Hi, about 12 years ago, I was diagnosed with a medical condition called Graves Disease which is a thyroid condition. Mine was a severe case, in fact one of the worst documented, eating through my large muscle groups of my heart and spine. the thyroid gland also controls your entire hormonal system so I was informed it would be extremely difficult for me to ever conceive.
As I was 28, children were not on the agenda and my partner and I lived a full and exciting life together. During the next 11 years I was constantly under specialist and doctors care and battled with conventional medicine and natural alternatives to control the disease. I was always in and out of remission, never on top of it completely.
At the age of 38 we decided to try and conceive and after one year without uccess went straight to Monash IVF program Richmond. We awere faced with another problem that a vasectomy reversal my husband had 12 years ago was not successful and he was not producing live sperm. No big deal as live sperm can always be extracted frm the testes.

IVF seemed straight forward as I was still producing (ovulating) large quantities of good quality eggs. I had one strimulated cycle and two frozen. The one problem was once implanted I could not hold them, something we put down to my thyroid condition. Just before the third cycle a work colleague gave me an article that appeared in The Sun weekend edition on Dr Antonia Ruhl at Natural Stress Therapy. I called straight away on the Monday only to be informed there was a five month waiting list. Then fate stepped in and the receptionist put me on hold to answer another call, which turned out to be a cancellation for that Friday. Of course I took that appointment.

that Friday I had an extremely stressful day at work, we sat with Antonia informing her of our situation, whilst I sobbed. She did not offer a lot of sympathy and proceeded to inform us that I would fall pregnant and I had two auras surrounding me. She Also informed me that I would conceive twins due to those two auras. We took Antonia's program, of herbs and saw her weekly for her energy treatment. At the start I did not respond to treatment and I never buzzed with energy like my husband did. In fact Antonia was quite direct again and stated that the condition my body was presently in I would most likely never hold an implanted embryo no matter how many attempts.

My body was so unbalanced and not a healthy environment to grow and nurture. After two months on the program with treatment and religiously taking the herbs I actually started to feel my body tingle and buzz when I went to her. My thyroid levels became perfectly balanced and I felt great. I had a frozen cycle in December and two embryos implanted. I was actually angry at myself for doing this cycle, as it was my busiest and most stressful time at work, which meant long hours, tiredness, not eating properly, and all the stress that Xmas brings.. I felt as if I had wasted two embryos and it was unlikely to work.

Due to Xmas I miscalculated my dates and felt like I had all the symptoms of my approaching menstrual cycle. I put the notion of it working completely out of my head. Two days before New Years Eve I had my regular appointment with Antonia and as soon as I walked through the door she looked at me and excitedly greeted me with a big hug and kiss of congratulations. She informed me that I was pregnant and not only that twins!!! I simply refused to believe her. A pregnancy test confirmed this and two weeks later my Obstetrician confirmed we wre having twins.

I am currnetly 36 weeks, fit, healthy and the twins doing perfectly. My doctor is so impressed with how well I am as most twins are born prematurely, I only stopped full time work last week, have so much energy, and are exercising every day. I have been constantly under her care and my husband thinks she is the most amazing woman. She also informed us right from the start that we were having a little boy and girl and correct she is.

Apart from making us the happiest couple I also have Antonia to thank for making me a better person in the process. She has managed to calm, de stress me and make my outlook on life more positive and myself a much happier and evenly blaanced person. One of her little phrases is "the past never equals the future". Antonia is also very supportive of IVF and in fact in my first consultation stated we needed to do both.

Many people due to a lack of education and ignorance are very anti IVF. I have overheard Antonia urging clients to seek assistance in that specialized field as well. She just prepares the healthy soil for the healthy tree to bear healthy fruit. I do not think the expense is any more than consulting a Naturopath Chinese medicine, or alternate treatments.

Antonia is so generous with her time and expertise, working extremely long hours going out of her way to accommodate clients out of normal working hours. I am so grateful and appreciative that she will attend during the birth of our twins. Antonia keeps me happy, healthy, balanced, positive, and bouncing with energy. We appreciate all that she has done for us and treasure her friendship.