Infertility and Mental Health: A 6-Step Plan
Do your emotions feel hijacked by the stress of infertility? Hear a clinical psychologist specializing in infertility share her top 6 steps for managing your mental health during infertility!
“Today I seek the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Adapted from Reinhold Niebuhr’s Serenity Prayer
After helping countless people stop infertility from hijacking their emotions, Dr. Marisa Perera is revealing the exact way therapy can help you take control back when it comes to infertility and mental health. By the end of this post, you will have a 6-step plan to stop infertility from ruling your emotions and life.
Infertility, Mental Health, and Feeling Out of Control
Chances are, you’ve been told you can achieve something if you work hard towards getting it. You’ve probably achieved many goals in your life because you worked hard to get them.
Studying for your tests probably helped you get that degree! Putting in those extra hours at work probably helped you get that promotion!
Infertility shatters this message.
Infertility can be one of the first times a person faces deeply wanting something but, even when they try very hard to get it, don’t have full control over getting it. It’s only natural to feel upset, sad, angry, and many other emotions when you’re working hard towards a goal and can’t make it happen.
Family building journeys are unpredictable and filled with unexpected moments. When these unexpected moments keep adding up, you may become more and more anxious because of the discomfort of not knowing what will happen next on your journey.
What Feeling Out of Control is Like
When that out-of-control feeling takes over, your emotions can feel unmanageable and out of hand.
In the mind, this out-of-control feeling can show up as feeling bitter, worrying, thinking about a situation over and over, avoiding certain places and people, spending less and less time with loved ones, and a having a hard time concentrating. Often, there is also a feeling of being on edge.
In the body, this out-of-control feeling can show up as crying, problems sleeping and with your appetite, tension in your body, headaches, and low energy.
When emotions like sadness, grief, anger, and so on build up over time without a safe outlet, they become intense and affect us at our core.
The Mind’s Way Of Dealing With Feeling Out Of Control
Our minds like to understand why things happen – our minds don’t do so well with the unpredictability of family building and not understanding why painful things happen.
Feeling out of control makes our mind crave and search for more control to counteract that uncomfortable out-of-control feeling. Makes sense, right? Taking more control can look like hyper-focusing on tracking your cycle, what you eat, what you drink, your exercise, how to relax, and anything “supposed” to help conception.
When that out-of-control feeling has been around for a while, our mind can also start turning on ourselves. It does this as an attempt to make sense of the painful, out-of-control reality of not getting or staying pregnant. This often shows up as feelings of self-blame and guilt. Maybe your mind tells you something you did (drank too much, an abortion, an STI) is why this is happening and that you won’t be a good parent.
It’s Not True And It Doesn’t Work!
I’m here to tell you that searching for more control and turning on yourself are just attempts by your mind to understand, control, change, and fight the confusing, unfair, and painful reality of not having a child when all you want is to have a child.
Please know, these attempts to try to understand your reality by telling you that you aren’t taking enough control over the situation or that you did something to cause it are NOT based in facts.
Let me say that again, these attempts are not facts. Just because your mind tells you to be in more control and that you did something to cause this reality, does not make those things true! It is just the mind’s way of dealing with unpredictability and feeling out of control.
The thing is, these attempts by our minds don’t even work!! When negative tests or pregnancy losses continue, it can make your emotions feel EVEN more out of control, which is the feeling your mind was trying to counteract to begin with!
Fortunately, there is an option to choose to lean into accepting the painful facts of your reality which is something you DO have control over.
Accepting Infertility is Not Agreeing With Infertility!
You may have seen the word acceptance above and thought – why should I have to accept this unfair, painful reality?
That’s a fair question.
I wish reality didn’t have to be this way for you. I also don’t know how to change the facts of anyone’s reality, as much as I wish I could. The options left are trying everything you can to change the facts of your reality (even though this is a losing game) OR accept the current facts as they are.
Acceptance means:
stop fighting the facts of our painful reality, especially when that reality isn’t the way we want it to be.
Acceptance does not mean:
agreeing with reality being this way or approving of the facts as they are.
Why are we accepting? Fighting the facts of the reality doesn’t actually change the reality. Fighting the reality actually keeps you stuck in uncomfortable emotions like sadness, anger, shame, which make the feeling of being out of control of your emotions grow bigger.
What are we accepting? The facts about our reality and that this is the moment we are in RIGHT NOW and nothing more. We are also accepting that there can be pain and meaning from life at the same time. You can experience deep pain in your family building journey and also get some positivity from being around loved ones.
6 Steps To Regain Control Over Your Mental Health
STEP 1: Check Yourself
Check yourself – could your mind and body be fighting reality in this moment?
Signs of fighting reality:
· Your mind is saying “it shouldn’t be this way” (lookout for “shoulds”!) or asking “why me”
· You often feel bitter, angry, and irritable
What do you need to accept? Consider a few important things in your life right now that you’re having a hard time accepting.
STEP 2: Accept the Facts and Nothing More
Every time your mind thinks the thoughts or feels the feelings from Step 1: Connect with acceptance by reminding yourself that the facts of your reality in this moment right now are what they are, no matter how much you don’t agree with them and want them to be different.
Remind yourself that agreeing with the facts of your family building journey is not a requirement for accepting the facts.
STEP 3: Accept with Your Mind
Practice accepting with your mind. You can say to yourself something like:
I don’t like this, it’s unfair, it hurts. I’m angry, I’m sad. I also understand this is how things are for me in this moment right now.
STEP 4: Accept with Your Body
Our body and mind are directly linked! It’s hard to feel acceptance with our mind if we don’t also feel a calmness within our body.
To accept with your body, check in with your body:
· Can you relax tension in your face? Check your jaw and tongue for tension. Try dropping your jaw drop a bit. Try removing your tongue from the roof of your mouth.
· Can you relax tension in your shoulders? Try dropping your arms, unclenching your hands, and facing your palms up, like you’re ready to accept whatever comes to them.
· Can you sit with stillness for a bit instead of moving your body?
STEP 5: Allow Space for Emotions & Lean into Grief
Sadness and grief often follow from a state of calming acceptance. Instead of pushing away or rejecting these emotions, allow yourself to lean into these emotions.
Allow yourself to grieve a different reality, maybe the family building journey you expected or imagined you’d have. Allow yourself to feel the sadness instead of pushing it away.
Note: This step can be especially powerful when done with a licensed mental health professional.
STEP 6: Show Yourself Kindness
It is a natural human desire to be free from suffering and to have happiness.
From this place, reflect for the next moment on the part of you that has comforted others when they have been in pain - maybe the part of you that has given loved ones a hug or held their hand in tough moments.
Imagine now that those same hands of yours that have shown other people kindness can also extend that kindness and comfort to yourself right now. Place your hands on your heart or any other body area that could use some kindness. Connect with your human instinct and wish to be free from suffering and have happiness as you do this.
What To Do Next for Infertility and Mental Health
This is HARD stuff but not impossible! Even if you try ONE of these steps out, that is taking you in a direction to regain control.
To build this skill of accepting, you might also make a habit of accepting smaller inconveniences where you have minimal control. Maybe the next time you are stuck in traffic or a friend lets you down you can try on this 6-step plan.
If you want to build this skill of acceptance further, check out my free 7-minute mindfulness practice for infertility and feeling out of control or Ultimate Guide to Handling Difficult Emotions During Infertility.
AS ALWAYS….
This blog post is not professional counseling or clinical advice. Please speak to a licensed professional if you are in need of support. If you are experiencing a mental health emergency, please call/text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, text HOME to 741741 from anywhere in the US for the National Crisis Text Line, or go to your nearest emergency department for 24/7 assistance.
You are always welcome to explore my infertility counseling services or contact me for a complimentary phone consultation to see if I might be able to support you on your family building journey.
Dr. Marisa Perera, PhD is a reproductive clinical psychologist based in Miami, Florida. She founded Natal Counseling to create a space dedicated to reproductive and perinatal mental health and to help people navigate the unpredictability and stress of building a family.
Photo by Lina Trochez on Unsplash
