Struggling to conceive and feeling angry at all the dumb things people say? Read this.
Do you feel angry when someone says “Just relax and it will happen!” ?
Or jealous when someone close to you falls pregnant?
Or maybe you feel extreme rage when someone says “It will happen when it’s meant to…”?
If you feel like you’ve been on an emotional rollercoaster since you started trying to conceive than this post (or video) is for you.
What to do when you’re emotionally triggered when struggling to conceive
Take a breath
When you find yourself being emotionally triggered by someone close to you, the first thing I want you to do is take a deep breath. In the space that this breath creates for you, it’s important to realise that your emotional reaction is about YOU not THEM.
Most people who say hurtful things along their journey don’t actually mean to hurt you. In many cases, they simply don’t have the experience to understand why what they said is insensitive.
It doesn’t mean they are horrible people.
It doesn’t mean they don’t care for you.
It doesn’t mean anything other than they don’t understand.
Give them some grace. Take a breath and let yourself feel the emotion without taking your reaction out on them.
Get curious
Negative emotions get a bad rap. Not only is it shit to be feeling them in the first place, we go and lump some guilt on ourselves for experiencing them at all. As if we’re not meant to feel anything other than positive, ever!
Instead, I want to encourage you to just allow yourself to feel and get curious about why you feel it.
If you happen to wake up angry one day, just notice… “Oh… I’m feeling angry. I wonder what that’s about.” This feels so much different than thinking “Arrrggg. Why am I so cranky? Why can’t I pull myself together? What’s wrong with me?!” Stop wasting your energy beating yourself up for how you feel and just let yourself feel all of it.
Give yourself space to process your feelings
We assume that we have to deny our negative emotions or they will take over, but actually the opposite is often true. When we deny our feelings, they tend to pop up at the most inopportune times and are often directed at the wrong people (IE. being massively triggered by something someone says to you).
If you’re feeling like you’re triggered all the time, I want you to start making space in your day to just experience how you feel. Without distraction. Without judgement. Just sit and feel all of it. The good. The bad. And the ugly.
Obviously (as a yoga teacher) I’m going to recommend yoga and meditation as practices to help you do this, but they are certainly not the only way. Journalling can be helpful. Or working on something mindless (like knitting) without distraction. Or even just drinking a cup of tea in the sunshine. Choose something that will allow your brain to get quiet so that you can notice how your body feels.
I should also be honest with you at this point. It often doesn’t feel good to feel our feelings. Especially if for so long we’ve run from our negative emotions. There might a lot of stuff buried in there that you’ll need to feel to let go of – stuff that you’d probably rather not experience again.
But let me assure you, you’re going to feel so much better once you’ve let it go. You’ll feel lighter. You’ll have more energy for life (instead of needing to use all your energy to carry all those buried emotions). Best of all, you’ll be less snappy and triggered by everything and everyone around you.
You’ll be able to find some calm in this storm, which makes the struggle of trying to conceive a whole lot more bearable.
If you’d like some yoga and meditation practices to help you deal with the stress and negative emotions on this journey, start by downloading my free fertility yoga guide.