Little Known Approach to Infertility? Really?
When age-old wisdom becomes a pawn in a political chess-game
NBC News recently ran a piece describing “restorative reproductive medicine” as a little-known approach to infertility. Today’s New York Times reports on a supposedly ‘new’ natural path to conception.
As someone who’s spent nearly three decades supporting people on their family-birthing journeys I thought, Is this a joke? New? Little-known? To whom? Certainly not to the countless women and couples who, across generations, have turned to myriad natural remedies when their baby dreams were slow to materialize.
If by “little-known” we mean “rarely acknowledged by an industry expected to hit $85.53 billion by 2034, then yes — restorative methods are obscure. Not because they lack merit, but because they lack the marketing budgets, political clout, and profit margins of IVF. In my experience, what’s truly little-known is not the existence of gentler, less invasive paths to conception — but the fact that they often work a whole lot better than high tech tools.
Most troubling is the suggestion, voiced by some IVF specialists in the NBC piece, that offering restorative methods “denies” patients access to a “proven” option. IVF is indeed a remarkable technology that has brought joy to many families. I’m not here to vilify it. But it is not, despite decades of media framing, the gold standard for every infertility case.
Even after four decades of extraordinary advances, conceiving through in-vitro fertilization remains less certain than many believe. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2022 report), just over one in three IVF cycles ends in a live birth. The Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology (2021 national report) shows that for women under 35, the live-birth rate hovers around 54 percent per cycle, slipping to 26 percent by age 38–40, and falling to 13 percent for ages 41–42. Beyond 42, the chance is closer to a whisper — under five percent. Billions of dollars, years of research, and still — no guarantee, only possibility.
And yet, numbers are never the whole story. Success rates cannot capture the whole landscape. Some of the most striking turnarounds I’ve seen have come when IVF was paired with a broader vision of healing. In my practice, I’ve seen IVF finally work after years of disappointment, not because the protocol itself changed, but because people were inspired to consider a more expansive view of what ailed them. In that light “little-known” approaches didn’t compete with IVF — they enhanced its success.
The NBC article rightly notes that restorative reproductive medicine takes time. A whole person approach to healing is in fact a life-long journey. When it comes to a fertility challenge, restoring hormonal balance, addressing endometriosis or PCOS, supporting egg and sperm health — these are not quick fixes. They require patience, skill, and partnership between patient and practitioner.
And sometimes healing arrives like rain after a drought.
I've seen what happens when we create space—physical, emotional, spiritual—for conception. I’d witnessed women, who’d endured cycle after cycle of IVF, only to discover that healing an unspoken emotional wound led them to conceive naturally within weeks. I've witnessed bodies remembering how to ovulate as soon as fear and the nocebo effect of “advanced maternal age” loosened their grip.
I have also seen people choose IVF as the right next step — after giving their bodies the best possible foundation for conception.
The NBC article, as well as the NYT piece touch on the political tug-of-war surrounding IVF and restorative medicine. That’s a conversation worth having — but not if it turns the very personal act of conceiving a child into a pawn in someone else’s ideological chess game. Fertility care should not be defined by partisan allegiance, religious doctrine, or the profit goals of any industry.
Reproductive medicine that doesn’t reduce the patient to a number on a lab report, is not “little-known.” It is simply under-valued by a system that measures worth in quarterly earnings, not in healthy pregnancies, thriving parents, and empowered decision-making. Let’s stop pretending restorative reproductive medicine is unknown. It’s been here all along—overlooked not for lack of evidence, but because the billion-dollar alternative is louder.Patients deserve to know every viable option — without fear, without a political spin.