REALITY CHECK - WHY CYCLES FAIL

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A negative test or failed cycle will make you question everything: Why didn’t it work? Should you have done something differently? Do you need a new clinic or a different plan going forward? These are all totally normal questions and thoughts.

Let’s break them down so you can move forward feeling as confident as possible, even in this terrible unknown.

In this video you’ll learn.

• A “negative news” reality check — just what are the odds and what does a failed cycle tell you

• Two ways not understanding fertility odds will hurt you — and much healthier alternatives

• One big holistic idea that will help you head into your next cycle feeling more ready, emotionally protected, and with better odds of success

You deserve to move forward with as much grace, hope, and peace as possible. This video will help get you there.

With love,

Nicole

Nicole Lange

LICENSED ACUPUNCTURIST
HOLISTIC FERTILITY EDUCATOR

• VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

  Hey friends, Nicole here.

  And today I want to talk about something that is more than a bit of a bummer but is a massively neglected, maybe even taboo, infertility topic which needs to change.

  I want to talk about failed cycles and months and negative pregnancy test news because the inattention, not to mention misinformation, on this subject hurts women and human beings like you which is not okay.

  So today we're going to talk all about why cycles fail and how to think about and process and move forward in a healthier headspace if, and when, they do.

  Here's what this video is going to cover.

  We'll do a negative news reality check where I'll cover some hard but super important fertility odds and statistics.

  I'll share two ways understanding these odds will help and totally protect you.

  And we'll wrap up on a super hopeful note with one big holistic takeaway that'll make moving forward after negative news a whole lot clearer and more empowered.

  Before I launch into these statistics I want to acknowledge that seeing any fertility numbers and data can be majorly intense and talking about negative tests and failed cycles can be a big trigger. I want to encourage you to check in, take deep breaths along the way, and stick with me.

  You are going to end up with a ton to get you through this miserable aspect of infertility feeling way more informed and way more intentional. And you are brave and fabulous for wanting these things.

  Besides, whether you know them and understand them or not, fertility odds aren't going to change and I really think knowledge is power.

  So let's get to it.

  The crappy reality is negative pregnancy tests and failed attempts at getting pregnant are pretty much inevitable for most people. Even in the most promising fertility treatments with the very best odds of success, donor egg IVF for example, negative results still happen 20, 30, even 50% of the time depending on the clinic and the exact circumstances.

  The average 35 year-old trying to get pregnant with good old fashioned sex has an 80 to 85% chance of not getting pregnant at best each month. And while there might not be a lot of 25 year-olds watching this video, I know there are a whole lot of 30-something year-olds who are telling themselves if they would have tried at 25 it would have been different. So let me tell you.

  Even if you were 25 and trying with sex your odds of not getting pregnant would still be 70 to 75% each month. So age clearly isn't everything here.

  The folks at Attain say IUI, that's intrauterine insemination, odds of not getting pregnant, again if you're under 35, are generally 80 to 90% per IUI cycle. And they go as high as 95 to 98% if you're over 40.

  The Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, that's SART for short, has a handy calculator for estimating the odds of success while doing IVF.

  At the time I'm filming this in 2021, a 38 year-old with no known male or female fertility diagnosis has a 60% chance of not having a baby on their first IVF cycle, just under 40% chance of not succeeding after two, and still a 30% chance of no baby after three IVFs. Which means even with no known issues in either partner and IVF, a negative test isn't a freak thing at all.

  I know this sucks to think about but simply put negative results are way more probable than we like to believe. And certainly way more likely than many things out in the world of infertility treatments and fertility culture seem to suggest.

  Real data and actual numbers like these ones I just shared show us that when it comes to pregnancy, getting pregnant is almost always less likely than failing at getting pregnant. And when you think about it of course it is.

  Pregnancy under the most perfect circumstances is complicated biology and infertility adds legitimate medical factors and obstacles that make it even more complex. The body is wise, and I'm going to be honest, often a little bit picky about getting pregnant because it is a huge, huge commitment to grow a whole human being. And it wants to do it well and have the best possible set up for success. And 'hallelujah' that we have so many amazing ways to understand and troubleshoot and work within this reality because we do.

  But that said, even with the best science and the best technology, we are still a very, very long way from pregnancy being a slam dunk. And we need to know that.

  Don't worry, I'm going to come back to some really hopeful statistics in just a bit. But first let's talk about why we need to face these really hard ones.

  First, it's not you ... it's math.

  If we think pregnancy is statistically more likely than it actually is and then we don't get pregnant, we tend to think it must be us and a singular failure of our bodies and fertility care when it's usually not at all.

  I want to say this very, very clearly here. Not getting pregnant, no matter how much you put into it, and I'm talking energy, effort, money, technology, medications, monitoring, time, heart, soul, blood, sweat, tears, it doesn't mean you did anything wrong. It doesn't mean your clinic screwed up or that anything was missed or that anything is extra broken or particularly wrong. Things can be as perfect as we can make them and we sometimes still will fail when it comes to pregnancy outcomes.

  And sure, we often get more super important info with each cycle and each passing month. But it's not like we were screwing around with our previous attempts. It's just that we have more data. And when we have more data we can use it. And the only possible way to get more data is through trial and observation. That's not a prior mistake. It's the reality of how tricky and personal trying to have a baby and dealing with a complicated human body and biology are.

  So I'm not saying just brush yourself off and do the exact same thing over and over again. It's important to be thoughtful here and of course I am a big, big fan of honing in and using good testing and technology and the best of both evidence-based Western and holistic treatments where they're appropriate. Definitely do these things.

  And in a quick side note, IVF labs and IUI monitoring are really crucial in both of these types of cycles. I cover this more in The Baby You Want program so make sure you choose the best clinic that you can and get the right care.

  But assuming that however you're trying, with sex, IUI, IVF, you're doing everything right, perfect cycles do sometimes still fail.

  And we will suffer less when we accept that it's not us it's math.

  Second, if it ain't broke ... hooray!

  Understanding fertility odds can totally keep you from making desperate and potentially misguided and harmful choices. Which is huge.

  Again, if we think that a negative test has to be a sign that something went wrong or was missed instead of just being statistically probable even when we do a good job, we get tempted to run towards unproven but oh-so-alluring fringy treatments with unfounded promises and no evidence to back them.

  At the same time, we have less time and energy to do legitimate self-care. And we also start to second guess perfectly good fertility care that's likely to work if we can just stay the course. Especially if we tweak what is evidence-based along the way and add things that make us feel more balanced and healthy as we go.

  These fringy choices are almost always the opposite of more balanced and more healthy. They're overwhelming, they're expensive, and I'm talking financially, physically, and emotionally, and at best they might give us a little bit of placebo effect, but at worse they set us back further and even make the next cycle less likely to work by sending us into even more threatened fight, flight, and freeze mode.

  Which certainly doesn't trump everything when it comes to getting pregnant, but it definitely does matter. Not to mention it sucks to hang out in month after month after month.

  So come back to understanding the odds. Stick with solid self-care that actually feels good. I'm talking about unsexy but powerful things like getting enough sleep or improving your sleep, setting good boundaries, eating moderately and joyfully, maintaining your mental health and relationships.

  And know that this is the best path forward on every single possible level.

  I can't tell you how many times I've seen a person get frustrated by a fertility doctor telling them to basically keep doing the same thing another time or two or six, depending on what they're doing. Who reluctantly accept that advice and then channel their desire to do something into solid self-care instead of those tempting but harmful fringy things. Who then get pregnant. Mostly through mathematical odds with some big picture improvement and self protection thrown in for good measure.

  Which brings me full circle back to some good fertility statistics.

  If you're trying with sex, did you know that nine out of 10 couples, that's 90%, will get pregnant having regular sex within 18 months?

  And that is a general population statistic which means that some of those people were bound to have PCOS and endometriosis and slightly less ideal sperm counts.

  With IUI, Attain also tells us that within three to six cycles there's an overall success rate of about 80%.

  And even with IVF, although I know that costs can be massively limiting here especially when it comes to doing transfers, sometimes you really just need to do it a few times.

  And for every story I could tell you about big picture balance and patience paying off, I could also tell you a story of someone who jumped ship and tried something extreme and fringy and really sexy, who then still didn't get pregnant. Often after spending a lot of money and getting more and more frazzled and getting their hopes up that they'd finally found the answer and convincing themselves that a baby was now practically a given.

  Which is extra heartbreaking.

  And of course I don't want to be overly simplistic and black and white here. I know someone's going to make a comment to share a story where the opposite of these things was also true and happened. And I have certainly seen these things too.

  My main point remains unchanged.

  More than anything here, this is about odds and statistics. And no matter how much you change or you don't change, outcomes often come down to that way more often than we want to admit. Accepting this reality, more than anything, gives us permission to put our energy where it really makes more of a positive difference and actually protects us, our quality of life, and does help our odds.

  Albeit in much more subtle ways.

  Which brings me to the one big idea I want you to take forward from this video. The idea is to embrace something called radical acceptance.

  And the way I like to teach radical acceptance is it's basically accepting life on life's terms. Or you don't have to like it, but accepting this is how it works will save you a whole lot of trouble.

  Let me give you some examples.

  If you do not radically accept the reality of infertility odds and you get another negative test, you're going to think it's your fault and that something is really wrong. You might then buy $300 of fertility supplements because someone told you they might fix the problem that you may or may not have, but they end up just giving you gut rot. You might add another holistic appointment that actually makes you feel worse.

  I call that faux holism.

  Maybe your holistic person even tells you really awful things like what one of my recent new patients was told by her prior acupuncturist after she had a failed IVF cycle. That "Maybe you aren't really ready for a baby and you need to believe harder."

  That's awful.

  Maybe that sends you spiraling into three days of tears and second guessing everything you did the month before like it did for her. Everything here moves you towards a disempowered, scarcity mindset.

  But with radical acceptance, with radical acceptance you start to see another negative month as the insanely hard, but realistic truth of the not-at-all effort-based or fair world of complicated biology and infertility. That clarity can lead you to compassionately assess whether there's changes to be made or not.

  To be patient and kind and gentle to yourself as you grieve how it is to land on the crappy side of these statistics. And also permission to channel all your very human and totally understandable desire to control something, into making those solid self care choices like resting and nourishing and breathing and so much more. You will have a strange sort of peace here that'll allow you to move into a more whole, balanced, abundance mindset.

  How you feel going into the next month in each of these headspaces is radically different.

  How ready your body feels to take that leap into pregnancy in each of these mindsets is radically different.

  And this isn't just about getting pregnant either.

  How ready you are to face the stress of that pregnancy, and the unknown of birth, and the intensity of being a parent, from each of these two different mindsets is radically different too. This reframe is the difference between abundance and feeling whole, and scarcity and feeling broken.

  You might even want to create your own little mantra around these ideas. You might do something like,

  "I release what I cannot control, and I feel the space it creates."

  Or, "I choose to put my energy where it protects me."

  If you get a negative test come back to these ideas and they will serve you.

  So here's what we just covered.

  We did a negative news reality check. It's not so much if but how many cycles in most cases.

  Two ways understanding fertility odds will protect you. You won't have to believe a negative test is a personal failure anymore and you'll make way better choices as you move forward with that knowledge.

  And we finished with one big holistic idea for moving forward after a failed month or cycle. Use radical acceptance, except life on life's terms, whether you like it or not, and then channel your energy into things that serve you and you will be better equipped for whatever comes next.

  I hope you will choose self-love.

  Choose self-care.

  Choose moderation, and big picture balance, and mind body care and protection here.

  You won't regret these things. They don't guarantee a baby because nothing can. But they will help your odds. Plus it just feels way better.

  If you like this approach and want to learn more I would love to invite you to check out and join The Baby You Want online program. It is all about cultivating more abundance and clarity and leaving behind the scarcity and overwhelm of the typical path of infertility.

  I am so honored to support you. I know this is a really vulnerable place in your life so thank you for hitting play on this video. I know this was not an easy one.

  Please subscribe and share this channel with your fertility friends. I just know these ideas are going to serve you, even if your next test is positive and I so, so hope that it is.

  Thanks again for inviting me in and I'll see you soon.