The decision to stop fertility treatment hits us all in the pursuit of a baby. Whether it is driven by finances, energy, or getting pregnant, you’ll need to make a decision at some point about moving forward.

“Should I keep going, or should I stop trying altogether?” is the most common question that comes up. Accepting infertility as the end of the road or continuing to pursue motherhood are big decisions. But how do you know if you’ve made the right decision or if you are just giving up on your dream of having a baby? Here is a helpful way you can know for sure if you are or not.

If you give up on your dream of motherhood, you decide not to continue to pursue it, even though you still could. At this point you have stopped believing that you will ever achieve your goal at all. Giving up usually feels negative and rushed. We usually choose to give up because of the temporary relief it offers us from those negative feelings. But in the long therm, giving up still feels negative.

However, when you have no control over some part of your infertility experience, acceptance is an appropriate path to take. You can accept your infertility diagnosis and still pursue motherhood. Accepting something you have no control over requires your active participation and effort. Giving up on your dream is a passive alternative. Both are okay, but always recognize which you are doing.

The best way to know which path you are on is to take stock of what you are telling yourself. If you have thoughts like:

• I just don’t want to work on this anymore.
• I just can’t do this anymore.
• This is no longer possible.
• This is too hard.

Mostly likely you are harboring some amount of resistance to moving forward. To release that resistance you may quit to feel the relief, and thus give up on the process. Too often we give up on the things we are pursuing and call it acceptance so that we don’t have to feel the negative emotion that comes with it. More often than not we give up too early before seeing any meaningful change occur.

Instead of giving up, accept what you can’t change in this immediate moment and then go ahead and decide what you want to change in the future. You may be in the space of accepting that this IVF cycle didn’t work and then deciding to make lifestyle changes to improve your fertility in the future.

When you are in the space of acceptance you think “I can accept and I want to
accept that getting pregnant is something that I can’t control.” Instead of thinking, “I have
given up on getting pregnant because I don’t want to work on it anymore.” Know where your motivation is coming from and what perspective you are taking. If you are uncertain with where you are at, check in with how you are feeling. Negative emotions usually follow giving up.

Are you facing the decision on what to do next and struggling with it? Book a free strategy session with me and let me help you in your process.