Venus Rising

Welcome back to this season’s final episode of Venus Rising. Today Kallie has a candid and informative talk with Brynne, one of the brave mothers featured in our newly released documentary “Trans Mission: What’s the Rush to Reassign Gender”.

At age 13, Brynne's daughter began suffering from "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria” (ROGD), a poorly understood phenomena currently affecting hundreds of thousands of girls worldwide. ROGD is characterized by a sudden and severe rejection of a person’s biological sex and corresponding body parts in favor of an identity aligning with the opposite sex.

Brynne realized early on that the “experts” proposed solutions to her daughter’s dysphoria all seemed to lead down a pathway of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones with potentially irreversible consequences, and she worried her daughter might later regret these changes. She was surprised to discover that any questioning of this medical pathway is routinely met with hostility and aggression, so she stands bravely in the gap for parents and their children, insisting on asking important questions that are often forbidden discourse.

Brynne advocates for radical self-acceptance of peoples’ whole healthy bodies, diverse personality expressions, and the elimination of harmful gender stereotypes. She works with nonprofits that seek to raise funds for public education in regards to the harms and abuse trans-identifying people and their families suffer in the medical and mental health community.

Watch Trans Mission: What's the Rush to Reassign Gender on YouTube: https://youtu.be/rUeqEoARKOA

Need to contact Brynne or join a Facebook support group? Email her at [email protected]

Today I have the pleasure of sitting down with four-time surrogate mother, Alyssia Wood. Having wonderful pregnancy experiences with each of her four children, Alyssia felt that surrogacy was an obvious way for her to help others start or build their own families. She is here today to talk about her different experiences as a surrogate mother, which included two miscarriages, two premature deliveries, hyperemesis gravidarum, sepsis, a near hysterectomy, and a host of unexpected challenges she now encourages prospective surrogates to thoroughly research before signing a surrogacy contract.

We are so grateful for Alyssia's willingness to candidly discuss her experiences with us so that other women can make informed choices about their reproductive options. Be sure to subscribe to Venus Rising so you can stay updated on Alyssia's story!

If you are an aspiring labor and delivery nurse or nurse midwife or have ever wanted to chat with a nurse that works at an IVF clinic then today’s show is just for you. I am especially excited about this episode because I get to sit down with nursing colleague, Kelly Wilson. I had the opportunity of meeting and working with Kelly when I was fresh out of nursing school, several years ago. Kelly has been a nurse since 2010 and joined the ranks of labor and delivery nurses in 2013. In 2019 she started working as a fertility nurse while she pursues her degree in nurse midwifery. Kelly has finished her clinical training and is excitedly graduating very soon! She lives in Ohio with her husband and two adorable sons.

Welcome back to Venus Rising! With me today is Dr. Susan Caldwell, a primary care physician specializing in women’s health practicing in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Today we tackle an emotionally sensitive topic, especially as we approach Mother's Day- infertility and IVF. Dr. Caldwell has three children of her own, all of whom were conceived through IVF. Today she explains why, in retrospect, she would not recommend IVF as a solution to infertility and why, in her expert opinion, naprotechnology is a much better pathway for couples struggling to conceive. Dr. Caldwell is able to navigate this difficult subject through a lens of both empathy and immense knowledge. Her insight is invaluable to the broader conversation.

Dr. Caldwell received her medical degree from Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center where she also completed her residency in Internal Medicine and Pediatrics. In 2016 she became a Certified Naprotechnology Medical Consultant. She enjoys writing and speaking about authentic femininity and reproductive health that upholds the dignity of all human life. She blogs about topics in women’s health at drsusancaldwell.com.

Welcome back to Venus Rising! One of the main commodities in the ever-growing infertility industry is human eggs. Young women all over the world are targeted by ads to "donate" their eggs. Who are these women and what are the risks to their health?

In this episode I have the opportunity to talk with Kylee Kwiatkowski about her harrowing story of egg "donation" and the aftermath that followed this life-altering decision. If you are considering "donating" your eggs or are dealing with health effects after egg "donation", this is an episode you won't want to miss!

You can read about Kylee's story online at: https://www.legalizesurrogacywhynot.com/kylee-kwiatkowski-s-story

Kylee was also featured in our award-winning documentary Eggsploitation. You can watch it on Amazon Prime here: https://amzn.to/2Q3NelW

In the early 2000s, Liz Scheier’s mom was facing eviction, so Liz, like many young women, turned to egg donation to raise funds to escape financial crisis. Over the next several years, Liz underwent a total of three rounds of egg retrieval.

In the years since, Liz has spent a significant amount of time analyzing the situation and asking important ethical questions related to it. She sits on the leadership team of We Are Egg Donors (WAED), a volunteer-run global support network for over 2,000 current and former egg donors across the world. WAED is regularly featured in media outlets including The New York Times, The Atlantic, NBC, WIRED, and others. As media liaison for WAED, Liz speaks frequently with journalists about the experiences of egg donors, the ethical issues involved in anonymous gamete donation, and the urgent need for a long-term longitudinal study of the effects of egg donation on women's health.

She is an author, editor, and product developer living in Washington, DC with her husband and two children, and we are honored to have her joining us on Venus Rising today.

Welcome back to an informative new episode of Venus Rising! This week Kallie sits down with Wendy Kramer, Co-Founder and Director of the Donor Sibling Registry (DSR), a network of over 72,000 members worldwide, united by their shared experience as individuals conceived as a result of egg, sperm, or embryo donation and their mutual desire to be connected with others who share their genetic ties.

Wendy launched the DSR in an effort to help bridge some of the ancestral gaps for her own son Ryan, who was conceived via sperm donation. A prolific speaker and writer, Wendy is a tireless advocate for the donor-conceived community and a strong proponent of regulations that prioritize the needs of the children born of third party reproductive arrangements.

We are so pleased to have her with us today.

You will not want to miss this week’s episode of Venus Rising, as Kallie sits down with award winning author and writer Pamela Mahoney Tsigdinos for a frank discussion on a painful topic: infertility.

Pamela’s book Silent Sorority, became the first account of reconciling infertility that was not written by a mother. With raw honesty Pamela drew from her experience to explore the stigma associated with fertility issues and the complex effects of living involuntarily childless.

Through her research and writing, Pamela was introduced to a vibrant community of IVF survivors. Her followup ebook, Finally Heard, gives voice to a large but seldom acknowledged population of women reconciling the trauma of failed fertility treatments. Her writing raises provocative, often uncomfortable questions usually reserved for late night reflection or anonymous blogging.

Pamela has authored many other publications and you can view hew work in a variety of media outlets including Marie Claire, Huffington Post, TIME, Redbook, and Fertility and Sterility. Pamela was the co-founder of ReproTechTruths.org, a grassroots initiative to provide a counter-programming platform for women to share the long-lasting impacts of failed IVF. She was named a Top 10 Health blogger by Time Inc.’s Health Magazine in July 2015. To date, Pamela continues to write and serve on several cross-discipline working groups monitoring assisted reproductive technologies. We are thrilled to have her joining us today on Venus Rising.