The infertility It is the inability to conceive a pregnancy, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), after twelve months of unprotected sexual intercourse. The latest report from the agency indicates that the pathology affects one in six people in the world.
(The taboo of infertility: why Spanish women would not have a treatment at work)
Infertility is not synonymous with sterility. For this reason, many couples who find it difficult to conceive resort to assisted reproductive techniques. In fact, according to advance ABCmore than 8% of children born in 2020 were conceived with any of these treatments.
Now, submitting to one of them implies a swing of emotions that is not handled easily.
“The diagnosis of infertility is one of the most complicated moments in the emotional journey of people who do not naturally manage to have a child. But there are also other especially delicate moments along the way”, said Raquel Urteaga, member of the Standing Committee of the Interest Group for Psychology of the Spanish Fertility Society (SEF), during the meeting ‘Fertility: a journey to explore ‘.
This was organized by the science and technology company Merck within the framework of World Fertility Day, which is celebrated on June 4. During it, the emotional journey of women undergoing assisted reproduction treatment.
(Infertility becomes a ‘pandemic’: it affects one adult in six, according to the WHO)
The actress also participated in this Miriam Giovanelli (1989), who had to resort to this process to conceive and who has recounted, for the first time, how she lived that experience.
an emotional journey
During the meeting, the psychologist Urteaga detailed the stages of the emotional journey and Giovanelli commented on how he experienced them in the first person.
Stage 1. You decide to be a mother. At this stage, illusion and beautiful planning related to motherhood predominate.
“I grew up believing that I could get pregnant at any time,” says actress Miriam Giovanelli.
Stage 2. Doubts and fear arrive. Doubts and fear begin to appear because you cannot get pregnant. These appear especially with menstruation, after joy predominated during ovulation.
Raquel Urteaga pointed out that the SEF recommends seeing a professional for women under 35 after one year trying to get pregnant without contraceptive methods and after six months for those over 35.
Stage 3. The diagnosis of infertility. This is the moment in which the difficulty is found by which the woman does not manage to get pregnant. At this point the woman usually suffers a duel for her own fertility, which is known as reproductive health mourning.
Giovanelli remembers the frustration he felt when he heard about the ovarian reserve and the tests that measure the anti-Müllerian hormone. He thought that if she had been older, she would not have been able to be a mother because they found that she had the ovarian reserve of a 43-year-old woman.
(Do you know what your ovarian reserve is? Find out the term to be able to get pregnant)
Stage 4. Hope and uncertainty mix. It is the moment in which you consider trying assisted fertilization methods.
As the psychologist explained, at a psychological level, several phases usually occur: one goes from shock or initial denial to anger, impotence or frustration. “After this, we negotiate, in some way, with ourselves, with the environment, sometimes with the partner, with the doctor… And what can be done? We are looking for options in most cases, the patients agree to resort to the process to try it,” he says.
Stage 5. Specialized psychological care. This is the stage in which you go to a mental health professional to deal with the situation. Urteaga says that patients usually go when they can’t take it anymore, but they manage to find tools that they didn’t know about.
“Medical help to the patient must include both the physical and the psychological part. Body and mind are one, we cannot be divided. In reproduction treatments, we all focus on the woman because, obviously, she bears all the burden physical and a great emotional burden, but let’s not forget that couples, for those who have them, also suffer, but in a different way and on many occasions they are misunderstood,” he adds.
For his part, Giovanelli comments on the pressure that is added when your environment is filled with pregnant friends and you start to only see carts on the street. Although she did have psychological support during her process and she recognizes herself lucky:
“Even feeling absolutely supported and sustained by my environment, I turned to therapy. I had to learn to go through this process like never before, dedicating physical and mental time to what caused my suffering. Without a doubt, it has been an emotional journey It has given me new tools that I still use today”.
Stage 6. Support and impulse. In this phase, the couple is key and it will also be very beneficial to have the support of friends and family. In addition, the psychologist points out that the treatment should be comprehensive and involve the couple, as we said in previous paragraphs.
Stage 7. The end of a trip full of emotions. After treatment, the goal may or may not have been achieved.
After explaining the stages, Miriam Giovanelli recalled that in her case she tried for a year without success and it was a close friend who encouraged her to have tests to rule out any problem.
“That’s when I heard terms like ovarian reserve y hormone as an antimullerian. At that moment I began to look for information on a subject that I did not know and about which it was very difficult for me to find answers, precisely because of the silence that has existed around infertility,” said the actress.
And he added: “I would like my experience to help release that pressure and allow others to walk the path lighter.”
Precisely to support these women and provide them with information prepared by health professionals, last year Merck launched a complete and unique digital ecosystem called Concibe.
“Information on fertility must begin as soon as possible in order to make correct decisions in the future,” said Paula Rodríguez, director of Merck’s Fertility Unit in Spain.
10 tips
With the aim of providing tools to manage the emotions that patients experience during the assisted reproduction process, Merck and the SEF offer ten tips that can help you walk the path in a lighter way:
- Given the diagnosis, allow yourself to feel the emotions that arise. It is normal to feel very sad, guilty, afraid. Do not plug them because then they will come back stronger.
- Do not lose sight of your goal, focus on what you want to achieve.
- Seek specialized help from the beginning. It will lighten your load and you will live the process in a lighter way.
- Don’t let treatment or infertility become the center of your life, it’s just one area of it.
- Maintain social support. Sometimes it is good to generate new ties, even with people who are going through a similar situation.
- Maintain previous pleasurable activities or seek new ones hobbies.
- Encourage your self-care, it will make you feel more secure, try good sleep hygiene, and learn some relaxation technique.
- Maintain a healthy diet, without toxins, it will make you feel more involved in your process. Perform moderate physical exercise, as it reduces anxiety and increases the feeling of well-being.
- Practice assertiveness: prepare answers to annoying questions or refuse plans that are too painful for you right now.
- Look for truthful information in specialized medical sources. Minimize the feeling of insecurity.
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