Amber Izzo  0:00  

Hello, you are listening to Misconception, a Gaia family podcast. My name is Amber Izzo and I am your host. Each week we release a new episode talking about the various paths to parenthood, from community stories to conversations with experts, we've got you covered. Gaia's mission is to make IVF more accessible for more people with a financial plan that allows you to start and protect your IVF and access to a community who just get it. We're here for you. You can request a free personalized quote at gaiafamily.com this week, we had told you that we would be airing part two of Kreena's story, but due to some scheduling clashes, we'll be releasing this later in the series for you. So stay tuned for that. However, this week, we are joined by Shaun and Ciaran, who you may know as Knackered Knackers and The Male Fertility PT, having both shared their fertility stories really openly, Shaun and Ciaran launched their own podcast, The Male Fertility Podcast, sharing all things male factor fertility. It's really great to hear from men on the fertility journey too. And so we're really looking forward to you hearing this episode. So let's bring them in. Ciaran and Shaun. Hello. Thank you so much for joining us. How are you both?

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Ciaran Hannington  1:30  

You're gonna go first, mate. I'll go first Yeah, I'm good. I'm good. Oh, good. This busy day, but yeah, really well.

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Shaun Greenaway  1:44  

Yeah, same, same as. Good, tired. Tired is standard these days, but yeah, just really happy to be here, and thank you both for your patience. We're supposed to do this. Oh, it must have been a good month or maybe more ago, but I was poorly with tonsillitis, so bearing with me? Yes, yeah, hopefully we've got a clean bill of health in the household, which is rare, but hopefully the times and what for what's coming with the spring. So yes, we'll see.

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Amber Izzo  2:12  

Can't wait the warmer days. Thank God. Finally, so I've given you both a bit of an introduction before we started, but it'd be really great. I know that you both have your own podcast now, and you both do your own work within the fertility space, so it'd be really great to kind of hear from you who you are and what it is that you do for our listeners. So I'll let you battle out between yourselves. Who's going first or if it's a mutual thing, but over to you,

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Ciaran Hannington  2:38  

You go first mate. I don't mind.

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Shaun Greenaway  2:39  

Thank you. My initial thought then was really like, but who am I? How long have you got? How far back should I go? This? Could get this. I could unearth some real trauma here. No, I'll keep it. I'll keep it brief. But Hi, my name's Sean, so I'm also known these days as knack of knackers, which is my instagram handle, which sums me up, I am infertile. I'm a man, which you just you don't hear that much, and that's exactly why I'm here. This is why I'm doing this is to bring that voice to the situation, because male factor infertility, as is becoming more and more known, is around about, like accounts, around about half of the cases of fertility. So I went through that journey with my wife when we started trying in 2017 to cut I'll try and keep it very short, because obviously years of pain, which, which all three of us will know that, you know, ultimately, it could take a long time to describe it in detail, but I we started trying. I went for a test, and I was quite soon afterwards, diagnosed with Azoospermia, which is means I have no sperm. The secondary test confirmed that, and there, therein, just started a whole journey of real pain and grief and shame and stigma, and there's just, there was just so much kind of of a dent to my identity as a man, and we have the kind of happy ending to the story. We tried a few things, and in the end, like I had a couple of operations to try and rectify the root cause, which didn't work, so we elected to use donor sperm, and in 2021 we were blessed with the amazing twins, our amazing twins, Ray and Evelyn. And just before they were born, I decided to start sharing my story, and I just wanted to be what I needed when I was going through it and like, yeah, it's just gone crazy since. And I thought, you know, if I thought, I thought, when I started, if I could just help one other guy, then that that was my goal. And over three years on, now I'm really pleased to say I've done more than that. I'm, I'm so ultimately, I would say I'm a for two. Advocate, and I then did a coaching course so I could help guys in a better way and more structured and objective way. And now I am a co host of a podcast, the male fertility podcast, with Ciaran, so it's good time to bring him in.

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Ciaran Hannington  5:16  

Very smoothly done. Mate,

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Amber Izzo  5:18  

Absolutely, this is really good.

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Ciaran Hannington  5:22  

Yeah, I'm Ciaran. My fertility journey started about 12 years ago. Just over 12 years ago, me and my wife got married late, 2012 2011 sorry, and we've been trying for about a year with no success, and we're aware that my wife had polycystic ovaries, so we were expecting to need some something like Clomid to get her ovulating. And she went for several tests. And over about six months or so, we got to the point that they were ready to kind of give us that prescription and move on. And just before they did, they kind of suggested that I should have a test to check, you know, what's going on with me, just to make sure it wasn't me. And two weeks after I gave that sample, we got called back into the consultation room and basically told that they could get my wife ovulating with something like covid, but there wasn't much they could do for me, which was a complete shock, because I didn't have any idea that I was infertile or had very low fertility. So they told me that they estimated that I produced about 1500 sperm, and less than 1% of that was viable. So like 15 they could use, and even that wasn't very good quality. So it was kind of a whirlwind, I should say, over a few years, kind of a lot of denial and things like that. And I kind of went through a real emotional journey trying to find myself for this, as Sean said, like it was a big smash to my identity. And after two cycles, I kind of took tried to take some control back and sort my head out, but also sort my body out, and made a lot of lifestyle changes. So I used my degree in sport and did a lot of research into the type of exercise and lifestyle I should have. Because, you know, 10 years ago, there wasn't much out there at all. It wasn't really talked about at all in terms of male infertility. And I put these changes in place. And over an 18 month period, I saw my fertility levels go from 1500 to 4 million, with four above 4% viability, and the the the quality of everything got better. I still needed ICSI treatment. I still needed everything because it was still too low. But obviously the quality had got better. And in 2016 we were blessed to have my son was born, Sebastian was born, but it was, I still had a lot going on in my head about what I'd experienced and my identity, as Sean said. And then after a short while, we decided we were going to try again. And we obviously we had to go back through our IVF real ixo route, and I just rolled out the dice again in terms of the same program. And we were lucky enough in 2020 Enya was born, my daughter. So I'd kind of processed a lot in this time, and got to the point I was happily mentally with myself. And I thought to myself, well, if, if this has worked for me, it's got to work for other people, other guys. So I did all my personal training and strength and conditioning qualifications, and now I on the side, I coach and train PT guys are basically looking to improve their health, to aid their fertility. So that's that's what I do, and also, as Sean said, I'm the co host of them now fertility podcast, which has been a wonderful journey, and something we both thoroughly enjoyed and want to continue doing. Because, as Sean said, Neither of us want anyone to feel like we did. And if we can help that one guy, it's worth everything.

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Amber Izzo  9:50  

I love that. I think it's really interesting how you know you both talk about the loss of identity, and I think I know from a female perspective, how that feels and how very. Much from my perspective of being infertile, I felt the exact same. I'd lost my identity. I didn't know who I was, who was I if I couldn't bear children? You know, what does that mean for me in terms of being a woman? But I don't think you really hear that very often. You don't really hear males talking about it as often or as openly, perhaps, as you do we have male factor infertility, and I know initially it was something that my husband really struggled to talk about. So how did you kind of make that decision to then go so public with it? And you know, really, I mean, Sean, you say that, you know, you're more commonly known as knackered knackers, and I think that's what I knew you as for a good, I would say, 18 months, two years, and then realized you had a name too. So I think it's very like, you know, it's really interesting that you've really taken that and kind of ran with it. So what was the deciding factor that made you both go actually, I want to talk about this, and I want to talk about this this openly.

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Shaun Greenaway  10:56  

I've got, I can, like, date mine as well. But I think you know what, what you mentioned there is that we almost now when you know when you're talking, in retrospect, it sounds like it was a quick and smooth process. It really wasn't. It talking years of going inward and which it was exacerbated by the fact that I wasn't seeing or hearing any other men talking about this, so I just assumed it was just me and I, yeah, I went, I went in a hole, a deep hole, and I wasn't talking to anyone. It wasn't talking to my wife, and she, you know, she, as many women, are recognized that you're better at sharing and better at talking and airing out your feelings, and you recognize that that helps. But then trying to get it's like the more she tried, she recognized quite early on, the more she tried to push, the further in I was going. So she kind of gave me a lot of space, and I then found my own way. And again, we're talking months and years, and like Ciaran said to you, mentioned denial, that's one of the stages of grief. I was going through grief. I was grieving the loss of my ability to pass on my genetics, the the loss of of the picture of the the future and the family that I'd always had and had discussed with my wife when we first started dating. And that's like, it's a really intangible grief, but and a lot of it, I didn't know that I was in that stage. I was just angry for so long, and I remember the blame stage of denial, because of grief, sorry, because I phoned my mum, and because, when it was established quite early on, my root cause of my infidelity could have been the fact that I had months when I was 22 and the damage that that did to my testicles, I found my mom, and I was like, Why didn't I have the MMR jab? And she was like, you did. And so I obviously caught some sort of super strain when I was 22 and so, you know, how horrible was that I was trying to hang it on her and but you're not in a rational frame of mind. And I was kind of dragged through that process, and the last and final stage of grief being acceptance, and that is, and was the hardest bit to get to, because it's really letting go of everything, and we can talk more, and if you want, but that we've talked about that loss of identity. You are unstripping everything that you thought you were as a man, as a as a husband, as a son, and you're having to rebuild that one layer at a time and come to an acceptance, to come to accept who you are truly. And you know I joked about at the beginning about who are you? But you have to do that. You have to do that work. And I did that. And suddenly, when you when you've hit that rock bottom, and you're building layers back on top, and you're getting out of that hole, you realize that you're so much more than your ability to procreate. And I remember, so we, we had a couple of delays in our treatment, and then my wife developed ovarian hyper stimulus. I can't say. I lost my ovarian hyper stimulation syndrome just as we're about to have our first transfer. So then we got put on hold indefinitely. It took a couple of two or three months to get over that, and we're about to start again. Then covid hit in 20 covid hit in 2020 March, 2020 we were that was like two days before due to start, that all the lockdowns happened. And then, and like all fertility clinics stopped. And then in May, Hancock said that facility clinics could reopen, which I still remember my wife crying with happiness, because, you know, we were just like everyone is so uncertain, but we didn't know, and our clinic called us and asked us if we'd been interested in being interviewed by the BBC about the impact of covid and lockdown on fertility treatment. So. We said, Yeah, fine. And so they were due to come round may 2020, and this is three years on, three and a half years on since we've been started to try to go through being diagnosed as infertile, and like I said, coming out of that hole. And I was painting classic lockdown, doing a bit of DIY, and we were waiting for the BBC chaps to come around during kind of lunchtime ish in the morning, I was painting listen to a podcast. I listened to amazingly powerful podcasts of a story of a guy called Ben Tansley, who I want to get on hours. It's not an infertility story, but he I've spoken to him quite a lot. You know his story is it changed my life, and his was completely different to me, but it was about acceptance. And so he had a motorcycle accident, which paralyzed him, and he was so inspirational that he and he was like he was on this podcast, because then he's now helping others who are in a similar situation, but he helped me, and my story was so different. And I said to my wife, I thought, when, when the BBC guys come around, I'm going to talk about my what I went through. And she just looked at me as if I was joking. Bear in mind, I hadn't spoken to anyone at this point, not counselors, therapists, friends, parents, anything. My mom knew, but I hadn't talked about it. My wife obviously knew, because she was like, very much in it with me, but I hadn't talked about it, and she was like, You mad? I was like, No, I'm going to talk about it. And they came around. We were filming in the garden, so obviously covid, and they just sat there, there's two guys, and they just were kind of like, mouths agape, my story, and it is, it came out like a blip. It was, it was like a release, and I needed to and afterwards, after they finished filming, they both said, like, thank you. That was so powerful. And what's really funny is that none of it made the cut because it's not what they were there for. They were there for the impact of covid on fertility. But, you know, they still got what? They still got that topic, and that went out. But then we were like, oh, no, we had, because we hadn't told anyone, and we were due to start our treatment again that day that literally, not long after they're gone, my wife then took the first injection that evening, and we're like, Oh, what if it goes out and all of our friends and family find out? So we then spent the rest of the evening phoning around, telling people what we've been through. And it was just so good for me doing that, phoning my friends who had known like my best friends I'd known since I was like five, and hearing their response as guys, it was just top draw, and that was a pivotal day for me. And I then, in May 2020, decided that I was going to start sharing my story to help others. But it still took me eight months to go live with knacker knackers, because the fear then started creeping in and holding back, holding me back, thinking that I was going to be trolled. Because, you know, there was still no one talking about it, and I it was a huge leap of faith and a lot of procrastination in which it was just fear and fancy dress, essentially about my the handle. I was like, am I going to be shamed? Because I'm trying to make I'm making fun of this. And I was trying to come up with these kind of really deep and meaningful names Instagram handles, and I couldn't think of any, and it just didn't they never really fitted well. So I just thought of that. So I started trying to think of funny ones and stuff like some of the obvious, obvious ones, like, like, new balls, please or no, like, no swim zone, etc, all a bit clunky. So in the end, I come up with, and I just did it. And, you know, it sums me up, is it? It's concise two words. You know what it means? Apparently, it's quite insulting in Ireland. So sorry to any Irish people. Yeah, whenever I've done some webinars and stuff, and they say I can't mention that, I'm afraid it's quite insulting, no. So yeah, but you know, it doesn't translate at all across in America. They have no idea what evil word means to explain that. But, you know, I did it, and it was a leap of faith, and I've never looked back since. It's been amazing. The reception was amazing, and, yeah, I just, I'm so glad I did it, because I feel like I was meant to I felt, I feel that everything we did was guiding us, first and foremost, to our children, but secondly, to me doing this, yeah? So there's a long answer to a short question. 

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Amber Izzo  19:49  

I love a long answer. It's great. It's yeah. I just think it's, you know, incredible, the work that you do. I mean, Kieran for you, what kind of, what kind of, pushed you? To to do the same, and to kind of start sharing your story and talk, you know, do the work that, that you do, some kind of defining moment, per se, 

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Ciaran Hannington  20:09  

I'm not sure, and I know when mine happened, and like, I can't explain how deeply lonely it is. It can be, it's like to be a guy going through, you know, facing infertility, and I, I found myself as low as I could get, like after our second cycle. You know, I've talked about it on our podcast, but I, you know, I seriously contemplated just taking my own life because I was just done with it. I was done with this feeling of feeling like worthless because I thought that's what I was, because I couldn't give my wife the one thing that she really wanted. So it was a really deep, personal processing that went on and dealing with all the grief, all the denial. But what happened was, once I started talking about it, so once I took control, basically, and started looking into what I could do to improve my mental health and to improve my physical being. I reached out and got some counseling. And those, those counseling sessions, generally, like, saved my life. I went to the first one I went to. I didn't really talk much. Just sat there, said a few things and left, but there was this distinct one where I went in and they were like, 45 minutes, half an hour, 45 minutes long, and I must have cried for the whole thing, because it just all came out, like Sean said, like it just came out, but, and it felt like such a wake being lifted off my shoulders, but I still wasn't at at the point where I could just walk out the door and everything was alright. So my son was born, and I anticipated like him being born, and it all going away and it but it didn't work like that for me, like I still had this horrendous feeling inside, um, obviously so grateful for the birth of my my son, and I would go through it all again to make sure I had him. You know, that's where I'm at now. But at that moment in time, I was still processing a lot about my own identity. Um, I was having panic attacks. I was, you know, wanting, not wanting to go out in society. I drifted away from my friends at the one time where people expected me to be at my happiest, you know, because I had had the baby boy. Had long, longed for. People knew by then what we were going through and why. But what happened was, I found the him fertility group, from fertility network. And Jim was like, you should just join them. And by this time, she was pregnant with with Enya, so it was like three or four years down the line. I'd held on to this, having all this going on in my head, and I joined and it was an amazing experience, like there was other people, I hadn't talked to anyone that had been in my situation, and suddenly there's like 20 guys on a zoom call. But I could talk to people and listen and hear that it wasn't just me, you know, I wasn't the only person in the world going through this. And after a short while, I got the opportunity to go to every space camp with the infertility group, and we were gonna raise money for fertility network UK and raise awareness of now infertility. And I started to kind of get, like the I started to move towards the acceptance stage, or what Sean talked about, I was kind of like, right? This is part of me. It's okay. I can do something good out of this. Anyway, we went to Everest, and when we got to base camp, it was, it was March, this March the 18th, 2020 we got to base camp, and there was, there's a big rock near it. There's loads of rocks, but it was one bit. And I went and sat on it, and I sat there for ages. And I started just I realized how far I'd come and what happened to me in my life. I mean, I'm putting it all into a couple of minutes, but a lot went on in, you know, in that 10 years from me finding out to be in every space camp, and I just started crying. I remember, started crying and I and then I stopped. I. And I got off that rock, and I went back to the group, and I felt like I was a completely different person. And when we landed back in the UK, I was ready to start helping guys, and I was something had switched, something could just kind of turn to my head, where it's like, right Kieran, you've been through this. You've processed this. Now it's time to help other guys make sure that no one else ever feels like you did. So I started to put together, you know, my personal training work, and like Sean said, I held back a little bit because there was that little part of me that thought, what if this isn't accepted because it's not talked about. And I'd had a bad experience on on social media, where I put something out once before and it gone, had some really negative feedback, like comments made. But what I realized, and what I realized now is that people that make negative comments either don't understand what you've you're going through and what you're saying, or they're the ones that actually have the bigger issue than me. So I kind of just accept it now and just go fine. But yeah, I had that little bit of fear of putting stuff out because I didn't want to be trolled again, but I bit the bullet and did it, and it's kind of snowballed from there, I've done lots and lots of media stuff. Now I've been involved, obviously, with the fertility network, doing the podcast, which is, like, the most amazing thing I've done, you know, really enjoying it and but it all stemmed from that every space cam, and it's quite a big thing. I mean, most people don't go, Yeah, is that every space camera, like this epiphany of life, but

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Amber Izzo  26:58  

quite a poignant moment. Yeah

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Ciaran Hannington  26:59  

Like, genuinely, like I sat on this rock and I just, it just flooded me, everything. And then I remember just jumping off of it after I stopped crying for a while, and just head back to the crew, and I just felt completely different. So that was the moment. But once again, like Sean said, it took time to get that confidence. It was there. I just had to kind of trust it, go with it, and I'm so glad I did. It's been, it's been phenomenal.

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Amber Izzo  27:31  

I mean, you've both done so much, like, it's amazing. And, you know, I think doing this, the podcast, I think, is very unique, because, as like we said, there aren't many men actually talking about it so openly. So it's really great that you're you're kind of using your experience to do that. I mean, you've obviously spoken about sharing your story and the fear of the feedback, as you called it, and kind of how that's going to be received by other people. And I know Kieran you mentioned that the reception on social media, and I know Sean you said, after you'd spoken to BBC, that you rang around all your friends like, how, how was that reception like when you have been talking about it and you've been speaking to the people that you know, the people that you love, like, I think you know, maybe we see things differently here. Philip, for me, when I was when I started sharing, I was always more scared of the people that I knew, that followed me on social media than I was the strangers. So it's I find it really interesting how people see it differently. But when speaking to people, were people generally quite empathetic? Or did you find that even with your loved ones, you had to explain certain things and tell them how you needed supporting, rather than them just being empathetic.

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Shaun Greenaway  28:41  

Yeah, definitely, in my case, when we were going through it, there were a lot of people knew we were having fertility treatment and struggled struggling to conceive, but not many people, well, no one knew why, because my wife was shouldering that. For me, she was taking on and don't get me wrong, you know, you're in it together, but she is was essentially because I wasn't talking and hadn't, wasn't in a place where I could even contemplate accepting what was going on. She was taking it on as a couple infertility. So she essentially, you know, she was, like, taking a lot of the questions, because, yeah, you know, I wasn't in a place where I could talk about it. And despite people knowing that we were trying to conceive and having fertility treatment, having tests, etc, like, no matter where we were, along it from the early days right through to the fertility treatment, which is, well, three years in which people because they don't understand. And this is, you know, immediate family members as well, and some of the comments that were made were just insensitive. And it comes down to ignorance of the situation. Not having any idea, and it's fine. You know, you don't have to know everything in the world. We if you haven't experienced something or know someone that has first hand, then it's fine. And it's understandable that you don't know what is this easy in this day and age to educate yourself on it. Pull out that thing for in your pocket that can access you. You can get any information in the world. Just, just read up. What? What is it going through? How hard is it like? What might they be facing? What? What feelings, what? What physical stuff might they be going through? Because we had to tell people, Don't ever ask us about our fertility treatment again until we decide to share, because it was so insensitive, what was coming back our way, and having then put out my story, those same people have since apologized and said, Look, I had no idea. I'm really sorry. You've educated me a lot, you know, but that, and that's them reading my my personal take on things and what we went through. But they didn't. They could have done that themselves and and like you said, something you mentioned about kind of people that follow you. So I had told my close friends and family it, I say in person, it was still locked down. So all the phone calls whilst, when we were then gearing up for the our third go, which was the one which worked, and part of it, and this is fine, you know, like I said, my main driver was to be what I needed, and it still is. It's like what guides our podcast, our it's like our Northern Star. It's our our mission to be what we needed, that voice we needed. But also there was, there was a selfie, selfish element from myself. It was me clearing the decks for those that kind of outer circle of friends, because I was about to it was a month away when I, when I put it out there from us having our children, donor conceived children. And there was definitely an element of safeguarding myself from those comments of resemblance. And of course, this isn't going to be that there are many, many people who use, who go down the route of donor conception and putting themselves out there. That is not going to be for everyone, but it's what worked for me. And it then again. But the reception was, was, was incredible. And people are, people are more thoughtful and empathetic than than often we give people credit for but then it's often the ones it's like they say, you know, like you'll remember the one bad experience over 10 good ones type thing, and that often the ones that you remember more. But yeah, people, when I did it, people just saying, you know how hard that must have been for you guys. And that's all you want to hear, is, yeah. Just understand that it was, it was terrible now that hopefully will give you some answers about why we might have not attended this or late cancelations for that. Because you do, you have to know, is a sentence. It's a complete sentence, and you don't have to give reasons. And we stopped doing that. We just started saying no more. So yeah, there was that ultimately, it's been an incredibly positive experience, whether it's helping others in the situation or helping my own inner circle and slightly out of circle, understand and hopefully they never have to experience it, but just to know that if someone else does, they'll know a little bit more about what's going on, what they should or shouldn't say,

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Amber Izzo  33:42  

Yeah, I think you touched on, kind of the fact that it becomes validating. And I think that's a really important thing, that actually, when people do know what you've been through, and they respond and say things like that, and they say that I'm really sorry that you experienced this, and in your case, actually apologized for being so insensitive. Like, I think that's a really mature thing for people. I think quite often people don't do that. People don't apologize when they've put their foot in the mouth and said these comments that are just incredibly insensitive. So, yeah, I think it is a really validating way of people kind of saying to you, you know, like the information you're giving here you are educating them, but you're so right in that they should. You know, people are able to do this themselves, and yet they don't. It's still the job of the people going through it to somewhat educate everyone else, which is bizarre to me, to be totally honest. I mean, Kieran was a similar, similar experience for you.

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Ciaran Hannington  34:41  

We had a mixed bag. I'd say weird. Some people were very How can I put it? Concerned for me when they found out, like when they found out what being. Through what I've been hiding. One friend in particular. You know, he was fantastic. He's one of my best mates, and he I told him what gone through, where we were at, what was happening. And he just, we were sat in the pub, and he was just like, I don't know what to say, but I wish he talked to me, and that's what I needed to hear. It's such a powerful thing, like I I didn't need all the bullshit that comes with it. I didn't need fluffing at that point. I needed my mate to look at me and just go, I don't know what you've been through, I don't know what you're going through, but I'm here to support you. And we had other people kind of be very open about the fact that they didn't agree with it, which was tough, especially when other people were close to you. But it, it kind of, it's another thing you have to process. You know, you get you. I had positives. I had negatives. Positives were amazing. Negatives were harder to deal with. I've found that since I've come out on social media, though and talked, all I've had is positives and real kind of thanks for what I'm doing. I haven't done it for that, but once, I mean, sure Sean will back me up here that we we expected to have some kind of impact with our podcast, but not to the extent that we have had like the contact we've had and the people thanking us and people sending our stories and things like that have been, has been amazing, and it just shows that we're doing it for the right reasons. You know, there are guys out there, guys and and their wives and their partners that need to hear what we've got to say. And I've kind of come to the conclusion that it's a very closed group fertility, like if you you don't think about it, unless you have to. I didn't think about my fertility until I found out I had issues, and most people don't, because you just assume it's all going to be okay. So I think the positivity comes from people that are coming across us and looking for us, need us, need that support. The ones that don't, don't come across us so we there's no negativity, not for me anyway. So yeah, I had a mixed bag, but I feel I managed to process and work with both really well. And I said it earlier in the interview, I learned, as I've got older and a little bit more wiser, that how people react to you or something, that a situation says more about them than it says about you, you know, be comfortable with who you are. I learned that I'm the same Kieran. I've just got a bit more information. You know, this was who I meant to be. I was probably always infertile. I just never knew it. I've just got that information now. So I'm no different. I've just got a bit more info. So, yeah, mixed bag. It was a mixed bag, but I was able to process both and work with both.

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Shaun Greenaway  38:29  

Sorry, Amber. I just wanted to pick up on something that Ciaran said, and I think this is, like a key takeaway to any men that might be going through this and listening is obviously, you know, there are, like, Kiera and I are here. There are other blokes talking about it now which, and you know, you can always contact any of us for that shared support, but, but what Kieran said about his mate in the pub, and I can echo that with like when I rang around all my best mates, one of them in particular, they were all great, but one and I still, this is, like, four years on now, and I still say to him about it, and he's like, he was, like, I was just being a mate, but he was just incredible. Like, he, he is out of our group, like, who would be the alpha? You know, the good looking one, good at football, you know, all that, and, and he had two kids easily and naturally and and almost everything would be set up for him to to not be caring and empathetic. And he was just amazing. He he cried. This was on the phone because, as I said, it was locked down. He and he just said, mate, I have so much respect for you for what you've been through and for what you're doing now, and for for still persevering. Because, you know, we hadn't, we weren't at the end. No, we didn't know if when the end was going to be at this point still. And, yeah, it was just amazing, like his response, and it just solidified why they and he, you know, all my best mates. And like what Kieran said, the response he got from. From his mate in the pub. So guys don't, don't do your mates a disservice by not talking to them. And of course, it has to be when you're ready, because it's not easy enough for me. As I said, was free is down the line. So when, when you do feel that you're in a space where you can open up a little bit, and it doesn't have to be all in. You don't have to go in two footed. You can dip your toe a little bit, just say a little bit about what's going on, whatever. But don't underestimate the people that have been in your life for a long time, because they've been there for a while. They've been around hopefully, you know, and that in my case, it was since we were five, and I was like, I don't know, mid 30s, when I told them so the fact that they're still in my life showed why they still were in my life, and it showed their response, then showed why they were, because they were just incredible. And, yeah, give your friends a chance to be the friend you need. 

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Amber Izzo  40:56  

You've both got some really great people around you. I mean, Ciaran, I think you know, like when you said that there were, there were people in your life that didn't agree with what you were doing. Like that took me back a little bit, almost. And I think if you're, you know, going through it, and you, you know, you said yourself about how dark the space that you found yourself in was, therefore, hearing that, and hearing that there were people in your life that weren't actively supporting you, per se, and weren't agreeing with the choices that you were making. Like, how do you cope with that? Like, how do you process that and move forward?

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Ciaran Hannington  41:29  

At the time straight away, not very easily, because, especially when those people are in your inner circle, you know people that you don't expect that to come from. I it was I was lucky. I was lucky that I had Jen, I had my wife, who helped cushion that a lot. And what I had to do was I expect that's where I kind of get this view of how people respond to a situation. Doesn't depict me. It depicts them. But I had to process that. It wasn't easy. I can't even really put it into words like it was, it was, it was a real hard thing to do. And funnily enough, I was having a chat with Sean about it a couple of days ago. You know, it's still something that is there, like in the back of your head, but I think I've just learned to accept it, that not everyone has the same view as me and the same views we all do. I think acceptance in that in that area, in that department as well, is very powerful. You know, not everyone has to agree with everything I do in my life, and just because it was the right thing for me doesn't mean someone else is going to accept it and agree with it. And even though you want them to wish them to you just kind of got to accept that they don't. But, yeah, I think that's, I don't really know how else to put it. I just kind of came to the conclusion of that's how they feel. I'm moving on with me and my family, you know, and I'll protect this little bubble that I've got now, and I'll make sure that they're set up to deal with things like that that come up in their life, that might come up in their life, I don't know, but it was definitely a path of acceptance on the fact of not everyone agrees with everything you say do or want to hear. You know, it's just the way it is.

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Amber Izzo  43:52  

Thank you. I mean, I know, like earlier on in the conversation, you kind of said about the fact that typically in the fertility space, we hear more from women, and women are more likely to share. Why do you think it is that men do find it harder to talk about this stuff? Like, what do you think is the reasoning behind that?

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Shaun Greenaway  44:12  

Well, I think that society has shown us that men are not as good at sharing about anything, which is a shame. We've all heard the statistics about male suicide, like, was it the biggest killer in of men under 50? And like Kira mentioned, you know, he had those thoughts, and he when he said that on our podcast, we then we always have a bit of a debrief after and he said, that's the first ever time he said that openly to anyone other than to his misses. And it's like, wow, and it shows how deep that runs. I saw some statistics from fertility network, the server they had done. 90% of people who go through fertility treatment will suffer depression. Out of that, 42 Percent will consider suicide or have suicidal thoughts and open like it's not we have just we've just talked a lot about the power of opening up, and it is because you're like a pressure cooker if you don't, and if you're not letting off that steam and sharing, it's just so it really slows down everything, but it's the highest the start it really does, like so much good will come from that, that we are both good evidence of that as well, right? I would never have been to the level of acceptance that I am now if I hadn't done that again. It doesn't mean that everyone has to get a podcast and share openly on Instagram or whatever it's. It just makes everything a lot easier when you're not carrying this weight on your shoulders. When I first told my employers, for example, what would go I've been hiding it for a year and a half, all of the appointments and the like, everything like the results that were just like absolutely rocking my world and just shaking me to the core. I was hiding it, and suddenly, when I opened up and said, Look, I might need a bit of time for an operation. And said, why? And they were so good, and so so and they proved, you know, why they're in those positions of leadership, how my managers dealt with it. And so then that was my first kind of real lesson about opening up. And everything just started getting easier, the more and more I did. And ultimately, like Kira said, when you can have that level of acceptance, like, it's like a suit of armor, like, what? What can hurt me now that I'm I am owning this shit. I'm sorry I didn't even confirm if we could swear on this one.

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Amber Izzo  46:47  

You're fine; you're recording with me.

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Shaun Greenaway  46:50  

But yeah, if you you know, you take that full ownership and that full acceptance, full accountability of everything you are and really open up. And like Kira said, there are, there are online groups where you can do it in just being in that shared space, like you are not alone. And that's exactly what we're here to try and show and, yeah, I can't speak highly enough of it.

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Amber Izzo  47:15  

Amazing. Thank you. Yeah, I think you're so like, you know, it is the power of opening up. I think were your words, and it is so scary. I think when you first take that leap to do it, because, like, you say, you just don't know how people are going to respond. But I think, above all, you know, you mentioned earlier, we need to give people more credit. And for the most part, most people, I think, can be empathetic, and I think a lot of the time, even kind of the negative comments that you do sometimes get, I don't necessarily always think that they are malicious. They're they're well intended, and they're just uneducated, I think a lot of the time. And unfortunately, I think male fertility is something that people aren't talking enough about still, and that I think, adds to that, it's, it's kind of the assumption that it's the woman's problem, rather than actually looking into male at all. And I mean, just to kind of finalize, really, on that, on that basis, and on that, on that topic, with the assumption being that it's a woman's problem. Did you find that when you kind of went into fertility treatment. Did you feel like you were always kind of trapped as as part of the couple and as 50% and that you did get the support that you needed from the clinical side of things initially, I know, obviously you know when you go on to have a diagnosis, but leading up to that diagnosis, did you feel like you needed to advocate for yourself? Did you feel like you needed to fight to get a diagnosis in the first place?

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Ciaran Hannington  48:47  

I didn't feel part of the process. I felt you know that when you get a letter that comes through the door and it says to Mrs. Hannington and partner, but it's the and partner is the reason why you're having this treatment. I'm just an and partner that needs to change, like, that's wrong. Like it needs to say to Mr. And Mrs. Hannington, because we're in it together. But through the majority of it, especially our first round of cycles for my son, I was just a number, and it definitely, definitely played a role in me feeling the way I did, like like I was told, Kieran, you got basically, you know, you've got poor quality sperm, and there's nothing we can do for you. We're going straight into ixo. Off you go. It wasn't as blunt as that, but they might as well have just said that. And. And as I've as I proved there was a lot that could be done to improve the chances of that working and but one of those key elements was feeling part of the whole thing. I didn't. I just didn't. When we had all that treatment for my daughter, completely different situation like that. My name was on the letters. I was spoken to directly. They take phone calls from me. Everything was different, and that was a different clinic, different clinic, yeah, different clinic. I mean, different end of the country, pretty much, but it was a different clinic. But, yeah, I think, like, I wasn't tested until right at the end when they were going to give Jen clomid. It was almost like, oh, let's just tick the box. And that box became the most important thing they found out, because if they'd given a chlomate, nothing would have bloody happened anyway, like it was me. It was me all along. Yeah, they could have got her ovulating, and yeah, she would have had ridiculous cycles and but the actual sperm that needs to go into that egg doesn't exist a good enough quality to do it. So it was, it was really poor. It was really poor, and it definitely had an impact on how I felt through the whole thing.

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Shaun Greenaway  51:38  

Yeah, that's, um, that's the best kind of answer that you can give, is that Ciaran wasn't even tested. It was an afterthought. And that is, sadly, quite common from guys I speak to, is that they've almost been identified as either the whole or a partial or equal like kind of part of the infertility, but quite late on, as an after I would, let's get the sperm tested that should be so we little bit different for hours, because I had the because I had the mumps when I was 22 I had that a small inkling that could be an issue. So we went to doctors and they referred me for a test immediately. But also my wife. And, you know, it's probably the right thing to do. That should be happening the other side as well, with with men, when, when people are going, if don't just deem it to be a female issue. But so from the outset, I was kind of part of that conversation, and it was my wife's facility was, was not an issue at all. And but then, interestingly, when we were in the fertility clinic, we had a five digit patient number, whether the five digit patient number was my wife's number, mine was that same five digit number with a P after we stood for partner. But it's like, but I'm we're here because of me. We're just, you know, so yeah, but I can't fault say, in the fertility clinic, I never felt ignored. I think that probably more than not, they had to talk to my wife because I was in a state of shock for a lot of the appointments. But, yeah, I never felt ignored. So I have to give, give them credit for that.

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Amber Izzo  53:16  

I think it's interesting. I think, you know, we like, I say for us, I mean, we were, we had, like, the basic NHS tests when we were first referred. But I think it took two failed, abysmal, really, IVF cycles with no embryos. Oh, well, one embryo across two cycles before anybody went. Actually, there might be a problem on the other side here, and it's a bit deeper than this. So for us, it was like, I think we were maybe 566, yeah, we would have been six years in by the time my husband had any more than just the baseline, wow, testing, and it's, it's crazy, and the whole like, we'd spoken to clinics, they were like, Oh no, there won't be an issue there. There won't be an issue there. This is, this is what you're diagnosed with. And it's like, well, yeah, but block fallopian tubes don't cause poor embryo quality. So what's, you know, what's going on here? And a lot of what you've said, he would completely echo, and the feeling like a number, and feeling like, you know, he's not really part of the journey at all. And I think it's such a shame, because this is something that we hear an awful lot. So thank you both, really, for continuing this conversation and for opening the conversation really more than continuing it. So just to round off, if you can tell everybody where they can find you and the name of your podcast, and that would be absolutely great,

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Shaun Greenaway  54:34  

Sure. So I'm at knackered_knackers on Instagram, Ciaran...

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Ciaran Hannington  54:40  

on Instagram, I am The Male Fertility PT,

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Shaun Greenaway  54:45  

and the podcast, you wanna do that?

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Ciaran Hannington  54:49  

Usually, do the podcast Instagram, I just blank out.

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Shaun Greenaway  54:52  

I know I was trying to catch you out and what I'll get you one day on something. But yeah, the podcast is the male fertility podcast, and you can contact us on Instagram, which is at the male fertility podcast.

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Amber Izzo  55:03  

And can people listen anywhere? Or are you running on certain platforms?

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Ciaran Hannington  55:08  

Oh no, we're all of them, just for good measure. Amazing.

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They can also email. They can also email us, the male fertility podcast@gmail.com in case you want to get involved, cool, see, I remembered that one

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Amber Izzo  55:27  

Amazing. Thank you so much for joining us. It has honestly been a pleasure to speak to you both. So my lisp really came out then that was a really bad mouthful. I do apologize. Yeah, it's been really, really lovely to speak to you both. So thank you very much for joining us. 

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Shaun Greenaway  55:43  

Pleasure

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Ciaran Hannington  55:44  

Thanks for having us.

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Amber Izzo  55:45  

Thank you Shaun and Ciaran, everyone. I really hope you enjoyed the episode. The two of them are absolutely brilliant, and we are so honored to have had them join us. So do make sure that you go and check out their own profiles and the male fertility podcast join us next week as we speak to another brilliant guest on misconception. Have a great week, and we'll see you then you.

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Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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