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TTC #2 MAJOR dilemma - thoughts, experiences appreciated

2K views 12 replies 11 participants last post by  lexbeach 
#1 ·
TTC#2 - a conversation that started not long after Sebby was born, but now we're getting serious...

Anyway, I had always expected to be pregnant and birth our kids. DP was never really into it and I was secretly pleased. I always left the conversation open though and [in hindsight) paid lip service to the possibility that one day DP would like to birth a babe...

You see where this is going? She wants to have the next one. She wants to do the primary care thing. AND she only want 2 kids. Thus, no more babes for me. My soul hurts. I'll never get my homebirth (which was promised when I agreed to the birth centre for Sebby), I'll never be pregnant again.

Realistically, I only want two kids too. We can't afford more than 2. We want to work and travel abroad. I want to study again. Given that having kids is not the ONLY thing I want to achieve in my life, it's not sensible to have more than 2. Nor do I have any great desire for more than 2.

Talk about moving the goalposts. We've been working together to get DP's business on track and generating a decent income so that she can quit her job, work from home and support us all. We had both agreed that I didn't have to go back to work unless I wanted to. She had committed to supporting our family for the next 5ish years. If she has the next babe and stays home with it, there is no way around it - I'll be back to my job in November and my study plans are off the table.

Plus, I really really really want to be pregnant again. It's a soul yearning. I doubt that I have to explain it to most of you.

The thing though with DP is that she really is amazing. If I sulked and argued enough, it wouldn't be hard to talk her out of it. She's WAY more giving and generous than me and it's hard not to take advantage of that.

How can I deny DP of the incredible, amazing, life changing experience that is pregnancy and birth? She might be ok or she might resent me for the rest of her life. Or it could lead to a big, major relationship disaster....

I don't know how to move forward with this. I don't want to manipulate her final decision but it's going to take a super human effort on my part to compromise on this.

Thoughts? Experiences? Help?
 
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#2 ·
what a dilemma! in our case, originally dp was going to have all our kids. she's 7 years younger than me, and i'm the primary breadwinner. i never really had the primal urge to have kids either. well, then my company opened a daycare and dp expressed a desire for a baby that "had curly hair" like me. so we had several discussions and suddenly i was very excited about being pregnant! lol! our son was the result of that pregnancy. i had a wonderful pregnancy. mild nausea, no throwing up and it was mostly over by 12 weeks. no heartburn. no trouble sleeping. no peeing 100x times at night during the 3rd trimester. no aches and pains (although i did have a weekly pregnancy massage). no hbp. no gd. i birthed him vaginally and it was an amazing exeperience.


then i had a post=partum blood clot and was informed that i would have to be on heparin injections if i was ever pregnant again. so we decided that dp would have all future kids.

fast forward to it being her turn. she has all kinds of issues - pcos, fvl, mthfr, hypothyroidism. took a while to get all of that under control. now she is pregnant and is having terrible morning sickness. during the process of getting her pregnant, i realized that yes, i would have liked to have been pregnant again. but for me it just wasn't meant to be. i revel in the fact that i had the opportunity to have our son - and he really is a mini-me, curls and all - and now i am super excited to have a pregnant partner.
it is strange being the ngp but wonderful all at the same time.

if your wife really wants to carry a child, i don't know that you'd want to deny her that. friends of ours had a 1yo when i was pregnant and the ngp asked if she was really missing out not ever being pregnant and i looked at her and answered simply "yes". feeling your baby moving in your belly is quite incredible....i know you know what i mean.

anyways, i probably didn't help much with my ramble....

g
 
#3 ·
If your DP really wants to have a baby, I don't think you can not let her have that experience. Since you were expecting to be the one carrying both of your children, your bubble was kind of broken by her desires. I guess you need to think about how you'll feel if she has your next baby - will that desire still always be there? You have to re-adjust your expectations. Are 3 kids totally out of the question?
 
#4 ·
oy. i will think on this one mujerista. i kinda agree that it would be a big thing to deny her when you have already had that experience.

an interesting complication is the mystery of who can conceive when. i have one friend who tried and tried to get her dp pregnant for yrs, with various txs, no luck. then with much angst they switched mamas and my friend got preggo first try. for the next kid her dp got preggo first try! giving them more closely spaced kids than they had planned....

you know what would be really awful, but "fair" in a flip a coin kinda way? you each try to get the other preggo and see who wins the race! of course you will prolly wind up with twins. lol i have one friend who is hell-bent on her and her dp conceiving the same mo. so they can have twins. i think she is nuts, but then again i suck at being preggo and need full-time caretaking when i am.

so basically i think this is super duper hard and i will think on it. but how cool that your dp has really taken to parenthood!!

also think about disconnecting who's the bio mom from who stays home (that's what dd's bff's moms did) -- which do you want more and why?
 
#5 ·
Oh MMM....


I've felt sick for you since I read this, and like Pie Pie, will think more on it. But a few thoughts, since I have more experience that I'd like with partner moving the goal post.

- It's an incredibly difficult position to be in that, in order to live out your best life, you need dp to not live out theirs. I don't have the answer for it, but it's been helpful for me to realize that, in order for me to do what I want to do, I need dp to do X, Y or Z, which is maybe not what he wants to do. I've been searching for how we make our best lives not dependant on someone else oppressing theirs.

- At the risk of suggesting a simplistic answer that perhaps isn't the point: Being a surrogate for another couple could be a wonderful way to be pregnant and give birth again. I suggest it hesitantly, because it leaves big issues unsolved and can create more problems that we can imagine (I have it only second-hand). But putting this option on the table can help to clarify what issues are the biggest for you, and perhaps help to piece together a really creative solution.

Hidden in all of this is the fact that DP wants to share this amazing experience that you had as well - I can't imagine what that could bring to your relationship, especially if part of her evolution has been how inspired she was to see your strength through it. That's more the pollyanna hindsight perspective, but it's pretty amazing even so.

Is DPs business such that you can team together to both WAH on it? I know you're interested in pursuing studies, I just wonder if this can be jigsawed together somehow.

And last, which will be an incredibly stupid question if you have, is wondering if you've discussed it enough to where she has absolute clarity that she wants to do this, and she understands what it means for you? I think you're wise to understand the power you have in her temperment and to not want to manipulate her. But I'd also hate to see such pain come from being too polite to admit to her how hard this is going to be for you, in case she has ambivalence on it.

It's likely there is some major parts here that you'll have to mourn and let go of. Much of it is all-or-nothing (such a not being able to split the pregnancy, etc). But there are enough issues converging that it does seem like a compromise can happen so that you aren't giving up everything in your vision.
 
#6 ·
this is a hard one. i birthed our DS. the plan was always that i would try and after the first baby we'd reassess. i did not love being pregnant but i loved loved loved giving birth and breastfeeding and i stay home. after seeing the whole process DP was pretty sure she did not want to do it.

fast forward and DS is about 15 mos old and DP says, maybe i do. i was *crushed* and yet knew i could not deny her the experience. she was still in the maybe phase and i walked around heart broken for a couple of weeks, and crying (but doing my best not to let her know how upset i was, so as not to manipulate her). in the end she decided she did not and i was so relieved.

having gone through it i know how hard it is to have your mind set and then have it taken away. i felt like a part of me died. but if DP really wanted to i would have had to make peace with it and support her.
 
#7 ·
DW and I have always wanted to each birth a child. I birthed our wonderful DS and we're about to start TTC with DW for #2. I know how hard it can be to not have that second baby. I had a rough labor that ended in a c-section and it's really hard sometimes knowing that's all me being pregnant and birthing will ever be. I have a lot of sadness around that. DS is almost 2.5 and I'm really okay with expecting but not being pregnant, but it's taken some time to get there.

What sounds hard is that you've always had expectations things would be one way and all of the sudden the agreement between you and DP is changing. I imagine that you're sad about this change. After all, you're losing something. It's a change that will cause you some pain and you will need some time to grieve and adjust.

You trying to manipulate DP into giving up her newfound desire to be pregnant and birth could easily drive a HUGE wedge into your relationship. We all sacrifice for the people we love and this could one of those situations.
 
#8 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by MujerMamaMismo View Post
How can I deny DP of the incredible, amazing, life changing experience that is pregnancy and birth? She might be ok or she might resent me for the rest of her life. Or it could lead to a big, major relationship disaster....

I don't know how to move forward with this. I don't want to manipulate her final decision but it's going to take a super human effort on my part to compromise on this.

Thoughts? Experiences? Help?
We have discussed this lots of times, and my dp has waffled about whether or not she'd ever like to become pregnant. My attitude towards that definitely shifted around a lot, though I was always glad to be the baby-carrier of the relationship--I got pg with #1, then pg again but m/c. Once I miscarried, I really really wanted to be pregnant again, and it took a long time (18 months), and towards the end we were definitely talking about her trying...it was very hard. And if she had wanted to get pregnant then, I would have held on to the hope of a #3, so I wasn't in the same boat, which sounds really tough.

At the same time, I was committed to supporting her if she ever expressed a clear and unambivalent desire to carry and birth a baby--how could I possibly deny the woman I love so much such an experience of a lifetime? I've always been committed to working through any disappointment and resentment I would feel if she really did want to give birth to a baby (even if it precluded me from doing so again)--that said, we had no previous agreements about support, me being the only one to give birth, etc. I would do "thought experiments" about it--I think it'd be very healthy for our relationship to both experience being the bio and non-bio mom, and I sincerely would love to have a child that was biologically connected to her.

All that said, at this point (we have a 6 month #2 now), I think she is ok with not experiencing pregnancy and birth--we haven't decided one way or the other about having 3, but she's now 41, so it's getting a little late for her to try and get pregnant. It's something that I hope we've navigated well, but I don't know if she will have regrets. I hope not, but if she does, I am comforted by knowing that I would have worked through whatever so that she could have the experience, and that it was her decision.

Oooh, that turned out to be rambly. Just commiserating that it's something we've thought about as well.
 
#9 ·
Thanks for the input folks...more to say later - just wanted to acknowledge that y'all took the time!
 
#10 ·
I have thought about related issues a lot. i always assumed i would be the one to carry all of our future children (we havent started TTC yet) and had a very, very hard time when DP told me that she also wanted to carry one baby and , furthermore, thought that she should go first since she is 4 years older. it felt very "unfair" to me since i was the one who has been dreaming about pregnancy since i was a teenager and has spent so much time doing research and planning, whereas DP never even seemed that interested. i am also femme and she is butch/genderqueer, so that adds another complicated dynamic to it. i think i was scared of being jealous of her going first, and feeling scared of the world not seeing this as 100% my baby, and of not bonding as well without being the breastfeeder, and even was scared that going second might jeopardize my chances at all. i have really moved past a lot of these feelings b/c i decided that i couldn't deny DP this experience and that the age factor is real and that if i went first and then she couldnt get pregnant i was worried there would be resentment. i am somewhat enjoying thinking about how to be as involved as possible in this without being the biomom but as we get ready to start TTC (hopefully in a few months) i have to say it is hard to feel like all of my excited planning (getting all the vitamins and fertility tea and accupuncture lined up) is at least in some ways out of my control - i can send DP off to work everyday with her vitamin regimen but in some ways it still feels strange that we are preparing her body for this and not mine. i feel simultaneously very connected to it and disconnected. a bit of a ramble, but definitely a complex subject.
 
#11 ·
I can't say I have the same experiences, as dp has NO interest in being pregnant and giving birth, and even less after seeing me go through birthing ds#1... I just wanted to say that reading your posts was really touching to me. i can relate in that ever since ds was a year old, I have been yearning to be pregnant again... I finally talked dp into having one more, and we are now ttc again. I cannot imagine how I would feel if that were suddenly taken away from me. I wish you the best of luck in this situation - it must be so difficult... The only positive thing I can say is that, in all truthfulness - biological mom or non-bio mom has made no difference in our relationships with our ds. We both have a very different relationship with him, but that is more because of our personalities, and he shows no preference for one of us over another...
 
#12 ·
Thanks to everyone for your thoughtful responses. I really considered what you all said, very carefully.

Our dilemma turned out to be a little less major than I had hyperventilated myself into believing, although it did open another can of worms. We talked about it a lot and the essence of DP's desire to TTC was actually about not feeling/being recognised as DS's mother. DP's family generally tend to forget that she has a baby and show little recognition/understanding of DP's family commitments, or why she's so tired or whatever. DP is working in her family business at the moment so she sees them all most days of the week. DP's mum has made the effort to visit once in almost 7 months. DP's dad won't even hold Sebby when we take him to visit them. DP's sister - who I might add, used to be a lesbian too - won't even refer to DP as Mummy (rather than her first name) when interacting with Sebby, despite us having asked her to on several occassions...I digress. All this, coupled with some issues around not being able to truly equally parent while I'm still breastfeeding really fed into DP not feeling important/significant and also kind of feeling like she gets all the shitty 'support' jobs...which, really, she does but she also gets sleep and time alone and and and...
So, we're back on the same page and trying to work through/rectify some of the concerns DP has. I will birth the next babe but the book is not closed if DP decides she wants to try for a third, though she doubts she will because when she weighs it up with going hard at her career, career wins. Things change though...
And we've made a decision that we'll TTC#2 when DS is 2, though not to the detriment of breastfeeding. (I don't have my fertility back yet, despite thinking that some rogue post partum bleeding at 10 weeks was the return of my period.)
 
#13 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by MujerMamaMismo View Post
Thanks to everyone for your thoughtful responses. I really considered what you all said, very carefully.

Our dilemma turned out to be a little less major than I had hyperventilated myself into believing, although it did open another can of worms. We talked about it a lot and the essence of DP's desire to TTC was actually about not feeling/being recognised as DS's mother. DP's family generally tend to forget that she has a baby and show little recognition/understanding of DP's family commitments, or why she's so tired or whatever. DP is working in her family business at the moment so she sees them all most days of the week. DP's mum has made the effort to visit once in almost 7 months. DP's dad won't even hold Sebby when we take him to visit them. DP's sister - who I might add, used to be a lesbian too - won't even refer to DP as Mummy (rather than her first name) when interacting with Sebby, despite us having asked her to on several occassions...I digress. All this, coupled with some issues around not being able to truly equally parent while I'm still breastfeeding really fed into DP not feeling important/significant and also kind of feeling like she gets all the shitty 'support' jobs...which, really, she does but she also gets sleep and time alone and and and...
So, we're back on the same page and trying to work through/rectify some of the concerns DP has. I will birth the next babe but the book is not closed if DP decides she wants to try for a third, though she doubts she will because when she weighs it up with going hard at her career, career wins. Things change though...
And we've made a decision that we'll TTC#2 when DS is 2, though not to the detriment of breastfeeding. (I don't have my fertility back yet, despite thinking that some rogue post partum bleeding at 10 weeks was the return of my period.)
I'm so glad that you're feeling better about things, and that DP was able to open up and talk to you about how she's feeling in regards to her NGP status. That sounds really hard. I will say, as a small hopeful bit, that it took some time for dw's family to really see our twins as their grandsons and to see dw as their mother (I remember my MIL saying to the boys, as babies, "that's your Lena!" and I'd correct her and say, "no, that's your Mama!"). I believe that it took a full year for them to really value Lena's status as the boys' mother--it took seeing her BE their mother, and them treat her like a mother, call her "mama" and be comforted by her--and to really fall in love with the boys as their grandchildren. But it DID happen eventually, and now I'm sure that all of dw's extended family sees dw as an equal mother, and they love our kids as intensely as they would if Lena herself had birthed them all.

I'm not sure if this is a possibility for you, but have you considered TTC #2 using DP's egg in your womb? Obviously it would not be a complete solution, but it might help DP to feel like part of her is in the baby from conception, and it might help her family as well.

I'm happy to hear that you are feeling more open to the idea of a third child; I really don't think either of you should have to give up such a strong desire to be pregnant (and I also just found having 3 kids to be a million times more fun than having just 2).

Lex
 
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