To feel slightly put out at the implication that IVF babies are more precious?

[jollyfrenchy]

As part of a discussion about choking and cutting grapes for small children, one lady said she also wouldn't be giving her daughter raw apple or carrot pieces until she was 5 years old for fear of choking. When she was then told she was being a bit overly paranoid. In response she agreed, but explained it by saying that it took 11 years of trying and 2 rounds of IVF to have her daughter, and she wasn't willing to take any risks at all.

Now, I do understand that sort of experience has an effect on you, but I slightly resent the implication that her child is somehow more precious than others. Kind of like, "Oh well you can afford to take risks, you've got three kids, and anyway, you if you lost one you could always have another. This is the only one I've got and will ever have so I need to look after her more."

Er, no every one of my children is as precious and important as yours, it's just that in life you have to take risks and eating apples is a risk I'm prepared for them to take.

Also surely it's not beneficial to your oh so precious child's well being to wrap them in cotton wool and never take ANY risk with them. In a similar way I know people who had a hard time having their baby or who adopted after years of heartache, who then go on to completely spoil the child (never say no, let them have their own way all the time etc) because they're so grateful to have them. Again, not doing the child any favours really.

Ivf babies are more precious...to their parents. They are a little more special to their own parents due to the heart ache and pain, longing and grief.

When dd1 died anyone (and there were several people) who told me I could have another got the same response. I didn't want another I just wanted her. Children are not replaceable or interchangeable and saying you can have another to a mother who has lost a child is just disgraceful, ignorant, hurtful and rude.

However I did go on to have 4 more. They are the most precious things in the world to me and I'm totally overprotective because I know the reality of child loss and I couldn't bear to be without any of them. That doesn't mean they're any more precious to everyone else though and I would never even imply that they are.

All mums have some irrational fears.

Some fear hot dogs, some grapes.

My mum had an irrational fear of us choking on peanuts (a peanut is exactly the width of a child's wind pipe)

We could still freak her out as teens buy throwing peanuts in the air and catching them in our mouths. Only now I am a mum do I realise how cruel that was!

worst fears. Everyone has similar worst fears. They are too big to handle, so we try to control a few small things like grapes, or peanuts

Debbriana. Right. 'I'll beat up anybody who implies I don't love my child massive amounts'.

Next breath 'I think somebody else doesn't really love their child that much'.

Riiiiiiiighty ho.

Alora - I am so sorry for your loss. People said that to my friend too. Like her 2 year old daughter could just be replaced. Then when she did have another, people acted like it must have 'fixed' her grief.

well 'most bizarre post of this thread going to Debbriana1
And she 'doesn't love her child that much' if she is only worried about food?

It's interesting. Nobody on this thread has an experience of somebody who has actually had fertility treatment telling them that they love their child more or that their child is more precious because they had that treatment. All I can really see is some rather hysterical and nasty women who seem to think that's what people who have fertility treatment must think and therefore that treatment and the very existence of a child as a result is a personal affront to them and their own children.

I would say that the mild annoyance of people who conceive naturally is FAR inferior to the pain that some people have experienced trying to have a baby

11 years of trying

1 fucking years, not knowing if you could be a Mum or not

sheesh. YABU

It's interesting. Nobody on this thread has an experience of somebody who has actually had fertility treatment telling them that they love their child more or that their child is more precious because they had that treatment.

I'm prett sure plenty have. But in being kind, it was never made into a big issue. I had a friend who had IVF and then maintained that we couldn't possibly understand (insert many random topics) but our children was easy to come by and we couldn't possible feel the same love.

It happens and hopefully most people are kind with it. But the last straw between my friend who had her daughter with IVF and another friend (who didn't) was when the children came into real difficulty in water (all was ok fortunately) and a horrid comment from friend who had IVF and about how she would suffer so much more should anything have happened to the DC.

It didn't end well, and they are no longer friends. And I don't blame the second friend in this scenario at all.

What if for example someone has the same view of boys over girls?

booyaka its true in my experience. I dated a single father whose daughter was conceived via IVF. I asked whether she might want to come pony trekking. His reply was 'not sure I am a bit wary xxxx took so long to arrive she's very precious to us'
I was gobsmacked. I can't remember what I said. I know his fear was real. But its completely inappropriate to imply that my children were dispensible

@toomuch Until they were about 12 months, and also after that if they were ill at all, if I had to wake them up in the morning (rather than them already being awake) I went in mentally preparing myself for what it would be like if one or both of them had died in the night. I'm not particularly risk averse and as a statistician by trade I understand relative risk a lot better than most people.

Seriously, most mums feel this way. I remember waking up in panic in the middle of the night because she didn't not wake up for her usual feed. I actually woke her up just to make sure she was already even the I could tell she was breathing. Or going to the gp for things that turns out not to bad but at that moment if felt like it worst thing, even the slightest of temperature rise. I don't regret it and I don't think it was wrong to feel that way.

I also think that most first time mums go through a lot of panic. It doesn't matter how many baby books you read. It's not a manual for children. Everything you encounter on the way can send you into panic.

As someone who's going through persistent miscarriages, I can vouch that (without evening having my special rainbow yet), I will certainly appreciate the complexities of life more than someone who fell naturally.

However, the woman sounded as if she was totally aware of her anxiousness but a person's tone of voice is exceptionally important in these circumstances, perhaps she said it in a little 'matter of fact/overly bearing' tone, OP? If so, I can understand your reaction a little bit.

Let's face it, appreciating somethings is a far cry different from loving something more. That's because I believe you'd be blissfully unaware what real complications can arise when you haven't experienced them.. Even if you are aware of them.

*Sorry, by falling naturally I meant falling with relative ease.

donajimena
Are you sure he wasn't just justifying his own anxiety there? 'I don't know if I want her to go pony riding. We are quite risk adverse with her because it took us so long to conceive her'

Gotham City is put to shame with the amount of projecting going on in this thread

I think when something is hard to come by, you appreciate it more.

Rubbish. I had two children from bc failure. I do not appreciate them less because they were easy to come by

OP, it's obvious your friend is talking about her feelings only and she isn't implying her child is more precious than anyone else's.

I have been extremely lucky in the fact that the children I planned for were conceived the first month and I can't imagine the heart ache infertility causes, so if it makes her more paranoid I'm not going to judge that, but I do think it is wrong to say that those who had babies via IVF are more appreciated.

But that isn't what he said. Showed what he was thinking....

I think unless you've experienced it yourself it's a very difficult thing to express. I'm quite sure my friends who conceived easily love their children every bit as much as I do. However I do wonder whether they are as consciously aware of how lucky we all are to have our children as I am. I don't think there's a day goes past when I don't think how different my life could have been. I'm not sure that that thought would occur to them. They wanted children and they had them. They were never confronted with the very real possibility that they might remain childless. None of that means my children are any more precious in comparison to theirs but I think I am more aware of how lucky I am, if that makes any sense.

Yabu and boring. Your the previous one!

Sometimes people don't phrase things as well as they might. I generally find it better to try and interpret it charitably if at all possible or at least have foot-in-mouth syndrome rather than assuming they are criticising me.

i find it interesting bamboo that you've failed to mention something so relevant, yet highly improbable, until this point in the thread, at such a convenient moment. I also find it interesting that you think this one experience means that it's a common attitude.

God Bamboo, I bet you're one of those people who will tell the parents of IVF babies that their child has no right to exist and that they're just a manifestation of their parents selfishness 'because if you can't have children then there's probably a really good reason why you shouldn't be a parent' and that all people with fertility problems would make bad parents. Or are you my other favourite? The mother with six kids who's never worked and is bringing them all up on benefits who is outraged by the fact that occasionally the NHS pays a few thousand pounds towards fertility treatment?

She sounds barking regardless of the ivf. I do think it makes the pregnancy more special to the parents. And it doesn't make my babies any less special to me and Dh. Meh.

There but for the grace of God...

It wasn't mentioned Boo because it didn't happen to me and I was deeply sympathetic. I was well aware of the impact that IVF had on her and was very supportive throughout it.

I actually agree with many other posters who say there is a disproportionately higher prevalence of stress and depression in mothers who have had IVF. I am still friends with my friend, although interestingly, she has toned down her views on this front.

It's just sad that it happened the way it did.

I've also miscarried and therefore have two rainbow babies never heard that term before now and wont' be using it again Is that relevant to? Perhaps, perhaps not!

God Bamboo, I bet you're one of those people who will tell the parents of IVF babies that their child has no right to exist and that they're just a manifestation of their parents selfishness 'because if you can't have children then there's probably a really good reason why you shouldn't be a parent' and that all people with fertility problems would make bad parents. Or are you my other favourite? The mother with six kids who's never worked and is bringing them all up on benefits who is outraged by the fact that occasionally the NHS pays a few thousand pounds towards fertility treatment

Yes, yes you've got me! These are my views entirely! I can clearly see how you've come to that conclusion and so rationally too!

Maybe a better way to phrase it would be that the existence of hard-won children (for want of a better phrase) is more precious? Not the children themselves.

Let's take children out of it for a minute as I think people's posts are beung cloudy by sentimentality. Let's look at degrees. I have a good degree from a good uni. It wasn't particularly hard won as the odds were completely in my favour - uni-educated MC parents, private school - of course I was going to uni and would get a degree, that's what 20 yo me thought. Bob's your uncle. Then there's someone who didn't have all that, who maybe had to leave school to get a job and after a lot of very hard slog at the age of 35 finally got her degree. The degrees are worth the same. But obviously hers would be more precious to her because if the journey she went through to get it.

Does that make sense? It's not about the thing (child, degree, whatever), it's about how that thing came to happen altering ones perception.

waits for MN to combust for daring to compare children to degrees and referring to them as a thing