I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again: Women spend more time planning for their wedding day than preparing for motherhood. One event lasts a day, and the other a lifetime.

The majority of patients who appear at my clinic are both frustrated and scared. All of them have tried on their own to get pregnant (or to achieve a full term pregnancy) and then sought “professional” help in the form of an OB/GYN or Reproductive Specialist. Most have had procedures like IUI or fertility drugs before meeting me, and are contemplating moving up to IVF, or have done IVF, seen it fail, and they are broke, disheartened, or regrouping, and trying to decide what route to go next.

Maybe acupuncture is the last try they’re going to make. Perhaps they know someone I’ve treated who became pregnant and had a baby, and they hope I can do the same for them. I call these “legacy patients”, and they are often three or four feet deep in referrals. I have been doing this work for over 15 years, and I have seen a lot. Unfortunately I am often able to predict who will succeed and who won’t. Often this prediction is based on patient compliance in my clinic, more than lab tests and hospital procedures.

I do my work with passion and gusto, and I really try to make the difference between burning you out, giving up, or cheerleading you to a full term pregnancy.

This patient population coming from a doctor’s office has never or rarely discussed basal body temperature graphs, supplements to help egg quality, dietary considerations, stress, menstrual issues, or any of the things which I both believe and know for a fact to be vital contributions to the fertility process. New patients are surprised that I am so interested to hear about these things at the initial consult, as they are rarely discussed in a doctor’s office, though commonsense tells you they should be. These are the very factors which should be explored and developed as the foundation of your fertility potential.

Doctors often tell patients they have unexplained infertility, or even with known conditions that impair fertility, little is done to correct and/or identify these conditions in a meaningful way before attempting drugs and procedures. When the initial drugs or procedures don’t produce a good result, the doctors continue to up the ante with stronger drugs, and more expensive procedures. And so it goes until some patients have had enough, or lost momentum, or feel so awful from the experience they are looking for another WAY.

I find this manipulation by doctors is just plain wrong, and it frequently takes the patient down an expensive and fruitless road to despair with no end in sight. Patients need to consider the basics of fertility from the beginning because your doctor sure won’t. Working with acupuncture, diet, lifestyle modifications, and supplements to make a perfect scenario for conception seems simple, too simple!

Quite often this does more for laying the foundation for full term pregnancy than what is offered at a doctor’s office. A large percentage of patients will conceive naturally after working with me, even after failed procedures with their doctor, including IVF. Working with your fertility in the acupuncture clinical setting allows you, the patient, to participate in your own process in a meaningful and powerful way, while under the guidance of someone who knows and cares that you get a baby to hold in your arms that’s yours.

Acupuncture for fertility is not just coming to the office to have needles stuck in you on random days. If this is what you’ve encountered in the past, shame on your acupuncturist for wasting your time and money. I am here to tell you there is more, much more to it. Fertility optimization will not just include acupuncture, and on specific days of your cycle, it is also dietary education specific to your unique condition, identification of basal body temperature weaknesses and correcting them, creating a plan for supplementation that is optimal, and making certain that your doctor has done ALL the right lab tests, as they often do not. Some patients are referred back to their physicians as deemed necessary. I am happy to work with your doctor(s), although they are often red faced when I send a patient back for suspected issues that should have been tested in the first place. If you read through a few of my Google reviews, you will see this is true.