So my work friend Ray is expecting her second child. She was due yesterday and is being induced tonight. Last time she was pregnant, I was too and her baby girl was born (3.5 weeks early) just under 4 months before kins. It has been very hard watching her grow while I have failure after failure.
We have been chatting in the office and now texting as she has been through the ups and downs of this pregnancy and now as she is pending delivery. She is high-risk and so there is a lot to stress over. I hope that she successfully delivers a healthy baby in the coming hours. This is planned to be her last, so I hope she closes out her last pregnancy on a high note.
Someone once asked me why I can't "just be happy" relating to pregnancy, babies, kins etc. I finally have an answer:
I can be happy for others. I can and I am. I am so happy that Ray has gotten to experience a full-term pregnancy (though they are hard!). I am happy that she is about to deliver a healthy baby. BUT I can't be "just" happy.
I want more kids than I will ever have. So I am happy, but I am sad.
I know we started TTC #2 much longer ago than she did. She got pregnant her first cycle of trying (last time was unplanned). So I am happy, but I am envious.
These comparisons are staring me in the face when I talk to, see or think about pregnancy, kids, families with more than one child. I cannot help but think of myself when these things are around me. It is impossible to be "just" when your mind is consumed with TTC.
The inability to be "just happy" is unjust. I would LOVE to feel "just happy" for someone. I know what this feeling is like- I am truly "just happy" when people get promoted, married or move into a new home. But pregnancy is my sore spot. I don't want it to be, but it is.
No one should have this heartbreak. Not in terms of family building, loss or anything else that someone really truly wants and cannot have.
Nothing is Just. In any sense of the word.
Unless you've been through the heartache of infertility you just can't understand. The money, the failures, losses, tears, helplessness. It's horrible. It has nothing to do with not being glad for others, but our inability to have it for ourselves.
ReplyDeleteI wish we didn't have to feel these crappy feelings either. I remember when my friend who, at 43, decided she was going to try for a baby on her own, told me after Blue died: "you'll get your baby." And it's true. But. I never feel just happy when it comes to other people's pregnancies. Your loss AND infertility are separate and compounding factors that can make you ask "why not them?" Even when you're also, partially, happy.
ReplyDeleteHere from Mel's The Creme post. And how I can relate. I remember all too well getting lapped (sometimes twice!) by people who had no issues conceiving and carrying to term. It sucks and hurts in a way those who haven't gone through infertility can understand.
ReplyDeleteAbiding with you.
This is such a hard truth to wrangle, and you do it so beautifully. This part, "I want more kids than I'll ever have," is so heartbreaking. I hate the Justs. It tries to take complex, difficult feelings and package them in neat bows and pushes them away where people don't have to be made uncomfortable by grief or comparisons. We have friends who are pregnant as we work our way through adoption, and they got pregnant on a break, spontaneously. They are well aware it is a miracle of sorts, and they went through difficulties to get there, but I can't help but feel a little twinge of envy with my happiness for them, because their experience is just so different than ours, so much less complex, and devoid of layers and layers of things we will need to consider for our family. It's hard not to compare. I'm thinking of you and hoping for a much better 2016 for you, as well. (Visiting from Mel's Missing Creme thread.)
ReplyDeleteI always feel the "can't you just be happy" comments say so much more about the person uttering them, than about us. As you said, we'd all love to be happy for our friends and family members. But it's such a reminder of what we don't have, what we couldn't achieve, or even if we did achieve it, what was such a struggle for us. It brings back pain and memories, or reminds us of our fears (what if it will never happen?) or failures (even though I hate that word in this context, I know that is how we feel).
ReplyDeleteIn time, we'll be able to be happy for others more easily. But it is always, always a reminder.