THE INFERTILITY FILES - Waiting for Babe

The Brutal Truth About Commercial Surrogacy and how Australia’s Laws Force Families Into Danger. Before you ever step on a plane, before the contracts, before the money, there are the glossy websites. Beautiful photos. Smiling surrogates. Western doctors in white coats. Words like ethical, supported, transparent. You’re fed an image that overseas commercial surrogacy is clean, regulated, legal, and even exciting — a hopeful...

IVF Designer Babies:  Fair, Ethical, or Too Far? IVF has given hope to families facing infertility, transforming what once felt impossible into a path toward parenthood. In Australia, parents can test embryos for serious medical conditions, helping prevent life-limiting diseases. But when it comes to non-medical traits—eye colour, hair colour, height, build, or other physical features—the rules are far stricter.  But should they be?

IVF is already an intensely personal, medical, and emotionally demanding process. Couples investing so much in their family arguably should have the right to make one additional choice—the sex of their child. You already have limited control over the IVF journey. Denying gender selection feels like society telling parents: “You’ve suffered enough, but this one choice isn’t yours.”

Infertility isn’t just a medical journey—it’s an emotional rollercoaster, a private grief, and a test of relationships. And yet, most people don’t know how to show up for those struggling to conceive. In fact, many of the things well-meaning friends and family say can hurt more than help. Here’s the truth: when someone is trying to conceive, they are navigating hope, disappointment, and grief...

The Questions That Haunt Every Donor Parent When infertility leads you to donor eggs or sperm, the path is anything but simple. It’s not just a medical procedure—it’s a journey through uncertainty, judgment, ethics, and a whirlwind of emotions that most people will never understand. From the very start, questions weigh on you like stones: Will my child see the donor as a parent? ...

The Loss That Doesn’t Come With Permission to Grieve There’s a type of grief the world struggles to acknowledge. It doesn’t arrive with flowers.It doesn’t stop time.Sometimes, there isn’t even a body to mourn. Because of this, grief from infertility and baby loss is often treated as optional — something you’re expected to bear quietly, move through quickly, and even feel grateful for.

I'd look around and see: Parents who never wanted children.Parents who resented them.Parents who seemed careless or absent. I didn’t think I was better. I thought I was desperate. I built a version of myself as a parent in my head — and compared it to what I saw. It didn’t make me feel superior. It made me feel robbed.

Infertility & Identity: Feeling Whole When Your Body Won’t Cooperate Infertility doesn’t just steal babies — sometimes it steals your sense of self. Suddenly your body feels like the enemy, and everyone else’s uterus seems to be winning the lottery. If someone had handed me a guidebook about infertility, it would have warned me about identity. Not just the medical side — the blood...

The Infertility Mind Games: How Your Brain Turns Against You Ever feel like your own brain is plotting against you? Infertility has a way of turning otherwise rational adults into obsessive, Googling, hormone-fuelled detectives of their own uterus. No one warns you that infertility isn’t just something happening to your body — it’s something that moves in, sets up camp in your brain, and...

10 Lies People Tell About Infertility (and Why They Hurt) Infertility isn’t just a medical struggle—it’s a social, emotional, and sometimes completely absurd minefield. People mean well, they really do… but some of the things they say? They hurt. A lot. Here’s a list of 10 common lies people tell about infertility—and what I’m really thinking when I hear them.