I am not coping. I can't do this forever.

[ratheroverwhelmed]

I'm so conflicted and I have no idea what to do for the best.

We lost our (unplanned) baby at 9 weeks two years ago this month. A missed miscarriage they called it. I had SMM. Never saw my sweet baby again. All I have left is a scan photo.

We tried again, I mean, after all that's what people tell you isn't it.
"You can try again!".
Well we did try again, despite DP never wanting his own children.
And magically I fell pregnant yet again - I say magically because I have history of fertility issues.

Our second baby died at around 5 weeks.

Before my world was shaken to the core, I never thought about having more children after my two DC with my ex-H. It was too painful to go through the stress of TTC again, I was happy with my lot.

But our two darling lost babies switched something in my mind and in my heart. I am so very desperate to keep trying.
DP refuses point blank - he is back to the thinking that he does not want his own children. If I am honest, we can't afford another child anyway.

But I am dying inside. It is all consuming.
Day in and day out I'm in pain with longing.

I love my DP deeply, totally in love with him, as he is with me. The thought of leaving him is too hard to bear. But I am so desperately unhappy. Everyone bangs on about rainbow babies and I won't ever get mine. I feel like I have a child shaped hole in my heart and it is not getting any better, two years later. I feel like my body aches to hold my baby.

DP knows how I feel. I have been to some very very dark places because of my feelings.

I think I have forgotten how to be genuinely happy. I pretend when around DP, because he gets frustrated when I am sad about it and lashes out at me verbally. I can't blame him quite frankly, it must be exhausting for him. It's utterly crippling for me being around me all the time.

I'm just so tired of being sad and feeling so lost. I'm constantly triggered. Cannot bear to be around pregnant women because the jealousy is too much. Cannot bear to see people happy to be pregnant - why not me?

It all feels so very cruel. Teased with two babies, then tough shit.

Would you leave someone you were in love with, in order to be true to yourself?
Or should I just be happy with my lot and learn to deal with it? Somehow...

[Itsbecauseimaleo]

I think you would benefit from some form of counselling. I don't know if the pain will ever go away and I'm so sorry about your losses. However you do admit that you can't afford another child anyway? Would it be fair to bring another child into a situation where money is extremely tight? Your other children would suffer too. Are you otherwise happy with your DP? Maybe you could do couples counselling? I hope you end up feeling a little better soon

[ratheroverwhelmed]

I've had lots of counselling over the past 18 months or so.
We've also had couples counselling

Yes, my logical part of my brain knows money is too tight. My logical brain tells me to stop being so bloody stupid.
But my heart and soul are screaming.

I'm finding day to day life almost impossible.
The thoughts are so intrusive on my life.

I'm actually trying a new tactic with life coaching sessions (free because it's my best friend's husband, otherwise would have been pricey). I'd love to try hypnotherapy, anything! I wish someone could physically beat it out of me.

[Quartz2208]

Have you posted before under a different name as this sounds very heartbreakingly familiar. Have you tried grief counselling at all?

I do think though that another child is not the solution - you need to properly grieve and recover from your loss

[ratheroverwhelmed]

It's been two solid years of grieving. It's too much now.

Yes I've had bereavement counselling, through Cruse. But they passed me onto someone else. I feel like talking therapies are like picking at the scab. Constantly re-opening the wound.
I'm hoping the life coaching will work. It a completely different way of viewing things.
I'm just having a shit couple of weeks after hearing about three pregnancies in my social circle.
I quite fancy running away and hiding in a cave on my own so I'm no bother to anyone

[Chattette1]

I'm so sorry OP I understand some of what you're saying. I have had two miscarriages and I feel like the old me before the losses is a different person. It makes me so sad that I can't be truly happy anymore but I am desperate to shake off this misery and fear. If you love your husband I would cling to that- it's hard because you're at a stalemate but in your situation I would try to convince him again about TTC. I know you will have done all you can so I'm sorry that's probably not helpful advice. I hope things work out for you X

[ratheroverwhelmed]

Thank you Chattette.
I have tried to convince him but it makes him angry and then he says we want fundamentally different things, ie, we should probably separate in that case .

I've no choice here. Like it or lump it.

I'm so tired of reading about people's 'rainbow babies' and people telling eachother on babyloss groups not to give up hope, and how they had a healthy baby after MC etc... I sitting there thinking "that's BULLSHIT"
Even the sonographer who discovered our first baby had died encouraged us by saying we can try again.

I haven't met anyone who has not had a baby after MC, friends, strangers online.... they have all gone again, or are trying again now. I feel so alone in my darkness.

Everyone around me seems to be either getting married or having babies or both. I keep thinking - but I want it more than ANY of you! Obviously I don't know that to be true, but it certainly feels like it is.

[moomin11]

I really feel for you, I was in a similar situation. My husband didn't want children in the end and I did, it was a horrible. I felt like I didn't really have any choice but to leave - I didn't want to push him into it and I knew I would end up resenting him if we didn't have children so the relationship was doomed anyway. Only you can know what is right for you, but it does sound like you have tried to accept it / 'lump it' (I tried that too for years) and that's not working

[ratheroverwhelmed]

moomin I'm so sorry. Are you happy now?

If I leave, I may never have my rainbow anyway as I'm approaching 40 with fertility issues. Who knows if I would ever meet anyone else, let alone in the short fertile years I have left (and who wants to be THAT woman looking for a man to breed with) I could end up leaving the man I love with all my heart, for nothing.
I feel like I'm damned if I do and damned if I don't

[PastaSauceHoarder]

I recognise you, OP!
I'm so sorry, I'm heartbroken that you're still feeling this way. You must feel exhausted, grieving takes up so much energy and I don't think a lot of people realise that.
My lovely friend had a mmc last year and hasn't tried again. I know she'd be desperate to if her circumstances were different.
It sounds as if you're in such a deep hole right now. If you don't mind me saying I feel that you're not accepting that fact that you can't really afford another child as reason to not try again because you know in your heart of hearts that you'd happily scrimp and make do if you were to fall pregnant - if that makes sense at all?
I wish that your journey finally gets a happy ending, OP. Although I have never lost a child I've had my own experiences of being so incredibly desperate for one.

[ratheroverwhelmed]

Thanks Pasta
I am so very sorry for you friend

I am finished, I really am. The slightest thing triggers me and I'm so so tired of it. I want to get through an hour without that pang of hurt in my chest. To walk past the pregnant woman at my office (who glides around with a permanent smile on her face) without wanting to scream.

From talking to the life coach and watching various talks online, I'm trying to understand that feelings are just thoughts and they come and they go if you just allow them to do their thing and don't resist them. But two years later, and I don't know how much longer I can allow these thoughts to take over my mind.

I feel that you're not accepting that fact that you can't really afford another child as reason to not try again because you know in your heart of hearts that you'd happily scrimp and make do if you were to fall pregnant
Exactly this. But DP would never in a million years give up anything else, and I wouldn't expect him to - his choice is his choice and he has perfectly valid reasons. But it doesn't stop this horrible pain of desperation to hold our baby. We were going to have a baby. We had made so many plans and invested emotionally and financially, completely naively.
My heart and my body is still expecting a baby, and the feeling is still as powerful as ever.

If this carries on, I will lose DP. I was single for 6 years before DP and I found eachother and fell in love.
I wish I knew before we fell for eachother that I wanted another child. I genuinely didn't care then and never imagined having anymore children.
If only I knew that deep down I did want another child, I wouldn't have allowed myself to fall for him, because he told me from the start that he didn't want children.
Hindsight is fucking shit.

[Casperr]

Oh love I recognise you as well. I feel so sad for you that you are still hurting. I remember talking with you last year and feeling so sad for you. I don't have much advice but I just want to say have you tried to take a short break from your partner. I think being so close to him hasn't let you process it all very well. You really need to have some space from him.

[ratheroverwhelmed]

Casperr he is much better these days. He is far less angry. Through counselling, he is slowly learning that getting angry at me isn't helping things. But equally, I have learnt to keep my feelings from him so I don't make him angry - which I have discovered isn't a very healthy coping strategy.

I don't know. I love him too much to be apart. We hate even being apart from eachother for more than a couple of days! I think being apart from him would be just as painful as what I'm going through now.

Perhaps I just need a lobotomy!

[PastaSauceHoarder]

It sounds like you've maybe answered a few of your own questions there - you definitely don't want to be away from him. So perhaps leaving him wouldn't help things at all? By the sounds of it you don't just want a baby, you want HIS baby.

[ratheroverwhelmed]

Hit the nail on the head Pasta.

Our two lost babies were his, and he completely embraced their impending arrivals when they were alive, despite never wanting his own children. Our first loss was a surprise, and our second was planned. My ex husband wasn't ever as enthusiastic as he was.

I guess if hadn't been so into it at the time, I could have dealt with it a bit better? I don't know.

I do wonder how you can go from absolutely vehemently against having any children, to being super enthusiastic, then back to completely against it. But who knows how his mind works.

Life is shit and then you die, eh? Just gotta try and make the most of it somehow. I have two children from my previous marriage, but it's not about being grateful for what I have. I already know full well how fortunate I am - and that makes me feel guilty for moaning.
But, even so, for some reason that doesn't stop the pain of needing another after our losses.

I do worry that I will never be truly happy again, and that isn't fair on DP or my DC.

[PastaSauceHoarder]

Thats totally understandable - you have two wonderful children already but you were supposed to have three. Just because you're yearning for your third doesn't mean you love the first two any less.
Has your partner explained why exactly he kept changing his mind? That seems totally unfair for you. Thats giving you hope and then taking it away again.
This whole thing has just been really shit, hasn't it? I think I've read quite a few of your posts in the past. You'll be happy again one day, I just really hope it comes soon for you.

[WheresTheEvidence]

. I feel like I have a child shaped hole in my heart - You have children. You just don't have children with your partner.

[Adviceplease360]

I wonder what sort of effect all of this has had on your existing children.
Sounds absolutely tortuous for them.

[moomin11]

It's understandable that you are grieving for the loss of the pregnancies even though neither of you thought you wanted children together. I've had previous losses and my last one was unplanned but it didn't stop us getting excited about it, imagining the future. It's cruel when that gets taken away and so difficult now that your OH has changed his mind again. It sounds like he could do with some counselling too?

[moomin11]

I am happy yes, I was very lucky to meet my now DH and after some losses we have a daughter together. Every situation is different though and only you know how you feel in your relationship and whether you can make it work. It's clear you're both really trying to x

[MynameisJune]

Hi op I’m really sorry to read what you’re going through.

I had a loss of s much wanted baby back in October, it’s heartbreaking and I’m sorry you’ve gone through this twice.

My only advice to you is stay off baby forums. You’ve mentioned reading threads online about strangers and rainbow babies. Honestly that is not going to help you accept your situation. Being on baby forums is just going to bring to the front everything that has happened and it’s going to keep those thoughts there constantly.

You have two choices, you stay and accept that you’re not going to have another baby or you leave and try to find someone else to have a baby with.

If you want to stay then I think you need to move yourself away from thinking of babies all day long. Stay off baby forums, stop reading articles. Maybe get out more, take up exercise or a hobby, read a book to stop your mind wondering down paths you don’t want it to take. Personally I think you’re torturing yourself reading all these things.

We’ve been trying to conceive for over a year now, bar the one mc last year it isn’t happening. I’ve stopped myself looking at the pregnancy forums and I’ve started reading more about one child families as that is possibly where we will end up (we have a DD already). Having an only isn’t what I planned but it might be what I have to accept and starting to move away from the things I don’t have to the things I do have is my way of beginning to accept it. I also start reading a book, knitting or running when I find thoughts of ‘why me’ entering my head. Not always possible but does help.