Parenthood is said to be a developmental stage in the lifecycle for women and for men, but non-parenthood is also a developmental stage involving creativity and generativity. The author explores the societal attitudes and expectations and individual conscious and unconscious motivations which determine a couple's fertility intentions. She reviews the existing literature. Grateful to have received a couple's permission, she gives five clinical vignettes from their couple psychoanalytic therapy process to illustrate how a couple can work from totally opposite positions towards a shared decision about parenthood and non-parenthood. She concludes by contemplating the couple therapist's role in relation to rapidly evolving changes in reproductive choice in the future social context.