Navigating Reproductive Decision-Making: Grief Counseling in Seattle for Couples in Conflict

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Deciding whether to put the time, effort, energy, and resources into building your family is a monumental decision. Such a decision is highly personal and intimate. This decision becomes harder when you and your partner(s) don’t agree on how to move forward. Each person in the relationship must work on personal and relational exploration, curiosity, and understanding. The goal is to support one another’s values, dreams, and emotional experiences rather than ‘winning.’ The outcome can look different for different families. It may be a decision to suspend family building, re-direct resources to other forms of caregiving, or work to build your family in expected or unexpected ways. The most important thing is that you and your partner(s) feel loved, supported, understood, and united in your relationship.

I’ve worked with many individuals, families, and couples facing the crossroads of deciding whether to attempt to have children, some having earth-side children, and some not. Most of the people I work with have not come to pregnancy or parenthood easily and have either dealt with fertility challenges, health complications, and/or pregnancy loss. The following content is meant for such populations.

Understanding the Emotional Impact of Reproductive Decisions on Couples

The choice of whether to have children is deeply personal. It’s typically related to wider, more complex visions of what you want for your life. Behind the decision to attempt to have children is unique to each individual and can change over time. The choice to attempt to have children is also tied to your relationship to your family of origin, adult relationships, support systems, your relationship to money, legacy, distress tolerance, and dreams. For individuals, couples, and families facing fertility challenges, health complications, and/or pregnancy loss, the cumulative grief, stress, and trauma of previous experiences compounds over time. How you may have felt at the beginning of your journey to parenthood may be extremely different now. If couples aren’t actively discussing these topics in real time, it’s easy to get on different pages, make assumptions, and find yourself engaging in conflict with your partner.

How Grief Counseling in Seattle Supports Couples in Conflict

What’s often missed in the discussion about attempting to have children, is the grief and trauma related to past events. Grief and trauma don’t only come from fertility challenges, health complications, and/or pregnancy loss, but they can also be experienced from interactions in the relationship. Conflict typically ensues when you don’t feel heard or supported. You may have heard the term, ‘hurt people, hurt people.’ It’s true. You are much more likely to lash out at people when you are feeling frustrated, tired, sad, discouraged, or beat down. Before moving forward, you must reflect on the impact of the past and be honest with where you are today. It’s helpful to do a personal inventory of how you are thinking and feeling before speaking to your partner.

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Here are some questions for personal reflection around reproductive decision making:

·      Why do I want to be a parent, or have another child (focus on values and dreams behind this desire)?

·      What would happen if I couldn’t have a (another) child?

·      What fertility/conception/pregnancy experiences have impacted me? In what way?

·      What other life experiences could be contributing to how I’m feeling?

·      What do I need to grieve related to this topic? (Family or origin issues, losses, relationship to body, etc).

·      What excites me the most about building our family?

·      What scares me the most about building our family?

Navigating Disagreement: Tips for Open Communication and Empathy

Before engaging in the discussion of attempting to build your family, it can be helpful to learn, practice, and review basic communication strategies. As an LMFT, we focus on process over content. That means that I want your process of communication set up for success before we bring in the topic of conception, pregnancy, and parenthood.

It’s so easy to go straight to trying to decide. I encourage you to take the time to slow down and build intentionality.

Here’s a general path to follow when facing conflict around reproductive decisions:

1.     Set aside a specific time for you and your partner to discuss family building. Set a timer. This is a form of containment, so it doesn’t take up all of your mental space.

2.     Once you’ve done your own work of identifying thoughts, feelings, beliefs, etc around this topic, you’ll then come back to your partner with curiosity about their experience. You’ll each take turns sharing, listening, and reflecting.

3.     The initial goal is to listen and understand your partner’s position. Don’t judge them or try to influence their opinion. Listen, reflect, and clarity to make sure you’re understanding them completely.

4.     Try your best to not be defensive or blaming. They tend to go hand in hand. ‘I’ statements can be helpful with this.

5.     Share and repair points of pain and disconnection through this process for each person. Take turns sharing and responding. It can be painful to hear the ways you’re hurt your partner, intentionally or not. Try your best to listen without defensiveness and respond in a loving way.

6.     Take a time out if things start to get heated. A proper time out means you both go to different areas for at least 20 minutes and then return after taking time to self soothe. Once you return to an agreed upon space, if you’re still heated, take another time out.

7.     Find commonality in your current perspectives (examples might be: you’re both feeling scared about the future, or you both want to stay in the relationship regardless). It’s easy to focus on the differences, but chances are you have commonalities.

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8.     Get out of all or nothing thinking: Think out of the box of other options. Take perspective. Maybe you wait 6 months and return to the conversation, or maybe you decide to try one more time and then you’re done. It’s easy to get caught in dichotomous thinking, either ‘yes we’ll try’ or ‘no, we won’t’ in regards to conception.

9.     Try a potential resolution on in your mind and set a time on the calendar to return to discuss thoughts, emotions, and more. Continue to prioritize checking in with each other every step of the way.

Finding the Right Grief Counselor in Seattle for Your Unique Journey

The role of stress, grief, and trauma in relationship to reproductive decision making and conflict are often under recognized. It’s not only about the decision, but how you and your partner(s) come to this decision. Ideally, it’s a process of love and respect. At worst, it can build resentment and pain within a family where everyone losses.

If you and your partner(s) are facing reproductive decisions and disagree on how to move forward, don’t hesitate to reach out today. As a grief, anxiety, and medical trauma therapist, I primarily work with individuals and couples facing reproductive and health challenges. Move forward in confidence and love with your family. Schedule a free consultation today.

About the Author: Seattle Therapist, Chelsea Kramer LMFT PMH-C

Chelsea Kramer is a Seattle Therapist who works with individual and families facing grief, anxiety and trauma, with special focus on reproductive and medical mental health.

Learn more about Chelsea’s specialties: grief, anxiety, infertility, pregnancy loss, chronic illness, menopause, medical trauma

Learn more about Chelsea

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