Grieving for the 3rd baby I'll never have. Help me

[imonaboat]

All my life I pictured myself with 3 children. I absolutely love being a mum and I'm so grateful that I already have 2 DD 3yrs and 1yr old.

But I'm desperate to complete my family and have another baby. It's not going to happen for us though. I'm mid 30s but DH is 48. He's open to having more children but I feel he's too old?!

The stars just haven't aligned for DH and I. We were TTC for many years until starting IVF. We suffered the horrific and horribly sad stillbirth of our son in 2015 but were lucky IVF worked for us again in 2016 and last year.

I mourn our son everyday and I think if he hadn't been born sleeping I'd have my 3 children now. I mean I do to some extent but a buried baby is not the same as 3 alive children.

How do I grieve for the additional child I'll never get? Will I ever get over it and eventually accept being happy with my 2 DDs?

I grieve the children I will never have as I can’t have any at all.

I'm sorry to hear that @Likethebattle I felt like this when I lost my son after so many years of TTC and lots of money thrown at IVF. I DO know I should be grateful for the 2 I already have.
How did you come to terms with it all?

I don't think your DH is too old at all. If you both want another child and can emotionally and financially cope with another round of IVF then go for it.

I'm sorry for the loss of your DS

Hi op

I’m sorry for the loss of your son, and how you are feeling now. Fwiw i felt much as you do (but i have not had your fertility struggles or bereavement, disclaimer) when my youngest was around the age my eldest was when i had youngest, if that makes sense, and i really wanted another one, it was hard to accept i would never be pg again, or hold another baby in my arms again, or bf and it made me very sad. However, (again, unlike you and so i am sorry if this is insensitive or unhelpful, but just saying what got me through) i am very lucky in that i never, not once, have felt the pain of ttc and it not happening, i have never lost a pregnancy. So i held on to that, as i know how incredibly fortunate i am, that i will never know that pain. Like you i was mid thirties at this time, and i imagined how it would feel dealing with that level of disappointment or grief while also wrangling my two existing children. And i knew that it would take me away from them, right when i should be enjoying those years of them still being so little. So i decided to quit while i was ahead and find my joy in the dc i had, and after a time i felt better.

Now i am so glad i made that choice as some years later my marriage broke down, and getting back into the workplace after being a sahm was an uphill struggle, and i am now a skint single mum grafting away on in work benefits and feeling like there’s never quite enough of me to go round 😬

Like i keep saying i realise my experience is different than yours, and essentially ‘be grateful for what you have’ is such a cliched thing to say in these circumstances. But it helped me, at the time, and now many years later i’m glad for that.

I honestly think we could keep going and going and not know when to stop. But at a certain point, one of our babies just has to be the last one. I'm 47 now but it was the stillbirth of our little girl years ago that sent me into a place I hadn't known before: jealousy of other bumps, the need to get pregnant, the need to fill up the huge vacuum and sense of loss that came with the stillbirth. Before the stillbirth I had a miscarriage. After the stillbirth I had another miscarriage at 14 weeks. I felt like a car wreck. Being 40 felt so worthless. All around me, bumps were blooming, fertility flowered, every woman was a vessel of life. Not me. I felt like a walking tomb. Sounds so melodramatic but that is how it felt. All I could see was what I saw. All I could feel was what I felt.
Getting older makes it much easier. In your 40s, you're waving off the baby-making years. It's not such a heavy agenda. Your friends are no longer having them (the odd one or two maybe). And your other kids are older. You move away from making a family, completing a family, to just BEING the family you are and cherishing what is right in front of you. But you have to allow time to take you to that place, and it will, undoubtedly. I think it's hard at your age, OP. You're in your mid-30s and I am sure you're just surrounded by Baby World. The topic of discussion among friends is babies: Making them, having them, raising them.
You'll make peace with it all in time. Your stillborn son paved the way for your other two. I like to think that this is true and I do believe in that. I believe that your other two children are here because their paths were lit by their spirit brother. Hang onto that. Try and remember what is right in front of you right now. Try to turn the shadow of your grief into the light of living in this moment, the one you have now with the people you love.

I had a late early miscarriage - just short of 12 weeks - and life kind of went to shit after that so I wasn't prepared to bring another baby into the mix. I'm 43 now and things have settled down but I am too old to take a chance on having another baby.

I did a good bit of crying about it. If I was your age and finances were ok I'd probably go for it. I would have loved another child (we have one) and I often imagine what it would have been like to be here now with our 11 year old and 6 year old. One child is a very small family. I used to look at people who had 2 or 3 and feel so envious.

But it is what it is. I'm lucky with the beautiful boy I have. It keeps my carbon footprint low, we'll be able to help him more with university and house deposit, that kind of thing. We're very close. He's a bit older so I have more time to myself that I wouldn't have if there was another child.

It still hurts though - well the grief for my other little child is still there anyway.

Different circumstances similar pain here. Have two lovely dds now 9 and 6 and started trying for a third in 2016. Had some serious health problems so put TTC on hold, started again in 2018 and had 3 miscarriages in under a year . Then got unwell again now and 39. I joke that if only someone would give me a sign I shouldn't have a dc3

But that doesn't stop the burning desire to try again. Despite head knowing it is daft I just want to hold another baby of mine. If I was a penguin I would have stolen someone else's chick by now

Just trying to plod on and almost wishing for menopause to take this all off the table. Dh is excellent and said to me this week to put the love I have to give to a dc3 to our dds. Very good advice I thought.

Tbh OP your title makes it sound as if you physically can't have another baby. You could. It's a little misleading and manipulative.

Thank you for such a lovely message @TheVanguardSix and I'm so sorry to hear of all the unbearable grief you've been through and also the harrowing loss of your daughter. It's a club no one wants to be a part of.