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| 29 weeks pregnant; also the last night we ran cell group at our house :) |
So I alluded to this the other day on my mother's day post but I've been feeling a tad sensitive lately.
There's a preggy bellies class at my gym in the same studio straight after my Zumba class on a Saturday morning so about 12 (huge) pregnant bellies are literally in my face every week.
(I think they're all first-time moms because they sound a lot like we did three years ago - you know, all optimistic and excited :) Clearly they don't know about the sleep deprivation!)
We've also noticed a lot of pregnant people in the family room at church.
But after I read the lovely Gabrielle Blair's spacing kids post I had an aha moment about the church thing.
It makes sense that I'm seeing pregnant women everywhere since a lot of their first "babies" are also 2 - 3 years old and this seems to be the "ideal" space between kids. Hmmm.
Although at my work this happened last year. Two guys whose wives were pregnant with me both had their second kids last year.
The point of this rambling is that it still stings. The infertility, that is.
Maybe it shouldn't but it does.
I'm 100% sure most of those people had the normal experience to get pregnant :) and it obviously still needles me that we and a lot of you had to go through hell and back to have our children.
I don't bedgrudge other people from growing their families; I just wish it wasn't so hard for some of us.
Tell me, does this bother you at all? Seeing people get easily pregnant when you've had to go through infertility, IVF, adoption, miscarriages, etc.
My Glugster "gave up" trying some time ago as our chances of having a baby without help are zero, and thats not money we can spend...
ReplyDeleteAnd even though I am fine most of the time, every now and then it makes me want to scream.
:(
What makes me sad is the idea of making love to my husband to achieve a baby...I want to know what it is like to "baby dance" and then wait for your period...it does not arrive..then to POAS...and wake my B up to say "We pregnant"..What a nice suprise!
ReplyDeleteBut alas, having no fallopian tubes and my B with his vasectomy, no chance of any miracle....Our only hope of achieving another child is to pay R 60 000.00 for a 1/4 chance ....
I do get sad and angry for me sometimes
I sort of can relate but not completely. I didn't have to go through the elaborate process to have Nicola, she was my miracle baby. But on our first scan the doctor did tell me that my womb was tilted in the wrong direction or some such thing and that I was actually supposed to be sterile because of it...I could have told him that since I had enough home pregnancy tests to decorate a christmas tree when I was married. It just never happened for us, maybe my backwards bits were the cause, who knows?
ReplyDeleteThe thing I envy a bit these days is seeing families with loving, involved, clearly besotted dads - for obvious reasons. And it's a real lump in the throat moment when Nicola asks me if I am her daddy and her mommy, or when she asks my dad if she can call him dad too. It sucks...
Sometimes I think how cool it would be to have such a dad-person in our lives, but recently I thought to myself how much that would have changed the relationship between us, and actually I'm pretty much okay with how it is now. It may be a bit selfish of me, but she's growing up so quickly and I am getting all the cute and love to myself! And that's all sorts of awesome because there's so much of it. In that way I'm sort of happy that her dad isn't involved, now I don't have to share her with him and his girlfiend. And I'm also happy not to be in a relationship, because I don't have another person making demands on my time and trying to tell me how I should raise my daughter.
So if you break it down: I'm a little bit jealous of other families with a dad, but I realise that I don't really want one in ours right now.
My question to you Marcia is, if you could just miraculously without intervention fall pregnant right now, do you want another baby or babies? If it was up to you, how many children would you have planned for? (I'm not trying to be insensitive, I'm just curious. I used to think I'd want at least two, but where I am now I'm pretty sure one is about all I can handle, even more so if it's just me doing the parenting. Especially now that I actually know what it means to be a mother! I'm not saying that if it somehow happens that I'd not want and love the baby, of course I would, but to actually plan to have one - I don't think I'm there at all, even if I had the money).
Am I making any sense?
Ah yes, and sorry for the "short" story again. You bring out the ramble in me with your topics. ;-)
ReplyDeleteMy taste was so brief, that luckily I have no trace left. And I do think that secondary infirtility is easier, although a lot of people choose to really downgrade it to nothing, it's not nothing, but you do have the consolation of no 1. It is maybe less intense. But it's still there - especially with this second batch thing that you are seeing now.
ReplyDeleteNow, I am totally over it, mainly because I feel I have enough kids, my hands are too full.
Lots of love my friend.
Ironically, we are perfectly healthy and able to have kids and that makes me feel totally unfair...like I have some guarded secret that I can't help. My sister-in-law is unable to have kids and it's always a show of Godmother this and Godmother that and feeling guilty that we have Marshall (like when he doesn't want to hug her or something) and that she has nothing. It breaks my heart that perfectly loving, kind, and compassionate women can be left childless. Is it even worse that we can have kids and are choosing not to (even though just saying that makes my ovaries hurt)!?
ReplyDeleteUgh, life.
I completely understand, Marcia. I have been able to be genuinely happy for a couple of close friends who've had babies in the past three years, but -- to be 100% honest -- most of the time I just "compartmentalize" it. I don't begrudge anyone, but it's hard for me to let myself feel much emotion about it.
ReplyDeleteI never would have expected this, either. I would have thought, once our girls were born, I'd be perfectly "normal" about the topic of pregnancy. Hmmm...IF, the gift that just keeps giving. HA!
And then - I can't even leave this comment with telling you I feel guilty about these feelings. I have my most precious baby girls, for whom I am immensely thankful. I know you know that...but just had to state it in the context of this conversation. :)
You have no idea. It eats me up, simply because I long to have more. It also tears me, but luckily not my marriage, apart knowing that I am only infertile inside my relationship. Knowing I could easily have another, just not with DH, makes hearing everyone else's joyful news not so exciting.
ReplyDeleteI'm geniunely happy for nearly everyone I cross, but I don't think that sting will ever go away. I just wish that it didn't make me want to try again. I couldn't part with that much money now that we have a family knowing there are no guarantees.
Infertility has defined me in a way I wish it didn't. So many friends - even co-workers, relatives - have kids again, and yet here I am, now with 3 (can you really call it 3 or is it just 2? I still don't know how to define this last one) miscarriages under my belt and no second baby.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if that longing can ever go away. The wishing things were different.
One thing that has helped me tremendously lately is realizing that even though people can get pregnant easily, they don't necessarily have a perfect life. Yes, they have something I can't have or do, but it doesn't make their life better or perfect. My life is pretty darn good, but I just can't get pregnant without an army of doctors, nurses, techs, and meds. Thinking this, can make me really happy for other friends who do get pregnant, have kids, or such, because I know that their life isn't necessarily easy either. Is that weird?
xoxo
Ughhh...I can only imagine how much it hurts to still think about those times. It's unfair that anyone has to go through that, especially when we know there are so many people out there every day who get pregnant and don't even necessarily want children. Just unfair!
ReplyDeleteI can so relate to the feeling that everyone else is getting started on their "next round", so to speak. It is happening (or has happened already) to a lot of my friends. I am a little irrationally jealous of them getting to start the process all over again, even though I could (presumably) do it myself if I wanted. I don't miss the sleepless nights or those oh-so-draining newborn days, but sometimes, there are experiences I would like to repeat...particularly knowing all that I do now, without all that first-time delusional thinking! : )
Having children was a “normal” experience for me. However, my life beyond normal i.e having sex and getting pregnant i.e. my life as it is NOW, WITH kids, is not normal. Far from it.
ReplyDeleteIn other words...I can’t relate to the infertility thing but in a way I can relate to your feelings because, like Louisa, there are other things in my life that are currently not normal (for me) but very normal for everyone else in my life.
My conclusion? It’s that “NORMAL” thing and the fact that I don’t have it. The fact that I have to make “normal” happen and pay damn good money for it too! THAT’s what stings for me.
Don’t get me wrong. I know that I am blessed and that things could have been so much worse and am THRILLED for other people and their normal. It just stings. A LOT. And it usually happens when I least expect it. Like
I am so sorry that you are feeling stung by it all, my friend.
Love you.xx
ps...I would LOVE to know your answers to Louisa's questions. My own answers to those questions would probably surprise everyone.
ReplyDeleteDo you know, Tim and I will be married 22 years soon? And over the past year, it has finally dawned on me, that I no longer have that surge of despair/ heartache when I see somebody else pregnant or with a newborn. This really took me by surprise.
ReplyDeleteMaybe it is what we've been through the last 3 years - loosing my mom, Tim's heart attack, Paul born with Downs, the high stress of Tim not having a job. .... I don't know. But now at nearly 44, I'm very sure I'm far too tired to be responsible for a newborn, let alone 3 little people. With my big girls now at almost 15 and 17, I'm looking at the possibility of loosing my extra hands that I've relied on so heavily the last 4 years.
But yet, there are days I wonder what a 5th child would be like ... Joel is always asking for a baby brother. And Ruezy is almost too big for proper cuddling. But still, it's not the same as before ... and I find I feel almost content.
Yes, bothers me a lot. Many of my friends are pregnant and some have been married less time than we have been trying and pregnant with their THIRD child?! I don't understand why it is so hard for us. I am really struggling with this now. So hard.
ReplyDeleteYes, it bothers me. Less than I thought it would, but it does.
ReplyDeleteI didn't realise it bothered you, though. Just goes to show... I should stop making assumptions about people!!!
We sold our double car seats and snap n go stroller a few weeks ago. Call me silly, but I don't know many twin moms and was excited to meet someone who was about to be! So I say, "Are you excited? Are you nervous?", and (as her 3 year old screams from the car) she proceeds to tell me that she JUST found out that she's having twins at her 20 week ultrasound. Well, that just knocked my enthusiasm out the window because I knew she was just lucky and didn't have to go through IF treatments. I guess I just assumed she'd been through IF treatments because of the percentages of twin moms that have. And rationally, it really shouldn't have bothered me - but somehow it did.
ReplyDeleteI have definitely seen a lot of pregnant moms lately. I know that we would try again if, you know, we won the lotto and I wasn't 39. But I think that ship has sailed and we are incredibly blessed to have the two we have.
And on Mother's Day, I thought A LOT about how bitter I felt when I was struggling to become a mom. I have a lot of compassion for those who are still fighting that fight.
While I don't have issues conceiving, I do feel that bitterness and jealousy towards people with easy breezy textbook perfect pregnancies.
ReplyDeleteI also would love to hear your answers to Louisa's questions.
When I started reading this post of yours, I knew exactly where you were going with it as I know your story of infertility. I'm really sorry that it still stings, my friend.
ReplyDeleteI know where you are coming from, from a point of view of fertility, and other issues too. Sometimes it stings me when I see announcements, hear about other people, but generally I am happy for them. I never crossed into a space of being bitter in any way, (not that you have), although having had a shorter journey than some I am sure that helped in that respect. I think I always only wanted one kid, am happy with the one I have. Louisa asked you how many kids you would have had - and I can honestly answer that for me it would likely only have been one regardless of fertility issues. BUT, and it is the BUT that so many people do not understand - I HATE and STRUGGLE at times with the fact that this decision was MADE FOR ME. I did not make it, regardless of what my choice would be, I am in a way not given the option.
ReplyDelete((( Hugs )))
ReplyDeleteI feel for you. I think what bugs me is that some people have one child after the other and are such useless parents. They don't deserve having children but have them so easily.
ReplyDeleteNever commented before, but often read. Had to post a comment on this one..... Yes, Yes and Yes! Infertility has been a defining force in my life. 13 years on and it still stings. x
ReplyDelete