Welcome to IVF This, episode 63- It’s different for our partners

Hello, hello, hello my beautiful friends

I hope you’re all doing well! 

Today’s episode is going to be a bit different than my usual format. I will get back to talking about coaching concepts next week but this topic has been on my heart for a while and so I wanted to share it with you all. 

It’s going to be more of a pep-talk, or a quick hit to refer back to when you are struggling with your partner. 

I will preface this does not apply if any of the three A’s are present: Abuse, addiction, or adultery. That’s not what this is for, that is not what coaching is for. If your experiencing any of the 3 A’s in your relationship I implore you to seek out some counseling and for you to ensure you’re as physically safe as possible. 

What this episode is for is when you are feeling distant from your partner, or maybe resentful because they don’t seem to be where you are in terms of grief, trauma, or even the emotions they’re experiencing or displaying. 

I have heard countless women talk about how their partner is wonderful and supportive but they don’t really “get it”. This concern that they don’t have the same level of commitment or emotional investment in this process as you. Or that you feel like you cannot connect with them in a way you want to or feel like you “should.”

In the interest of full disclosure, I very much felt that way throughout several parts of our journey. Not the whole time, mind you, but through different seasons. He didn’t take the month to month devastation like I did- in fact, particularly in the early days more often than not he was kind of confounded by how hard it was on me, emotionally. 

My husband was more resistant to the idea of IVF than I was. The high cost without a guarantee scared him- rightfully so. He’s a numbers guy, an economist. Risk vs reward, opportunity costs, and financial stability and freedom have always been in his calculus. And of course, this hyper-logical individual fell in love with a sassy, flight of fancy, spontaneous, outs spoken dreamer. Because of course he would. Oh he’s also legit a foot taller than me, so the whole opposites attract thing REALLY holds true for us, in some of the most wonderful and ridiculous ways- I will have him on the podcast one of these days because I think it would be wonderful and hilarious to share with you all from his perspective what our journey has meant to him. 

But I digress, it is a normal human experience to walk through a difficult challenge and to feel isolated, alone, unsupported, resentful, whatever it is you might be feeling or might have felt. 

Now, that doesn’t mean it is true that you are isolated, alone, or unsupported- right, our feelings are not evidence of some greater truth. They are a byproduct of our thinking. 

One thought that I held onto very tightly was, he just doesn’t understand, he doesn’t get it. 

I waited for him to be in the same place as me with grief, with impatience, with all of it. Standing right in the thick of it with me. I was waiting for him to catch up. 

But really the truth was, he didn’t need to catch up. His experience was different. Not lesser, not superior, but different. He was never going to feel the way I felt because he was not me. He felt his grief in his own way. He felt him impatience in his own way. 

I think in many ways, because I was so heavily seeped in grief, impatience, anger, resentment, self-imposed isolation- I stopped giving him the benefit of the doubt. I stopped giving him room to be him. An opportunity to have and to express a different, sometimes vastly different experience than I was having. This doesn’t mean that I was a terrible person or a terrible wife, or a terrible partner. It means that I am human. I was a human that had never been introduced to coaching and thoughtwork like I am now. 

What I know now is that his lack of lived experience in my body and, thus, his inability o truly understand what it was like for me- was never a bad thing. Love, support, compassion, and empathy can exist without understanding the nuances of what you’re experiencing. They can exist without the same lived experience. And this is true for our partnerships as well as the other relationships in our lives. 

Our partners are having a very unique infertility experience, themselves. They often feel helpless, as they watch us navigate the mental, emotional, and physical toll of infertility. When we can see their experience as different, not right or wrong, we open up to the possibility of and begin the act of holding space for them. 

Now, what does holding space mean? Heather Piett describes it as the willingness to walk along side another person in whatever journey they’re on without judging them, making them feel inadequate, trying to fix them, or trying to impact the outcome. When we hold space for other people, we open our hearts, offer unconditional support, and let go of judgment and control. 

And the beautiful part about holding space for other people? It’s practice for holding space for ourselves, and vice versa. 

Holding space is one of the most beautiful and intimate gifts that you can give yourself and your partner. And that is what I want for each of you. That gift. 

Ok, that is what I have for you this week. Have a beautiful week and I will talk to you soon.