Today’s bonus episode guest is Dr. Maria Rothenburger, a psychotherapist who specializes in infertility. If you haven’t already listened to it, she shared her personal infertility story in Episode 18.
Dr. Rothenburger and Heather discuss how to talk about infertility with friends and family:
- Once you decide to have a conversation with friends and family about infertility, what are some good ways to define infertility so they will understand it as a medical condition?
- I’d like to spend the rest of this episode going through possible responses to various scenarios that might happen. The first is when someone says, “When are you going to stop concentrating on your career and start a family?”
- How can you respond when someone complains about their children or pregnancy?
- What about when someone says, “Why don’t you just adopt?”
- How can you respond when someone springs on you, “Guess what? I’m pregnant!”
- What about when someone says, “Just relax. It will happen!”
- How can you respond when someone says, “There are worse things that could happen” or other statements that minimize feelings?
- What about when someone says something along the lines of, “Maybe God doesn’t intend for you to be a mother.”
- How can you respond when someone says, “Why don’t you just try IVF?”
- What about when someone tries to give you sex advice?
- Do you have any final tips or scenarios you’d like to talk about?
BONUS: Check out BONUS 17 for a discount code for some of Dr. Rothenburger’s services.
