Parenthood Support Therapy in Chicago, Illinois

Parenthood Support

When parenting does not feel the way you thought it would.
Just the ongoing, exhausting work of doing everything and wondering what went wrong in the process.

Start Feeling Like Yourself Again

There is no right way to feel in parenthood. Therapy can support you at any stage, including when you are:

  • Flat lay of baby essentials, symbolizing the early stages of parenthood and the emotional weight that can come with starting a family.

    Wondering If Parenthood Is Right for You

    You may feel unsure about having children or be navigating fertility questions, external pressure, or uncertainty about what a future with kids could look like. Therapy offers space to explore these questions with honesty, clarity, and care.

    This work often overlaps with Individual Therapy and Perinatal Therapy when identity, grief, or medical complexity are part of the experience.

  • Smiling parents sitting with their baby at home, reflecting the emotional connection and complexity of early parenthood.

    New to This Role

    You may be postpartum and barely recognize yourself. You may be adjusting to adoption or another major identity shift. Whether this season feels joyful, ambivalent, or overwhelming, your experience is valid and worth attention.

    Therapy helps you make sense of emotional changes without rushing you to feel grateful or put together.

  • Trying to Hold It All Together

    You are doing everything for everyone and losing sight of yourself in the process. From mental load burnout to emotional disconnection, therapy helps you reconnect with what matters and who you are outside of being the dependable one.

    This support often complements Couples Therapy when caregiving roles or expectations are creating strain.

  • Multiple hands placed on a person's stomach, forming a heart shape.

    Parenting Through Complexity

    You may be navigating a nontraditional path such as fertility treatments, surrogacy, step-parenting, or parenting while carrying unresolved trauma. We offer therapy that honors complexity and creates room for your full story.

Close-up of a baby's legs and feet lying on a bed with a beige sheet, dressed in brown pants and an oversized brown shirt, with a pacifier clip to the right.

What We Help With

Parenthood can begin to feel like constant crisis management instead of connection. You are always scanning for what could go wrong, carrying responsibility, and wondering whether you are doing enough even when you are doing everything.

We support clients who are navigating:

  • Postpartum anxiety and high-functioning hypervigilance

  • Intrusive thoughts, fear-based decision making, and emotional overload

  • Mental load and emotional labor that make rest feel impossible

  • Guilt around asking for help or needing space

  • Identity loss after becoming a parent

  • Relationship strain tied to caregiving roles and expectations

  • Ambivalence about becoming a parent

  • Parenting with a partner who is not aligned

  • Fertility challenges, grief around parenting, or nontraditional family paths

At Hearten Therapy, parenthood support meets you in the middle of the chaos, when caregiving feels relentless, identity feels blurred, and rest feels out of reach. Even when no one else sees the cracks, we are here for what it is costing you to hold everything together.

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A line drawing of a tangled, scribbled shape on the left side, transitioning into a more structured, brain-like outline on the right side, both on a black background.

How Therapy Helps

This is not checklist-based therapy. It is space to say what you are actually feeling and have it met with understanding rather than judgment.

We help you:

  • Validate what is real. Postpartum anxiety, caregiver burnout, and identity loss are real experiences.

  • Separate fear from truth by identifying patterns that keep you stuck in overfunctioning or emotional shutdown.

  • Reclaim your voice by practicing clear communication, redefining roles, and asking for help without guilt.

  • Redistribute mental and emotional labor so everything does not rest on you alone.

You should not have to carry all of this or process it in isolation.

Who We Work With

We work with adults across Illinois who are seeking:

  • Support for parents of all genders, roles, and family structures

  • Inclusive care for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC parents

  • Therapy for new parents navigating postpartum mental health concerns

  • Support for stay-at-home parents, working caregivers, and those balancing both

  • Space to explore parenthood, ambivalence, or fertility questions

  • Help for couples where one partner wants children and the other is unsure

At Hearten Therapy, support for parents and those considering parenthood is relational, inclusive, and attuned to the emotional weight caregiving can carry.

Virtual therapy is available throughout Illinois.

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Meet Our Therapists

Meet Our Therapists

We also offer specialized Perinatal Therapy for those navigating pregnancy, postpartum adjustment, and early parenthood.

Whether you feel overwhelmed, disconnected, uncertain about becoming a parent, or are carrying grief related to fertility, our therapists are trained to support the whole experience, not just symptoms.

Learn more about our clinicians and approach on the Meet Our Therapists page.

Let’s talk about what support could look like for you.

Schedule a Consultation