Friend refusing to go to baby showers as it's triggering

Yeah I wish the Yanks had kept this stupid tradition on their side of the pond! I also find most of them incredibly sexist too.

I am surprised this even needs a AIBU discussion.

I think it’s fair - the risk with trying to swallow her feelings and go anyway is that she ends up getting upset and ruining it for the mum to be. She’s trying to avoid this as well as the inevitable ugly cry to her husband when she gets home. It’s good she is being honest, people will understand that - saying you are busy too often will lead people to think you are trying to separate from the friendship or being off with them. Your friend should send a gift, though.

The one mistake your friend made was telling yje truth. She should have continued to decline invites and just say she had other plans.

Same! I got invited to one at work last week, "I just said, sorry, I don't do baby showers". Everyone seemed to accept it without any offence.
I'm generally a nice person (honestly!) and I'm the first to help new mums when the baby arrives but baby showers? Nah!

What makes you think she is not happy for others

You’re wrong but that’s ok.

Incidentally nowhere does it say she is unhappy for her friends. You can be happy for other’s news while recognising that news triggers pain in you.

It would be different if she was trying to stop others celebrating but she is not.

You appear to be unpleasant.

I can see that you have been berated by this poster later in the thread, and I want you to know that I completely agree with you. I’m not going to address their later post, as I’ll just get a load of shit flung at me (probably will anyway). But I feel my DH’s IVF journey was no less than mine, regardless of who got prodded and poked.

I support her decision. Her priority is her mental health. I have a friend who similarly avoids baby showers and came off social media to not see pregnancy announcements / weddings / engagements.

I would actually side eye anybody who DID have an issue with it.

Have you ever suffered with infertility?

Baby showers are so tacky and grabby. How many more celebrations centred around you could you possibly want? Nobody really cares that you are procreating other than you, your partner and possibly the baby's grandparents and it is egotistical to expect otherwise. It is so classless to expect two sets of presents, one before the baby is due and the inevitable mound of presents and cards that will build after the baby is born.

I disagree that it shows an unpleasant aspect to someone's character. What would make someone unpleasant is if they went and were resentful, or said mean, catty things about the party, gifts or friend out of jealousy, or got drunk and upset and made it about them or made others feel bad.

Knowing your limits and not going to an event that is likely to cause you to feel crap and potentially affect others having a nice time shows self awareness and consideration. You can be happy for someone else and sad for yourself at the same time.

I know it's not exactly the same, but when I went for a promotion into my current role at work, another colleague in my team went for it at the same time and I know was bitterly disappointed to lose out. My team took me for a celebratory drink after our away day, to which I absolutely didn't expect that colleague to come (although she was welcome), and she didn't. Others might see that as churlish, but I felt she was being sensible to protect herself and wouldn't have wanted for the world for her to force herself and be miserable. Not everyone is able to suck up their own feelings and put on a happy face all of the time, and it's much more honest to acknowledge it if you can't.

Totally her choice. Baby showers aren't an essential thing, just a casual get together imo. When I was going through multiple miscarriages I'd have politely declined too. For some reason I found pregnancy difficult to deal with but no issue when the baby arrived so she may be fine with meeting baby or similar (or she may not be).

I'd do the same in her shoes. Showers are awful anyway.

All of the whataboutery on this thread is really strange to me. Presumably the hypothetical people invited in these hypothetical scenarios are your friends. I can't think of a single event in my life where I would expect any of my friends to prioritise me over their own feelings and MH. I don't care if it's a baby shower, wedding, house warming, parents anniversary or any other tenuous example given, if attending is going to be something they have to put on a brave face and "get through" then I don't want them to do that to themselves, especially if they are going to struggle.

I could imagine the MN posts where a visibly quiet person struggling with infertility at a baby shower was labelled as attention seeking, making it about her and "should have stayed away if she couldn't be happy for you".

The poor woman can't win.

I'm also sorry that the friend she turned to for support has opted to gossip rather than be there for her

@EggnogNoggin I understand what you're saying and can see that it's deeply affected you. I'm sorry you've had such a hard time and it's obvious that, for you, having a baby was the most important thing in the world. However, that's not the same for everyone. Not everyone wants a partner. Not everyone wants a baby. For some people, either might feel like a desperate need, for others it could be a mild want and for others a definite dislike! There are people who would desperately feel the need to find a partner and despair that they couldn't, no matter how many years they've got. For some, that need could far outweigh their desire to have a child. Obviously, the opposite was true for you. Everyone is different.

Do you not understand that it is possible to be happy for others and sad for yourself at the same time? And quite frankly, if someone doesn’t get why a friend struggling with infertility might prefer not to attend their baby shower,they are the unpleasant, mean spirited one.

It would be better if she could be happy for others and not miserable for herself. However if she can't, she can't and it's better she makes excuses and doesn't go.

Absolutely the right choice and should be respected by others.

I understand people protecting their mental health, if you feel that way about your friends’ pregnancy then it is better to stay away.

But that doesn’t stop it being an unpleasant aspect of your character - to be unable to find joy in your friend’s joy when it has no impact on your own fertility.

I empathize with infertility, of course. I can’t empathize with infertility being an excuse for failing to be happy your friends find joy from the exact thing that would bring you joy.

I specifically said I understood he was as devastated. But come on, you really believe that the average man goes through the same physical process? Of course they don’t. You say your husband did the injections, do you mean he injected drugs - many being used “off certificate” - into his body or do you mean he gave you them or was there when you did them? The latter are not the same.

also language like “how dare you” is hyperbolic. I obviously dare, but assuming you actually want to know would you like me to explain the mechanism? It’s actually very simple: I think something, examine it to see if it stands up to my scrutiny and if it does, I use my finger to type it on my phone. HTH.

Finally, I don’t agree that I am “minimising” the PP’s experience - I am asking that he does not minimise mine. Which is when we get to the philosophical problems with “subjective truth”. So maybe I should have made it clear that what I was saying was I do not believe that the PP while having suffered the devestation of infertility did “go through” IVF etc in the same way that I did or another female did. And I don’t think he should express himself in the way that he did without being challenged. But feel free to behave obnoxiously if it makes you feel better.

When I was struggling with fertility, a pregnancy announcement would knock me for six. Thankfully baby showers weren’t the norm but I definitely wouldn’t have been able to go.