Pro-Actively waiting for the BFP to arrive

Fertility treatments can be very stressful because so much is at stake. As we realize that we might need to get pregnant with the help of treatments, we tend to think that something is wrong with us. The word “broken” often comes to mind and we get to feel very low about our abilities to achieve our life dream goal.

As a Coach and as someone who went through many years of infertility treatments, I know how important it is to stay inspired and positive through the process. We have no control over this process and when it will result in a positive pregnancy. This puts us in a position of waiting. How can we pro-actively wait? With the right tools we can turn this time to be one of extreme value to our personal growth. These tools can also help in the way we “show up” for our partners and future kids in our day-to-day life.

Here are some points on how to Pro-Actively wait during the time of infertility treatments and/or while waiting for adoption or a Gestational Carrier/Surrogate:

• Getting rid of obsessive thinking: How best to define an obsessive thought? Obsessive thoughts are those, which keep repeating in our mind and usually have NO answer. Typically they sound like … When will I…? What will happen if…? Maybe they will say that…. Will this cycle work? When will we get pregnant? And many more…. The common denominator to all these questions is that they all have ‘No answer’ which is why we keep obsessing over them again and again. These thoughts are never supportive or productive. They never get us to a happier place or give us a positive outlook on our life. When experiencing these thoughts I find that we should challenge ourselves to ask them no more than two times. If by then we don’t have an answer, we categorize them as ‘Obsessive Thoughts’ and work on pushing them away any time they come up.

• Observing our thoughts about “Why?” Entering infertility treatments we are exposed to lots of new information about the process and “Baby Making”. We suddenly know much more than we were ever intended to know about our bodies and this at times can be very confusing and raise lots of e­­motions. I remember spending lots of time trying to learn and figure out why things are the way they are. I wanted to know it all, understand it all and was busy asking lots of questions. The biggest insight I can share with you after all these years is; that the WHY of it, is very interesting yet – it never empower us to change, usually it actually does the opposite. We get overwhelmed and stressed, which is never supportive to our well being during this process.
• Lacking Control: Lack of control is a big factor in infertility treatments. We are use to things going the way we expect them to, when we do our best. In this chapter of our life we are never promised the desired outcome. We put baby making at the top of our agenda, we do everything we are told; yet we still experience a lack of control when it comes to the result. Being without control can be very frustrating and scary, what do we do in order to survive this? We start to control all other aspects of our life, just because we can. These controlling behaviors creep in mostly without us ever realizing. We start to be controlling at work, with our partners, with our family and soon we will see that these relationships start to suffer and be pressured in some ways. A better way is to just allow this process to be and accept ourselves with the lack of control that comes with it. Easier said than done. Yet if we just acknowledge to ourselves the times we get controlling, we will have an easier time letting go, when these behaviors come up.
• Being here now: We often hear people speak about the power of being in the NOW. I really believe in it, as a powerful method of cooping with stress and uncertainty. How do we stay in the now? First things first, we don’t “think” ourselves into the NOW, we try to take action that will put us in a place where we are just present and not thinking about the past or the future… For each of us this action can be different and can change from time to time. For me I found a few things that do the trick: swimming, singing, and photography, all of these things keep me really energized and allow me to forget the worries of the day. What can these actions be for you? Try doing them as much as possible and you will create great energy for yourself and those around you. Practicing being here and now in all areas of our life will create lots of positive shifts and is worth the practice.
• Surrendering: I bet this sounds weird. It might at first. When I talk about surrender I talk about acceptance. Acceptance of how things are, how long they take, etc. When we surrender, we give up control, or at least thoughts of control. When we give up and know that things will happen when they need to, we take away the need to fight, we give up being a victim of infertility treatments and by accepting this new reality we can start to think how we can get the best out of it. When I was faced with the need to terminate a pregnancy in week 17, I had to surrender to this new reality. It was far from being easy, but it allowed me to learn more about myself, my strength, and my ability to put all my needs and wants aside and accept that this dream wasn’t happening when I thought it was. It allowed me to come out the other side a stronger woman and see myself in a whole new light. Surrender is hard, yet it means that we stopped fighting. As a result our brain isn’t busy fighting and obsessing, it can be open to new ways of thinking, new insights and new ideas on what will work best for us.
• Creating Affirmations: In an older blog I wrote about creating affirmations. I truly believe that practicing these positive thoughts instead of spending time in the “Victimhood”, as I call it, can shift our thinking in the long run into choosing positivity in a more auto pilot type thinking. It re-wires our old way of thinking to new ones that are more productive for us.
• Checking the expiration Dates: Most of us spend time stressing and being fearful of things we have feared for many years. They show up in different ways, but the experience is the same. We get scared and shut down. I want to suggest that we check the expiration dates on our fears; I bet some of them are long expired. They had their time and place many years ago, or even a year ago, but they have expired and we didn’t pay attention. Please take a personal inventory of your fears and see which are of relevance and which you can let go of. One more thing to check when we look at our fears is, “who owns them”? Is this a fear that you own, or one that someone else told you about and now you took on and are spending your time being afraid of too? We tend to take other people’s fears and adopt them to become our own. When you can identify and let go of these, you can help yourself to be less fear based about the whole process.
• Helping Others: One more aspect that always helps is our ability to step out of our issues and go help someone else. Service is a great way to feel better by just being there for someone else when they are in need.

I hope some of these points are things you can relate to and you can challenge yourself to think differently about. Feel free to share your experiences, with re-wiring your thoughts and proactively waiting, in the comments section of this post.