Top 6 Ways to Manage IVF Stress | Your IVF Journey | Future Family
IVF while exciting can feel stressful when you are going through it. The medications, the exact timing, all the doctor’s appointments, and all of the emotions can make it feel overwhelming. While we can't take away all of the pressure, and stress of IVF, we want to offer you some tips that can lighten the load of IVF stress and get you set up for a better journey from the start.
1) Start preparing your lifestyle
During your IVF journey, there will be some things you cannot control, which might feel frustrating. There are however many things you can control, and getting your lifestyle set up for IVF is a great way to help you feel empowered before you even start.
Things like healthy food choices, cutting out all alcohol and tobacco consumption, and staying active, are just a few of the steps you help make your IVF journey healthy and lower IVF stress.
2) Come up with some stress management tools
It will be really helpful to come up with some go-to methods to help manage your stress before you start your process. These can be as simple as going for walks, playing video games or watching mindless TV. This also might be a good time to take up a meditation practice, and we’ve got a lot of anecdotal evidence that acupuncture actually helps people going through IVF relax quite a bit on their IVF journey.
3) Build your support team
Teamwork makes the dream work. There will be peaks and valleys along your IVF journey and like any journey, it helps to have a group of people you can turn to to help you get through the next stretch. It’s important to consider who you want in this group because it might be a different group of people than you’ve turned to in the past. For example, you may not feel comfortable sharing this experience with your parents or usual group of friends, because of the personal and unpredictable nature of the process. Instead, you may want to seek out other people you know who have gone through IVF as they will likely be more familiar with what you’re experiencing.
One plus of working with Future Family is that we’re in your corner. Every plan comes with support from our Fertility Coaches, who are all registered nurses with years of healthcare experience helping thousands of people go through IVF and deal with IVF stress. They’re here to answer your questions during treatment so we’re with you every step of the way.
4) Think of strategies to stay on top of your meds
This is one thing that you can control and will dramatically improve your chances at a successful IVF cycle. That said, we know that staying on top of your medications - taking the correct doses at the right time, consistently - can be a lot to manage. So before you start your IVF journey, think about some tricks you know work for you. Try setting alerts on your phone and creating some calendar reminders (and enable push notifications). You can also place a post-it on your phone before you go to bed so that you see it first thing in the morning. The idea is to find some things that work for you before you start so you’re already ahead of the game.
If keeping track is too much for you to manage alone ask your partner to set reminders to remind you. This may seem like overkill, but it’s one of the few things that is 100% in your power to control and can really improve your chances of a successful IVF cycle.
5) Make a financial plan
Ok, so this is probably the least exciting but most stressful part of the IVF experience - financial planning. It’s easy to let the worry of how you are going to pay for your IVF overshadow your journey. This is why it’s great to start thinking about financing before you start.
Future Family has low-interest fertility loans that make paying for your fertility treatments much easier. Not only do we help spread out the cost of your treatment to make IVF more accessible, we also consolidate all of your bills into one simple payment so you have less to keep track of during an already intense period.
6) Now just trust your team (and yourself)
You did all that hard work of researching the best doctors and clinic for you, now trust that you did a good job and let the team take the lead. It is SO tempting to turn to Dr. Google whenever something happens or feels different. It’s so tempting to look for new homeopathic solutions or home remedies that will improve your chances of a successful IVF cycle, but the internet can be a scary place when you’re searching for medical advice.
It’s best to trust your doctors and Fertility Coach to do their job, so that you can do yours - taking good care of yourself, keeping up on your medications and looking after your mental health. In essence, you want to give yourself the space and tools you can to experience this moment.
Of course, if some alternative medicines give you peace of mind, by all means, treat yourself. Just know that your doctors and Fertility Coaches are doing everything in their power to make sure you get your desired result, so you don’t have to go out and find the magic fertility solution on some stranger’s blog.
The Takeaway:
We want you to feel empowered on your IVF journey so you can enjoy the excitement with less stress. With a little prep work, you’ll be able to let go of some of the IVF stress, and focus on what matters.