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Margaret Cali: Everybody Told Me to Relax, but Nobody Told Me What to Do With the Fear…
Margaret Cali/LinkedIn
Sep 10, 2026, 16:13

Margaret Cali: Everybody Told Me to Relax, but Nobody Told Me What to Do With the Fear…

Margaret Cali, IVF Readiness Integration Strategist, shared on LinkedIn:

”Everybody told me to relax.

Nobody told me what to do with the fear.

I do not think people meant to be unkind.

Most simply did not know what else to say.

‘Try not to think about it.’

‘Stay positive.’

‘Just relax.’

But I was already trying.

  • Trying to keep working.
  • Trying to be a wife.
  • Trying not to compare myself with everyone around me.
  • Trying not to think too far ahead.
  • Trying not to let another disappointment undo me.

And underneath all of that effort was fear.

  • What if it never happens?
  • What if my body lets me down again?
  • What if I cannot cope with another disappointment?
  • What if I am running out of time?
  • What if everyone else keeps moving forward and I am still here?

‘Relax’ gave me nowhere to put any of that.

So I did what I knew how to do.

I kept going.

I looked like I was coping.

I pushed the feelings aside and told myself I would deal with them later.

But later kept moving.

Looking back, I did not need someone to tell me to be less afraid.

I needed somewhere to understand the fear.

  • To name what was underneath it.
  • To separate what I could control from what I could not.
  • To know what I needed when the pressure became too much.
  • And to stop believing that being strong meant carrying everything quietly.

That is one of the reasons I talk so much about emotional readiness now.

It is not about teaching a woman to relax her way through IVF.

It is not about removing fear or replacing it with positivity.

It is about helping her understand what she is carrying and building more support, steadiness and emotional structure around it.

Because sometimes the woman who looks as though she is coping is quietly thinking:

‘I don’t know how much more I can carry, but I don’t know how to stop.’

IVF prepares the body.

Emotional readiness prepares the woman as a whole.

For those working in fertility care, what do you think women most need to hear instead of ‘just relax’?”

Other articles featuring Margaret Cali on Fertility News.

Fertility Fertility News IVF Margaret Cali OBGYN reproductive health Reproductive Medicine Women’s Health
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