ANNOUNCEMENT ANGUISH

🌷I am not proud to admit this, but every time I hear a pregnancy announcement, my heart breaks a little. Even with our healthy, happy, beautiful daughter with us, the news of someone else getting pregnant naturally reminds me of what Phil and I had stolen. We will never get to “try” to get pregnant. We will never get to throw caution to the wind and just have a go at it. I’ll never get to pee on a stick and hope for two lines, much less ever feel my baby kick from the inside out. Evie will never get to watch my belly grow and have conversations about her sibling inside mommy. I’ll never get to experience pregnancy or trying to get pregnant. Having a baby will always be a massive undertaking. Months, if not years, of tests, financial outlay, planning, and anxiety. I failed pregnancy or transfer, miscarriage, or chemical pregnancy will never result in “just try again next month.” We will never get to simply state how many kids we want to have.

99% of the time, I don’t think about what pregnancy does and does not look like for us because I am so Goddamn happy and grateful for our growing family, but my heart can’t help but sink with each pregnancy announcement. I wish this wasn’t so, but it is my reality, and likely always will.

This past week, I found out one of my dear, dear friends is pregnant. Her family has been one of our biggest supporters through our fertility journey. They family to us. I feel so much guilt that the first thing I felt when she told me was sadness. The happiness and joy followed, but the sadness was real. I wish my brain could immediately feel the happiness for them, but my brain simply gets triggered at every announcement, whether it is a random stranger on social media, or from someone I love like a sister. Am I a terrible person? Will this always be my reaction? I so wish I could just choose to not feel the weight of everything we have lost when I hear of someone else getting pregnant naturally.

I don’t admit these feelings to anyone, but Phil. I truly want to share in these life moments with those I love. I would never want to be removed from the announcements because I am truly, sincerely happy for them, but at the same time, it’s hard to feel my heartbreak knowing what I will never get to experience.

I have accepted that every time I hear a pregnancy announcement, my heart will break while simultaneously feeling joy. I wish I could just feel the positive feelings, but that’s not life, and that’s certainly not the hand we have been dealt. If nothing else, I tell myself, I would rather have this experience, with our beautiful daughter next to us, than go through life hearing pregnancy announcements without a child. That would be unbearable.🌷