Infertility

Book excerpt: Infertility: Psychological Issues and Counseling Strategies is a valuable reference for mental health professionals who treat individuals and couples grappling with the psychological and emotional strains of infertility and its treatment. Drawing upon their professional experiences as well as the current literature in the field, leading practitioners consider the differences in how women and men react to a diagnosis of infertility and describe strategies for helping individuals deal with the anxieties, feelings of inadequacy, and low self-esteem that can follow such a diagnosis. These experts examine the effects of infertility on love, sex, and other facets of a relationship and detail methods for helping couples resolve conflicts about infertility. They explore the latest findings on pregnancy-related stress and its possible somatic effects, and they describe effective stress management techniques. They offer practical guidelines for helping patients to cope with failed fertility treatments and manage the grief of a miscarriage. And they examine a wide range of clinical issues surrounding alternative routes to parenting, including adoption.