You’re Only as Sick as Your Secrets: How Infertility Taught Me to Live My Truth
From the outside, it might’ve looked like motherhood came easily to me. But my family-building journey has been almost a decade long, and it’s shaped everything about who I am today.
I’ve experienced nearly every side of the spectrum: a secret IVF journey, a surprise pregnancy, and secondary infertility. Each chapter taught me something different about resilience, surrender, and self-discovery.
Chapter One: Lying About IVF
This chapter taught me that you’re only as sick as your secrets.
I spent two years lying about doing IVF. Every time someone asked if twins ran in my family, I’d say yes, which was technically true, so I told myself it wasn’t really a lie. But it was. I was carrying a secret that felt like a dark cloud following me everywhere. No one knew my twin girls were conceived through IVF, and the silence made me feel anxious, ashamed, and alone.
I was born in Ireland and moved to the U.S. with my family of six when I was five. We went to Mass every Sunday, and Catholic values were ingrained in me from a young age. The Church taught that IVF was wrong: it was “playing God,” selfish, and interfering with God’s plan. I didn’t realize how deeply I had internalized those beliefs until I was faced with infertility myself and diagnosed with unexplained infertility.
After years of trying, six months of clomid and four failed IUIs, I was faced with the crossroads of doing IVF. My subconscious beliefs about IVF being wrong surfaced, and I questioned if it was the right step for us. Until my husband said something that shifted everything for me. He told me, “You’d use medical intervention for any other disease: heart disease, cancer, HIV. Why wouldn’t you use it for infertility?” That reframing helped dissolve my judgment. I was ready to do IVF, but I wasn’t ready to tell anyone. I feared what others would think, and I didn’t want to bring shame or embarrass my parents, so I hid it for two years.
After years of trying, six months of clomid and four failed IUIs, I was faced with the crossroads of doing IVF. My subconscious beliefs about IVF being wrong surfaced, and I questioned if it was the right step for us. Until my husband said something…
Then one day, I met a neighbor down the street, who was also from Ireland, and had twins the same age as mine. She spoke openly and confidently about doing IVF, and for the first time, I felt safe enough to tell the truth. As soon as I said the words “I did IVF,” something inside me lifted. It felt so healing to talk about the experience (and the trauma) with someone who understood. I no longer felt ashamed and broken. I felt seen, heard, and valued.
From that day on, I started telling everyone: friends, neighbors, even the delivery guy, anyone who would listen! “I did IVF.” Three simple words that set me free.
Chapter Two: The Surprise Pregnancy
This chapter taught me that living authentically is the real key to happiness.
I never imagined I’d be one of those couples who got pregnant naturally after IVF. But there I was, hours away from hernia repair surgery, when a nurse told me I was four months pregnant. My husband and I were in disbelief. After years of intentional trying, it had happened without us even knowing. Our son would share the same due date as our twins, born just one week and one year later. Irish triplets!
At first, I used the surprise pregnancy as another excuse to keep my IVF story hidden. Three babies under one, no one would ever think we’d struggled with infertility. I was proud of myself for “getting away with it.” No one could judge my choices or my body for not working.
At first, I used the surprise pregnancy as another excuse to keep my IVF story hidden. Three babies under one, no one would ever think we’d struggled with infertility. I was proud of myself for “getting away with it.” No one could judge my choices or my body for not working.
But it wasn’t other people’s judgment that was the problem. It was my own.
I told myself I was fine with my decisions, but by not living in my truth, I was feeding my shame. The more I hid, the more isolated I became. That’s when I learned one of my biggest lessons: shame can’t survive when we speak our stories out loud.
Once I owned my story, it stopped owning me. This was my path, and I could finally be proud of my story.
Chapter Three: Secondary Infertility
This chapter taught me that happiness isn’t a destination; it’s something we create in the present, not chase in the future.
I thought that because I had “cured” my infertility, getting pregnant again would be easy. But it wasn’t, and I found myself right back where I was before. What you resist persists. As the youngest of four, I had always imagined a big family, and I became fixated on having four kids of my own. That desire and belief consumed me.
For two years, I tried everything: going vegan, detoxing, tracking, negotiating with my husband, and obsessing over timing. But my husband wasn’t on board, not with more fertility treatments, and honestly, not with another baby. I tried to convince him by taking on more, doing more, and being more, only to end up resentful and depleted.
For two years, I tried everything: going vegan, detoxing, tracking, negotiating with my husband, and obsessing over timing. But my husband wasn’t on board, not with more fertility treatments, and honestly, not with another baby.
Looking back, I see how I let one belief drive every decision: I need four kids to be happy. I was living on autopilot, chasing a future that blinded me to the beauty of what was already in front of me.
When my husband got a new job, I left mine as a jewelry buyer and stayed home with our three kids. I told myself it was a practical choice, but secretly, I hoped it would prove we could handle a fourth. It didn’t. But it led me somewhere even more meaningful.
I enrolled at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, where I discovered a new way to understand health and myself. Through that program, I began exploring the emotional side of fertility, how our thoughts, beliefs, and self-talk shape our experience. I realized that my fixation on a fourth baby wasn’t about the baby; it was about control, identity, and an outdated dream I hadn’t reexamined since childhood.
That insight changed everything. I learned to surrender, not by giving up, but by accepting life on life’s terms. Letting go doesn’t mean losing hope. It means making space for something new to grow. Through healing myself, I developed a desire to help other women on this journey. Instead of birthing a fourth child, I birthed a new passion & purpose: to help other women on their TTC journeys.
“I learned to surrender, not by giving up, but by accepting life on life’s terms. Letting go doesn’t mean losing hope. It means making space for something new to grow.”
What It All Taught Me
Each chapter of my journey: a secret IVF journey, surprise pregnancy, secondary infertility, has been a teacher. Together, they’ve woven the story of my life, connecting the dots and shaping me into who I am today.
Infertility taught me to treat myself and others with empathy, to live with integrity and own my story even when it looks different from what I expected, to make choices that align with my values, not others’ opinions, and to remember that faith and hope often exist in the unplanned.
My family-building journey gave me purpose and led me to become a fertility coach, helping other women feel seen, supported, and safe in their own stories.
Infertility can bring profound loneliness, grief, and anxiety. But when we realize we aren’t alone, and start sharing what we’ve been hiding, we begin to heal.
We don’t always get the ending we dreamed of. Sometimes it takes longer and hurts more than we ever imagined. But when we keep showing up and trust ourselves, we uncover what psychologist Anne Masten calls our “ordinary magic,” the innate resilience within us that runs deeper than we ever knew.
Infertility is tough, my darling, but so are you.✨
Ceire Nevins (aka as The Fertility Mama, is a fertility coach from Boston, Massachusetts, and the creator of The Fertility Mindset System —a coaching program that helps women release guilt, quiet their inner critic, and feel like themselves again through infertility. She received her coaching certification through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, specializing in holistic health and the mind-body connection, and completed Yale’s Science of Well-Being course in positive psychology.
Her own experience with infertility inspired her passion to support and empower women through their family-building journeys and to help break the taboo around infertility.
Connect with her at thefertilitymama.com or on Instagram @thefertilitymama for fertility awareness and support.
