Donor Conception and Shifting Perspectives with Becky Kearns

Fertility Life Raft

I had the pleasure of chatting to Becky Kearns in today's episode. Becky is a friend of mine who I met through the online community sharing our stories and how we found we didn't have the support we needed as we were going through our experiences. In this episode she shares her story and says she remembers how lost and alone she felt. By hearing these stories, by opening the dialogue, by smashing down these taboos it just makes it so much easier and so much better for all of us to understand much more about donor conception. I hope that you love this episode!

Becky is a mum to three girls all thanks to egg donation. After an early menopause diagnosis in her twenties she went on to have five unsuccessful cycles of IVF, including a miscarriage, with her own eggs. Making the decision to move to donor conception wasn't easy, but eventually Becky found hope in this path to parenthood as she began to redefine what it meant to her to be a mum. Becky and her husband were fortunate that with their first attempt using donated eggs they were successful and welcomed their eldest daughter Mila into the world in 2016, before having their twins in 2018.

Now finally a mum, Becky remembered just how alone and lost she felt on her fertility journey as well as how little donor conception was talked about and so she started her DefiningMum blog almost three years ago, sharing both her fertility struggles but also her reflections and parenting journey now. In 2020 she launched a virtual donor conception support platform - Paths to Parenthub, designed to offer information, support and much needed connection for anyone needing to use a donor to build their family.

In this episode, we speak about:

• The importance of self-advocation and finding a good GP who can empathize and help you through an initial diagnosis

• Defining hope and shifting your perspective to become hopeful for many different outcomes in your life

• Processing grief and the emotional challenges that come up along your journey of infertility

• Having self-compassion as we experience sadness and happiness coexisting with anything we go through in life

• The items in Becky’s Life Raft

• How important it is to have a space where you can share how you’re feeling and not worry about judgment or shame

• and more!

Powerful Quotes:

There’s so much work to be done around supporting people through that, and helping them to build their own family narratives and having that confidence to talk about their story without shame.

There are so many different pathways within donor conception. It all can feel quite lonely until you meet someone else who’s been on it.

It took me saying “I’m sure there’s something wrong.” I think it was just having to really find that within me to know that This is MY life and my body. They don’t really mind what happens to me and I do. It’s affecting my mental health. All I’m asking for are some tests.

Connect with Becky Kearns:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/definingmum and https://www.instagram.com/paths_to_parenthub

Website: www.definingmum.com and www.pathstoparenthub.com

Thank you for listening to the Fertility Life Raft! I would love for you to share this episode and let me know what you think! Join our Instagram community for more support: www.instagram.com/thisisalicerose . As always please take a moment to rate and review right now or half way through or at the end - it makes the world of difference!! Thank you so much to everyone who has already.

I’m running a free live event, Reclaiming You, on 21 April and 22 April for anyone trying to bring home a baby and finding themselves feeling lost; stuck in a ‘left behind’ mentality; exhausted and in comparison mode. Read more about it, to see if it’s suitable for you and join me by saving your space here.

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