Denial of pregnancy is no joke. Imagine that you’re sitting at the hospital, feeling abdominal pain without knowing why. Suddenly, the doctors tell you that you are about to give birth. You stare at them in confusion, and ask yourself how could that be possible? You’ve never had any symptoms, kept getting your period, and for 9 months, there was no obvious physical change. So, how can you be about to give birth to a child you never knew existed?
Thankfully, it’s a rare condition, and it only happens to 1 in 2.500 women. However, 1 in 500 can make it up to the 5th month of pregnancy before noticing.
Denial of Pregnancy Is a Mental Disorder
According to medical research, denial of pregnancy ”may show different categories of the condition, such as frank denial, suspicion of pregnancy without conscious awareness, and complete knowledge of the fact that she is pregnant with denial and concealment of the condition.” However, it occurs most likely to women who suffer or have suffered previously from a mental illness, or trauma.
Possible Causes
Causes and risk factors of a denied pregnancy are several. First, young age seems to be a common one. However, the main cause remains an unstable mental state, or use of substances and drugs to treat an existing psychiatric disorder. Nevertheless, as per some case studies, few women who suffered a denied pregnancy presented no mental disorder symptoms.
In fact, experts also discuss that some other possible causes can just be the simple result of a natural complication. According to a doctor in The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, ”These are women who don’t have routine sex, don’t have routine periods, and don’t regularly see a doctor.”
Diagnosis And Management
Experiencing a denied pregnancy is particularly hard on an emotional level. Among the many complications of this condition, the most troubling is a damaged moral. When you are told you will be a mother in an advanced pregnancy state, or just few hours before delivery is traumatic. That’s why doctors always resort to psychologists for support post-partum. diagnosis is an important step, as it reveals the reason that caused you to have a denied pregnancy. Therefore, understand how to deal with it.
Second but most importantly, managing the situation is often the hard part. While some women find themselves in a situation in which they can afford having a baby, other don’t. In some cases, young girls are faced with the hard choice of keeping the baby, or looking into other alternatives. Although the chances of having a denial of pregnancy are rare, some women who actually lived it came forward and shared their emotional and inspiring journey.
Photos: Freepik, Unsplash.
Leave a Reply