Feeling heard, supported and like someone really gets how you are feeling makes the world of difference

Ways we can work together to support your Fertility Journey & your path to and through parenthood.

A fertility Journey can be incredibly lonely, isolating, overwhelming and can impact how we feel in ways we never expected. It can also spill over and start to impact our relationships and how we feel about ourselves and how we connect with others. When we don't have space to process what has being going on for us, that impact, along with the grief and trauma gets carried over into pregnancy and in some cases on into parenthood.

There are many of us too, that find ourselves in a situation where we are trying to reparent ourselves, we are still parenting our own parents and now are looking at trying to hold space for our child and feel immense pressure and place great expectations on ourselves and on our parenting ability and we are trying so desperately not to 'get it wrong'.

That is a lot of pressure to be carrying around internally and on our own. It is something I did not see coming, and added to my anxiety and to the sense of overwhelm and 'failing'.

This is something that we do not talk about enough and creating space to do so makes the world of difference. I have seen it for myself and with the clients that I work with.

I have been supporting individuals, as they navigate their fertility journey, for almost 3 years now, and as mentioned previously my approach is very much person centred. I love the feedback and the suggestions with regards to support from those I have worked with. As we begin a new year I am gathering all of the feed back and suggestions along with my own insight from conversations and what is really working for and making a difference for people to create support methods and packages to suit those needs.

I will be sharing those over the coming weeks.

There will be ...

Grief and Trauma Support - Talk Therapy/Counselling styles sessions.

These sessions will be suitable for those who are feeling lost, overwhelmed, exhausted and burnt out. Those of you that would like support with grief and to get from a state of overwhelm and feeling lost to a point of neutral. Where you are beginning to feel lighter in your self and like you can breath again. This will create space to process your grief and gain clarity around what you feel ready to do next.

When we are in the thick of grief and trauma we are not in a place to make big decisions, to make great life changes, to take great action. Very often we are just about keeping it together and there is no mental, emotional or indeed physical capacity to take that on. We instead need space to stop, to breathe, to allow time for the grief, to understand what is going on for us and space to feel heard, understood, held and supported.

This is something I know for myself and that I see through feedback from those I support. The sessions and packages will be tailored to suit this stage. It will be suitable for those currently navigating both reproductive and perinatal grief, loss an trauma.

There will also be Fertility, Pregnancy and Parenthood Coaching Sessions

These sessions will be tailored towards those of you that have done a lot of the grief and trauma work. Who now feel ready to move from coping or striving to thriving. To get compassionately curious around what has been going on for you. For those of you that feel ready to start to take action and accountability for what comes next for you. Whether that is taking a break to focus on you for a while, or exploring coping mechanisms and self care stratagies before you head into another cycle or indeed if it is deciding to end your fertility journey and what comes next for you.

I will be explaining the difference between the Grief/Trauma - Support Counselling style sessions and Coaching sessions. This will help give you an understanding of both and help in deciding what feels right for you. I always arrange for a phone call before sessions to help with clarifying this too. A lot of the time we don't know what we need and a frank and honest conversation, where we get to say out loud what is going on and what we are able for right now, very quickly helps make that decision for us.

Everyone's journey is different, because everyone is different. We have developed ways of coping, reacting and responding to things that come our way in life, in particular difficult things. How we handle those, looks and feels different for everyone. I feel is it so important to acknowledge that and to create support that meets that and the different stages for people.

Watch this space over the coming weeks as I update you here and indeed on Instagram @fertilitywellbeingireland. Looking forward to connecting with you all. Much love. Dara xxx