. But where do you see this show up in your work?

Jaime: Yeah, I mean it sort of does, right? Because the problem with female fertility is that our ovaries are gonna tap out at a pretty young age based on the success that we can have professionally, right? And personally, so most women are going to see a real change in their fertility when they get to like their mid, late thirties.

Jaime: And a lot of us will not be ready to have children potentially by then or have not completed our family. So if we don't address this at a young age. Then we're gonna find ourselves struggling with infertility when we are ready to have a family. So we have to be cognizant of the fact that, okay, I am born [00:05:00] with all the eggs I'm ever going to have, and okay, by the time I hit 32, I'm gonna have lost 90% of my eggs.

Jaime: Now, that's not to fear monger and try and tell women they must have kids in their twenties. It is just to say, listen, if you're on a plan that involves you not having children until 40, you should address this at an earlier age.

Erica: You said 90%.

Jaime: By the time you're 32.

Erica: That's insane. I didn't know that. Wow.

Jaime: don't, or most people don't know. Like, I'm born with all the exert I'm I'm ever gonna have. Uh, by the time I hit puberty, I'm down to 350 to 500,000. And people incorrectly assume as long as I'm getting my period, I can get pregnant. Right. And then when I was a fellow.

Jaime: If we used to write abstracts for different scientific meanings, I came up with the slogan Menes doesn't equal motherhood. And what I mean by that is just because you're getting a period, it does not mean the quality of your eggs is able to make a viable, healthy pregnancy. So we need to [00:06:00] remember that.

Erica: All right, so let's talk about egg freezing then. I would love for you to just. You know, anyone who's listening that maybe is considering this, maybe they're, you know, not ready to have a child yet or what have you. When should we start thinking about freezing our eggs and a little bit of what that process looks like?

Jaime: Yeah. I mean, I think we should do it in our twenties. Right? Which is shocking for some people to. Here because they're like, wait, our twenties, but our twenties are when we have our high quality, high quantity amount of eggs. Right? And it's also when if you do the process, you're going to get a lot of bang for your buck on the backend.

Jaime: So egg freezing. The experimental label was removed from it in 2012. Right. And I call 'em on my book, the OG Egg Freezers. Women who Froze their Eggs initially, they were in their mid forties, so when the data came out, people were like, egg freezing is terrible. Of course, it was terrible. The women, we were freezing, their eggs of quality was long.

Jaime: As the age of the egg freezing patient has Dr. Shifted downwards, [00:07:00] the success has increased. So we know most women are not having kids in their twenties, right? At least in a lot of these, you know, major metropolitan cities. So we should address fertility preservation in our twenties.

Erica: Hmm. Fascinating. Okay. You mentioned your book, and this is what I really wanna dive into today. First of all, you're a very busy woman. You are a full-time doctor. How the hell did you find time to write a whole book question number

Jaime: Well, I, I was very fortunate I had a collaborating author. I think a lot of people don't own that. Like, it's weird to me. People are like, they don't talk about it, but. It's sort of like I call medicine, I always say is a team sport, right? We win together, we lose together. I have a nurse, I have embryologists, I have medical assistants, and if I don't get people pregnant on my own or help them preserve their fertility, it's all of us.

Jaime: The same thing about writing a book, like. I would venture to say that most of the books that you read, nonfiction are written with a collaborating author. Right. And maybe people just are not open about that. But I would not have been able to do this on my [00:08:00] own. It's, it's a massive task. Um, and while I, I think I'm a pretty good doctor, writing was not my first, you know, it wasn't my first love.

Erica: Hey, look, there's, there's no wrong way to have a baby, right? There's no wrong way to write a book, but

Jaime: true.

Erica: where, what, what inspired you to write this book and what's the, like that main mindset shift you want women to take away from after reading it?

Jaime: Yeah, so I thought to myself, you know, as, it's actually funny, the pandemic really motivated me because I saw a shift in the number, an increase in the number of women freezing and a, and a shift in who was freezing, right? We saw younger women coming in to do it, and more and more women, and also I felt.

Jaime: Like my family jokes, I'm very loud. I, I, I really am, but I was only as loud as the four walls of my office for the patients that I was seeing. So I'm like, well, we need to take this message and share it with women beyond the people we see. And I felt that there was a real need for a good fertility [00:09:00] book.

Erica: I love it. And you do talk a lot about the blame and regret that maybe some women have. They think they should have done things differently. What's that advice that you give to them?

Jaime: I mean, I always say this, if we could live life backwards, we'd all do it differently. Right? But that's not the way that life works. I'm very open. I tell people, you know, I, I went through a divorce that I never thought would happen, right? And like, if I could live my life in reverse, maybe that wouldn't have happened.

Jaime: But, but that's not the way it is. Right? So we can. Mourn the loss of something of our eggs, a marriage, uh, you know, a cancer di whatever it is. We mourn that, but then we must gather ourselves and move forward. Otherwise we stay stuck in that grief or in the anger or in the whatever, bargaining, whatever it is.

Jaime: And we don't get to where we ultimately wanna be, which for a lot of my patients is being a parent.

Erica: Yeah. And I imagine you have people that do not have successful transfers and so they have to come back to you several times. [00:10:00] How do you help these families through, and like, how do you, how do you keep showing up? I think in such a time that is so tough.

Jaime: Yeah, I mean it's definitely not easy and I always say like that is something they do not teach you in medical school. They do not teach you how to give bad news, which is very hard. And I think I wasn't good at it when I was a younger physician. I think as I've gotten older. I have gotten better with it, mostly because I've been on the end of receiving bad news, right?

Jaime: So I'm like, oh wait, that doesn't work. Maybe I have to do this. But I think it's really being a partner on a journey and being in many ways, like a cheerleader or being present and letting someone just cry or whatever it is, you have to find what your role is to help that individual or that couple continue on their journey.

Jaime: But also, it's being honest, right? Because. We know fertility is a business, right? So there has to be a stop point. If I let patients do endless egg freezing or endless IVF, then I'm not really doing my job right, because I need to say, Hey, [00:11:00] you can have a family, but not in this way, and you have to make a change.

Jaime: We have to shift the course that we're on.

Erica: Yeah, absolutely. And I imagine you're seeing some of these women like at just such a, I'm imagining this sticky floor point because I'm thinking about myself and a lot of my friends and we've had these conversations like. You hang your hat sometimes on being a mother. Right. And, and this idea of exactly what that means and what that looks like.

Erica: And I mean, I'm just thinking that's a tough job, girl, to help

Jaime: Well, because most of us, like I even look, I remember when my girls were little and they play house, right? They put like the pillow in their stomach. So we always think we're gonna be a mom, right? It's just something that seems like ingrained or in something that would will happen. So if somebody like me says to you, Hey, I don't think you're gonna be able to have a genetic child or carry your.

Jaime: You know, carry your pregnancy. It's so counterintuitive that it's like [00:12:00] this jarring thing that hits you and you have to really course shift and I have to help you. And sometimes, like I can't be totally honest and blunt all at once. 'cause I need to slowly baby step it, no pun intended, to get the person there and then hopefully watch them make a change.

Erica: Yeah. No, I can imagine. Absolutely. All right. I know I've heard a lot about. Especially corporate women, we're very stressed, we're very anxious about work and like that's the reason we're not getting pregnant.

Jaime: Yeah, no, I mean that drives me crazy. Like I'm always like, infertility is a medical disease, right? And we don't tell patients who have cancer like, Hey, maybe you should just go like, have a spa weekend and eat some, you know, healthy food. Because the reality is there is, it's not just fixing your stress.

Jaime: Infertility is a disease. Yes. Mitigating stress is good for all of our organ systems, our brain, our heart, our, you know, in intense everything. But just decreasing [00:13:00] stress does not change the outcome of your disease.

Erica: So I'm fascinated by this because I come from a long line of nurses. I like to think of myself as, you know, not a total dumb, dumb off the street when we're talking about medical language and stuff, but you are the first person I've ever heard refer to infertility as a disease. And I think that's super powerful.

Erica: Like, I think it, it really, for people out there who are really struggling or carrying that shame, when you hear that it is something like a disease that you do not have that control over. I think that in my, in my head, I feel like that might relieve a bit of the shame. Is that what you're

Jaime: Completely because so for so long we try and will it, right? We're like, if I do this, then I can change it if I do that. But the reality is you cannot, for most of us, we cannot, and we have to accept that because if we don't, then it's a really negative spiral and then it impacts every aspect of your life.

Erica: mm So true. So true. Okay. With [00:14:00] IVF, like I know there's a lot of myth and there's a lot of just like random information out there. What is the single. Biggest misconception about IVF, the process that like if you could wave your magic wand, it would be gone forever.

Jaime: Oh yeah, that the pill causes infertility. The number of times that I have heard that I'm like, that is just not true. Uh, the pill does not cause infertility. Can it mask infertility? Sure it can, right? Because when you're on the pill, you're going to get regular periods. That's the point of the pill, but it does not cause infertility.

Jaime: I would say probably, you know, number two, one that we just spoke about, if you just. De-stress, then you'll get pregnant. That's a total bunch of you said, we're purse here. So that's a total bunch of bullshit. And number three, I would say that you don't need to think about your fertility until you're 40.

Jaime: Right? Like I have seen so many women where I'm like, where have you been? Right? Like [00:15:00] it's, oh my goodness, you gotta come to this way earlier. And it's a shame that we don't teach women that they need to address it at younger ages.

Erica: Yeah, I do. I do think that it's starting to be a bit more mainstream and less taboo than it is,

Jaime: A hundred percent. Even in our waiting room, you know, used to be people would come in in our fertility waiting rooms, you know, they have a hat, they look down with the sunglasses. Then like the influx, I gotta give the egg freezing patients credit, they, they come in like with their friends. It's like, so it's like happy hour, like, oh my God.

Jaime: Like whatever. We're all here together and that has really taken away a lot of this. Stigma of infertility or fertility treatment, and that's very powerful in my opinion.

Erica: Yeah, I was at a women's event in New York and there was this woman who I'd never met before and we were just chitchatting and she was talking about how hard it is to date these days, especially in New York City, and I was like, girl. I don't even wanna know. I don't wanna know right now like I'm married, I live in North Carolina.

Erica: This [00:16:00] is a whole horror story game is what it sounds like. But she goes, that's all right. I already freeze my eggs. I ain't gotta worry about none of this right now. I can do what I want. And I was like, okay, then, you know? But to see that level of empowerment

Jaime: Well, I actually think it helps women date better. And listen, like I said to you,

Erica: ooh. Oh yes.

Jaime: am no like matchmaker, you know? But I do think there takes a stress off of it. 'cause I, as I've said to you, which is why I feel like we're friends, like I'm very blunt. So sometimes I'll say to a patient, like, this attitude going into a date is not helpful.

Jaime: Like being like, if I marry him tomorrow, then I have kids here. I'm like, that is, this is very short. I'm feeling it right. So I think if you freeze your eggs, that timeline, you sort of like it relaxes a little bit, you know, you loosen it up, that grip, and then you're able to sort of like live your life a little and say, okay, is this the right person?

Jaime: Maybe this is not the right person and maybe I need to stop fighting it just because I wanna have a child in X number of, you know,

Erica: Oh, [00:17:00] there absolutely were Clocks running through my head every year of like, how old am I? And it's hysterical because. I was at a function last night and somebody was talking about how their 26-year-old cousin is about to have a baby, and I'm like, but that's a baby. You know,

Jaime: oh my, I have, I cannot tell you, I don't think I've seen a 20-year-old couple come in having infertility in years. Right? Like, we just don't see that anymore. Nobody, at least in New York City, people don't try in their twenties. It's just Totally, yeah. No, it's crazy.

Erica: Yeah. I mean, different worlds, but you know, it just, it reminds you like, number one, how quickly time does fly, you know? But I think that's so interesting to hear. And I, I mean, I'm pa I'm done having kids, so that's not a conversation I need to worry about having. But it does make me think of like, when my daughter gets older, I love this idea of like.

Erica: Empowering her with the knowledge of, yeah, get out there and freeze your eggs and

Jaime: and this is what I say, like I, I, I talk [00:18:00] about, like, we wrote a, I wrote an article with my collaborating author for Oprah about why I'll freeze my girls' eggs at 22. It is not that I am telling them to have children. I'm not telling them to freeze their eggs. What I'm saying to them is then you have reproductive choice.

Jaime: And the timeline is according to you, not according to your body. Now I get it, like I got a flack for that article, right? You're a fertility doctor, you have the resources, et cetera, et cetera, and I own that. But what I will say is the landscape has shifted dramatically. So many more employers are covering this because they have to, because women spoke up in droves and were like.

Jaime: No, I'm not coming to have a job there if you can't cover, if you're not gonna cover egg freezing or whatever it may be. So I do think that we are starting to move the needle on what is offered to female employees by their employers.

Erica: Yeah, I mean, we're definitely seeing more in menopause support. Um, I haven't seen myself personally too. Also, I'm a chief people officer by [00:19:00] trade, and I haven't seen as much on the egg freezing yet, but I'm super hopeful for that. But for any woman who's like listening and they're like, we don't have any of this at our organization, they don't offer any of that, how can they advocate for these practices in their workplace so that maybe they could

Jaime: I would go to your HR department, like I've had a couple of patients be like, I went to HR and I changed it. I'm like, go, you right. You can go in and say, listen, you know, I looked online and 15% of the businesses in our, you know, area are tech companies, et cetera, are covering one round of freezing or a round of em.

Jaime: Embryo freezing, but work with HR because together you guys can actually probably make change.

Erica: Hmm. I love this. So Jamie, in my body of work, I always say like, to change your mindset, there's this whole SNAP method and it stands for to stop and like notice the physical sensations that are happening in your body. Name, what that thing is. I'm feeling anxious, I'm feeling frustrated. Right? Ask and answer the deep and personal [00:20:00] questions.

Erica: And then you get to the P, which is the pivot. And this topic is, I mean, again, I've, I'm done having kids, but I'm so passionate about it because I love these choices and these pivots that you are giving women when it comes to their reproductive schedule, right? Like you are actually telling them, you don't gotta hurry up and find a man.

Erica: You don't have. Just take your eggs, go freeze 'em when they're good. And take back that control. I mean, like two different things you've said today that have blown my mind and have really given me a big pivot. And that is that infertility is a medical disease and that freezing your eggs gives you reproductive choice and.

Jaime: exact. Yep. Uh uh. And I call the reproductive pivot, right? I say it all the times to patients. I say, you can then move either way. Now listen, people are like, well, egg freezing isn't a guarantee. That is true, but we buy insurance for our house, right? We have flood insurance or fire, whatever it is.

Jaime: And you may [00:21:00] unfortunately have a flood and then your insurance company may not pay up, but you're not gonna live on the water and not have flood insurance. 'cause that would just be really silly, right? Same thing if you know you're not having kids till 40, you should freeze your eggs. Now, doesn't mean those eggs are gonna work, but it means you're gonna have a way better chance entering that quote unquote flood if you have them frozen.

Erica: Mm. I love it. Are there any other massive life-changing pivots like those two that you have that you see frequently that you just wanna drop with us today? Or are those the two big phases?

Jaime: you know, I, I think, I think what I have learned, and listen, I am a culprit, right? I'm a type A. You go to, you just keep pushing, pushing, pushing. But like, the journey of life is circuitous, right? And I have this quote in my office. I, I love it. It's the, you know, the fall seven, fall down seven times, get back up eight, like.

Jaime: Life knocks the shit out of you. We have all been there. You may not have infertility, you may lose a parent, you may have, you know, cancer, you [00:22:00] may, whatever it is, but you have to gather yourself up and push forward. Otherwise, say this all the time to my kids. What do you just lay on the floor and the rest of your life be miserable?

Jaime: It's not fair. It's not this, it's not that. You have got to gather your shit and get back up and keep going because that's the only way that you're gonna live your life.

Erica: Hmm. That's so powerful. And I agree with all of that because yeah, what, you have no other choice but to do it. So like, let's get a move on. Jamie, what are

Jaime: live miserably, so, and that's not good either.

Erica: that's not a choice though. We, that's not a choice we wanna entertain.

Jaime: no.

Erica: What are you excited about in the world of reproductive health right now?

Erica: Like are there any cool studies or anything that you think are gonna be super interesting?

Jaime: So much. I think probably, I mean, I always say the fastest area in medicine as a whole is genetics, right? Like genetics has moved medicine in every aspect forward. So fa, you know, so much faster. I think it's amazing what we can test embryos for in [00:23:00] terms of health and in terms of medical disease. So I think the marriage between genetics and fertility is only gonna have, you know, incredible results as time goes on.

Jaime: I.

Erica: Hmm. Fascinating. I love that. All right, girl. Where can people find you? Where can they buy their, your book when they hear you and they're like, oh my God, I need to know more about this. Le, lay it out here.

Jaime: let's see. So, um, you, we uh, we, I have a website, uh, that's Dr. Jamie Nottman. I have an Instagram account also with that name. And the book could be purchased on Amazon or Barnes and Noble. You can pre-order it. It is called Own Your Fertility. It's pub Date, it's January 13th. Uh, I'm super excited and very grateful to get to share this piece of work with the world.

Erica: Yes. And it's not meant K-N-O-P-M-A-N

Jaime: K-N-O-P-M-N, correct?

Erica: spell it for you people who are listening, which I think is fascinating. Oh my gosh. Dr. Jamie, thank you so much for coming on, for talking about this interesting [00:24:00] topic. I know that whoever's listening, if it's not impacting them, like.

Erica: I'm not having a baby. It's not impacting me, but I know so many women that I think like I would just love to share these pivots with it. So super incredible. Listen, if you're listening today and this conversation lit a fire under you, here's your next move. I don't want you to keep it to yourself. I need you to share it with somebody that you know.

Erica: I need you to drop a review and get out there on Amazon and buy Dr. Jamie's book. Okay? Let's keep this conversation going. Remember that your potential is a limitless, and the only thing standing in your way are those sticky floors. But guess what? You have the power to break through them. So go out there, take up some space, and let's shatter some ceilings together and think.