Navigating Pregnancy as a Therapist

The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide with Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy

Navigating Pregnancy as a Therapist

An interview with Emily Sanders, LMFT about how to navigate being a therapist while pregnant. Curt and Katie talk with Emily about when and how to disclose to clients, what it means to integrate the pregnancy into the clinical work, the transference and the richness that is available in the clinical work. We also look at practical, business, and clinical logistics for pregnant therapists (with a couple of thoughts for therapists with pregnant partners).

It’s time to reimagine therapy and what it means to be a therapist. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy talk about how to approach the role of therapist in the modern age.

Interview with Emily Sanders, LMFT

Emily Sanders is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in the state of California who works in a solo private practice in Orange County seeing individuals and couples. Her areas of focus are anxiety, perfectionism, attachment wounds, and relationship issues. In addition to her 8+ years of clinical practice, Emily has taught Human Development and Advanced Counseling at Life Pacific University, speaks for retreats and workshops, and contributed to leadership health and readiness assessment teams. Of all the roles she plays, she most loves being wife to her husband, Michael, of 13 years and mother to their three children Liv, Ellis, and Arlin.

In this episode we talk about:

• The challenges facing therapists when navigating pregnancy
• Whether or not to hide pregnancies as long as you can
• How to integrate the pregnancy into the clinical work
• The fear of bringing your parenting journey into the work
• Navigating client infertility while pregnant
• The individual differences that could impact disclosure, transference and the clinical work
• Considerations for when and how to disclose to each client
• Themes of abandonment that can come up
• Desires that clients can express related to wanting to be your partner or your baby
• The connection clients may feel and what they can witness, the curiosity they can experience
• Assessing the level of self-disclosure
• Seeking the stories related to considerations related to parenting and the parenting journey
• Integrating self into the room as a whole person therapist
• Planning for taking time away from your practice
• The business considerations (including finances)
• Clinical coverage and whether clients return to you after a maternity leave
• Idea for notifying clients when the baby is born
• The importance of looking put together when you return and challenging the notion that you might be fragile
• Transference when you return
• Looking at the timing of how long you can be gone (financial consideration)
• The fear that people will decide on their leave based on financial concerns
• Opportunities afforded when you are going to be out for maternity
• Business considerations to make sure you’ve addressed prior to maternity leave
• The logistics of breast feeding when you return to work
• Considerations when your partner is pregnant
• Logistic versus comfort-seeking questions you can get from clients both before and after pregnancy