Not pregnant yet? You bet!

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!”

– So subconsciously you decided to become a boy to win the love of your mother? But boys cannot get pregnant either, only woman can.

Yana cried bitterly at those words out of self-pity:

– I wanted to be a girl and alive. I wanted my mother to love me…

– Imagine talking to your mother, tell her these words.

– Mother, I want you to love me, I want to live!

– What would you answer if you were her?

– “I love, but I’m angry at you at the same time!”

– Why are you angry?

– “You move so much, you bother me all the time, you are so restless!”

– Do you mean – alive?

– Yes! Alive! Dead daughter would have been more convenient.

This being said, Yana realized that her mother’s pattern of behavior towards her as a child did not let her to grow into an adult self-sufficient woman who would have her own children. Instead she encouraged her to “stop dead” to be convenient. And this is how she lived acting in her relationships with her husband as a convenient “dead” woman. And when she tried to get pregnant she did the same towards her future children.

In fine font

We have decided everything

No need to worry “bout a thing.

Just don’t read the bottom line

It’s in fine font and it’s fine.

    Internet meme

You would think that after realizing this, the right and logical thing to do is to change your life strategy. However, our psyche has its own unfathomable logic. Clients do change their lives instantly, but only if they are ready for these changes or they have or acquired resources to do so. In Yana’s case her resource was her way of staying alive – stop dead and stand still, not to show her own feelings by any face movements. It was not until she had a different experience that resource would be the only one.

Despite the fact that Yana attended the women’s group for a year, and she understood the nature of her infertility there, she went through with IVF. Just before the procedure she called and asked if it was safe for her to go to the group, because it was not good to get nervous before IVF, otherwise it wouldn’t work. The director told her that it was up to her to decide. She did come. When she was talking about her purpose for this meeting she laughed a lot and told repeatedly that everything was fine. It looked more like hysteria, than like joy and happiness, so the director asked to sober her up:

– Yana, if everything is fine, why have you come, to ruin it?

Yana was still defensive and repeated that everything was fine. More than fine, “awfully wonderful”.

– What are you in awe of?

Confusing conversation, where the role of the director was to find out what feelings the client had and the client tried to put on a brave face, revealed that Yana had read the fine font at the bottom of the medical agreement. There was information about possible complications of IVF and it was said that in case of her death she wouldn’t be able to make any claims. And this happened, mind you, after many a discussion during the group about the harm of IVF.

– Well, yes, I told you several times that I had read about that on the internet, – the director reminded.

But Yana did not read any of this “for some reason”. She had to admit that the real reason for her “inattentiveness” was fear of IVF that was to happen in a week. And her goal was to work with the fear.

– But your fear is fairly logical, you can in fact die.

When said out loud, these words caused an outburst of Yana’s suppressed feelings. She once again remembered her mother’s words at her brother’s funeral, again she cried out of self-pity, and about the fact that she couldn’t say openly about her feelings. To whom? This time to her husband about the fact that she was scared to undergo a life-threatening procedure, and that she was afraid not to go, and felt guilty, because if her husband had spent a load of money for this, it was necessary to finish the deal.

– Who is it necessary for?

– For my husband.

– And what is necessary for you?

Yana did not give an answer. Then she disappeared after telling to the group beforehand that she probably won’t come to the meetings, because her husband was concerned about her getting nervous during psychotherapy sessions. This was an excuse that allowed her to pass the responsibility for her choice to the another person and not to get in touch with anxiety from deciding what to do and making her own choices.

Yana’s life has not changed. IVF has not brought the expected results, her plans have not not come to life, her story is not over.

“Kittens”: commentary

Take a pond of salt, pour it into you wound.

When you call me again, I feel nothing, but doomed

    Internet meme

Yana’s story is a story of a codependent woman. To cure her of infertility is to cure her of codependence. There are many definitions of a codependent person. I like Marilyn Murrey’s, because it’s both short and simple. She says that a codependent person is a person who gives up his or her dignity, abiding to another person and taking responsibility for another person, thus encouraging his or her destructive behavior. A codependent person, as rule, is a product of the culture of restrictions and prohibitions, which preaches that to have one’s personal boundaries is egoistic and evil[16 - Marilyn Murrey, Prisoner if Another War: A Remarkable Journey of Healing From Childhood Trauma.].

Any woman who grew up in our fallocratic culture is damaged in a way, as she constantly suppresses her own needs. When growing up, each of us was told time and again that a woman should be obedient, sacrifice herself and care about others. For many it is as natural as breathing.

Fortunately, now there are books on codependency and love addiction which openly state that this is a disease and teach how to deal with them. The book by Robin Norwood Women Who Love Too Much is one of them. It’s not just a book, I don’t get tired of saying that it should be a guide for every Russian woman, despite the fact that it was written by an American. What is it about this book that makes me “prescribe” it to practically each of my clients? It’s about each one of us. In order not to make any allegations, here is a short fragment of the text[17 - Robin Norwood, Women Who Love Too Much.]: