Welcome!

Welcome!

This blog addresses various emotional aspects of experiencing infertility. It is written by a clinical psychologist who specializes in infertility counseling. Thank you for reading, and best of luck with your journey!

Thursday, September 16, 2010

The negatives of positive thinking--denial, optimism, and pragmatism in infertility treatment

One question I am frequently asked by clients in the process of infertility treatment is what sort of attitudes and expectations they should maintain about the outcome of their treatment. In my experience, it can be common for some infertility patients to maintain a very optimistic outlook regarding their chances for success, even in light of indications to the contrary. Frequently, people with this outlook are seemingly afraid to explicitly acknowledge the possibility of problems or failure. In this post, I am going discuss some of the pitfalls of this type of thinking as it relates to infertility treatment.

Why thinking positively may not always be the best thing to do


You may be wondering what on earth could be wrong with maintaining a positive attitude in even in the face of a challenging situation. I realize that my argument does fly in the face of much conventional wisdom, but I think that having an unqualified positive attitude may give rise to two problems. The first is that it can make it difficult to acknowledge and respond to important medical and situational information. The second is that it can make it difficult to acknowledge, process, and respond to negative emotions, such as fear, anger, despair, and hopelessness, that are an all too common part of the experience of infertility.

In our culture, there has been a great deal of recent emphasis on thinking positively, as epitomized in books such as "The Secret". The fundamental gist of these beliefs is that to get a positive outcome, you must only think positive thoughts about your situation. Thinking negative thoughts is not good as it will somehow bring negative energy, and negative outcomes, your way. You have no idea how much I wish that it was really that simple, because life would be a much, much better place. But the fact is that although you can think as positively as is possible, the power of your thoughts cannot change the physical reality of the situation. I remember in my second IVF cycle, I decided to use a lot of positive imagery and visualizations as a way of improving my ovarian response. During the early part of the cycle, when we could still travel, my husband and I serendipitously came across $300 round trip tickets to Hawaii. What better place to have a positive attitude? One day as I snorkeled among the beautiful fish through the sunbeams, I imagined the warmth of the sun healing my underachieving ovaries. Then unbelievably, I was suddenly joined by a pod of spinner dolphins, who surrounded me, leaping in the air. The pod was filled with several pairs of mother and baby dolphins--what could be a better omen than that, right? Flash forward to my first big ultrasound for that cycle, and--you guessed it--there was no dolphin magic for me. Although it was an amazing experience, it didn't change the reality that my ovaries were not up to par. If I didn't accept that information and respond to it, both practically and emotionally, I would not be able to make decisions to maximize my success given my situation.

In my opinion, not accepting the possibility of a negative outcome, or believing that positive thinking can trump physical realities, really isn't positive thinking at all. Rather, it is denial. It is much more common in infertility treatment among people who tend to use denial as their main psychological defense in other areas of their life. And I've seen it have some very negative long-term effects in people's lives. So trust me, you don't want this to be you.

Secondly, I have found that some people are afraid that if they consciously acknowledge their negative feelings about their prospects, they will somehow "cause" their treatment to fail. The idea that negative thoughts or feelings by themselves can produce some sort of negative outcome is quite common and in fact is a normal part of our childhood emotional development. If we don't get the proper responses to our negative emotions as children, this belief can sometimes persist, albeit unconsciously.

However, if we deny ourselves the opportunity to acknowledge and express negative feelings as they come up (and in infertility treatment, believe me, they are going to come up sometimes) we unwittingly create more problems. In order to avoid awareness of our negative feelings, we must use up a lot of psychological energy. This can be exhausting and draining, but may lead to a more serious problem--it can chronically raise our cortisol levels, which has been linked to several negative health outcomes and may even impair our fertility--although the jury is really still out on that one. Plus, we don't get the benefit of the information about ourselves and our situation that our negative feelings are giving us. Just as thinking positively cannot transcend our medical reality, acknowledging negative feelings and working through them in a measured way can't make our medical reality worse.

The power of practical thinking

Now I am by no means suggesting that one should adopt a doom and gloom attitude when it comes to infertility treatment. I believe that positivity has its place, and that optimism is a very useful outlook. But it must be tempered with an awareness of the problems that we currently face, as well as the negative outcomes which potentially occur. As much as I've witnessed bad things happen to people in their infertility treatment, I've also witnessed true miracles. But these miracles usually happened to people who acknowledged the problems in their situation, and adapted their treatment strategy to them--often with great daring and personal sacrifice. It has taught me that true optimism and hopefulness isn't really what you think or feel--in the end, it's what you do that counts. Pushing ahead as best and as wisely as you can, being fully aware of the emotions involved and the risk of failure--to me that's optimism and bravery at its best.

17 comments:

  1. I just wanted to thank you for what you have been sharing through this blog. I have really appreciated the perspective you bring as a psychologist and a woman who has gone through IF. Every post has been interesting, well-written, thought provoking and enlightening. I look forward to each one!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow, I just did a post about that this morning! Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Great article. My own therapist and I have discussed this at length. She has talked me about being cautiously optimistic. Being real about that face that this IVF is not a guaranteed thing.
    This attitude helps a lot considering people love to tell infertile people. Just Think Positive. My mother being the #1 culprit.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks so much for all of your comments. I am glad that some of you are finding the blog helpful. I know it helps me to write it...and it's good to know that all that suffering was not for nothing! Please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions of topics you'd like to see discussed. And best of luck to everyone!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks for this wonderful article. I all too often fear I will jinx myself by not thinking positive and it can be exhausting to be honest!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Perhaps it's not "thinking positively" per se, but being in an open listening, loving frame of mind? Listening to and healing your body from within while calmly and non-judgmentally hearing the challenges your body has TTC.

    Not that I have any particular need to defend 'The Secret', yet it has been misunderstood. Their thing is actually about seeing positive outcomes for the ACTIONS that you take. They're are about taking action. That being said, the main producer, Rhonda, has written that she cured her short-sightedness with a "mind over matter" type visualization. And don't forget folks like Louise Hay who cured herself from cancer...

    So the more I think about it, I'm not sure I wholly agree with you, and the more confused I'm getting! How do you reconcile those mentioned above (and the scores of other stories around) with stuff that really doesn't work - like the Christian Scientist family in my daughters' school who insisted they were curing their kid's lice infestation with prayer, when in actuality our kids suffered repeated lice outbreaks (thanks to them) for the entire school year? It was brutal!

    ReplyDelete
  7. wonderful post! I think it should be required reading for everyone who is telling me to think positively and not worry about the fact that I might have to deal with a stillbirth again!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Great post! Thank you! First time I come in here and it was exactly what I needed to hear.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I am a person who avoided starting fertility for a long time in fear that I would hear bad news. In the end, I tried fertility treatments and was eventually successful after months and months of bad news. The attitude that helped me during my fertility treatments was to see each month as a month in which I would or would not know that I had done all I could to try and get pregnant. I decided I would feel worse if I did not try than if I tried and failed. Every month was grueling, but by focusing on my choices rather than the outcome, I at least got little kudos for myself along the way.

    ReplyDelete
  10. It is imperative that we read blog post very carefully.
    wealth mindset

    ReplyDelete
  11. Don’t think of anything else just contact priest eka and purchase some of his herbal medication and your depression will go away. This was my state of mind when my doctor told me that i will not be able to concieve due to the Fibroid that was rolling in my family life and when i decide to reach out to the priest, and the priest told me what to do in other to get the medication. Eventually I receive all the Herbal medications that cure my Fibroid and give me the chance to become a proud mother: Eka is a great spiritualist, He did it for me, you can contact Eka on (dreka14demons@gmail.com). If you are suffering from the following gynecology disease::
    1. Fibroid, Asthma, All STD, sinus infection
    2.High Blood Pressure (herbs to reduce your BP within 7days)
    3. Infection, regular body pains (yeast infection),urine tract infection.
    4. Blockage from the fallopian Tube
    5. Cyst from the ovaries
    6. Unpleasant smell from the virginal, virginal itching
    7. Irregular menstruation
    8. Weakness of the penis (not able to have sex with your partner or inability to satisfy your partner sexually)
    9. Watering sperm (low sperm count) not able to get woman pregnant.
    10. Infertility for easy Conception.......
    11. Skin diseases, Toilet infection and bad body odor…….Etc..
    Simply contact the spiritualist DrEka on (dreka14demons@gmail.com) to get his Herbal Medication to cure your disease and put yourself on a motherhood side of life..

    ReplyDelete
  12. My name is Caroline Ahmed from New York,After 6 years of marriage with no child i finally I got pregnant Glory to God almighty my Dear sister am writing to you to share with you what the Mallam Abudu Has done, I said to myself that I will testify when the Mallam Abudu does this with herbal medicine ,I emailed you for a request of your pregnancy medicine last year after seeing the testimonies of other ladies on a website online I decided to put my faith and come in agreement with you.Your pregnancy medicine and You prayed for me we agreed for me to conceive, Hallelujah!! Yes I did conceive two months after and I am now 4 months pregnant Glory to the Almighty God. I know I will have a smooth and easy delivery soon.contact him. mallamabuduspiritualhome@gmail.com or call +2349055637784

    ReplyDelete
  13. Great Post….. I read a few of your other posts.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I expect this kind of important information in future also so keep it up this nice work.

    ReplyDelete
  15. You write good content, I am looking for this thanks for sharing it will help others.

    ReplyDelete
  16. It is a joyful thing to have a table surround by our kids in our home, all thanks to doctor Uduehi. I suffered ZERO SPERM COUNT ( AZOOSPERMIA) for a very long time until I red about how he cured someone who experienced similar problem, at first i wasn't sure if he's real because I have tried so many medications and it was all to no avail but I have to give it a try hence no more hope. But behold after taking his medication for one month, I became fertile, my SPERM COUNT risen from zero to 14 million plus and after 2 weeks it became 18 million. All thanks to Dr. UDUEHI for his good work, you too can be cured reach him at: uduehiherbalcare@gmail.com phone/WhatsaPP: +2347084878384

    ReplyDelete
  17. I am testifying about a great herbal doctor who saved me from AZOOSPERMIA , his name is Dr. Uduehi. I suffered zero sperm for many years, I’ve married twice and no woman could stay because of my inability to make them pregnant. I read about Uduehi’s medication online and I decided to try my luck, I contacted him and after using his medication my sperm count was 8 thousand and just like that it keeps increasing and its above 16 million as I speak and my wife is pregnant You too can become fertile just like me if interested. Contact him through: uduehiherbalcare@gmail.com phone/WhatsaPP: +2347084878384

    ReplyDelete