EBSA-2026-0232-0001, Reply Fertility

I am a multi-certified fertility awareness-based educator, and I want more people to be knowledgeable about their reproductive cycle, especially to be able to identify the days when they are most fertile during their cycle. I pursued a career path in reproductive health as I am a pro-choice feminist who believes you cannot make an informed choice that is aligned with your belief system if you are not empowered through education. I attended a 2-year master’s level certification program with Justisse College International, focusing on Holistic Reproductive Health. Justisse College is a secular, non-religious certification program that embodies pro-choice and embraces diversity. For the past 10 years I have been educating people about their reproductive cycles in a clinical setting at Reply Fertility - a Restorative Reproductive Medicine (RRM) clinic. Fertility awareness-based education is an essential tool for RRM. Receiving this education is the first step patients take in the program at Reply Fertility where cycle charting is required for all patients undergoing RRM care. The level of body literacy of patients first coming to the clinic is astoundingly low – although I shouldn’t be surprised at this as I certainly wasn’t educated about my cycle during my earlier reproductive years. At Reply, we have found that most of our patients who first come to us for care are not aware of what their body signs mean, how to identify when they are ovulating, and when their fertile window opens and closes. Many patients end up avoiding their fertile window altogether, having been misguided (even by some health professionals!) to think that the body sign they’re observing is a sign of infection versus a sign of fertility. This fertility awareness-based patient education occurs at the same time as some initial RRM investigative diagnostic testing is being done. For those patients taking advantage of their newly acquired reproductive knowledge of the extent of their fertile window and when to time conception focused intercourse, it is not unusual for some of these patients to conceive shortly after they’ve had their initial fertility awareness training, even before any treatment has been initiated. When conception happens shortly after couples start receiving care at Reply Fertility, we recognize this success as “fertility education for the win.” Research has shown that focusing intercourse on high or peak fertile days during the estimated fertile window enhances the probability of achieving a desired pregnancy. Fertility awareness-based charting is very effective at helping couples of any background and belief system to determine their fertile window and target intercourse accordingly to achieve pregnancy (Mu Q, Fehring RJ. Efficacy of achieving pregnancy with fertility-focused intercourse. MCN Am J Matern Child Nurs. 2014;39(1):35-40. doi:10.1097/NMC.0b013e3182a76b88). When RRM becomes more widely known and accepted as a choice for fertility health care, those couples who desire to conceive naturally will become more educated and empowered to time acts of intercourse effectively for conception. I envision a future that embraces the RRM model of care, where it will be increasingly possible for couples desiring pregnancy to avoid costly, invasive, unnecessary, and undesired treatments.