by Tara Shafer posted in Mom Stories

There are many hidden traumas associated with building a family, as we remember particularly this National Infertility Awareness Week. For 1 in 8 couples coping with fertility challenges the road to parenthood is painful and uncertain.
Many women of child-bearing age who are coping with infertility describe a feeling of isolation. Efforts to conceive can be become increasingly stressful as months go by and conception does not naturally occur.
Among those women facing fertility challenges are those coping with secondary infertility. This applies to women who have previously conceived without apparent difficulty, but who are unable to conceive again.
Women coping with secondary infertility often feel left behind. Because they had previously conceived without difficulty, they understood this to be their norm. The emergent fertility struggle may blindside. They work to come to terms with this altered reality in the present, as well as plans for the future. In a telephone interview with BabyCenter, Dr. Julie Bindeman, Psy-D, an expert on maternal mental health said:
?Because a woman has one child, she has friends in the same place. Friendships grow up between women and their children. When these friends get pregnant and she does not, there is a sense of isolation, of feeling left behind.?
In addition, women who are experiencing secondary infertility tend to have their pain and concern inadvertently minimized. They are reminded that they do h...