Aligning with your partner around issues in pregnancy and childbirth - Decision making

Sep 22, 2026

A moderated discussion with four Chicago-area maternity-care providers focuses on aligning decision-making between partners during pregnancy and childbirth. Experts describe common disagreement areas, including who attends the birth, the role of extended family and cultural expectations, birth location and type, and choices such as circumcision. Doulas and therapists also highlight partner support dynamics and how unspoken emotional needs can lead to resentment if not addressed before birth.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryLetters

FormatPDF

Pages13

Reading Time5 min

AccessFree to download

Alignment and decision making

Typical disagreement areas

Birth location and support roles

Emotional support and unspoken expectations

Anne Nicholson Weber (00:00) : Today I'm talking to four Chicago area providers who work with expectant couples. Two of them are therapists, two of them are very experienced doulas. They are Suma Karandikar, who is the owner of thepracƟce, Thrive Postpartum Couples and Family. She's a licensed clinical professional counselor, a couples counselor, a cerƟﬁed GoƩman therapist, and also a cerƟﬁed perinatal mental health specialist. Michelle Schaefer is a partner at Cherry Hill Counseling. She's a licensed clinical professional counselor with a perinatal mental health cerƟﬁcaƟon, and she is also trained in EMDR and in emoƟonally focused therapy. Megan Trinter is a birth doula and childbirth educator with Birthways and has aƩended over 600 births. She's also a cerƟﬁed professional midwife. And ﬁnally, Tara Van Dyke is a birth doula and childbirth educator with Family First Birth Services, who has aƩended over 400 births and with her husband, who's a marriage and family therapist, she hosts a relaƟonship-centered podcast called With You, leƩer U. Welcome to the four of you. I'm so excited to talk about the topic for today, which is aligning with your partner around issues in pregnancy and childbirth, and parƟcularly focusing on decision making. So I think we could just dive in. Maybe Michelle, you could just talk about some typical areas of disagreement that you see between partners around this topic of decision making and pregnancy and childbirth. Michelle Schaefer (01:33) : Yeah, so, you know, the decision making process can vary dramaƟcally. People oŌenƟmes come in with diﬀerent values, diﬀerent cultural experiences, diﬀerent family concerns. And so some areas of conﬂict that I have talked through and, and worked with are from decisions about like who will be present at the birth. That's a big one. That shows up oŌen when there's a liƩle bit of a mixed cross-cultural dynamic between partners where maybe one partner comes from a family culture or an ethnicity where family is expected to be very included in the birthing experience. And then, you know, maybe one partner is like, no, it's just you and me doing this thing together. And so that can be an area that becomes very sensiƟve because whenever you're talking about family and history and values where those things intersect or are maybe in conﬂict or intenƟon, that can be diﬃcult. And then other sort of current somewhat charged topics like, you know, whether or not we're going to circumcise our baby, you know, things like that where there can be deeply rooted tradiƟons and, and family values. Those would be some examples. But I know that the doulas will have many more to add to that story as well, because, you know, they're really in it. We're sort of talking about it outside the context, but they're on the front lines of it, so, Anne Nicholson Weber (03:07) : Well, I, I agree with that. So maybe, Tara, what would you say are some of the topics that can be diﬃcult to navigate as a couple? Tara Van Dyke (03:15) : Yeah, so as birth doulas, we start working with clients as soon as they hire us and talking very, you know, speciﬁcally focused on their birth choices. So we go directly to that. And I'd say the top things that I, that come to my mind that someƟmes cause conﬂict are someƟmes just the birth locaƟon or type of birth. So, you know, one partner might want to have a home birth and the other feels that's unsafe. And so they have to come to agreement on that. And the other is, like Michelle said, has a lot to do with extended family and people--who's going to be involved in the birth and how, and who's communicaƟng with, you know, the grandparents to be and all of that stuﬀ. So those are the biggest ones. And then maybe a third one would be how the partner support is going to look. So how involved the partner's going to be with supporƟng the person giving birth and what they, what they, how they both view that and how they, what they want from each other.

FAQs

What are common areas of disagreement between partners during pregnancy and childbirth decision making?

Providers commonly see conflict about who will be present at the birth, the involvement of extended family, cultural traditions and values, and medically or personally significant choices such as circumcision.

How do birth doulas describe topics that couples find difficult to navigate?

They often focus on birth location and type, who is involved in the birth, and how partner support is expected to look during the pregnancy and labor.

Why can lack of emotional support become a problem later?

One therapist notes that resentment or hurt can develop after birth when emotional support needs during pregnancy were not discussed clearly, so couples benefit from talking about expectations and values beforehand.

Sep 22, 2026

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