35. Why Your IVF Clinic Shouldn’t Be Your Only Support System

If you’ve ever walked out of an IVF appointment feeling overwhelmed, emotionally exhausted, confused, or like you’re somehow supposed to just “hold it together” through all of this… this episode is for you.

In today’s conversation, I’m talking about the difference between the clinical side of fertility… and the very human side of fertility.

Because IVF clinics and fertility coaches are not doing the same job.

And I think women deserve support for BOTH.

In this episode we cover:
✨ Why so many women feel emotionally unsupported during IVF
✨ The difference between clinical fertility care and whole-body support
✨ Why building your fertility support team matters
✨ My own IVF experience and the fear spirals that came with it
✨ The emotional load women carry through IVF
✨ Why nervous system support matters during fertility treatment
✨ What EFT (tapping) is and how I use it with clients
✨ Supporting sperm health and why fertility should never fall entirely onto women
✨ Why you do NOT need to become a perfect fertility robot overnight

If this episode resonated with you, send it to someone who might need this reminder too 🤍

⸻

✨ IVF CLARITY SESSIONS

If you’re wanting more personalised support around your own IVF prep or fertility picture, this is the work that I do and I genuinely love it.

These are 90-minute personalised sessions designed to help you feel calmer, clearer, more supported, and more prepared heading into IVF or conception from a whole-body perspective.

Together we look at the full picture, including:
• whole-body fertility support
• lifestyle + nutrition foundations
• nervous system support
• stress load + emotional overwhelm
• inflammation + possible root-cause drivers
• sleep, blood sugar + daily habits
• IVF prep priorities
• where to focus instead of trying to do EVERYTHING at once

And depending on what’s coming up for you emotionally during the session, we may also do some live EFT/tapping work together to help process fear, anxiety, overwhelm, grief, perfectionism, or whatever feels most present for you in that moment.

The goal is not perfection.

It’s helping you feel more supported, more regulated, more emotionally held, and more confident about what actually matters for YOUR body and your season.

You’ll leave with a grounded, personalised roadmap and practical next steps that actually feel realistic and supportive for both your body and mind.

🔗 https://calendly.com/abi-wilde/wilde-ivf-clarity-session

⸻

✨ FREE EFT / TAPPING GUIDE

If today’s episode got you curious about EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique), I’ve also created a free EFT guide for you to try yourself at home.

EFT, also known as tapping, is one of my favourite nervous system regulation tools for helping process stress, fear, anxiety, overwhelm, perfectionism, grief, and emotional overload in a way that feels gentle and supportive.

It’s something I use regularly with my clients throughout IVF and fertility prep because sometimes your body needs support emotionally too… not just physically.

If you’re wanting to explore EFT for yourself, you can download the free guide below 🤍

🔗 https://abiwilde.myflodesk.com/eft

Or come say hi over on Instagram:
@abi.wilde

If you’re craving a little extra support, I’ve got some beautiful free resources to get you started.

You can grab my IVF Prep Checklist here:
https://abiwilde.myflodesk.com/ivf-prep-checklist

And if you’re in that in-between, the waiting, the overthinking… I’ve also created a Two-Week Wait Support Kit to help you feel more grounded:
https://abiwilde.myflodesk.com/two-week-wait

If you’d like more personalised support, you can book a free 30-minute IVF support call with me here:
https://calendly.com/abi-wilde/30min

We can chat through your fertility journey and what your next steps could look like.

I’m creating something really special… BLYOOM — a supportive app for women trying to conceive, with nervous system tools to hold you through the real moments… the two-week wait, negative tests, pregnancy announcements… all of it.

If that feels like something you need right now, you can join the waitlist here:
https://abiwilde.myflodesk.com/blyoom-waitlist

And if you want more, come hang out with me on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/abi.wilde

It’s where I share free tips, tools, and fertility support for whole-body ...

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:36

Hey beautiful and welcome back to another episode of The Wild Way. So today's episode is one that I've been wanting to record for a while now because I was actually having a chat on Insta with another fertility coach recently, and she was telling me about a lot of stuff she's seeing online lately around fertility coaches. And she was saying how hard it's been watching like fertility specialists and doctors she has trusted and followed for years becoming really vocal online about their frustrations with fertility coaches and the wellness space. And while we were having this convo, I just thought to myself, like why? Because we're not even doing the same job. We're actually supporting very different parts of the same journey. And before I bang on any further, I want to be super clear about something because I know these conversations can get super spicy online really quickly. RVF gave me my son Jack. Okay, I am deeply grateful for reproductive medicine. I think fertility specialists are incredible at what they do, like genuinely incredible. The science behind RVF completely blows my mind. Okay, the ability to retrieve eggs and create embryos and genetically test embryos and transfer embryos, it is amazing, honestly. But I also think women have been led to believe that IVF clinics are supposed to support every aspect of their fertility journey when that's actually not what the medical system was designed to do. And I think understanding that distinction is really important because so many women are walking into IVF feeling unsupported and blaming themselves for struggling and not getting the outcomes they're hoping for. So I want to talk about the difference between the clinical side of fertility and the really human side of fertility. And to be fair, I don't think any woman looking to do IVF should have to choose. I think women deserve support for both. So let's start here, okay, because an IVF clinic's job is to help create pregnancies. Their job is to retrieve eggs and create embryos and monitor cycles and manage all of your medications and hopefully transfer embryos safely and effectively and help women achieve pregnancies. That is their role, and it is a highly specialized medical role. But their job is not necessarily to help you improve your overall health, okay, or support your egg quality from a lifestyle perspective, or help create the best possible internal environment around the process, or get your body into the best possible shape for conception, for pregnancy, and also for postpartum, and creating the healthiest little humans possible, right? Let's not forget about that. And I know when you're on a fertility journey, it can be so hard to see beyond just getting pregnant. But let me tell you, okay, pregnancy is hugely demanding on your body. It depletes you. That little treasure takes everything you've got, which is both beautiful and brutal. So postpartum depletion is the real deal, babe. Okay. I know this well because I've lived it twice now. And because I'm still breastfeeding Sadie at her every whim at 17 months, I still feel like I'm rebuilding and working on parts of my own health constantly. And this is the thing nobody talks about enough. Because, like I said before, it's not just about getting pregnant. It's also about how well are you entering pregnancy? What reserves does your body have to lean into? How supported is your nervous system? How inflamed or depleted are you already before you even get pregnant? And again, this is not me criticizing clinics, not at all. Okay, we need both. It just simply means that's not the model that they're operating inside of. Okay, their job is also definitely not to coach you through nervous system regulation or optimize your sleep or help you recover from emotional burnout, the insane amounts of pressure that infertility puts on your relationships, or helping you like reduce your toxic load, or helping you stabilize your blood sugar and eat enough protein and all the things. Okay, or even just supporting you emotionally when you're freaking out after your appointment. And that doesn't mean that they don't care. I believe they probably absolutely do. It just means that they are operating inside of a medical model. And I think that this is really important for women to understand, generally, when they're building their fertility support team. Every practitioner works through the lens that they have been trained in. Okay, so if you go to a surgeon, they are trained to operate. A doctor is trained to diagnose and prescribe medication, right? An RVF specialist is trained to help create pregnancies through reproductive medicine. A naturopath might focus on, you know, herbs and gut health and inflammation and nutrient deficiencies. Yeah? An acupuncturist is going to look at, you know, your body through a completely different lens again. And none of those approaches are necessarily wrong. They're just different tools and different skill sets, which is why I personally think that women need to stop feeling like they have to place every single part of their fertility journey into the hands of one person. You're allowed to build a support team around yourself. And for some women, maybe that looks like, you know, a fertility specialist, a GP, maybe an acupuncturist or a naturopath, or a dietitian, or a therapist to help you emotionally and mentally, or maybe it's a fertility coach, or someone helping support the emotional side of RVF too. Because I don't want women going into RVF feeling unsupported or underprepared. Okay, IVF is a massive financial investment. You don't want to be throwing like 20K at RVF and then just sitting there hoping for the best. You want to know that you've actually prepared your body properly. You want to know you've got the right people rallying around you. You want to feel like you're putting yourself in the best possible position for the best possible outcomes heading into the process. Even things like sperm health, right? Often they barely get discussed properly inside fertility conversations, despite the fact that sperm quality absolutely matters and can improve over time too. And I think that women deserve to know that there are things they can do proactively to support themselves and their partners heading into IBF if they want to. And I actually think where things sometimes get like super messy online is that women are expecting one person or one clinic to hold every single aspect of this journey. And unfortunately, that is just not realistic. Okay. It's kind of like expecting your husband or partner to fulfill every single part of you. It's just not doable. And it's way too much pressure to put on one person. Because your fertility specialist might see you for like 15 minutes in an appointment, okay? 30 if you're lucky. But you still have to live inside your body for the other 23 hours of the day. And that's exactly where I see my role with my clients coming in. Because IVF isn't just happening during appointments. It's happening in all the moments you're coming up against at home, too. It's happening after the phone calls, right? It's happening while you're lying awake at 2 a.m. like deep diving IVF success rates on Chat GPT. It's happening during the fear spirals after reading a random IVF forum thread online. Okay, anyone else relate to this? It's happening during, you know, the fears before your transfer. All the waiting, the overthinking, the emotional exhaustion and the hypervigilance. The immense amount of pressure that women are carrying while trying to function normally through all of this. Can you relate? I remember feeling like this constantly while I was doing RBF, waiting weeks for appointments. Okay, and then you get there and you've built everything up massively in your head because it feels like your entire future hangs on this one conversation. And then suddenly you're like sitting in the appointment hearing words like follicles and blastocysts and percentages and protocols. And then 10 minutes later, you're back in the car park trying to remember what Dr. Whatever his or her face even said to you. And then you find yourself like panic googling acronyms or just trying to decode whether the doctor sounded hopeful enough so that some of that hope can like appease your frantic mind for just a second. And then you go home and you're somehow supposed to just function normally again. You know, just answer your emails and fold your washing. Go to lunch, pretending like your life isn't mentally consuming you right now. Meanwhile, your brain is just running like a fertility-themed FBI investigation 24-7. And for me personally, IVF became like this constant attempt to control the outcome. I genuinely believed if I could just research harder, if I could optimize harder, supplement harder, track harder, maybe I could somehow guarantee my success. I was deep in IVF Facebook groups at midnight, just like reading every transfer story imaginable, trying to convince myself that I wasn't missing some like magic answer out there. I was researching immune stuff, tea killer cells, implantation failure, how my endodiagnosis could be impacting implantation. Every single protocol under the sun. I even joined a surrogacy Facebook group, like just in case. Because I was already mentally building backup plans before my IVF cycle had even finished. I had a plan A, I had a plan B, plan C. And under all of that obsessing was fear. Fear that if it didn't work, I'd blame myself forever for not doing enough. At one point, I genuinely felt like I had about 46 invisible tabs open in my brain at all times. A tab for supplements, researching rabbit holes, okay? I was ripping through every bit of fertility literature I could get my hands on, every book, okay, everything I could find, working out the best possible IVF prep plan and still thinking constantly, like, what if this never happens for me? What if it doesn't work? What if I never get to be a mama? And I know I'm not the only woman who's done this, because when you're terrified, your brain starts convincing you that if you can just gather enough information, maybe you'll finally feel safe. But women are not just reproductive systems floating around separately from the rest of their bodies. They're human beings carrying fear and grief and hypervigilance and relationship stress, financial pressure, all of it. Because your fertility is impacted by every other system in your body. Okay, your nervous system matters, your sleep matters, your inflammation, your blood sugar, nutrient status, your emotional well-being, all of that matters. And yes, there are absolutely situations where RBF is needed regardless. But I also think women deserve support around the whole body picture, too. That is a huge part of the work that I do with my clients. My work is probably like 50% physical support and 50% emotional and nervous system support. Yes, we work with the body, nutrition and inflammation and sleep and all of that stuff, the gut health, okay? What I like to call the fertility foundations, supporting the whole body heading into RBF, and then pregnancy and then postpartum, okay? Looking at root causes and helping women feel more physically supported going into the process. But the emotional side matters just as much. Okay, don't kid yourself. Sometimes it matters even more because women can only like white knuckle their way through the stuff for so long before their nervous system completely taps out. A huge part of what I do is helping women process what's happening while they're going through it instead of just trying to stay positive all the time, which is so unrealistic. And one of the tools I use a lot is EFT, okay, which stands for emotional freedom technique. It's also known as tapping. You might have heard of it. I sometimes call it emotional acupuncture because that's genuinely what it feels like to me. It's an incredible nervous system regulation tool where we combine tapping on acupressure points with emotional processing. Okay, we don't hide from the real feelings here. We don't hide from what is actually going on for you. We look at it head on and we tackle it. So instead of women sitting alone trying to logically think their way out of fear, we are actually helping the body process what it's been holding emotionally in real time. Okay, all the stuff that might be coming up for you, like fear or grief or pressure, maybe your perfectionism, maybe we're releasing a past trauma that's kind of holding you back. Okay, loss of control, dealing with all the disappointment and the fear of maybe getting your hopes up again. That very real fear of maybe never becoming a mama. And one of the reasons I love EFT so much is because fertility women are often so stuck in their heads. I know I was, right? The researching and the overthinking and the trying to control every possible variable. Okay, any other control freaks out there, or is it just me? Meanwhile, their nervous system is completely overloaded underneath all of this. And EFT helps bring women back into their bodies again, okay? Back into safety, back into regulation, back into feeling like they can actually breathe again. Not because it miraculously guarantees any pregnancy outcomes, obviously not, but because women stop carrying the whole thing alone. I'm actually currently supporting one of my clients through her IVF cycle right now, and she keeps saying to me over and over again, like, I cannot believe how different this feels having support this time around. Because she's done RVF before without this kind of support. And she said the entire experience feels completely different this time. Not because RVF suddenly became easy, okay? Not because she's like never scared anymore, okay. She is. The stuff comes up, but because she doesn't feel like she's carrying the whole thing alone anymore. Yes, we're supporting her physically, but a huge part of the work is emotional too. Okay, voice notes back and forth after appointments when she's freaking out. Personalized EFT sessions around fear and disappointment, and helping her process what's coming up in real time instead of sitting alone, just panic googling like worst-case scenarios at 11 p.m. Helping her zoom back out when the fear takes over. Because it does take over. Okay, that is a reality that is just part of this experience. You can't go through IVF without feeling anxious. Not possible. I mean, I don't know. Maybe there's a Zen monk out there. You tell me. But for the majority of women out there, you are dealing with fear, you are dealing with anxiety, you are dealing possibly with grief of like, you know, failed past transfers or miscarriages or all of the things. This is like a really intense part of IVF, right? So I'm helping her stop feeling like every single symptom means like disaster. And I think that's such an important conversation, okay? Because sometimes the biggest shift isn't more information. It's finally feeling emotionally supported while living through one of the most emotionally and physically intense seasons of your life. And I think a lot of women go into IVF thinking, I'll just do it myself, right? I'll just do all my own research, I'll just hold it together, I'll just push through. And I completely understand that mindset because I was that person too. For real. But doing IVF solo can become incredibly isolating. And when you're anxious and overwhelmed and sleep deprived and hormonally overloaded and terrified of outcomes and consuming endless information online, right? Like saving every single insta post, it becomes very difficult to hold yourself objectively through the process. Sometimes support isn't about needing someone because you are incapable. Sometimes support is about not having to carry something this heavy completely alone. And I think women have become so used to surviving everything independently that they don't even realize how dysregulated and unsupported they've become until someone actually starts holding them through this process. Because so many women are entering RVF completely burnt out, inflamed, exhausted, overstimulated, so chronically stressed, right? And emotionally exhausted. Just like that whole notion of like, you know, feeling like you have to do everything right, and you're just falling apart internally. And then on top of that, they're handed like all the injections, okay, all of the appointments, the financial pressure, uncertainty, the waiting periods, and the emotional weight of feeling like everything depends on these outcomes. It's a lot of pressure. Okay, no one's disputing that. That's a lot for like a human nervous system to carry. And then if a cycle doesn't work, so many women immediately turn against themselves. Okay, their body, their age, their low AMH, okay, their eggs, their worth. When sometimes nobody has actually supported the full picture. Now I also want to say this because I do think nuance matters. I understand that some doctors get frustrated online sometimes. Okay, there is misinformation in the wellness space. There are people making huge promises to vulnerable women out there. And I think that we need to be really careful about that. Because nobody can guarantee pregnancy. And if anyone does, that is a huge red flag, okay? I say that as your friend, your bestie. But nobody can guarantee RVF success outcomes. But you can support your body in the ways that actually matter to give you the best possible chances of success. Instead of just like throwing some pasta to the wall and just hoping that something sticks. Yeah? And I personally never want women feeling blamed if things don't work out. But I also think there's a massive difference between fear-based wellness marketing and genuinely helping women feel healthier and calmer and more nourished and regulated and more emotionally supported while going through IVF. Those are not the same thing. Personally, I don't think women should have to choose between science and holistic support. I think they deserve both, okay? Because IVF clinics and fertility coaches are supporting very different parts of the same experience. The clinic is treating the clinical side of fertility, which is so necessary, okay? But a good fertility coach is supporting the woman from a whole body perspective, helping her optimize her body for the best possible IVF outcomes while also supporting her emotionally through the reality of living this experience every single day. And that support can look really practical too. If I was preparing for IVF now, alongside my clinic protocol, I'd absolutely still be focusing on things like blood sugar stability and optimizing my sleep quality and reducing overwhelm and you know incorporating gentle movement into my day, anti inflammatory nutrition foundations, nervous system regulation, actually nourishing my body properly. Instead of running on stress and adrenaline, creating emotional support around myself. And supporting sperm health too, because this is never just about women. I think that conversation matters so much because fertility women often end up carrying the entire burden of this process on their shoulders while their partner's health barely even gets discussed. But sperm health matters hugely. Okay? Sperm are constantly regenerating, which means that they can respond really well to lifestyle changes too. It takes around 70 to 90 days for sperm to fully develop, which is why things like sleep and alcohol intake and smoking and stress, nutrition, inflammation, even heat exposure. Yeah. I remember saying to Chris, like, you are not allowed to have your phone in your pocket. I'm sorry, it's just a non-negotiable. He just laughed at me. But he did it anyway because he loves me. Okay. But also looking at your partner's nutrient deficiencies and their overall lifestyle can absolutely influence sperm quality, right? And you can change it. You can improve sperm quality. Okay. This is why I always say preconception health is not just about preparing for pregnancy. It's about preparing both bodies for pregnancy. Chris and I approached our IBF prep very much like a team. Okay. He's not into health and wellness like I am, okay? I had to kind of like, you know, give him a guide. I was just like, here, these are the things that you're doing. And he was like, okay, these are the things I'm doing. But we both cleaned things up, right? We both made lifestyle changes. Because this should never fall entirely onto women. And I also think that women need to stop feeling like they have to become perfect fertility robots overnight. That mindset alone becomes stressful. Okay, you do not need to do everything perfectly. You do not need to earn your pregnancy through suffering. You do not need to become the world's most organic woman overnight. One of the biggest shifts for me personally was realizing that I didn't need to force myself through fertility with sheer willpower alone. I needed support. I needed regulation and consistency and nourishment and someone helping me stop carrying the whole thing alone. So if you are going through RVF right now, I just want you to know this. You are not weak for needing more support than a 15-minute appointment can provide. You are not dramatic for finding this emotionally hard. You are not failing because your nervous system is struggling under the pressure of all of this. Your clinic is there to support the medical side. But you are still allowed to support the human underneath the protocol too. Because IVF was never designed to hold every single part of being human. So if this is your IVF season, I really hope this episode reminds you that you do not have to carry all of this perfectly on your own. You are allowed to need support. You are allowed to advocate for yourself. You are allowed to support your body in ways that help you feel more nourished and more regulated and more emotionally held through this process. Because IVF is already hard enough, yeah? And I truly believe that women deserve more than just surviving their way through it. And if you are wanting a bit more support around your own IVF prep or fertility picture, this is the work that I do and I genuinely love it. I would love nothing more than to support you through yours. So if this sounds like something you'd like, I'll pop the details for my IVF clarity sessions in the show notes. But otherwise, thank you so much for being here and spending this time with me today. It really means so much to me. And if this episode resonated with you, please send it to someone who might need to hear this reminder today, too. So until next time, I'm sending you huge amounts of love, and I'll see you in the next episode.