Oriana’s fertility journey has been a long road filled with a lot of grief. On this episode of the podcast, she shares how she had to terminate her second pregnancy at 5 months for medical reasons. The loss of her son Felix set into motion a huge transformational process. By focussing on the narratives she was telling herself, she came to understand how a shift of perspective can create more lightness of being. This is not a story about toxic positivity. This is a story of embracing your pain to thereby heal the deeper wounds in your life that are activated by grief and loss. We also talk about male-factor infertility and the impact this has had on her partner and her relationship.

Top quotes:

Oriana van der Sande: “The realization that there was something in me, maybe call it intuition, maybe call it something else, that was giving me information, that helped me afterwards to get more in balance with my mind and my soul and my heart.”

Oriana van der Sande: “You cannot let go of a lot of things that happen to you. They are part of your identity, they’re part of your journey. Letting go sounds like dismissing them, or trying to erase them. I prefer to talk about embracing a new identity, or to put more emphasis on a part of your identity that was already there but that now gets more attention.”

Oriana van der Sande: “Every journey is different and every journey is personal. Every loss touches upon other painful things in your life. So be aware that it’s not just about the loss, about the fertility issues. It will be about more things that are there in your past, in your life, in your DNA. The loss will impact you in more ways than you can possibly imagine. So be aware of that and be open to healing your deeper wounds through this journey.”

About Oriana van der Sande

Oriana van der Sande is a life coach who specializes in transformative coaching, training and storytelling. You can find her on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/oriana.vd.sande/ or on her website: https://orianavandersande.nl/

On this episode of the podcast I talk to Sophie Jane Hardy, host of Red School’s Menstruality podcast, about how you can use menstrual cycle awareness to deal with the challenges of (in)fertility and pregnancy loss. We discuss how you can work with the inner seasons to deal with the pressure of baby-making sex, the two-week-wait, and the grief that often comes with menstruation. Sophie shares about her own fertility journey and how it has helped her embrace the irreconcilable nature of life. She offers some practical advice on how you can use menstrual cycle awareness to become more resilient.

Top quotes:

Sophie Jane Hardy: “the more that I listened to my premenstrual rage, the more I saw that there was wisdom in that second half of the cycle for me. It was trying to let me make certain changes that I needed to make.”

Sophie Jane Hardy: “I know from this ‘month after month after month of trying to reconcile the irreconcilable’ that life is messy and what we need to do, what I need to is to cultivate resilience to be able to be with the messiness rather than try to make it ok.”

Sophie Jane Hardy: “Practicing menstrual cycle awareness helped me to honor and dignify whatever I’m experiencing. Which helps me to have a greater container for whatever initiation I am inside of. And it did really contain me in infertility. It made sense a bit. It didn’t make it ok, but it made sense of why I was feeling so rough all the time. Because I was going through death and rebirth every month.”

Download Red School’s free menstrual chart here: https://www.redschool.net/chart

About Sophie Jane Hardy:

Sophie lives by the Rivelin River in Sheffield, UK with her husband Ade, her two-year old Arty and her labrador Frodo. She brings a decade of communications experience in the fields of women’s leadership, environmental activism and independent film to her current role as communications director at Red School. She draws on twelve years of menstrual cycle awareness and the initiations of infertility, IVF and motherhood to give voice to the emerging Menstruality movement through Red School's podcast (https://www.redschool.net/podcast), and her greatest passion is supporting teachers, healers and creatives to set-up, run and grow cycle-aware, 'cyclical businesses'.

When Kohenet Nancy Wolfson-Moche started trying to get pregnant at age 43, she turned to the magical power of food to conceive. On this episode of the podcast, she shares with us about the energetics of food and the importance of being really mindful of how you eat. We discuss how to cook with intention, how to set up your kitchen as a sacred space and the role that food can play in processing grief and loss.

You can use the coupon code ‘MOTHER’ to get a 25% discount on her book ‘Vegetables for Breakfast’ when you order through her website: www.youarebecauseyoueat.com

Top quotes:

Kohenet Nancy Wolfson-Moche: “Everything we eat is prepared by someone - be it nature or a cook. And part of what we receive when we eat food is that energy. So part of my work is teaching how to cook everything with a certain intention.”

Kohenet Nancy Wolfson-Moche: “Conception is the ultimate form of communication so eating with your partner is one of the most important things. Eating the same food is a form of communicating and nourishing yourselves together is a very important practice.”

Françoise Molenaar: “In this world where we’re always on the move it is difficult to create that space for intentional cooking and eating. But it’s also a place where you can start to bring some magic back into your life.”

Book recommendations:

‘The particular sadness of lemon cake’ by Aimee Bender

‘Like water for chocolate’ by Laura Esquivel (not Gabriel Garcia Marquez!)

About Kohenet Nancy Wolfson-Moche:

Kohenet Nancy Wolfson-Moche is a nutrition educator, counselor, certified Torah yoga teacher, chef, and cookbook author who crafts recipes and curricula, blogs, and teaches sacred culinary arts to students of all ages. Nancy is an ordained Hebrew Priestess, presenting eating as a sacred Jewish practice, creating symbolic meals and menus infused with meaning and ritual. Her book, Vegetables for Breakfast from A to Z, invites the reader to re-imagine breakfast, lunch, and dinner by enhancing more plant-based meals with locally grown produce.

Pregnancy loss is a life-changing event that - next to pain and grief - can bring you deep healing as well. On this episode of the podcast, I talk with Rahel Koot about how her pregnancy losses taught her how to connect to her body and invest in healing and self-care. Rahel gives some very tangible examples of what these practices, such as having a womb healing ceremony, looked like for her. We also discuss some of the biggest misconceptions about pregnancy loss and the importance of having a community around you to support you. That’s why Rahel started Soulcafe: an online community for women who’re healing from pregnancy loss.

As a special Mothers’ Day gift to the listeners, you can subscribe to the community for free on May 14th 2023. Find out more @rahel_soulcafe

Top quotes:

Rahel Koot: “It gave me something back. That little baby wanted to give me the chance to develop more consciousness about having a baby, about motherhood and about being pregnant.”

Rahel Koot: “I was always a ‘head’ person and I didn’t have that connection with my body. The miscarriage gave me the gift that I could open to my body.”

Françoise Molenaar: “Every loss is a loss.”

Rahel Koot: “By connecting to my body, my thoughts couldn’t dominate my being. Because I could observe my thoughts, I could make the choice to not feel the stories. What I felt instead was the connection with my body, which was a nice place to be. And this gave me the belief that my body would give me the things that I needed.”

About Rahel Koot:

When she experienced her first miscarriage, Rahel Koot discovered that the only way to heal from this loss was to connect to her body. She also realized how much she missed having a community of women around her who could support her in this process. She therefore started Soulcafe, a podcast series and online community that focuses on pregnancy loss. You can find out more at https://soulcafe.nl/ or follow her on Instagram @rahel_soulcafe

The podcast is back from maternity leave! In this episode, I share how I questioned whether I should continue making this podcast now that I have three small kids at home. Yet while meditating on this question, I saw a small spark of light that made me realize that I’m still driven to show you how you can find light on your fertility journey. I feel that many of the challenges we face on this journey are part of a larger, global process where people are finding their way back home to their bodies and to spirit. I discuss how, for me, (in)fertility helped kickstart a transformational process where I became so much better at embracing my emotions (even the darkest ones) and connecting to a deep source of wisdom within. You can reach me at francoise[at]thatfertilefeeling.com if you have any questions or suggestions!

Before going on maternity leave, I wanted to record one final episode where I recap my key take-aways from Season 1. On this episode of the podcast, I discuss why certain personality types can have a particularly hard time surrendering to their fertility journey and why that shouldn’t stop you from trying to do so nevertheless. I also recap some ways in which you can develop this attitude, which focuses on shifting from doing to being. Key elements consist of getting a better sense of what is right for you, right now, working with mindfulness and embodiment techniques to getter a better handle on your inner emotional landscape, and learning to live more in sync with your inner cycles of activation and relaxation. While I’m on leave, I would love it if you send me a message with your feedback on the show, things you’d like me to talk about next year, your own fertility journey, etc. You can reach met at francoise[at]thatfertilefeeling.com

Years ago, I discovered that sometimes the planets just align in a way that really messes up your life. I’ve been a big fan of astrology ever since. It allows me to identify the bigger energies that are present in my life and helps me accept that sometimes life is just chaotic because of forces outside of me. So when my friend told me her partner is a good astrologer and that he might have some really interesting pointers on what your birth map can tell you about your journey towards motherhood, I was game!

On this episode of the podcast, we discuss the methodology behind astrology, what your unique birth map can tell you about the planetary influences on your journey towards motherhood, but - most importantly - how astrology can give you pointers on how to overcome some of the challenges and transformations you might be facing along the way. I asked Juan to look at my own map going back to the point when I first started trying to conceive and I was blown away by the big life lessons that he identified for me in hindsight.

Top quotes:

Juan Belmar: “The irony is that you decide to try to get pregnant but then it’s also something connected to so much. The souls coming, your body being ready, your being ready to let go. A lot of couples do it from a sense of will, but it’s also something we do in connection with the cosmos. It’s not something that only you do.”

Françoise Molenaar: “There’s not one 1-size-fits-all solution to let go of control and relax more. What works for you is really based on your own unique constellation.”

Juan Belmar: “There are really no failed attempts because each attempt teaches you something. Maybe if you have a miscarriage, maybe if the process didn’t work, it’s not about failing – it’s about how the energies are moving through you to bring you more wisdom, maturity, and light. If you can face it, then you can grow so much from it, accepting and learning and then being more ready for motherhood.”

About Juan Belmar:

Juan Belmar (Akash Astrology) is an astrologer who currently resides in the Netherlands. You can book an online reading with you through his whatsapp number: +31 6 86 41 73 12

Embodiment mentor Amanda Biccum is someone who I’ve been following on Instagram for a while now. I love how connected she is to her body, her emotions and her sensuality. When I reached out to her to see if she’d want to come on the show to share her wisdom with women who’re dealing with (in)fertility, I found out she’d just suffered a pregnancy loss of her own. On this episode of the podcast, we discuss how to embrace the body when it feels like it’s failing you throughout your fertility journey, how to work with the body to process grief, anger, sadness or loss, and how to rekindle the intimate relationship between you and your partner.

Top quotes:

“Sometimes there’s so much noise and we’ve been so disconnected from our bodies and our wombs and our yonis for so long that it takes time to reconnect to that channel for us. But the more that you listen and the more that you tune in and the more that you give yourself space to feel what is actually wanting to come through, the louder the voice is going to be.”

“The way I like to view the human experience is that we are here to experience the full range of emotions. And though there are some that we would rather not experience, like grief or sadness or pain or loss or anger, when we avoid it, when we avoid feeling it, it’s just going to come back stronger, as a harder slap of spirit.”

“Embodiment is deeper listening. Your body is your best friend. It’s time we start treating her like that and really developing a beautiful relationship with her. And so many of us don’t or haven’t or don’t know where to begin.”

Book recommendation: “Awakening Shakti: The Transformative Power of the Goddesses of Yoga” by Sally Kempton

About Amanda Biccum:

Amanda is a pleasure coach for the feminine embodied leader. She’s here to help you cultivate a juicy, orgasmic connection to your body so that you can have deeply fulfilling relationships and live your most abundant, pleasurable, magnetic AF life in every way imagined. You can find her on Instagram @theamandabiccum or on her website https://www.amandabiccum.com

A couple of days ago, I found myself spiraling. I’d had an appointment at the hospital that brought up so many old triggers and unprocessed emotions. I really had to take a moment and tease out all that was happening inside of me. There was intense grief as the ultrasound scan had made me relive the moment we found out that our first baby had died. There was also a lot of fear - fear for this pregnancy and whether the babies were doing ok. Fear that they might end up in the NICU and/or that I would have to stay in the hospital for weeks on end.

It took me a couple of days to work through all of that and I decided to record my journey along the way for you to hear how I got myself out of that spiral again. I share some of my techniques for dealing with grief, fear, the self-care practices that I used to ground myself and feel supported, and how I eventually managed to get back to a space of love, connection, surrender and acceptance. I’m happy to share that we’ve since had another scan and the babies are doing perfectly fine. But more importantly, I know feel confident again that me and my husband will be able to deal with any challenges that may come our way.

On this week’s episode of the podcast, I talk to Marjon van Opijnen about her experience with unwanted childlessness. Although Marjon always pictured herself ending up with a large family, life took her in a different direction. We discuss how unwanted childlessness has affected her life and the key truths about life that she has come to learn along the way. We also touch upon the importance of working with the body as a tool to deal with the trauma of (in)fertility and the grief of unwanted childlessness.

Top quotes:

“Unwanted childlessness is a scar that is part of my life. And every phase in life has its own grief around not having children. But I do notice that the grief around it becomes milder and easier to face.”

“One of the questions that came up to me throughout this whole process is ‘what is motherhood’ and ‘what is motherhood if I can’t live that through raising children’, and ‘what is it that wants to get birthed through me.’”

“Life unfolds itself. Life is an iceberg and there is so much under the surface that we don’t see. That part underneath the surface unfolds itself and directs life somewhere. There’s that top of the iceberg that you can see. But I’d say to my younger self that there is that part underneath that you can’t really change or that that is just where life takes you. And to have more faith in that.”

About Marjon van Opijnen:

Marjon van Opijnen is a somatic trauma therapist, breath therapist, embodiment trainer and freelance lecturer at universities in the area of (embodied) leadership and integral sustainability. She works with professionals, pioneers and students to live a more embodied, resilient and balanced life. You can find out more about her work on www.embodimentlab.nl (in Dutch), on her podcast The Embodiment Talks (English) or The Embodiment Talks (Nederlands) or her YouTube channel Embodiment LAB.