Sometimes the journey to having a baby looks nothing like you thought it would.
You might have been trying to conceive for months or years. You might be going through fertility tests or IVF, or finding yourself having conversations and making decisions you never imagined you would have to make.
You may have experienced a miscarriage or pregnancy loss. Or perhaps you've had to make the incredibly difficult decision to end a pregnancy.
And sometimes you're simply trying to get through all of this while everybody around you seems to be getting pregnant, having babies and carrying on with their lives.
It can be really hard.
One of the difficult things about pregnancy loss is that other people don't always understand the size of what you've lost.
You haven't only lost a pregnancy. You may have already imagined your baby, your due date, your maternity leave, where the cot might go or what Christmas would look like next year. You may have started imagining yourself as a parent to this particular baby.
And then suddenly that future isn't there anymore.
People often don't know what to say. They might try to make things better with comments like “you can try again” or “at least you know you can get pregnant.”
Usually they mean well. But that doesn't necessarily make it hurt any less.
Counselling gives you somewhere you don't have to make your grief easier for somebody else to hear.
You can talk about what happened, what you've lost and what it has meant to you.
And you can take as long as you need to do that.
When you've been trying for a baby for a while, it can start to feel as though your whole life is organised around it.
Dates matter. Cycles matter. Symptoms matter.
There can be tests, appointments, medication and waiting. So much waiting.
And every month can bring that strange mixture of trying not to get your hopes up while, of course, hoping desperately that this will be the month.
It can also be difficult watching other people's lives carry on around you.
Pregnancy announcements can hurt. Baby showers can become something you dread. Even an innocent question like “when are you two going to have children?” can suddenly feel enormous.
You might then feel guilty for feeling that way.
You don't need to feel guilty here.
We can talk about the jealousy, anger, sadness, fear, hope, resentment and exhaustion, including the feelings you think you're not supposed to have.
Fertility treatment can ask an enormous amount of you, both physically and emotionally.
There can be injections, scans, procedures, numbers, embryos, phone calls and decisions. Underneath all of that is something incredibly important to you.
So of course it can feel overwhelming.
You might find yourself analysing every sensation in your body. You might be frightened to hope because you've been disappointed before. Or you might feel under pressure to stay positive because people keep telling you that stress isn't good for you.
You don't have to be positive with me.
You can be hopeful one week and completely fed up the next.
Both are allowed.
Something I think is really important is remembering that two people can be going through the same fertility journey or pregnancy loss and experience it very differently.
One of you might need to talk about it.
The other might cope by keeping busy or trying to fix things.
One of you might want to try again immediately while the other isn't sure they can face it yet.
That difference can sometimes begin to create distance at exactly the time you most need each other.
It doesn't necessarily mean that one person is grieving more or cares more. You may simply be finding different ways of getting through something painful.
I work with individuals and couples, so we can look at what this experience is doing to you personally, or at what is happening between you.
I'm not going to tell you how you should feel about any of this.
There isn't a correct way to experience fertility difficulties, pregnancy loss or the uncertainty that can come with trying to have a baby.
What I can offer is somewhere you can talk honestly.
We can look at the grief. The waiting. The fear about what happens next. How you feel about your body. What it has done to your relationship. The decisions you're facing. Or the fact that you're simply exhausted by thinking about it all.
And you don't need to turn up with a neat explanation of what's wrong or what you want from counselling.
We can work that out together.
Sometimes you just need somewhere you can say what this has actually been like for you.
That's a perfectly good place for us to start.
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