Are you trying to be a mother, naturally or through assisted reproduction treatment, and you can’t? Is this difficulty causing you stress? Did you know that high levels of stress and anxiety can reduce your chances of conception?
A high percentage of couples have reproductive difficulties and, in fact, this percentage is increasing year after year. The life habits that you may lead, if you are overweight, if you live in an environment where environmental pollution predominates, if you suffer from some pathologies (both physical and mental)… are just some of the factors that, in particular, could be preventing you from achieving be mom.
I can’t be a mom: when should I start worrying?
Many women panic already from the fifth or sixth month after trying to get pregnant without success. Are you also one of those women who thinks it will take a little while to get pregnant and as the months go by you start to panic? Be careful with your level of expectations because they could play a trick on you.
According to the World Health Organization, infertility is defined as a reproductive disorder that prevents pregnancy after 12 months or more having intimate relations without contraceptive measures. However, many women go to the gynecologist or Assisted Reproduction Units thinking that they have fertility problems already in the sixth or eighth month. Have you ever considered that this simple fact can because you stress, with the consequences that it can have on your reproductive system?
The influence of chronic stress on the reproductive system
The chronic stress that you may suffer, whether due to reproductive problems, after a diagnosis of infertility or due to the rhythm of life you lead, entails a series of manifestations in your body:
Ongoing stress could affect the functioning of your hypothalamus (a gland in the brain that regulates appetite, emotions, and the hormones that signal the ovaries to release eggs). If you are much stressed you may ovulate later in your reproductive cycle, or you may not ovulate at all.
It could also decrease your libido (interest in having relationships) and, therefore, also the probability that you will get pregnant. It is very important to be able to enjoy intimate relationships in order, in part, to achieve the desired pregnancy and foster the union of a couple.
Alterations in the secretion of gonadotropins and catecholamine’s produce negative effects for the implantation of the embryo in your uterus (such as uterine contractions) and in your fallopian tubes (obstructions).
High levels of cortisol (the so-called “stress hormone”) can also make it difficult for you to ovulate or cause very irregular cycles in your reproductive system and therefore make it difficult to conceive.
Also, for implantation to occur, you need to have a good level of estrogen and progesterone. Do you know your blood level of these values? Given a deficit of these values, your reproductive system will not be able to complete the implantation process and pregnancy will not be able to occur even if the egg has been fertilized by a sperm.
If you’re trying to get pregnant and you’re under stress, your cervical fluid can send you a warning signal that something isn’t right. Instead of feeling an increase in flow as ovulation approaches, you may experience days of heavy flow combined with days that are totally dry. It’s like your body is trying to ovulate but stress is continually delaying it.
On many occasions and in response to stress, you will overeat. This fact will increase the number of fat cells in your body and disturb your hormonal balance, which also affects your fertility level.
An added problem in this situation is that, often, you will even be able to deny that you are suffering from stress or you will not be able to identify the situations that cause you stress. Has it happened to you? Do you feel identified with this situation?
Reproductive problems, are they just a physical disorder?
It is not at all solely a physical disorder. In many cases it comes from or derives from mental health problems by not being able, after fertility treatment, to conceive. It tends to occur mainly in the case of women, even if you have previously had children.
One of the factors that will most influence your mental health, after going through an experience of this type, is not the fact of not having managed to become parents, but maintaining the desire for motherhood after the failure of the treatments.
The diagnosis of infertility may imply an emotional imbalance for you and your partner. Each one of you can come to experience it differently, without this implying that one of the two suffers less, you will simply manifest it in a different way.
Reproductive difficulties or going through assisted reproduction cycles usually implies a long and costly road on an emotional, psychological and economic level (if you finally have to go for assisted reproduction treatment in a private center).
On the other hand, the difficulty or impossibility of being a mother or being a parent naturally can cause feelings of shame, guilt, fear and low self-esteem, which can evolve into variable degrees of depression, anxiety, anguish and worse quality of life.
Additionally, fertility treatments are associated with higher levels of psychological distress. If you have to undergo assisted reproductive treatment, you could even run the risk of experiencing a greater number of psychiatric disorders, so it is important to recognize your degree of vulnerability and if you have (or have) risk factors that may contribute to it. Also, it is important to identify and be able to rely on protective factors that will help you live this process in a more optimal and satisfactory way.
What to do so that stress does not affect your fertility?
Frederickson et al. (2015), in a work in which they reviewed 39 studies, pointed out that psychological interventions in couples with infertility problems were effective (especially cognitive-behavioral therapy) to reduce psychological problems, as well as to increase pregnancy rates in women. Those patients who had managed to reduce their anxiety levels.
As we previously mentioned, some personality traits can be considered protective factors for the risk of suffering from anxiety or depression; such as, for example, optimism, the search for problem solutions, social support (from your partner, your family, your friends, etc.), and the strategies for accepting the situation. If you carry out an active confrontation (and look for information to find solutions) and/or manage to attribute a positive meaning to this situation, you will be able to adapt better to this situation.
For this reason, perinatal psychology, specialized in reproductive difficulties, aims to help you achieve your goals with the least possible psychological impact, achieving an adequate level of emotional well-being while you travel this difficult path. In addition, with this therapy, your level of discomfort will decrease by teaching you to manage the negative emotions that may arise throughout the process, helping you to improve your intimate and partner relationships, and improving the ability to adapt to the different stages of treatment.
