Earlier this month (September 2026), I ran In the Waiting, a creative therapeutic workshop for people navigating infertility, fertility treatment, IVF and pregnancy loss.
It was a small, intimate group, which felt right for the kind of space I wanted to create.
Although everyone in the room had been affected by infertility, nobody’s experience was exactly the same. People were at different stages, carrying different histories and facing different kinds of uncertainty. But there were threads that connected us.
One of those was waiting.
Waiting between appointments. Waiting for results. Waiting for treatment. Waiting for your body. Waiting to know what happens next.
And while you’re waiting, the rest of life doesn’t conveniently stop.
There are friendships to navigate. Other people’s pregnancies and announcements. Work. Relationships. Medical appointments. Decisions. Hope. Disappointment. The strange experience of watching other people’s lives appear to move forward while yours can feel suspended.
Making Room for the Things We’re Not Supposed to Say
Something I wanted In the Waiting to make space for was what I think of as the shadow side of infertility.
The thoughts and feelings that can be difficult to admit to other people, and sometimes even to ourselves.
Jealousy. Anger. Resentment. Bitterness. Fear. The desire to avoid people you love. Feeling unable to celebrate someone else’s good news. Feeling disconnected from your body. Wanting to hope while also wanting to protect yourself from hoping too much.
These feelings can sit alongside love, generosity, gratitude and genuine happiness for other people. Human beings are complicated enough to hold contradictory feelings at the same time.
What became important in the workshop wasn’t trying to make those feelings more acceptable or positive. It was having somewhere they could exist without judgement.
The group talked and reflected, but we didn’t rely solely on words. We used images, objects and art materials to explore how infertility can reach into different parts of life, including our internal worlds, relationships and the wider systems and expectations surrounding us.
Creativity gave us another language for some of what can be very difficult to articulate.
Creativity Without Needing to Be Creative
There can sometimes be a bit of apprehension when art materials appear in a therapeutic space.
I’m not artistic.
I haven’t done this since school.
What am I supposed to make?
But the point isn’t to make something good.
One of the things that stayed with me from the feedback afterwards was that simply having permission to use art materials again had mattered. For one participant, rediscovering that way of focusing their attention continued beyond the workshop, and they returned to painting afterwards.
I love that because it wasn’t an outcome I’d planned.
The creative process had simply reminded someone of something that was available to them.
Different Stories, Shared Space
Perhaps what struck me most about running In the Waiting was the value of bringing different experiences into the same room without trying to make them the same.
There was space to recognise yourself in somebody else’s experience, but also to have your own experience remain yours.
There was space to speak about the ways infertility can affect friendships and other relationships.
There was space to acknowledge thoughts that might feel too dark, uncomfortable or socially unacceptable to say elsewhere.
And there was space to make something without needing to explain exactly what it meant.
That, for me, is part of what creative therapeutic work can offer.
It doesn’t necessarily provide answers. It doesn’t make the waiting disappear.
Taking In the Waiting Further
I’m hoping to adapt In the Waiting into an online workshop in the future, making the space accessible to people beyond Glasgow and to those who might find attending in person difficult.
I’d also love to hear from organisations, fertility services and others working in this area who might be interested in bringing In the Waiting to their community or exploring ways we could work together.
If you’d be interested in joining a future online workshop, bringing In the Waiting to your organisation, or simply having a conversation about the work, please do get in touch.
I’d be really interested to hear from you.