A Visual Exploration of Psychodynamics in Problematic Pregnancies: Case Studies in Analytic-Aesthetic Arttherapy Institute for Arttherapy and Artanalysis Cologne, Germany

Pregnancy conflicts have a wide range of content and many levels. This paper deals
with some predominantly unconscious psychodynamic aspects, which are expressed in
strong, ambiguous feelings about the pregnancy, but can often not be explicitly addressed
because the social taboos around certain anxiety-related topics are still too great and often
the counseling and therapy resources are inadequate to meet the need.
Unconscious abortive tendencies often stem from unresolved pre-and perinatal and
early-child trauma of the parents or transgenerational conflicts of the family. An abortion
may be an emergency solution for unbearable unconscious pain, fright, and agony, i.e. out of
the couple’s deep fear of killing the child later, the embryo must be aborted. The real child
in the uterus is confused with the traumatized “inner child” of the father or the mother.
These processes are unconscious, but strongly motivate action and are very complex.
Therefore, they rarely appear in a public discussion.