There are SO many things to think about on the fertility journey! WHEW! It can be super overwhelming. And just when you get into one routine, something else seems to fall to the wayside.

It's tempting to beat yourself up and tend toward perfectionism on this journey but you are SO much more than your to-do list. ​​

In this video, I'll talk you through what I see is the most often overlooked step in fertility rejuvenation. Take a half hour for YOU today and join me.

Get my free meditation here: aimeeraupp.com/freemeditation

Disclaimer: Please keep in mind that I am not a medical doctor. I have been a practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine for over 17 years and I will be speaking from my clinical experience helping thousands of women conceive. The office of Aimee E. Raupp, M.S., L.Ac and Aimee Raupp Wellness & Fertility Centers and all personnel associated with the practice do not use social media to convey medical advice. This video will be posted to Aimee’s channels to educate and inspire others on the fertility journey.

See the full transcript below.

All right, I'm live, aren't I? Hi! Sorry, let me… I am not in my office, as you guys might be able to tell. I am actually at the Rejuvenating Fertility Center because I was here this morning to see a client. Sorry, let me just get me all set up here. So I'm in, if you guys know the clinic, Jessica, I'm in her office. She is the head nurse, she runs the show here. And yeah, I came in. So those of you that are brand new to me. Hi. Hi, hi, hi, how are you? I'm Aimee Raupp of aimeeraupp.com and I get to come to your live every single week. Usually at noon, I was about 15 minutes late to day and I apologize. I was doing some self care taking care of myself. Something very important to me, prioritizing me and not always putting everyone ahead of me.

And I knew I was running late but in my head, I said to myself, “What's more important right now, is taking care of something that was important to me or rushing to not be late?” And it's like this judgment battle. So we're going to get into this bit of this conversation today but what I wanted to first share was, today we're going to talk about what I think is one of the most overlooked steps in the fertility rejuvenation process. And I have been helping women conceive for almost two decades and I think I've learned a thing or two.

Diet of course is important, supplements of course are important, having the right doctors and the right support, so incredibly important, detoxing bath and beauty routines, ridiculously important. But what are you doing to take care of you? Are you, as I talk about in my book, Yes, You Can Get Pregnant, which is and has been for many years on the top 10 to top 20 bestselling books in all of fertility on Amazon and my more recent book, The Egg Quality Diet, which is, seems to just be hanging out in the top 10 on all of Amazon in bestsellers. So thank you to all of you who have supported me in purchasing those books and leaving reviews. It's incredible how many women we are reaching.

What would I talk about it, yes, you can get pregnant. Is this piece of, there's a lot to do. Fertility sucks, fertility challenges suck, fertility doesn't suck sorry, being challenged in the fertility department sucks. Not having a baby when you want to, absolutely sucks. Feeling like you're broken, feeling like a failure, worried about timing, constantly worrying about, am I doing enough? Am I doing it right? Is my partner doing enough? Is he or she's doing it right? Are we ready? Are we not ready? Why am I being punished? Is this bad karma? Is this something that I did bad in a past life or because I had a termination when I was younger? Like all the things, it's overwhelming. This process is overwhelming.

I have seen it as a clinician. I have gone through it myself. I understand how the mind can play tricks on us. And then how also doing all the things feels like a lot of fucking work. And it starts to become, you start to become resentful. I have to take all these supplements, I have to eat a certain way, to read Aimee's latest book, now tuning into these lives, I'm listening to all these podcasts. I'm reading all these books, I'm doing all these things. It's a full time job to optimize fertility. And I know because I put a lot of pressure on you guys. I give you lots of things to do in this process. And so it's, as I talk about in, Yes, You Can Get Pregnant. I'm going to move this camera because I just don't like it. As I talk about in, Yes, You Can Get Pregnant that I think, nope that's not, what is that? That I want us to adopt this piece to all of the things to the overwhelm.

Could we look at it as a self love health mission rather than all the things I need to do to get pregnant faster? Because what I see and I actually was just having a conversation with Jessica. We co-treat a lot of patients here, I'm at one Rejuvenating Fertility Center right now. And I treat a lot of their clients and they all signed a disclosure that we can discuss their case, which is great because it's, the more cooks in the kitchen, I think the better. And so we were discussing a case and Jessica who knows the case very well said to me, “I think it's, we just did another transfer. This woman makes healthy embryos and she didn't get pregnant.” And we were discussing, what do we think? What's, what's the next step? So the next step is we're going to try a fresh transfer.

She's going to retrieve some more embryos. She's been pregnant in the past. She has a healthy child. So we assumed, we know she can do this. And she's the, yeah, as all of you, she's gone down the anxious rabbit hole of, what are we missing? What am I doing wrong? Do you think it's autoimmune? Do you think it's this? Do you think I should do this? And we got to have a very candid conversation with Jessica about the case. And we think it's a couple things but mainly we think it's her stress levels. And that sounds so ridiculous. But it's not. It's like when you were in a chronic state of fight or flight, it is not a very fertile environment. And so what could we do? We have to work on easing her and how I see that working is yes, I still want her to following the diet.

Yes, I still want her doing the supplements. Yes, I still want her getting acupuncture and all the things she is doing but I also want her to slow down, to look at this as, from a global perspective that her self care now will manifest into better health for her and a better environment to receive this child. And it's what I see of somewhere in here it feels like we are doing so much for ourselves because yeah, we're not… We're avoiding certain foods and we're taking our supplements and we're getting our sleep and we're wearing our blue light glasses and we're using non-toxic bath and beauty products. So of course yeah, I to do so much for myself. I do so much self care. But is it self care or do you see it as a job, as something you have to do and you actually resent it?

And I think there's a really important distinction there. Are you doing these things from a place of I'm broken? And if I don't do them, I can't get pregnant. If I don't do them, I'm going to continue to be punished or when I eat less gluten, I feel less bloated, when I eat less soy, my eyes are less puffy. When I poop every day, I feel awesome. When I sleep eight to nine hours every day, I feel like a fucking rock star. When I take time for me to meditate and visualize every day, there is a smoother process to my day. I feel more at ease when I slow down enough to listen to myself, to own my presence, my choice here, when I do that, do I feel better? So, the title of this conversation is The Most Overlooked Fertility Rejuvenation Step.

And dare I say, I think it sums up to the words self care and self compassion, which really have to be embraced in the process. And I know it's, it feels, even for me saying it out loud, it feels some contradictory on some level because I do feel like, “Hey, I just wrote you this book, it's quality diet book and it's a hundred days and exactly what you should be eating.” Which I think is awesome. And I'm very proud of that book and the material in there. And I think it's super helpful to so many but I also realize it comes with this set of pressure. It's an elimination diet. It's pretty intense. And then on top of it, I layer in week nine on, I layer in all the other things I want you to be doing, like what to do for sperm health.

If you're in a heterosexual partnership, what to do for bath and beauty products, learning about epigenetics and how they impact egg quality, learning about sleep and movement and mindset and all of these other pieces that we layer on. Which I can see, it feels like a full-time job. So it's basically not stopping the things but almost shifting the approach. Does this stuff make me feel better or worse? Does caring for me feel good on some level? What are the changes I'm seeing in my life and in my body when I take these steps to care for myself? So rather than looking at it as feeling overwhelmed by all the things we have to do, maybe start to see, when you go non-toxic with your bath and beauty products, there's so many benefits to you, to your future children, to your future grandchildren, to the environment. You're supporting mall time small businesses who aren't selling out and using harsh coarse chemicals that are killing our environment.

Maybe we step back and see that when you make sustainable food choices, can you feel the same way when you buy from small farmers, when you buy grass fed beef or farm fresh eggs? Can you start to see these other components that the choices you're making and what they're having on this global scale? But then also almost from the macro level for yourself to see how are these choices impacting you? Not just to help you become more fertile. That does happen, that is a side effect but how are they impacting you? How's your skin look? How's your hair? How are your nails growing? When you do get your period? Is it less crappy, less cloggy? When you take time to meditate instead of forcing yourself to meditate because that's what everybody says to do or forcing yourself to visualize or to journal because that's what the fertility coaches out there are saying.

Could it be more about this is time for me? So today is a perfect example of I was late for you guys and I knew that. And instead of me being in the harsh critic on myself of, I made a commitment to be there at noon and it's 12:13 and I'm just going live. The old Aimee would have this conversation with herself. That was, “You're a loser, you're rude, you're making other people wait, how dare you put yourself first.” This Aimee however, I love myself and I get to come to you guys for free every single week and share valuable information with you and connect with you and build this community and it's okay if I'm running late because I took time for me to do something that was really important for me. For my process, for my journey. And I'm making that choice.

And listen, I also know we don't all have that luxury. This was a luxurious moment. If I have to pick up my child from school, I don't necessarily have those 13 minutes to be late. If I, and making plans or things to do at home, I to have a full-time job, I have three businesses that I run. I have a family that I'm very actively involved in and I do, do all the things I preach to you guys. And I still do find time for self care. A lot of times I'll sneak it, I might sneak a seven minute meditation instead of thinking, I have to do a 10 minute meditation this morning. I snuck in 20 minutes of exercise where normally I like 30 or 45 but I did a little bit so that I felt like I was doing something for Aimee.

I also planned ahead and brought myself food because I knew I'd be out of the house for several hours. And that stuff to me doesn't feel like work. It actually feels like an act of self care. And so for you, it's thinking those things through, instead of, “Ugh, Aimee says I have to have bone broth and I got to get 80 grams of protein in a day and Jesus goes like so much fucking work.” Could it be, I feel so good when I prepare my food ahead of time, I feel so good when I take time for me to support myself, I feel really good when I make these choices? And listen, even if it's five minutes of meditation, that's better than none. How about to tuning into the energy that we're bringing to our meetings, our food, our lunches, our breakfast, our dinners, our relationships, our interactions.

I think a huge piece of the self care base, if you will, is consciousness. If we can slow down and be conscious, why? What is the, why behind doing things? Your why might have started as, my friend followed this diet and she got pregnant, I'm going to do the exact same thing. And then now you're in two years later, you're still not fucking pregnant. This is annoying, now I know I hate everything. I'm mad and I just want to binge on a bagel and have three glasses of wine and screw everybody. So now you're basically in a space of resentment and then you're rebelling. You've lost your consciousness there. You're numbing now, you're choosing coping mechanisms to make you feel better because you're upset. So becoming conscious of that, why am I rebelling, why am I sabotaging?

Why am I being hard on myself, critical of myself? Why do I feel like I have to be perfect to get pregnant? When other women are not perfect and they get pregnant and perfect, I mean that loosely and whatever term you've decided your definition of perfect is and that's different for everybody. But what if we tuned back into the why behind this, the consciousness and it is, as I always say, fertility is an extension of health. Health is mental, it's emotional, it's physical, it's nutritional. The basis of health is self care, self nourishment, self compassion. What is your, why? What is your reason for being here? Why do you follow me? Why do you read my books? Why do you read my blog? Why do you consume my information, my content? Are you waiting for me to dispel the magic secret to pregnancy?

Or is it, you feel soothed and you feel understood, you feel heard, you feel supported? And then even more, why are you continuing with the diet and the supplements? What things have you seen shift? What about meditation? What about tuning in or doing inner child meditation? So listening to the conversation you have in the privacy of your own mind, that is self care. Listening to the conversation you have in the privacy of your own mind is self care. What is motivating you? What is driving you? What is your why? So for me, simple acts of self care or tuning in. When I feel frustrated, when I feel angry, when I feel upset, when I feel like I just want to go and get a gluten-free muffin and an iced coffee that's like my rebellion, if you will, some days. Why, what is my why behind that?

Is it because I feel sad? Is it because I feel left out? Is it because I feel overwhelmed? So what can I do to help myself feel better? So check in with myself, I have an embodied belief this conversation of like, “Aimee, where are you?” All right. Two years down the road and still not having everything in life that I want or something like that. I'm in this space where I'm being hard of myself. So what can I do to ease myself? And it's talking myself off the ledge as my teacher, Abraham would say, meeting myself, witnessing, okay, so in this moment you feel frustrated. Why do you feel frustrated? Why do you feel sad? Why do you feel overwhelmed? Why do you feel disconnected? Why do you feel left out? Why do you feel angry?

Why do you feel like you want to blame somebody? And bringing a conscious awareness to that will in and of itself dissipate. And that is the root, the basis of self care, self compassion, understanding that you are human, that you are not perfect, that you do not need to be perfect to get pregnant. It came up in my group before. One of the girls asked on, “My sleep's been off for the last three weeks. So should I stop trying this month because I've had poor sleep?” And I said, “No.” The same thing I always say, consistency and frequency, poor sleep for three years will definitely impact fertility. Poor sleep for three weeks. No, everybody is human. We go through human experiences. It's okay. You should still be able to try. But and what I said to her was, “But maybe you actually want an excuse to not try. Maybe you're tired of trying right now. Maybe you need a break.”

So what is the deeper understanding there? And until we slow down enough and that's where meditation and journaling, I think does offer us that slowed down that consciousness. But until we slow down enough, do we tune in to, what is my why? Why am I rebelling right now? Why do I doubt my body right now? Why am I having an issue? I just heard you're struggling to hear me. So I'm not on my computer. I'm at home. I screwed up. So if Facebook, if you can't hear me, we will upload this video like we always do on to YouTube or go over to Instagram and you can listen to it there. I'm sure the volume on Instagram is working out. So I apologize. I, yeah, I had a misstep this morning.

I forgot my laptop. And so I'm on a friend's computer at the office right now. And maybe her volume settings are off. Hold on it looks like the microphone is on. And the volume is all the way up. Let's just see, yeah, I'll turn it up more. I turned it up more so maybe you'll hear me better but we're almost at the end anyway. So, but it's this, what do I think is the most overlooked step is, I sum it up and I say, it's self care but what do I really mean by that? I mean, consciousness, are you? What is your why? Why are you doing the diet? Why are you doing the supplements? Why are you here? Why are you showing up? Why are you doing this? Why do you want this baby? Why do you want your fertility to shift? Why do you want better menstrual cycles, better skin, better hair, better nails?

What is your why? And maybe you don't fully buy that diet or supplements or bath and beauty products have anything to do with fertility. That's okay to, be honest with yourself. But what is your why? And are you using the diet and the supplements and maybe your inconsistencies with those as a reason to count yourself out or fail or set yourself up for failure? Is it actually a defense mechanism? Are you blaming other things? Are you, there's lots of reviews for the Egg Quality Diet, most of them are amazing, some of them are just nasty and it's like, this is ridiculous. This is too much. Maybe you're better than me but I can't follow this. But obviously I think those of you that know me or have been following me for a while.

I would love to say, “I have a heart of gold and I come from a very good place. And I just, what I figured out helps a lot of women is a diet like this.” But it might not work for you, are you at peace with that? Because when you blame other people or you attack other people, you're still not at peace. You're now you want to sabotage somebody else because you're pissed that they told you, this is something you need to do or should shift. And so getting conscious and aware of our why, then gets us rooted in, I'm doing this for me, I'm doing this from my heart. I'm meeting me with kindness and compassion on this difficult journey. This is not easy. It's not like there's a secret group somewhere that has all the answers and you've been left out.

Your body is having challenges and your job is to bring your body back to homeostasis so that it feels safe enough to get and stay pregnant. That's what this is about. So for a lot of women, homeostasis is dietary shifts. It is lifestyle shifts. It is meditation. It is sleeping more. That is what brings the body back to homeostasis. But a body can come back to homeostasis if you're constantly battling it, if you're constantly doubting it, if you're constantly berating it, if you're constantly second guessing it. If you're just not, you're at odds with yourself. So that's where the consciousness comes in. Why am I doing this? Am I following the diet? At the end of the day, I'm hating you all and I'm annoyed that she told me how to eat this way. And then I go and rebel or do I feel better? Am I learning more about my body? Am I looking at this as a discovery process rather than something that I have to do?

So with all that, something I have to do is leave and relieve my babysitter. So the way my day has gone is here. And so I'm going to leave you with that. And Instagram, I see there's lots of comments on here, my team and I will come through and answer those later but I want you to just start to come back home. How am I supporting me? How am I nourishing me? That is a huge piece of what do I believe in my heart of hearts that I need to do to succeed on this journey? Versus what everybody else has told you. What does my heart say when I clear away all the gunk? That is self care guys, that is compassion and that's what most women are missing on this journey. I'm going to leave you with that. I'm going to send you all lots of love.

Also want to remind you my team and I are on vacation until September 6th. We will be back online September 7th. All of us will be pretty much off of email. So just keep that in mind. Anything urgent comes up, Sam, my assistant will be checking emails every couple of days and consistently. So just, we're taking a break for our acts of self care and this, it was a big step for me last night, I had a question from one of my associates come in. She was like a rush job. She wanted me to go through somebody's notes and their Dutch analysis. And I was like, normally I would have compromised my downtime and he said, yes and instead I said, no.

September 6th is around the corner. I'm off. I'm not going to go sign on and look at her case right now. And I'm not going to review her Dutch. And I'm not going to listen to that 30 minute recording because I'm on vacation. I'm on vacation. I'm taking care of me. I'm taking care of my family. I'm putting myself first and I'm in touch with that and I don't feel guilty about it. That is key to the guilt. Guilt serves no one, guilt is a shitty, shitty, useless emotion. It serves no one. So tune in, how am I nourishing and supporting me? Okay. I love you guys. Have a great day. Ciao for now.

End transcript.

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