How does it feel to watch your dreams fade away? It’s never a good feeling, but what if those dreams involve how many children to have or when to walk away and end your journey to conceive a child? Somehow, this dream cuts deeper than other dreams that may go unfulfilled in your life.
Dr. Maria Rothenburger is a fertility therapist and coach who has been through infertility challenges. Her doctoral research focused on post-traumatic growth as opposed to PTSD. Though she still practices as a psychotherapist, her passion has become fertility coaching, as she uses a four-pronged approach for movement toward optimal fertility.
Episode Highlights:
- How she and her husband tried for more than 6 years, going through deep depression, anxiety, and intense marriage struggles
- Why they decided the process wasn’t worth the pain and decided to be child-free until changing their minds to pursue adoption
- What post-traumatic growth is and how you can recognize it
- Why Maria is passionate about growth and uses it in coaching
- What is involved in the question: Can we have more children?
- Questions to consider if you are wondering if “this journey needs to end”:
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- Do the negatives of trying to conceive outweigh the positives?
- Do the positives of stopping outweigh the negatives?
- Are you “talking the talk” but not “walking the walk”?
- Do you spend time obsessing about trying to conceive instead of living life?
- Do you live in a way that isn’t in line with your personality, values, and beliefs?
- Do you feel resentful of the time and energy it takes to try to conceive?
- Do you have a loss of creativity and curiosity around family-building options?
- Do you have a feeling of dread around actually getting pregnant?
- The judgment around your gratefulness, happiness, and positivity for every single moment
- The acceptance piece and how it brings a healthy response
- Recognizing the feelings and making the decision to stop
- Realizing you can grow your life in other ways if you choose not to grow your family
- How pain and grief can be the impetus for finding joy and gratefulness
- Maria’s year-long plan for healing her marriage and finding peace
- Maria’s advice to listenters: “Letting go does NOT mean giving up”
- The fear and desperation that works against you in creating fertility
- How and why we withhold joy and pleasure from ourselves
- Re-train your brain to grow new neurotransmitters and synapses
- Final words of hope: “Pay INTENTION about listening to yourself and trusting yourself. You already know what to do next, and you just have to tune into it.”
Resources:
www.drmariarothenburger.com
Find Dr. Maria on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter
Pregnancy Brain by Parijat Deshpande
