Hello, Hello, Hello my beautiful friends! I hope you’re all doing so, so well. 

This winter here in Texas has been so interesting. It’s been relatively warm for the most part. Often sitting around 60’ish degrees or around 15 Celsius (I do have a large international audience, LOL)

But it’s like winter keeps getting mad and storming off and then storms back in screaming “And another thing?”

Two days ago it was 80 degrees around 27 Celsius, and in about 18 hours or so, it dropped to 28 degrees which is -2 Celsius. 

I know I have a good sized following in what I would call the frozen food sections of the world, like Canada and such, and I have a few Canadian clients that have laughed at me but let’s be real here- that’s a HUGE swing with almost no time to acclimate yourself. 

Ok, I will get off that particular soapbox

Today we’re talking about, what I would say is the primary and underlying reason that we feel so terrible so much of the time. And this is not an overstatement. When you boil down ALLLLL of the work that I do, and pretty much every other coach or therapist or counselor in this world- it relates to self-worth. This idea of good enough. It’s like the root of all our stuff. 

Work pressure, body image, weight, relationships, and yes, 10000% infertility. 

So many of my clients have come to me with this idea that IVF kind of started their, what they often call or consider their downward spiral, and then the more that we dig in, the more that we find, that’s not actually true. There has always been this thread of not good enough-ness and what happened when they were confronted with infertility and on that journey? Well, it was like a giant-ass spotlight shone down on all of the things they already didn’t like about their lives. In essence their self-worth. 

So over the past few podcast we’ve laid some important groundwork, boundaries, understanding fear and safety, black and white thinking, a bunch of stuff but this is kind of the root of all of that- no don’t fret, it doesn’t mean that once we cover this topic we’re done. Nope, I’ve still got a lot of stuff to talk about. I just didn’t want to go any further without addressing this particular albatross around all of our necks. 

But the first thing I want to teach is how to feel that you’re good enough. So let me ask you this question, do you ever have the thought, I’m just not enough? I’m just not good enough in this way? If you say no then I want you to question if that’s really true because the truth is we all do at times. Some of us might experience that thought more frequently, some of you think that thought all the time in all different areas of your life. Some of you only think it occasionally about certain areas. But we all do think that and we all wonder that on some level. 

And I say this all the time so you might have heard me say it before but I just want to back up that claim with Brené Brown’s research on shame. Shame is a feeling that we feel when we think that we’re not enough, we’re not good enough. And according to her research, everyone feels shame at some point unless you have psychopathy or sociopathy. 

But every healthy human being does at some time, in some way, experience shame which is the feeling that comes from thinking that you’re just not good enough. 

So that is so important for you to know because a lot of you think the thought, I’m not good enough and feel the shame and then you think that something’s wrong. Well, first you think something’s wrong with you but then as you gain awareness that that’s just a thought, and hopefully you have some other more conscious higher level thoughts that counteract that where you know that actually we’re all good enough. We’re all valuable. So then when your subconscious thoughts come up and cause you to question it then you think that there’s something wrong with you thinking that. 

And that’s the first thing I want to offer to you is that there is nothing wrong with you thinking that. In fact it’s right that you would think that. It means you’re a mentally and emotionally, healthy stable adult. It means you have a human brain. Yay! Congratulations. You’re totally human. I find a lot of comfort that the people that I look up to, sometimes, question if they’re good enough. Oprah, Beyonce, Dolly Parton, Malayla, Brene Brown- Every single one of them. Now, they might question it to varying degrees, like it might not be something they questions all the time, but they do and have questioned their worth. 

Why do we all question our worth? Because its part of the tribe mentality that we and most importantly, our brains, have evolved understanding. We had to fit in to stay in the tribe, to fall in line. If we didn’t measure up then we could be cast out of the group. So there was this constant comparison that we would draw between ourselves and our peers or perceived superiors. And because our brains have always been kind of a-holes, it was never good enough. So you add that into our very capitalistic society (certainly within the US but we don’t have a monopoly on that) and this social/ cultural understanding that we are only as good as we produce, we can never produce enough. 

I’ve probably seen the movie Encanto like 100x by now. And one of the last times I was watching, when Maribel confronts her Abuela towards the end, saying “It will never be enough.” And I was kind of like, we all have this abuela in our brains telling us it’s never perfect enough, it’s never enough. This Abuela is like the cultural and social messaging that we have been subjected to for centuries and now, because of how ubiquitous social media is in our everyday lives, it’s like we get a constant bombardment of people only showing the shiny, happy, luxurious aspects of their lives- which feeds this false narrative and ambiguity around what is “good enough.”

So all that to say, this is a completely normal experience we all have. There’s nothing wrong with experiencing or questioning the good enough-ness. 

Our brains question whether or not we’re good enough, that’s just the way it goes, it’s totally normal, there’s nothing wrong. We don’t need to completely solve for it. Now, we are going to lighten it up a bit because I do think for some of you it’s driving you way more than it needs to. 

And I think you’re sort of believing it when your brain says, “Am I good enough? Maybe I’m not good enough.” And I don’t think that’s necessary either. I think that you can sort of counter it. And I want to talk to you about that next. So let’s just dive in a little bit to this thought, I’m not good enough. What does that even mean? What does it mean to be enough? What are we trying to be enough of? How do we know if we’re enough? What makes us enough? Is it if other people think that? How could that be because some people might think that you’re amazing? Other people might not care for you at all or think that you’re terrible. 

So how do we know if we’re enough? It’s not even a thing that is provable, or real, or concrete in any way that’s useful. It’s just a made up construct that there’s this thing as being enough or not enough. That’s not even a real thing. Isn’t that fascinating? Like it’s just a bunch of crap that is made up. It’s like that improv show “who’s line is it anyway? Where everything is made up and the points don’t matter.” Somewhere along the way, people just started deciding these arbitrary things mattered to them, and then we compared ourselves to that and it just spiraled. 

And the other thing is yes, you are enough, and also no, you’re not and you’re not supposed to be. You’re not supposed to be any better than you are. Did you know that? You’re not supposed to be further along. You’re not supposed to be more capable than you are. You are perfect, and whole, and complete exactly as you are. That knowledge doesn’t stop of from achieving. It doesn’t stop us from setting or achieving goals- it just helps to take the drama and the suffering WHILE you’re in pursuit of those goals. 

What is also true is that there are things we are not as good at, as other people. And that’s not a problem, until we decide it’s a problem. Now, I think I am very bright and articulate- and you. Know what? There are women that are more bright and more articulate than me. I just hope their wielding their power for good and not evil. I have pretty touchy asthma, there are people out there whos lungs don’t decide at a moments notice to stop working properly, or to be super touchy. I have one ovary bc my left one kept growing giant-ass cysts and had to be surgically removed. Like these are all truths for me. And there are so many other people who have both of their ovaries without those types of issues. But they also have a different struggle. 

I feel like it was Brene Brown that says, no one rides for free. We all have our shit. 

Ok, so I gave you all that background because this is where is really comes out and what I really wanted to address for us IVF’ers.

This idea of good-enough is so pervasive in the infertility community because we literally make whether we can get pregnant or not, stay pregnant or not, mean something about our inherent worth. That if we were, in fact, good enough, then this would not be happening. 

It’s as if, infertility or miscarriage confirms every terrible thing we’ve believed about ourselves but never really admitted. 

Or even, that there’s like this good enough tax that you haven’t paid yet. Like you have the house, the relationships, the financial security, and now it’s time for the baby but that’s not happening so where did I go wrong. What did I do that was wrong. What didn’t I do- what wasn’t good enough. 

And then when you get started on this journey, well then its like a rolodex of things you have to do, should do, need to do in order to do it right. To be good enough. To try hard enough. We kill ourselves over books, essential oils, supplements, acupuncture, diets, throwing away all of our plastic containers, going scentless, even shoving a jade egg up your unmentionables – and yet, if our efforts do not match the outcome well, then there was something, anything that we did not do enough of or correctly and therefore we are not good enough. 

I want to share with you all what my amazing RE told me like 55 years ago when I was freaked out about my transfer, “It will take either something incredibly intentional or something incredibly neglectful for you to have THAT much of an influence over this process. 

Now, I am not poo-poo’ing the idea of supplements, or any of the stuff that I just mentioned. Not at all. But it’s a question of doing those things and then using them against yourself. Using them as a sort of backwards confirmation that you aren’t good enough. Like see, I did all this stuff and it still didn’t work so it clearly means I am not good enough. 

That’s what I take issue with. Ya know, IVF is such a weird thing bc the effort we put into the process does not equal the outcome. And that is such a mind meldy screw-job. 

So, how do we break this cycle?

Well #1 we have to acknowledge that doing all of these things and beleiveing it’s not good enough or your’e not good enough- is optional. It’s optional. You know how I know it’s not an inevitability that if we do all of those things, we don’t get what we hope for, and therefore we make that mean we are not good enough? Because I know SOOOOOO many women that have other thoughts. So it it’s not a universal truth like 2+2=4, then it’s optional. Then it’s a thought. I realize to you it might not feel optional. But that’s ok. That’s where most, well all of us start with thought work. But ask yourself, “could it be optional? Like take yourself out of the equation and make the central character your closest. Dearest, most beloved friend. What would you say to them? They did all the same things you did and still got the same outcome? How would you treat them? If the way you treat yourself differs from the way you would treat them- then that shit is optional. 

So, if you can buy into the premise that it is, in fact, optional. Then how can we approach it? 

Well, it’s a question of reframing. Cognitive reframing is a psychological technique that consists of identifying and then changing the way situations, experiences, events, ideas, and/or emotions are viewed. 

And it ties in a lot with acceptance. 

So let’s say that you took all the supplements that you were suggested, offered, or reasearched. You crammed two fistful of pills per day down your throat, you ate so clean, you did acupuncture, you took all the meds the dr prescribed in the correct method and dosage, you attended all of your appointments, and you, generally, took care of yourself. 

Then I say, the reframe is, I did everything that was asked of me (and more), man, I REALLY showed up for myself and our family. I controlled all of my controllables. I didn’t have any say in how my body reacted to the meds, how my follicles developed, how the sperm and egg interacted, not how the uterus and the embryo interacted. What I could control, I did, and I showed the hell up. 

THAT’s the reframe. 

And again, this is not in service of like silver linings or some positivity BS. This will not take away the grief of a failed cycle or a failed transfer. That is going to hurt. BUT what it can do, when you practice it (and by practice I mean repeat it to yourself until it becomes beleiveable) it will lessen YOUR suffering. You know that added layer of dirty pain that we lay on top of ourselves when we’re already hurting. That place of self-loathing and judgment- that place. We lessen that. We show love and compassion to ourselves. We acknowledge that there were things that we did- good things, amazing things. And that there is no right/ wrong. There was no intention or neglect that interfered with this working. I showed up. And this is the shit of fertility treatments. Often, they do not go the way that we hope. Conversely, they often DO go the way that we hope. But then we don’t really question our good enough-ness there- or at least not in the same way. Because then it just morphs into something else. 

But when you practice acknowledging and recognizing where, and how you show up. That’s a skill you can continue to use, for, well for the rest of your life.

And that is what I want for all of you. You are all working so damn hard on this dream. Blood, sweat, tears, money, all of it. Do not discount all that you have done, all that you have become, because it doesn’t match some perfectly curated Instagram grid. 

You are doing enough. Because YOU are the one that decides what “enough” is. 

You are enough. Always. It is your God-given, divine right. It is inherent in your birth. 

You are enough. Even when you don’t believe it. You are. I will hold that belief for each and every one of you, until you believe it yourself. 

Ok, that’s is what I have for you my beautiful friends. Have a beautiful week, and I will tlak to you soon.