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This paper examines some of the unconscious reasons that may lead to unfulfilled pregnancy,
either by means of spontaneous abortion, or by conscious planned abortion. During pregnancy the universal dilemma of maternal ambivalence towards the foetus and whom it represents may be strongly influenced by unresolved conflicts and anxieties belonging to earlier stages of a woman's psychic development. Spontaneous or planned abortion, which allows the woman who has become pregnant to deny life to the foetus, may provide a psychosomatic solution to this psychic conflict.