I decided to start seeing a therapist again to navigate through my feelings around this seemingly endless fertility journey we have been on. My support network is decent, but I figured I could use an impartial third party to talk to who doesn’t actually know me. Lucky for me, my company actually offers 10 covered therapy sessions through a program/app called Modern Health, so I don’t have to worry about any out of pocket costs until then.
We spoke for an hour today for the first session, and I knew she was going to be a good fit for me when she distilled down the things she thinks I am grappling with at a high level:
- Lack of control: it frustrates me when I feel like I have ZERO control over a situation and I start spiraling downward. This is also why I hate confrontation (despite what my passive friends say); in confrontation, you have no idea (and no control) over how the person you are confronting will respond.
- “All or nothing” mentality: You are either going to be completely successful or a total failure. Hence… you have five mature eggs… who knows if they will all make it or all die by Day 5?
- Negative thoughts tend to overtake any potential positive thoughts, and I always immediately jump to the worst case scenario: why does this keep happening, and how can we combat it to find more balance? I know at a high level why I do this; it’s like a defense mechanism. But why is it my ‘default’?
I love talking to therapists. I feel like I have even more respect for them after having read Maybe You Should Talk to Someone.