We love to help families grow.
Preconception is an important stage that can lay the groundwork for increased fertility, easier conception, and a healthier pregnancy. I offer skilled intrauterine inseminations (IUI) services. I specialize in fertility and insemination for LGBTQIA2S+ individuals and families. I also welcome single parents by choice. Cisgender and straight families that have been unable to become pregnant on their own usually have fertility needs are beyond my scope of practice. In this case, I recommend contacting a reproductive endocrinologist for help growing your family.
Fertility Appointment
At this intake appointment, we review your health history in depth, perform a head-to-toe physical, and run any lab tests that you need or want done. I will talk about how to chart your body’s fertility signs and signals. If you have been charting for a while we can review and fine-tune your charting methods. A good chunk of our time is spent discussing how you can live a more fertile lifestyle through diet, exercise, stress-relieving techniques, and other means. We'll talk about alternative and complimentary therapies that can increase your fertility such as acupuncture.
If you are planning an insemination, we discuss donor selection, review important legal aspects to consider, and chat about your plan going forward. And of course there will be plenty of time to answer your questions. The initial consultation entitles you to 3 months of ongoing email and phone support as needed. This can include things like a diet diary review, helping you decipher your fertility chart and your precise ovulation day, or consultations about referrals for alternative therapies or fertility medications.
Insemination
I offer IUI (intrauterine insemination) in my office. Many of my clients choose to use frozen sperm from a sperm bank, and some use a known donor which requires us to wash the semen prior to an IUI. Leading up to the insemination, you receive on-call phone and email support as needed. We schedule your insemination around your ovulation, appointments are often on weekends or in the evening and/or early mornings.
Most of my insemination clients are healthy folks without serious fertility issues looking for a low-intervention insemination. For many, the only reason they are choosing to do an insemination is because they lack easy access to sperm. I can help you determine whether you’re a good candidate for a low-intervention insemination.
Licensed midwives cannot prescribe fertility medications such as clomid or the trigger shot, nor can we perform an ultrasound to check for follicle development.
A fertility appointment is required prior to your first insemination. This ideally takes place at least 3 months before you plan to start inseminating. This gives us sufficient time to track your cycle and helps us know exactly when you are ovulating. It also gives time for dietary and other lifestyle changes to work. The more information we have, the higher your chance of success. I will consider agreeing to work with clients for an insemination with less than 3 months lead time only if they are already very experienced with charting their cycle.