Rimma Efimkina - Not pregnant yet? You bet!

Medical specialist would object that today’s medicine does not have any effective ways of treating infertile men. Why do you think this is? Maybe because men are not so dependable and controllable as women are to be experimented on in such a way? Maybe the world-wide-spread discrimination of women reveals itself on this level as well? And maybe it’s high time women came to think of this: if it does not work with this partner, maybe their relationships are the reason? And this is the subject of relationships psychology, where medicine treating people as soulless bodies is powerless. This is why, Olunja, neither insemination, nor hysterosalpingography, nor laparoscopy bring any results.

But let’s go back to the “male factor”. I repeatedly spoke to healthy women whose husbands were incapable of fertilizing. One of my psychotherapy group members liked to sigh over the fact how she just loved children, but when I asked her directly why didn’t she have any, she got embarrassed and didn’t say a word. She came to me during a brake and whispered to my ear: “My husband just can’t…” I knew that she was filthy rich, but she didn’t not work. So I suggested that she is kept by his side not only by emotional, but also by financial ties and fear to step outside her comfort zone.

The other participant of my psychosomatic workshop, whose hair fell out after IVF procedure, said bitterly that she did not to go through with it for the fifth time, because after the forthcoming procedure there was a greater risk of cancer. I asked her why she even discusses the possibility of yet another try, she said that otherwise she would have a conflict with her husband who cannot fertilize her in an ordinary way because of his low sperm motility. Her husband insisted on having a baby, and she was afraid that if she refused to go through the dangerous and damaging procedure, he would leave her.

Bert Hellinger thinks that if one partner is physically unable to have children he does not have a right to keep their partner at their side. If they do stay, the other one should treat this decision exceptionally respectfully. This is very important. It is only in this case that everything is clear and consolidated between them 14 14 Bert Hellinger, The Art and Practice of Family Constellations . . I fully agree with him. Respect instead of threats, willing consent instead of fear – do you feel the difference?

Unfortunately, women often do not realize they fear their husbands, because they mistake their fear for love. But love lives where there is order, and to make this happen partners should discuss the details of the situation they are in, share their feelings. Women more often obey the decisions their husbands take on an ex parte basis. Psychologists call this widely spread fear of one’s husband “love addiction”. It is easily mistaken for love, and that’s sad, because instead of treating the love addiction with psychotherapy, women treat the supposed infertility with surgery.

There is a story of a woman who was afraid to say no to her husband below.

When she came to women’s psychotherapy group, all the other participants had been in for several months and had established trustful relationships. Yana sat with a face of stone, she did not smile, did not laugh at jokes. Her voice did not match her appearance. Despite of the fact she looked her 38 years old, her voice was baby-doll-like with hurt intonations.

The group members were offered to do “advertisement” exercise as a warm-up – they should have taken several items from the box of small toys and come up with an advertisement. Yana chose for her advertisement three little kittens. There also was their mother-cat in the box, but Yana did not notice it. Then, according to instructions, they should have voiced the characters. Yana and the director had the following conversation:

– Now voice the characters in the first person.

– “We are pretty little kittens. Someone, please take us!”

– How does this reminds you of your life.

– I have no idea.

– Maybe it’s not all of your life, just a small aspect of it.

– I don’t know… are you saying that I’m like these kittens? Someone should adopt me? But no! I don’t see any connection.

– Now try to say the same, but using affirmative language form.

– I lose connection…

– The kittens also lost someone with whom they had a connection, whom they were connected to. Who was it?

– I don’t know.

– There is their mother-cat in the box, they were sold together as a set.

– I didn’t see it.

– Maybe they lost HER.

– I don’t know. I would like to finish this exercise.

The director did not insist that she continued, although it was obvious that this dialogue caused strong feelings in Yana, but she, as it was her habit, preferred suppressing them to remain calm at least on the outside. The director reminded her of free-will rule that applied to all group members. This meant, that the participant should decide for themselves whether to continue or not. But if she stopped an exercise, she took the responsibility for the consequences of her choice – i.e. possible psychosomatic issues like headache, for example.

Then it was time for sharing, during which Yana again began saying that it was difficult for her to communicate with others, as she did not understand what they wanted, she took it as an offence and closed up like a spoiled child. The director said to this:

– I would like to point that little girls do not give birth, only grown up women do.

After these words Yana stopped suppressing her feelings and started crying, and then said to the group that she had a dream that she had a baby, but it was strange, it was not clear whether this was a boy or a girl. She had mixed feelings about it: she both loved it and was disgusted with it.

The director told her that a dream is the royal road to the unconscious. She suggested using a method by Fritz Perls, founder of gestalt school, according to which all parts of a dream represent dispersed fragments of one’s personality, so each part of a dream is one aspect of the dreamer’s personality. To integrate each part and become whole it is suggested to voice it in the first person in present tense and end with: “And this is the essence of my existence”.

– Voice this baby from your dream.

– “I’m a newborn, I’m neither a girl or a boy. My mother both loves me and is disgusted by me”.

– How does this remind you of your situation?

Yana pondered for a bit and told that this reminded her of her childhood. Her single mother raised her and her brother all by herself. The brother died when he was young, mother began drinking after his death. Yana lived with her mother and when she was drunk, she was really embarrassed of her in front of her friends and boy-friends. According to her, it was her husband who “saved” her from this unbearable life. Yana talked about this very enthusiastically and underlined her great gratitude and love for her husband. But at the same time she called sex with him her conjugal duty, unpleasant, but mandatory. Going back to her point, Yana said:

– When my brother died, my mother told me at his funeral “I wish he was alive and you were dead instead!”