Abstract
This chapter focuses on coparenting and family dynamics during the transition from infertility to parenthood. Eighty couples who had infertility issues were assessed before they underwent infertility medical treatment. Of these, 29 couples who were successful in becoming pregnant within 1 year were assessed again during pregnancy and after childbirth. We analyzed their family alliance trajectories from the fifth month of pregnancy to the ninth month after birth. Our results revealed three distinct family alliance trajectory groups from pregnancy to the postpartum period: One group showed a decrease in family alliance (average to low pattern, n = 11); a second group remained stable in their family alliance (high stable pattern, n = 11); and a third group showed improvements in their family alliance (low to high pattern, n = 7). Analysis of the pretreatment data revealed no significant group differences in narrative quality, infertility-related stress, and marital satisfaction. Additionally, pretreatment variables did not predict subsequent family alliance trajectories. We provide a case illustration of each family alliance trajectory, in order to illustrate the challenges faced by couples who have experienced infertility and successfully undergone medically assisted procreation.
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This work was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant N° 32003B-111985).
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Darwiche, J., Antonietti, JP., Corboz-Warnery, A. (2021). Family Alliance Trajectories from Infertility to Parenthood. In: Kuersten-Hogan, R., McHale, J.P. (eds) Prenatal Family Dynamics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51988-9_7
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