Click here to read “The Unbearable Oneness of Being” chapter  from The Fertile Female

I was compelled to share this chapter from The Fertile Female after reading the NYT piece about egg quality, ovarian aging and the breakthrough UC San Francisco Study.  Before reading  the chapter you might find these reflections helpful.

“With a new imaging technique, scientists discover an ecosystem that determines how eggs mature and ovaries age.”

That’s the subtitle of a NYT piece about research from UC San Francisco published in Science on Oct. 9, 2026. .

Diana Laird, PhD, the senior author of the study, tells us that the new imaging techniques showed that ovarian aging is not just about egg cells but by the “whole ecosystem.” The role of the nervous system in ovarian health is also reported as a brand-new surprising, unexpected finding.

For me, the new imaging simply validated a self-evident truth:

Nothing in the body exists in isolation.

The Unbearable Oneness of Being chapter from The Fertile Female is a way I’ve been speaking about this topic through metaphor and language that might more easily bridge the gap between scientific explanations and lived experience.

There is a great deal more to say about the SFUC study. For me there is an essential lesson here for anyone trying to conceive. Or for that matter anyone interested in healing. Physical, emotional, whole and holy-human healing.

We can continue to refine technologies that allow us to observe the body’s intelligence more clearly. At the same time, we can begin—now—to cultivate the internal and external conditions that allow that intelligence to function more optimally.

In other words, we can create the most pleasing inner and outer environment for that Inner Physician to do their job.

Scientific discoveries expand our understanding and our options. But healing happens with or without scientific discoveries. With or without the drugs that the Laird’s team is already exploring to slow ovarian aging.

Healing is an intrinsic capacity that science, at its best, learns to support rather than replace.