Latest / The Home of Fertility with Liz Walton & Helen Zee / Season 2, Episode 1: Where Vulnerability Meets Vision – The New Era of Fertility Care

Transcript

Season 2, Episode 1: Where Vulnerability Meets Vision – The New Era of Fertility Care · The Home of Fertility with Liz Walton & Helen Zee

• 0:04
  Liz Walton: Welcome to the home of fertility, a space for real conversations and expert insights about fertility, healing and creating family.
• 0:14
  Liz Walton: I'm Liz Walton.
• 0:17
  Helen Zee: And I'm Helen Z.
• 0:18
  Helen Zee: We are two mums who've walked this path and are passionate about supporting you on your journey emotionally, physically and spiritually.
• 0:28
  Liz Walton: We talk about it all fertility treatments, holistic support, relationships, mindset and the emotional highs and lows.
• 0:38
  Helen Zee: Because sometimes the missing piece lies in someone else's story, in the quiet wisdom of the body or in a breakthrough that's finally made for you we are so glad you are here, let's dive in.
• 1:00
  Liz Walton: Welcome, welcome everybody that's here.
• 1:04
  Liz Walton: And so we're starting a new podcast and so much has evolved since season one and this is this is so exciting.
• 1:18
  Liz Walton: This is one of the most exciting things for us as we're coming together.
• 1:21
  Liz Walton: What began as really me a calling from Melbourne from last year of the Australian Fertility Summit, from people saying and a few clinics going I love what you're doing, would you come to Melbourne?
• 1:34
  Liz Walton: And me going oh, I don't know how I'd go to Melbourne.
• 1:37
  Liz Walton: I don't know about Melbourne.
• 1:39
  Liz Walton: I'd need to find somebody who lives in Melbourne and someone who's as passionate about the fertility space and, you know, wanting to, you know, do something bigger.
• 1:52
  Liz Walton: How could that happen?
• 1:56
  Liz Walton: And then a girlfriend of mine introduced me to this wonderful lady called Helen Z.
• 2:00
  Liz Walton: I think we talked for something like three hours nonstop and by the time we came out of this, really we both decided let's do something together and this was the beginning of the Melbourne Fertility Expo the conception, should I say, and that's where it grew and it's been an absolute honor.
• 2:23
  Liz Walton: So the vision has felt so aligned and it's not just bringing together fertility practitioners, medical practitioners and everyone you know in between that, but it's about bringing heart and passion into this conversation, and what I'm so excited is today is actually the first year anniversary.
• 2:41
  Liz Walton: A year ago today, I did the Australian Fertility Summit, and I'm just so grateful.
• 2:43
  Liz Walton: I did the Australian Fertility Summit and I'm just so grateful.
• 2:46
  Liz Walton: I'm so grateful for everybody that attended, for everybody that I the Canberra Expo, the Canberra Summit.
• 2:53
  Liz Walton: The Canberra Summit.
• 2:54
  Liz Walton: I was getting a bit too excited.
• 2:56
  Liz Walton: You're right, the Canberra Summit, so it's the first year anniversary.
• 2:59
  Liz Walton: So I'm just so grateful for that.
• 3:01
  Liz Walton: And so, helen, thank you so much.
• 3:02
  Liz Walton: Already, you've brought me back, helen, it's just been magic to meet you.
• 3:08
  Helen Zee: Oh, liz, sharing with our viewers and our listeners.
• 3:13
  Helen Zee: Thank you, thank you, thank you for being here.
• 3:16
  Helen Zee: It's an absolute gift.
• 3:18
  Helen Zee: What started off as that conversation, as Liz said, turned into a partnership, a friendship and a shared mission to build something that was bigger than both of us, and I always say that when something needs to be shared and sprouted, there's a lot of different energies that come together for this creation to take place.
• 3:42
  Helen Zee: No different to the fertility journey or all the heads and hearts that come together to create a brand new soul to enter the world.
• 3:53
  Helen Zee: And, my friend, what I'd like us to do in honoring Canberra anniversary last year, and also this beautiful season two, session one, where it's now the home of fertility, let's take a pause, have a drink, take a cup of tea.
• 4:15
  Helen Zee: I would like to light a candle in your honor, honor and in our unified vision of re-imaging fertility, family planning, health care for australians and beyond.
• 4:33
  Helen Zee: So this is for you, my friend, and this is for everybody joining us from today and this moment on happy birthday, the beginning of something beautiful with love.
• 4:46
  Liz Walton: Should we blow it out?
• 4:50
  Helen Zee: okay, liz, let's share with our listeners why we're here, what the mission is, what people can expect from us yes, absolutely so.
• 5:00
  Liz Walton: our mission our mission is you clear, full of passion is to deserves access to good quality, ethical care which allows the best choices for you, for everybody.
• 5:32
  Liz Walton: So it's, yeah, it's a real big passion.
• 5:35
  Liz Walton: That's why we're here.
• 5:36
  Helen Zee: Yeah, and I'd like to add that we are bridging worlds the medical and the holistic, the evidence, the embodiment, the science and the soul.
• 5:45
  Helen Zee: What we find through our shared practices is whole person-centered health, and also family health, is so important.
• 5:55
  Helen Zee: Let's just not look down the lens of when we think of fertility or raising a family, of when we think of fertility or raising a family predominantly, it is the female form that comes straight up, and we're spending so much energy and time about female reproductive health.
• 6:12
  Helen Zee: But what about family health, family-centric health?
• 6:16
  Helen Zee: What about underlying conditions?
• 6:18
  Helen Zee: Underlying conditions?
• 6:27
  Helen Zee: So we are going to be bringing forth the experts and the voices that are the knowledge and the hands of support for you to get access to, so we don't want people to feel like they have to choose one over the other.
• 6:35
  Helen Zee: You are a whole person having this experience and there is so much support around you.
• 6:40
  Helen Zee: Yes, so let's tell our listeners what to expect this season.
• 6:46
  Liz Walton: Absolutely so.
• 6:52
  Liz Walton: This season we're going to be opening the door to some great conversations, you know, conversations with IVF specialists, with naturopaths, all kinds of complementary therapists, somatic therapists, all different types of healing.
• 7:02
  Liz Walton: Complementary therapists, somatic therapists all different types of healing.
• 7:05
  Liz Walton: We're going to have people sharing their lived experiences and their path of what it was like to try and conceive, and this is all inclusive.
• 7:11
  Liz Walton: And we're going to speak to some of the most beautiful human beings as they walk this path because, as we know, it's a very bumpy ride.
• 7:19
  Liz Walton: It's not a very easy one.
• 7:21
  Liz Walton: We know it's a very bumpy ride.
• 7:25
  Liz Walton: It's not a very easy one.
• 7:25
  Liz Walton: Lots of bumps along the way.
• 7:26
  Liz Walton: So how can we traverse those bumps in the best way possible and do our best to keep ourselves sane in body and mind?
• 7:33
  Liz Walton: So, yeah, there's going to be some fun things we're going to be talking about.
• 7:36
  Helen Zee: Yeah, I'm actually so glad you mentioned the word fun, because I feel that that's something that we can introduce into our sessions as well.
• 7:46
  Helen Zee: I was actually having a conversation with someone yesterday and it's like this can be the tail end and the serious end of when delayed fertility takes place.
• 7:56
  Helen Zee: But there are also many people and many listeners that are here for Preconception Health, for that preparation of preparing the home of the body and the home of you know, the shell and the shelter of the home, for preconception.
• 8:17
  Helen Zee: So what does that include?
• 8:20
  Helen Zee: That also includes the medical side of fertility.
• 8:23
  Helen Zee: We will be talking about hormones, how the body works, reproductive health, as well as treatments, as well as diagnostics.
• 8:30
  Helen Zee: We will be talking about the emotional journey from resilience and what builds resilience, dynamics in relationships, grief and loss, as well as the healing path that opens you up to something so much bigger and greater than what you were before you started this journey.
• 8:51
  Helen Zee: And in that we do touch on the spiritual and intuitive aspects, because the miracle of life is that it is a miracle.
• 9:01
  Helen Zee: It is spiritual as much as it is physical, which is why we are bridging those worlds, and also in the mystery of what your body knows but hasn't said.
• 9:12
  Helen Zee: Yet, liz, would you like to add to?
• 9:16
  Liz Walton: that, sure, and you know, this is the voice of knowledge and the hands of support, and this is where it all comes together.
• 9:24
  Liz Walton: So, if you ever felt like something was missing from the fertility conversation, I want to let you know that this podcast, this podcast, is so for you.
• 9:35
  Liz Walton: Let's just dive deeper into the amazing conversations.
• 9:40
  Liz Walton: In terms of amazing, conversations, yes, those conversations.
• 9:45
  Helen Zee: Let's just very briefly touch on ourselves, liz, so our viewers and our listeners can get to know us a little bit better as well, because we are both mothers and, as you shared earlier on, the journey isn't always simple or what to expect.
• 10:02
  Helen Zee: And for others, yes, it is.
• 10:03
  Helen Zee: For me personally, the longing to be a mother wasn't just a desire, it was felt in all the trillion cells of my body and it was the soul calling that shaped my life from a really young age, and more so as a teenager.
• 10:19
  Helen Zee: So it was a really big surprise to me that I had this essence of what we call matri-sense, and matri-sense is matri being maternal sense.
• 10:31
  Helen Zee: So, just like we've got the six senses, you know the smell, taste, hearing, seeing, touching the intuitive space.
• 10:42
  Helen Zee: Mattress.
• 10:47
  Helen Zee: Sense is when you start viewing the world and the body from the essence of becoming a parent.
• 10:49
  Helen Zee: And for me, that hit me at a really young age of 16.
• 10:53
  Helen Zee: So I didn't know what was happening.
• 10:56
  Helen Zee: I didn't know where this insatiable desire was coming from, to the point where I felt like I was going to die if I did not become a mother in this lifetime.
• 11:07
  Helen Zee: Luckily for me, I did.
• 11:11
  Helen Zee: Years later I decided you know, you've got to wait.
• 11:15
  Helen Zee: You've got to wait.
• 11:16
  Helen Zee: I don't want to be a mum at 16.
• 11:18
  Helen Zee: But I do remember distinctly sitting, I thought where do I go with this feeling?
• 11:25
  Helen Zee: I'm trying to understand this feeling.
• 11:27
  Helen Zee: Where do I go with this feeling?
• 11:29
  Helen Zee: So I went my mum, of course.
• 11:32
  Helen Zee: So I remember telling my mum and really showing her this passion that existed in my whole body and trying to understand what was going on.
• 11:43
  Helen Zee: And saying mum, I really really want to become a mum, to the point that I feel like what is this feeling of like I'm going to die if I don't do this?
• 11:52
  Helen Zee: And, being in a Greek Orthodox background, her response was and doing a cross, the biggest cross I've ever seen her do, going oh my gosh, helen, you're having sex.
• 12:08
  Helen Zee: And I'm like no, mum, you're not getting it.
• 12:13
  Helen Zee: And then I had to try and find other ways of understanding what was going on for me.
• 12:20
  Helen Zee: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:22
  Helen Zee: So I understand that insatiable desire and also the resourcefulness and the resilience that opens up to be able to create these soulful spirit beings coming in through our bodies and in through our families, my friend.
• 12:43
  Liz Walton: Yeah, yeah, beautifully put, helen.
• 12:45
  Liz Walton: And look for me.
• 12:46
  Liz Walton: I had such a very different experience when I was young that really wasn't on my mind at all.
• 12:54
  Liz Walton: It's the unconscious learning that we're told you get married and then you get pregnant.
• 12:59
  Liz Walton: And so for me I'm like, well, that will happen for me.
• 13:01
  Liz Walton: It took me quite a while to find a man of substance and by that time I was already 35 when I got married and considered an older mum, bizarrely enough.
• 13:14
  Liz Walton: And so, you know, after getting married it was like, let's, you know, let's become parents.
• 13:20
  Liz Walton: So for me, married it was like let's, let's, you know, let's become parents.
• 13:25
  Liz Walton: So for me, that did not happen.
• 13:25
  Liz Walton: It did not happen at all.
• 13:26
  Liz Walton: And that's where I started my fertility journey of trying to understand, you know what's wrong, what was wrong with me and um, and having really, you know one of the deepest spiritual experiences from you know the very depths of despair to finding myself, and you know having to learn about who I am and what I am if I don't ever become a mother.
• 13:52
  Liz Walton: There were six IVFs, a rather gargantuan amount of money spent and really wanting to understand why, what.
• 14:04
  Liz Walton: You know what's going on for me.
• 14:06
  Liz Walton: So for me, I ended up having to give up.
• 14:10
  Liz Walton: My sister-in-law, around year eight or year nine, I can't remember now had a baby first time, ivf with a donor sperm, and although I was so happy for her, it really brought up a lot of deep pain for me and this really was my North Star going Liz, time to move on and let go, and so that's what I did.
• 14:31
  Liz Walton: I did a lot of work on myself I would say 18 months and just to really let go, and then, a couple of years later, I ended up falling pregnant.
• 14:42
  Liz Walton: Naturally, I thought it was because I was in menopause, because I felt rather dreadful and then realizing that, you know, I had actually fallen pregnant, but even then, still, it was not a simple path.
• 14:55
  Liz Walton: I was told that my child would not be viable.
• 14:58
  Liz Walton: And again, another deep journey of trying to understand what that is and also, in the end, having a wonderful, wonderful, beautiful birth and a very, very healthy baby at the age of 46.
• 15:10
  Liz Walton: All of this, those 10 years, has given me a blueprint which I now want to support other people on this journey so that they didn't have to have that 10 year journey.
• 15:21
  Liz Walton: So that's how I've turned it around and it's been such an honor.
• 15:26
  Liz Walton: And then that deeper calling of how else can I help people?
• 15:31
  Liz Walton: So it's always been that, you know, how can I find that voice?
• 15:35
  Liz Walton: And as a woman, as a practitioner and now as a mother, to support others, because it's in the vulnerability that we discover who we are, and it's in these experiences are what really make us and help us grow.
• 15:48
  Liz Walton: You know, sometimes some of our most painful times can be when we grow the most, you know.
• 15:52
  Liz Walton: And how can we be a light for others, walking this path and finding more understanding, knowledge and community path?
• 16:00
  Helen Zee: and finding more understanding, knowledge and community.
• 16:02
  Helen Zee: Yeah, yay, and all the stories in between.
• 16:07
  Helen Zee: You know the ways that we shape our family and when you were talking about naturally getting pregnant at 46, and you know the viability of a child, I am a mother to adult children, but I also became naturally pregnant at 45 and got to experience that, but for me, I got to experience that also as a loss and so opening up the bandwidth of the mattress sense journey and that of becoming a mother, which does come with also loss and grief.
• 16:43
  Helen Zee: My friend, I would love to talk about redefining family and the re-imaging of the diversification of the modern family in our lifetime.
• 16:57
  Helen Zee: Now, my friend, you and I both speak about the heteronormative relationship, but we want to say this very, very clearly to our listeners that family doesn't look one way anymore and whether you are a solo parent, a same-sex couple, heteronormative relationship, navigating donor conception, surrogacy or simply finding out what family means to you and your future, you are welcome here that this space is for everyone and that the whole family has evolved, and so should all the support that we receive along the way for people to experience whole person health.
• 17:43
  Liz Walton: Absolutely it is.
• 17:45
  Liz Walton: It's for everybody, because it is wonderful and beautiful how family has changed so much, and with that it means that it's about encompassing and supporting everybody.
• 17:57
  Helen Zee: Yeah, yeah.
• 17:58
  Helen Zee: So, my friends, we want to welcome you home and welcome you to the home of fertility.
• 18:04
  Helen Zee: This isn't just a podcast, it's a home from our home to your home, a place where the vulnerability meets the knowledge, where the hope meets the truth, and also where you don't have to walk this path alone Absolutely, you do not have to walk this path alone.
• 18:21
  Liz Walton: Absolutely, you do not have to walk this path alone.
• 18:23
  Liz Walton: We are here as well as it is growing this community, this is the home where voices can be like medicine.
• 18:32
  Liz Walton: This podcast be an elixir that touches the soul, the heart, and allows you to feel that sensation of understanding, of trust.
• 18:43
  Liz Walton: You know.
• 18:44
  Liz Walton: It's where you can feel moved to share your story because you know sometimes it might be your voice that might be the key that unlocks someone else's healing.
• 18:56
  Helen Zee: Mm beautiful, and with that my friends.
• 18:59
  Helen Zee: We look forward to sharing more in our next episode.
• 19:04
  Liz Walton: Absolutely.
• 19:05
  Liz Walton: Our doors are open.
• 19:06
  Liz Walton: You're right here.
• 19:07
  Liz Walton: We're going to be here regularly and we're going to bring you all of the stories, all of the insights, all of the wisdom and everything that makes our conversations so powerful.
• 19:19
  Liz Walton: Welcome to the home of fertility, welcome, no, you are welcome.
• 19:28
  Helen Zee: Thanks for joining us at the home of fertility.
• 19:30
  Helen Zee: We hope today's episode brought you clarity, comfort and connection.
• 19:37
  Liz Walton: If this podcast resonated, please share it, leave a review or subscribe.
• 19:42
  Liz Walton: This helps us support more people that are on this path.
• 19:47
  Helen Zee: And if you'd like to connect or share your story, find us on Instagram and Facebook.
• 19:53
  Helen Zee: At Australian Fertility Summit.
• 19:56
  Liz Walton: Remember the missing piece might be waiting in a story your body's wisdom or something new just made for you.
• 20:04
  Liz Walton: Take care and we'll see you next time.