How getting pregnant birthed a podcast
EDUCATION: Making my content as part of the infertility community has made me so aware of how fortunate we were to only need one round of treatment to have our son. That said, our journey was still incredibly daunting for us, especially for my husband when we discovered our infertility was male factor. On December 23rd, 2013 we were told we needed to have treatment. Christmas was ruined, as you can imagine. We spent a lot of it in tears, hiding away from family so we didn’t have to talk about it. On New Year’s Eve, though, privately, we raised a glass to ‘the process’ we had to follow.
My husband and I dealt with the stresses very differently. I told my family, he didn’t tell his. I told my best friend, my husband didn’t. He felt he only had me to talk to because men can find it hard to talk at the best of times, but this was one of our worst times. Once we knew the path we were on, we worked through it together. But it was hard. Our relationship suffered from the shock of it all and we didn’t ask for any help. Now I know we should have. Luckily we have both now sought external support and are so proud of our special family of three.
EMPOWERMENT: Once pregnant, I knew I wanted to do more with my experience than just go through it. Having spent my career working in radio, I knew the power of audio and I was already podcasting ( in 2014 ) Despite having to explain what a podcast was I knew this conversation could really be brought to life, so I created this podcast to share, to explain, to connect and to encourage more of what was then a difficult and taboo conversation for many. I also wanted to make sure that men were heard more. My husband often felt that his viewpoint wasn’t important during our consultations, and I’ve heard many men echo this sentiment, so I’ve been on a mission to give male fertility a voice. You can hear previous episodes here.
Most of all, though, this podcast was created to be a place of solace, a friend, and somewhere you can rely on for evidence-based information.That is why I invited Kate Davies to join me as co-host on the podcast in 2019 as my ‘science bit’. Kate and I met when I was just starting the podcast and she was launching her practice, working as an Independent Fertility Nurse Consultant. She was one of my early podcast guests and we’ve become great friends.Kate loved the medium, so taught her everything I knew from my 20-year-long broadcasting career.
Kate always wanted to see the evidence which I loved, as you can find yourself down rabbit holes when researching fertility. Together we re-organised the podcast starting from where we thought your journey might have started and we followed all routes to parenthood, giving you as much useful content as possible. Our archive has resident fertility expert Dr James Nicopollus answering your questions in our ‘Ask the Expert’ feature and he is one of numerous experts sharing their wisdom into your earholes. In 2022, Kate took hold of the mic, flying solo until December 2024 with more patients’ stories as well as her expert insight, so do listen back to our feed to benefit from our range of conversations
Today the pair of us are doing all we can to fly the flag for both Women’s Health and Reproductive Health issues. Kate is now focusing her focusing her energy within the femtech space doing amazing work and she will be back on the podcast to update us.
I’ve been busy with Fertility Matters at Work which you can read more about below as well as facilitating all sorts of other conversations within the fertility space. I’ve used my presenting background to facilitate conversations at key fertility industry events, trade shows, festivals, charity dinners, women’s health launches. I’ve also merged my voiceover career into this space and guest hosted podcasts and produce them.
Having decided to mark the 10th anniversary of The Fertility Podcast by calling it a day with production, we’ve made aU-turn and I’m really proud to announce a new partnership with Fertility Action, the UK’s newly launched charity focused on fertility education and support. As Fertility Action’s official podcast and media partner, The Fertility Podcast will continue its mission to empower, educate, and support individuals and couples on their fertility journeys.
Through this partnership, Fertility Action and The Fertility Podcast aim to elevate the conversation around fertility, increase education and awareness, and provide vital emotional support to all those navigating fertility challenges.
FERTILITY MATTERS AT WORK
This is where you’ll find me today, putting all my energies into changing your experience at work when you are trying to grow your family.
In terms of education and support, I hope this podcast is a really useful reference point for you. Please know that if you are struggling to talk about what you are going through or are worried about what your employer might think or do if you disclose your plans – I’m one of three co-founders of Fertility Matters at Work which is a really exciting well-being and digital media company on a mission to educate the workplace on the support people need when they are trying to bring home a baby. We are dedicated to normalising the conversation about infertility within the workplace, by creating a cultural shirt within the well-being agenda at work to talk about these issues
This is not a tick-box exercise to write a policy, oh no. We want to change the misconceptions so many people have about fertility treatment being a lifestyle choice and something that always works and we are doing this through our unique E.A.S.E Methodology to help organisations become fertility friendly.
Plus we have a podcast (course we do) called The F Word at Work, so have a listen
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