Law of Inverse Fertility: Difference between revisions
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Couples who want to have children will have trouble not only conceiving, but adopting and using surrogates as well. Women who don't want to have children, however, will be faced with unwanted pregnancies [[But We Used a Condom|even if they used several different forms of birth control]]. Particularly if the conception was [[Child by Rape|forced upon them]]. Teenagers, of course, [[Can't Get Away with Nuthin'|will get pregnant their first time]], double points if they [[Miss Conception|thought they couldn't]]. The reason for this, of course, is obvious: "woman becomes pregnant with longed-for child immediately" and "woman doesn't want to get pregnant and doesn't" [[Rule of Drama|don't make for very good stories]]. At least the woman with a baby she doesn't want can give it up to the woman who is desperate to conceive, but expect much [[True Art Is Angsty|angst]] along the way.
In many cases the stress of trying to have a baby will suppress fertility, and, once the couple decides to adopt or give up, the stress disappears, and: hooplah! they have a baby! Sometimes it's ''after'' they went through the hassle of adopting, as if Mother Nature felt humorous one day. Many people believe this to be [[Truth in Television]], but in [[Real Life]], while infertile couples do sometime conceive after adopting, they also sometimes conceive if they don't
Conversely, as soon as a woman begins to accept her pregnancy, her chances of a [[Convenient Miscarriage]] double. Or if she's simply having a pregnancy scare from a missed period, it'll turn out that she's not carrying after all, just as she starts warming up to the idea. This particular trick is common on shows where [[Status Quo Is God]]; whether the former or latter version is used depends on how much drama the writers wish to evoke.
This is very old, involuntary infertility being found in the opening of a number of [[Fairy Tale
{{examples}}
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* Aunt Sissy in ''[[A Tree Grows in Brooklyn]]'' wants a child more than anything, but all her pregnancies result in stillbirth. She finally fakes a pregnancy and adopts the child of an unwed Italian girl, and about a year later becomes pregnant and has a healthy baby boy.
* ''A Soldier of the Great War'' references this trope. A young boy is talking to the protagonist about various fertility superstitions he's heard about. Alessandro tells him that the real rule is "Once if you're not married; a thousand times if you are."
* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s [[Warhammer 40000]] novel ''[[Brothers of the Snake]]'' Antoni explains to a Space Marine that she has had two husbands and no
* Federico García Lorca's ''Yerma'' is mainly about this topic: a woman who wants a child but can't get pregnant no matter what.
* Happens to Detritus and Ruby as their relationship is developed through the [[Discworld]] series. Vimes noted that their marriage was happy but childless. They do however adopt Brick later in Thud.
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** On the other end of the scale it is a miracle that [[The Ditz|Brittany]] ''hasn't'' become pregnant. She has claimed to have had sex with almost every guy in the school and yet she thinks using protection means having a burglar alarm and additionally she still thinks babies come from the stork.
** There's also Shelby Corcoran, who after {{spoiler|giving Rachel up for adoption}} is told she can no longer have children. {{spoiler|She finds her way around it by adopting Quinn's daughter.}}
* On ''[[The West Wing]]'', we find out via flashbacks that Toby's wife Andi desperately wanted to have a baby, and they tried every fertility treatment under the sun. In the series timeline, they're divorced, but Andi becomes pregnant with Toby's
* On ''[[The X-Files]]'', Scully is not only told she is infertile, but that she had her ova removed. While she had never given that much thought to having children before, she did after hearing that. An invitro attempt with Mulder failed, as did trying to adopt, and yet by the end of season seven Scully is pregnant by circumstances never fully explained. However, [[Word of God]] did confirm that Mulder is the father of Baby William.
* In an episode of ''[[Legend of the Seeker]]'', Kahlan gets magically split into two people, each one representing a major part of her personality: a highly-emotional Kahlan with no powers, and a cold, calculating Confessor who enforces draconian laws whether or not they are moral. Both of them end up having sex. The emotional Kahlan finally sleeps with Richard, and the Confessor Kahlan sleeps with a tyrant she has confessed purely for procreation. When it comes time to re-join them, both claim they could be pregnant from a single encounter. Zedd, however, performs a magical scan and determines they aren't pregnant. He claims this is because they are [[What Measure Is a Non-Human?|not real people]].
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== Videogames ==
* Played with in ''[[Baldur's Gate]]'' in the form of Aerie, and more straightforwardly, the mod-added [[Mary Sue
* In the sound novel ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro ni]]'', it takes Natsuhi and Krauss Ushiromiya 8 years after their marriage to conceive their daughter, Jessica. Krauss' ambitious younger sister Eva, however, gives birth almost immediately after she and Hideyoshi marry, so she tries to use this as a bargaining chip to secure her son George's headship in the family over Jessica.
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== Web Original ==
* Frequently happens in ''[[The Gungan Council]]''. Beth gets knocked up after her first time ever and Kirk, who vehemently ''does not'' want children, knocks someone up as well with just one encounter
* Quite a few surprise pregnancies occur in ''[[Chakona Space]]'', most notably Admiral Boyce's first three children (all by [[Polyamory|different mothers]] of supposedly [[Interspecies Romance|incompatible species]]). On the other hand most characters who want kids usually have little trouble making them, the major exception being Forestwalker's foxmorph mates Katrina and Kristopher.
== Western Animation ==
* ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]'' - Apu and Manjula are trying to have a child with no success. Apu asks Homer how he and Marge did it, and Homer laughingly notes that each of their kids was unintentional. He then tries to [[Invoked Trope|deliberately invoke this trope]] to help
** And of course, because apparently every member of the Simpson family ''sans'' Maggie was slipping Manjula fertility drugs, they have octuplets.
* Also happened in ''[[Family Guy]]'', where Lois and Peter tried to have a fourth baby. Of course they had Stewie actively working against them, and eventually shrinking down to destroy every sperm in Peter's body. [[Fantastic Voyage Plot|Manually]]. {{spoiler|He meets a sperm he considers a worthy ally and abandons the plan, only for Peter and Lois to decide they actually don't want a fourth kid.}}
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== Real Life ==
* A book by Mary Pride points out that some people (like the author) may get so used to "family planning"-style matter-of-course birth control that they believe that merely ''going off the birth control'' is enough to cause pregnancy in a very short period of time. This is, of course, at odds with (statistical)
** If you have gone for years with your birth control method working perfectly, it can mean that eventually you become less vigilant about using it, or worry less about whether you might be pregnant even if you do have a condom break or forget to take a pill. But yes, women in their thirties or forties can still get pregnant by accident, and just because you never have got pregnant doesn't mean you can't.
** After one year of "trying" (well-timed, unprotected sex) with no pregnancy, you meet the medical definition of "infertile." Most couples without a diagnosable medical problem will be pregnant by that point, although there are always exceptions...
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