From the author: Based on the results of working with clients on infertility issues, I wanted to write an article and share some stories. For example, what could be stopping me from getting pregnant? And a lot of things can get in the way. Mini stories from real life. At the end of April, I published an article about my work with female and male infertility. In two months, almost forty women contacted me for a free consultation. The purpose of the free consultation was: to get to know us personally; to get acquainted with the situation in the client’s family; to understand what may interfere with the birth of a child; to formulate a request: “What do I ultimately want to get from working with a psychologist?” Of all the women who applied, only three went into therapy . I think these are the women who really want to have children, who want to understand the reason that is hindering them and eliminate it. I was very alarmed by the fact that after conducting 40 free consultations, working for about a week for free, in the end there were only three clients left who were ready to work with themselves. But since the work didn’t work out further, I thought, what could be the reason for what’s next for women didn’t want to work: What stops women from going to therapy and understanding the reasons for their infertility? Disbelief in the positive result of work? Or fear of deception, that I will promise that pregnancy will come, but this will not happen? Or not the desire to invest material resources, your energy , strength to work? Or did they want to solve their long-term problem in one free consultation? Or do they devalue their and my work on this issue in advance? Yes, I know that free psychological assistance cannot be provided. Payment is a prerequisite for psychotherapeutic work; only then the work carried out is valued and produces results. I can imagine that many people wanted to receive a magic recipe in one consultation that would help solve the problem. But that doesn't happen. Our psyche is a multi-layered world, and in order to get to the bottom of the true cause, it may take some time and psychological work with the deep subconscious, which can last several months, or maybe even one or two years. And then, I cannot give any woman a 100% guarantee that pregnancy will definitely occur and a child will be born. A woman’s body prepares for pregnancy every month, and 99% of the results are positive, but 1% still exists. I want to tell you a few stories that I have worked with and, in my opinion, seem to be interesting examples of what can happen and interfere with the birth of a child. “Installation. For example, someone close to you laments the fact that they have children. Without them it would be simpler and easier to live.” Such words can not only be deeply deposited in our psyche, but also influence the prevention of pregnancy. A child is a difficulty, it is an additional expense, living with a child is more difficult because it is a responsibility; in our country there has never been and never will be parental support and stability. After such a conversation, a mechanism may turn on and the psyche will begin to control the body so that pregnancy does not occur. “Or when a woman lives in the city with her husband, and there are no one close. My parents and all my relatives live far away.” “The relationship with my husband is not stable, and maybe he is not a reliable person. And then there’s divorce.” You can get married a second time, but you may never have children, while your ex may have children. And then what happens to the woman? She begins to blame herself. “And then what influences the fact that there are no children in the second marriage: guilt, fears or something else?” “Or maybe a woman does not want children on an unconscious level, because she is afraid that her child may die “The obvious cause of infertility may be the husband’s chemical dependence. The woman will be afraid to give birth to children.” This fear may remain, and pregnancy will not occur either through natural contact or with the help of IVF. Of course, in order to identify the true reason that prevents you from having a child, it is not enough to do one technique and talk. Need deepand long-term work, to understand her fear, what it is connected with, what her life situation is at the moment, how psychologically stable she is now. “Or a mortgage. We bought an apartment with a mortgage. One of the two is studying, and another may lose his job.” The egg may even be fertilized, but the embryo will not be implanted. “Or the couple lives with the girl’s mother. But the girl has no separation from her mother. A mother may consider her daughter a small child, instill in her that she is not able to do anything on her own without her.” And then you need to work on separation from your mother, not only psychological, but sometimes physical separation is required, move to live separately for pregnancy to occur Working with infertile couples, I receive confirmation that if pregnancy does not occur, then often some kind of “skeleton in the closet” emerges in the couple’s relationship. It can be anything. “For example, a man’s addiction to alcohol, drugs.” “Or maybe the husband did not support the woman at a difficult moment, and she was left alone with some of her psychological fears, or during surgery, illness, in a difficult relationship with her parents or with situation at work.” You may have a question, how is it that in their youth many couples get married on the fly and pregnancy occurs without any problems? When there is no stability between a young girl and a guy, both are studying, there is no financial base, and the relationship itself may leave much to be desired, and then suddenly a surprise - she got pregnant. Yes, until the age of 21-22, as long as our head is not connected to our body, pregnancy occurs without problems. 1-2 months of sexual behavior and the girl becomes pregnant, and pregnancy may even occur from a single sexual contact. A woman’s body prepares for pregnancy every month; pregnancy is an absolutely normal process in the female body. Disturbances occur when the psyche intervenes in the work of the body and begins to regulate this process. The task of the psychologist is to bring all repressed events, thanks to which the psyche begins to avoid pregnancy, to a conscious level of the psyche, so that the repressed events and feelings do not affect the work of the body. Here a few more cases from clinical work with women. “A woman and her husband have regular strong conflicts. The husband is constantly in a bad mood and irritated, yells at the client, and is dissatisfied with the way she conducts the household and financial affairs of the family. A woman may have many repressed feelings of anger and resentment towards her husband for treating her this way.” “A common cause is alcoholism, or daily everyday drunkenness. Even when a man can stop drinking alcohol, pregnancy may not occur, or will occur and end early.” “Even when a woman becomes a mother for her mother, she worries excessively about her mother.” “It may be that the mother holds her daughter and does not let go. Or maybe the daughter is holding her mother and won’t let her go. Strong attachment, worries about mom, about her health. And a woman is a mother to her mother, not a daughter.” “Or it may be that the pregnancy does not occur from the husband, but from accidental contact. And the woman has an abortion. And this pregnancy may be the only one.” Why does a woman terminate a long-awaited pregnancy if she wants children, what prevents her from having a child if she really wants a child? There may be an unconscious resistance to having children. If a couple wants to have children, then what’s stopping you from taking a child from an orphanage? Men easily accept the fact that their woman can accidentally become pregnant from another man. They calmly accept the situation and this child. The main thing for a man is that he has heirs. But a woman, on the contrary, has a very hard time accepting the situation when pregnancy occurs not from a regular partner, but from a random one. Or if we talk about IVF, when donor sperm is used. Then a woman has a hard time accepting IVF with donor sperm and a donor egg. If there is some reason why a woman does not want a child or is afraid of having one, not only from the partner with whom she lives, but.