Grief is not just saved for people we have lost. Grief is what we feel for someone or something we’ve not had.

There’s a hole, a gap, a feeling like there’s something missing. You can feel grief when you see a woman walking down the street with a baby because it reminds you that you are not a mother yet.

You can feel grief when you get your period because another month has gone by and another chance to make a baby.

Each time you get your period, it opens up the wound of grief and sits heavy in your heart. You can spend all month picking yourself back up, getting positive and feeling hopeful, only to get your period again and go right back to grieving for the baby you’ve not yet made.

It’s so painful to be in this place. Month after month to feel the pain of being childless.

I get this feeling. I know grief too well. The grief of those I’ve loved and the grief of those I’ve never known. I grieved when I thought I was losing my first baby. I started bleeding and thought I was having a miscarriage at 10 weeks.

When I feel grief I give myself a lot of space. I give myself permission to be fully sad for a time and then I breathe and transform the emotion.

One of the biggest recommendations I have for you is to allow yourself to fully feel whatever you’re feeling. Grief reveals itself in different ways. Here is how to do it:

Sadness

• If the grief comes out as sadness then you might feel unmotivated, listless and need to cry. Give yourself a night off being perfect. Allow the rebel you to be in charge for one night. Drink a glass of good red wine, have a hot bath, hang out in your PJs and watch a movie.

• Give yourself permission to feel sad, to cry and do whatever you want. If you pretend it doesn’t matter, ignore it and push the sadness down, then it will still be there.

• Sadness not expressed will hang around in your heart and stop you from feeling happy. Better to let yourself fully feel sad for one night, so that you can clear it and find joy in the rest of the month.

Anger

• If the grief comes out as irritability, frustration and anger then you’ll need to move and do something physical. You might want to run, dance, scream or punch (a cushion!).

• This kind of energy needs to come up and out. Much better to do it when you feel it.

• Anger that is not expressed can seep out as irritability later and it can affect your relationships. Anger that is suppressed comes out in your body in physical ways such as period pains, inflammation, heat, stiff muscles and headaches.

Transformation

• After you’ve given yourself space and fully allowed yourself to be sad or angry take yourself to the next stage. Use your emotions to help fuel you to achieve what you want.

• Emotions are energy and you can transform the uncomfortable ones to give you the motivation, energy and passion to keep trying for your baby.

Find a way to reframe your thoughts and use your grief to fuel your determination to improve your fertility and get pregnant.