The failure to conceive a child can be a heartbreaking and difficult experience - and it's one Dom Harvey knows all too well.
Harvey opened up about his experience trying to conceive with ex-partner Jay-Jay, and how hard the struggle can be.
He says the couple turned to IVF treatments after they discovered they couldn't conceive naturally.
"Me and Jay-Jay did five or six rounds of IVF before we accepted we wouldn't have biological kids, and moved on to donor sperm," he told The Project on Wednesday evening.
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But donor sperm wasn't any easier.
"You still deal with most heartbreaking moment with a donor - when you get that call from the embryologist saying 'I'm sorry, it's a negative result'," he said.
Harvey says the challenge changes your mindset.
"You almost get a gambler mentality, where you say, 'Okay we've done six rounds so, if we go back for one more, odds would suggest it's going to happen this time'."
But it didn't happen - and Dom and Jay-Jay made the heart-wrenching decision to stop trying. He likens it to a stone chipping the windscreen of a car.
"It's like a stone chip in a windscreen. The initial shock is when you find out you're infertile, you can't have kids. And then every failed round of IVF, that chip just gets bigger and bigger and you have to stop or else it'll implode," he told The Project.
The decision took its toll on him.
"The first couple of years after deciding to stop trying, I'd be on a run - that's where I do most of my thinking - and I'd find myself just welling up and crying," he said.
He says IVF is different to natural pregnancies, as women who conceive naturally can choose when they want to reveal the news.
But with IVF, everyone knows the ins and outs of your experience, and that can make it even harder when it doesn't work.
"When you have a failed result, you feel like you're letting down your family and friends," he said.
Watch the full interview above.
Newshub.
