Will stress stop me from getting pregnant?

Women who have been trying to get pregnant for a while often hear the oh-so annoying "Just relax, honey, and you'll see that it will happen for you in no time!" I don't need to tell you how frustrating this sentence or a variety of it is, I am sure! But what is the deal with stress and fertility? Will stress stop women from getting pregnant? Is it possible to be so stressed out that conceiving a baby because impossible? As always, we don't have a clear-cut answer to offer you.

Stress is possibly one of the most complicated experiences for the human body. Some people do better with stress than others. Some people notice a physical reaction to any stress they may have, while others do not. Stress can sometimes affect the ways in hormones in your body work, but it is rather tricky to find out if this has happened for you. It is possible that a lot of stress can affect your sex life and your libido. If you are not having sex at all because you feel so stressed, you obviously won't get pregnant.

At the same time, being under a lot of pressure in life can be responsible for causing irregular cycles and stop you from ovulating, but it does not have to. Perhaps we should distinguish normal, every day stress from extremely stressful and shocking events. If you are generally unhappy and stressed out at work, for instance, this is less likely to impact your chances of ovulating then being in a car crash one day. There will be bigger hormonal changes if something unexpected happens suddenly. Will stress stop you from getting pregnant? Probably not, but perhaps sometimes this is the best answer than we can come up with. If you have been trying to get pregnant for more than twelve months, and people are telling you to just relax, telling them to shut up and take their nosey mouths elsewhere might just help you release some tension...