Saturday Fertility Yoga Classes Starting Soon!

Fertile Ground Yoga is Back! 

With the expansion of our practice, I am excited to announce the return of Fertile Ground Yoga, which runs for four consecutive Saturdays at 4:00 PM starting June 4th. To learn more and register, click HERE.

Fertile Ground classes are for women who are facing fertility challenges and who are looking for a safe place to nurture their bodies, minds, and spirits along the way. Whether you trying to conceive naturally, going through assisted reproductive treatments, grieving a loss, or considering other family building options, there is a space for you here. The class includes meditation, group support, qigong, yoga, self-inquiry, and guided relaxation to enhance your fertility and to support your vitality.

About the instructor: Brooke Lewis, R.Y.T, C.P.T, will be teaching this series. Brooke has been a student of yoga for 11 years. Her journey to becoming a teacher has had a profound effect on her life. Having always been involved in the health and fitness industry, her yoga asana practice was at first a wonderful way to keep her body healthy. Today yoga touches every part of her life and keeps her healthy physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Brooke first met Jane and Merry during her own struggles with fertility. That experience has given her new compassion for, and a desire to help, women in similar situations. She is very grateful to be a part of the Acupuncture Denver team. In addition to being a registered yoga teacher, Brooke is a certified personal trainer and teaches Pilates.  She and her husband are also proud parents to their beautiful son, Cameron.

The cost for the series is $60 or $50 for Acupuncture Denver clients. Please click here to register, or call us at 303.929.9582 to sign up.

L’s Story: An IVF Journey

I was waiting for the right guy. I was waiting to get married. I got married for the first time at 37. We thought we were being aggressive by waiting only a few months before trying to have a baby. Can I have those few months back?

A year passed with systematic monitoring of basal temperature, careful not to move from bed before I got my temperature every morning. I charted my cervical mucus and tried to discern what “sticky egg white” meant. We timed intercourse with ovulation kits, trying to get in the mood every time it was time for our “business sex.” I bought sexy lingerie. We dimmed lights.

I was obsessed with pregnancy.

Every month when my menstrual cycle would start; I’d see blood and cry.  I went to four ob/gyns. Three tested me for everything. The tested my hormone levels at the wrong point in my cycle. They told me to just keep trying. They discounted my complaints that my menstrual cycle was lasting too long. I soldiered through their advice. I lost weight for them; I gained weight for them. Did they not read the pamphlet on “Aging and Infertility in Women.” The fourth ob/gyn that I saw didn’t even exam me. For my $89, ten minute session, I got the advice I wish I had been given a year prior, “Go to a fertility specialist.  You can’t wait. Here is a list of who I recommend.”

Advice was everywhere, “relax or you won’t get pregnant” or “just adopt and you will magically get pregnant because you won’t be stressed.”

I started going to a fertility clinic a month after we bought a house (two weeks after the last doctor had said, “you don’t have time.”) I had great insurance, but the fertility clinic required payment upfront. Thousands of dollars went by. I opened a credit card with a $15,000 limit and charged every dime of it on medical bills. Why’d I buy a house? I wanted life to go on. I wanted something to move forward.

Blood tests, vaginal ultrasounds, Clomid, more Clomid, IUI (repeat three times), shots, vitamins, powders…I was their experiment. What would you do for a baby?

I was emotional. I went on antidepressants, then off of them, then wondered about going back on them. My parents kept telling me, “just adopt.”  They wanted this to end. I would be happy to adopt after I grieve the fact that I am infertile. Did anyone see that missing step?  I was torture on everyone around me. I’m good at sharing.

In January of this year, I started the IVF process. My husband gave me three shots a day for twelve days. Every needle that went in, I’d close my eyes and try to imagine a baby’s face, but I had little energy left to hope. I could never picture a baby’s face. The medication made me constipated. I didn’t have a bowel movement in 12 days and I was worried. The nurses told me to increase my fiber and take a stool softener. I took three a day and was eating 35 grams of fiber per day. I had incredible pain from gas and bloating. The doctors said no laxatives and no straining. I wanted to jump out of my body and run away from it.

There was no running away from the fact I’d be forty years old this year. I had to keep going, pain or no pain.

After the 12 days of shots, they retrieved 10 eggs, 7 which they thought were mature enough to fertilize. That number quickly dropped to five eggs in a matter of hours. I mourned the loss of my two eggs. Out of the remaining five eggs, three were the ideal maturity level at the point of retrieval. The same week of the egg retrieval they transferred three embryos to me, the other two they would keep growing. They brought the three of them into the room in a baby incubator. We could see them on the monitor; they looked just like the textbook pictures in seventh grade education class that I never understood. My husband cried and was instantly protective of each one.

Out of the two remaining eggs that were fertilized, one lived to be frozen for another transfer if I decided to do a second IVF. One. One lonely one.

No one wanted to give me a percentage of what my chance at pregnancy would be with the transfer of three embryos.  The nurses kept referring to the doctor and finally on the day of transfer the doctor told me. 50% Wow. Should I be excited or disappointed by that number?

About two weeks after the transfer, I am sobbing. I go into the doctor to take my blood test to check for pregnancy. I am stressed. Two years and $18,000 later, will it be worth it?

The nurse calls and tells me I’m pregnant. I just slump to the floor crying. I can’t understand how I feel. I’m exhausted. It’s over. The fight is over. I broke into a million pieces. Shock.

Today I am four months pregnant. I am having twins. I am sick all the time. But did I really expect the “pregnancy gods” to be fair and make this part easy?

My husband has a picture of his mom at her fortieth birthday party. She has a big smile on her face and is pointing to the lettering on her black T-shirt. In big white letters it says, “I’d rather be forty, then pregnant.”

I get it. Women are insanely strong. They don’t always share it, but if you are looking for a hand, reach out to a woman, she’ll hold you up until you can walk on your own. You are not alone. Guaranteed.

K’s Story: HOPE

Another inspiring, wholehearted family-building story about how hope can carry us despite the odds, the statistics, the dismal prognosis…and a great follow up to H’s story since hope mattered much more than low AMH in this case!

Hope

I never gave up hope.  Not even after receiving the heartbreaking diagnosis that I had a 2% chance of conceiving, even if I went the expensive route of in vitro fertilization.  My anti-müllerian hormone level was almost non-existent at .1 ng/ml.  My follicle-stimulating hormone was 17 iu/l, a level indicating perimenopause.  In other words, my eggs were duds, acting like they belonged to the body of an old “past-her-prime” woman, not a woman who was 30-years-old and ready to start her family.  I had Diminished Ovarian Reserve.

I was destroyed, but somehow through reading success stories and hearing about miracle babies I managed to keep a glimmer of hope alive.  I sought some natural therapies—Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) through Acupuncture Denver and yoga.  I found support groups.  I talked.  I blogged.  I changed my diet.  I researched.  I tried to make sense of the pain that I experienced every time an announcement was made that another friend or family member was pregnant.  I tried intrauterine insemination with injectable hormones, but my body didn’t respond well enough and the cycle failed.  So, I kept up with yoga and TCM because it did seem to make a difference in my cycles and at least helped my mindset.

It was hope that kept me going.  I wanted a family.  After two years of trying, my husband and I decided to start down the adoption track.  I started to funnel my energy into researching types of adoption, agencies, the incredible cost.  It was a whole other daunting research project.  But, I still kept some hope in my heart that my body might jump start and shoot out a good egg while I was researching adoption.

And it did.

I still remember the beautiful morning, almost like it was yesterday, when at 5am I had gotten up early to shower for work.  My period was due the day before, but hadn’t shown up yet.  After two years of trying to conceive, I really didn’t test much anymore because it was heartbreaking every time only one line showed up.   But, I still kept a stash of tests in the closet.  When I awoke to no period, I thought, “Hmmm… maybe I should test.”  After three minutes, I looked at the stick and thought my eyes were deceiving me.  I rubbed them, looked again and staring back at me were two lines.  TWO lines.  One was still faint, but it was there.  It was really there.  I have never been more overcome with emotion than I was at that moment.  Was it possible that I was really pregnant?  Was it possible that I overcame my measly 2% chance of success?

I was a maniac.  I screamed and laughed and cried at the top of my lungs.  I bolted into our bedroom to tell my husband, and he thought I had hurt myself or that the house was on fire. I couldn’t even talk.  All I could do was turn on the light and shove the pregnancy test in front of his eyes.  We were finally going to be parents!

When our daughter was 6-months-old, we found out we were expecting unexpectedly again.  Impossible, right?  We couldn’t believe it, but we were thrilled that we might be lucky enough to have not one, but two babies biologically.  We waited the obligatory time to share our news with the world.  But when I went in for my 16-week appointment, our baby boy’s heartbeat was not detected.  He had died at about 15 weeks 4 days.  We were devastated and again facing the infertility diagnosis of Diminished Ovarian Reserve.

The grief and sorrow of losing that baby was intense.  I cried every day.  I forced myself to go through the motions.  But, I decided after a couple months that I wasn’t ready to give up hope.  If my body had gotten pregnant twice without interventions, it could do it again.  And although we weren’t really trying, we also weren’t really NOT trying.  Miraculously, in August of 09, I must have had one more good egg because we found out in early September that we were having another baby.  We were cautious for most of the pregnancy, but after we passed the 20-week mark, we let our guard down.  We were actually going to have another baby.  And even now, I’m still in awe that we managed to get pregnant again.

Now we have two magnificent daughters who grace us daily with laughter, love and a little rivalry to keep things interesting.  There’s not a day that goes by that I’m not thankful for the gifts we’ve been given, for the beauty that we have in our family.

Hope is amazing.  To be given a 2% chance of success, but to get pregnant three times naturally means we beat the odds.  And hope…hope is responsible.

H’s Story: Holding on to Hope Against the Odds….

I’m honored to present our first fertility journey story, shared by someone who is not even a patient at Acupuncture Denver, but who reached out to share her story immediately when she saw the call for stories on my newsletter or facebook. I’ll be sending you an article on how TCM views AMH/FSH and how acupuncture and TCM can help (just to answer your question at the end).   Thank you for your courage, your big heart and your vulnerability. I am sure there is someone out there who needs to hear your words of hope and understanding….

“What a way to begin the infertility awareness week. Yesterday I had an appointment with my fertility clinic and was told I will never be able to have a biological child. I will be able to get pregnant with someone else’s eggs or embryo adoption but at the young age of 34 I have bad eggs and cannot have one of my own. Well I felt like someone took the winds out of my sail. But in the true spirit of my life I decided to look on the bright side, that atleast now my options have been cut in half and it is either embryo adoption or start that long process of adoption. (Now don’t get me wrong, before we started trying to have kids 4 years ago we have always planned on adopting…but the plan was to have 2 biological kids and then adopt 2). So now we don’t have to make the hard decision of spending all of our money and taking a loan for the rest just for one try at IVF. It has been weighing heavily on us this last year. We even started looking seriously into an IVF vacation this weekend. But after 3 miscarriages over these last 12 years and an AMH level of less than .1 I was told no way I can have a baby with my own eggs. 

So you would think I would be bummed ….. well I woke this morning to an LH surge and decided we will have a miracle baby. It took my mom 4 years to get pregnant with me and 4 years to get pregnant with my sister. We have been trying 4 years….so this is the year. My husband decided we will get a miracle (or he just enjoyed waking to a wife wanting sex…haha either one is fine).  I thank my fertility clinic for all their help and have decided to just pray for the miracle and start the embryo adoption process. My husband and I have worked so hard for a child. Living these last 4 years putting all our hard earned money into fertility treatments, which of course are not at all covered by insurance, living each month thinking this will be the month and having our dreams crushed each and every month… not any more. We will have a child some way or another (just not the Raising Arizona kind of way..haha) and we just have to believe that things will work out. 

I have more than 20 aunts and uncles if that gives you any clue to how big my family is, and I am one of the only ones that is without child. This is funny since my talent, my gift in life,  is working with children. I went to college for early childhood education and have worked with children from birth to 3rd grade. Besides being a teacher and nanny, I am also a doula. So I guess what they say is true… “those who can’t teach….”

I just want to say with all the heartache my husband and I have been through we can still see a silver lining. We still know there is a child out there for us. We also joke that with my husband’s intelligence and my compassion that the child has just taken so long because they are destined to be president or to solve the world’s problems. 

There is no giving up on us. With that being said if anyone knows any way of raising your AMH levels (besides breaking into the lab an changing the results…hahaha), I am all ears. If not say a prayer that a loving family picks us to raise their embryos…. 

I wish everyone out there good luck in all of their journeys, no matter what path you go down just know that there are many people out there going down the same path and they are there to support you when you start to feel down…”

Share Your Story

In honor of National Infertility Awareness week, I am inviting one and all to share their family-building stories with us. Whether it’s a story of overcoming enormous odds to have a biological child, experiencing the miracle of adoption, embracing child-free living, or being part of a story that is still unfolding, I would love to hear from you. I have grand plans for a way to share these stories in the future, but for now will plan to share them on my blog. I truly believe in the truth I have learned from Brene Brown’s work on shame and vulnerability/wholehearted living. She believes that “owning our story and loving ourselves through the process is the bravest thing we will ever do.” To learn more about her work, visit her website or blog.

Please share your story with me. I believe sharing our stories is one of the most important ways we can inspire others and help them feel less alone in their own struggles. When you were in the depths of your darkest hours in your own fertility journey, wouldn’t it have been nice to hear an inspiring or just really raw story of someone who had been there? I know we can all benefit from taking the risk to be vulnerable with those who understand this particular struggle of longing, loss and hope. To share your story, please email to me (jane@acudenver.com) with “my story” in the subject line.

I am excited to hold space for this!

Congratulations Merry, new ABORM Fellow!

We just found out that Acupuncture Denver associate, Merry Reasons, passed the recent ABORM (American Board of Oriental Reproductive Medicine) Exam.  I am so proud and impressed!! Merry has shown such dedication, hard work, and commitment to Acupuncture Denver over the past few years. Merry started in the clinic in August 2008 when I was on maternity leave and has been with us ever since. Merry followed me in the clinic for many months before starting, trained with Randine Lewis to become  a Clinical Excellence In Fertility (CEFP) member with the Fertile Soul, and agreed to sit for the ABORM exam earlier this month. Here is more information about the ABORM certification from their website:

The ABORM has been formed by leading professionals in Oriental Reproductive Medicine who have come together voluntarily with a resolve to meet the patient and physician demand for a demonstration of knowledge of care in this field. We have recognized the need for a certification to maintain that practitioners who are treating patients with Oriental Medicine in the field of Reproductive Health are doing so with an advanced knowledge and experience, and to allow practitioners to demonstrate their knowledge through the process of voluntary examination.

We are happy to both be certified ABORM fellows and to offer our patients the highest standard of care in the field of Oriental Reproductive Medicine at Acupuncture Denver.  Since this certification is not required, it sets apart those practitioners who have extensive knowledge, experience and dedication to the specialty. Since there are more and more acupuncture “fertility specialists” out there as time goes by, we feel that having met the criteria of the ABORM and having attained status as ABORM fellows distinguishes us as practitioners and as a clinic dedicated to women’s health and fertility enhancement.

In addition to becoming such a great practitioner, Merry has been an amazing support to me as a friend and professional partner at the clinic. Her friendship and loyalty have given me inspiration to grow both personally and professionally over the past few years. As many patients have told me, Merry is very “zen” and  brings a calm presence to any situation. She has the wonderful ability to hold space, allow for open emotional release, and bring non-judgmental compassion to those she touches. I am truly grateful to have Merry in my life and know she gives so much to everyone she treats at the clinic. In addition to  now being a certified ABORM Fellow, Merry has a huge heart, a humble nature and a gentle, calm spirit.  Congratulations, Merry! I don’t know what I’d do without you– you have my gratitude and love!

Words of Wisdom From Randine Lewis

Here is a great reminder of how to embrace our seasonal shift from Randine Lewis, my mentor and friend, founder of The Fertile Soul:

Happy Halloween, marking summer’s end.  In Gaelic, Samhain marked the Celtic New Year, beginning November 1, when the veil between the worlds was thinnest, as nature turned from the full expression of yang inward to yin, where the born returns to the unborn.

I like to think of this time as coming home. Not necessarily returning to the sentimentality of the secular “home”, but of plowing back under that which is no longer needed to compost that which can be. As the sap returns from nourishing the summer leaves back into the core, let us return to our own inner essence as we evaluate where our energy has been expended. As we begin this return to the depths, may we each have the courage to let go of that which is no longer serving us. Returning to the depths, to our own zhi, is not usually a time where things fit nicely together. It is often a time where things fall apart, and tumble to ruins so we can experience the utter chaos of new potential.

 I have found when I can embrace the processes of nature and live in accordance with the Tao, it sparks this same ability in those who come to me for help. I can only offer that which I have been through and that which I am; not the impotency of that which I have learned. Time is too precious to try to fix things from the outside in. My greatest gift in healing has never been in the form of “Let me do this for you,” but rather, “May I stand with you as your world falls apart?” The potency in healing is like shaking the tree, letting the leaves fall so what is revealed is bare openness, allowing life to emerge freshly once again. Let go of the structures that no longer work. Dare to jump into the abyss of the unknown.

Jane Gregorie is attending ASRM!

Jane Gregorie, M.S., L.Ac., and owner of Acupuncture Denver, is attending the American Society for Reproductive Medicine’s (ASRM) Annual Meeting, which takes place in Denver this year from October 23rd -27th.  According to the ASRM’s website, the 2010 meeting theme is “Taking Reproductive Medicine to New Heights,” and is designed to meet the educational needs of both practitioners and scientists within the fields of reproductive medicine and biology.  The five-day program brings together the finest reproductive endocrinologists, scientists and clinicians in the reproductive health field and offers “postgraduate courses, lectures, symposia, roundtables, debates, abstracts, posters and videos that focus attention on the latest scientific developments in the field of reproductive medicine and their translation to clinical medicine.”

Everyone at Acupuncture Denver is thrilled that Jane is attending this year’s ASRM Meeting. We know that our practice and our patients will benefit from this cutting-edge conference that attracts some of the most knowledgable fertility specialists from around the country!