The unique challenges in counseling infertile individuals and couples

Abstract

This current study explored the unique challenges encountered by counselors and the adapted strategies the counselors used when working with infertile individuals and couples. A total of 17 licensed practitioners (psychologists, clinical social workers, clinical professional counselors, and marriage and family therapists), with formal training on infertility counseling and with clinical experience in offering infertility counseling services to infertile clients participated in a semi-structured face-to-face interview. The participants responded to questions regarding their clinical experiences in working with infertile clients, overall challenges in infertility counseling, facilitation of infertile clients' emotional reactions, issues with self-disclosure, experienced ethical dilemmas in infertility counseling, a memorable case, their adapted strategies to resolved the encountered challenges, and etc. The data was analyzed by the utilization of the Consensual Qualitative Research (CQR) methodology (Hills, Thomson, &Williams, 1997; Hills & Williams, 2011). Four major themes regarding counselors' encountered challenges emerged from data analysis, including challenges related to infertility counseling education, challenging clinical issues, ethical concerns in infertility counseling, and the effect of counselors' personal experiences on the counseling process. One theme addressing counselors' strategies was identified, suggesting a need for adapting an interactive, solution-focused, flexible, and integrated approach in order to offer effective services to infertile clients. The results of this study are discussed and recommendations for training, credentialing, practice and future research are provided.