AIBU to have wanted to get pregnant and now regret it

[Mamatobear]

Sooo… my DH and I thought we’d like to ttc soon as our DS is now 2 and we’d like to extend our family- ideally would like 3 children.
we went on holiday and dtd and didn’t think much of it. It took months and months to conceive our DS so we were expecting to it to take a while to conceive no.2.

anyway… 2 days ago we had a huge financial hit. I don’t want to go into detail but we’ve lost £15,000 ish (so pretty devastating). We decided we’d stop ttc until more financially stable as we were counting on this money- I was thinking maybe next year.

now this morning I was feeling ‘off’ and decided to do a test, fully expecting a negative, and it’s positive. (But very faint)

im now spiralling and have been hit with a feeling of dread and worry.

we can’t afford another baby now… I don’t want to go ahead and risk our financial situation getting even WORSE. I feel terrible as this baby was originally so so wanted, but now will completely devastate our family.

BUT I know I’d hate myself forever if I terminated even thought I think it’s the right choice. I don’t know what to do!?

am I being an awful person? I know many would kill to have a baby 😣

@FeatherBlower thank you for your message

weve quickly discussed it and he’s supportive either way.
too much to process right now maybe- I’m just feeling all sorts of emotions

Look at all options - you may have to take a shorter maternity leave or perhaps if u have a mortgage as for holiday or interest only.
You know your prone to pnd so consider medication early on etc

If I understand your other thread correctly, you already chose to TTC instead of completing a career related qualification. So I think you know that having more money / security is less important to you than having another baby. You say you can afford it. So I think you’re right - you’d regret termination more than you’d regret going ahead. Maybe make the head decision before TTC the third though, if it’s causing so much stress now?

what a ridiculous thing to say. Of course the OP isn’t using a Mumsnet poll to decide her and her unborn child’s future. What a stupid way to have a go at someone for no reason.

I think the point is why’s it in AIBU with a poll. People don’t usually vent or look for advice like this in AIBU and what is the voting for? She’s entitled to feel anyway she wants, nobody can really call that unreasonable. What are we supposed to vote for here? YABU: you’re not that badly off, keep the baby or YANBU: you’re in no position to keep this baby, have a termination?

My friend was high risk for PND and has good support antenatally as a result - so if you do go ahead, reach out to your MW early on that.

I get where you’re coming from and I might sound a bit biased as I was in a similar situation where things actually turned out great. I fell pregnant during the pandemic (wasn’t planned though), husband had just lost his job, I was already on maternity leave with my first baby and was informed that I had no job to go back to just as the first lockdown was announced. We weren’t entitled to furlough either. We were fucked with a big mortgage, a baby and a pregnancy.

I kept the baby. I realised I’d be forever haunted by a termination especially if things ended up only being bad temporarily - which was the case. Husband found a better job, we moved house, and now we’re in a better position than we was before the job losses and I’m so thankful I continued with the pregnancy despite struggling for the first year.

the unknown is the scary part but in most cases it doesn’t turn out as bad as we think it will.

I think you need to take the long view. Your hormones will already be making you feel out of sorts and lots of women have this doubt in the first few months. People have babies in all sorts of circumstances. You will be able to manage. You might regret terminating this pregnancy for a short term financial situation.

@Testina you’re right we have dabbled with the idea for a while. Our financial situation is so different now even compared to then

my partners careers has really take off and we were in a great position. However the loss is related to a business separate to this.

i think going from great to bad suddenly changes the way you think

@Winceybincey that’s definitely reassuring to know!

im glad out worked for the best. Maybe my idea for the next 5 years was wishful thinking

we were in a terrible position in lockdown too, I hoped that now things were SO different that it would be the perfect time (then in comes the curve ball)

$15k is a relatively small amount of money in the long term scheme of things. I'm surprised this is an amount that would have you considering terminating a child you tried for. You only wanted the baby if you had a $15k buffer?!

You're not losing your house or job by the sounds of it.

It's very strange. Most people wouldn't jump to termination.

I'm 100% pro choice, for any reason, but I think it makes sense to keep it in your situation. Maybe take a shorter maternity leave, the loss of the income of the person taking parental leave is usually by far the biggest cost for most families.

I think there is always an element of "what have we done" with a subsequent child. I would give yourself a little bit of time to make sure the way you are feeling isn't that.
When I concieved my second we had a great income, I was a SAHM and had a great standard of living. When the baby was 2 weeks old my DH company made us move 2h away then when he was 6 weeks old he was made redundant at the start of covid. We had to move house and I had to start work at 12weeks postpartum. I'm not in any way advocating for having DC when you don't have the funds but how things are may be different to how they are 8 months down the line.

@isweartoomuch I think it’s more, having been in a bad financial situation, to being in a good one, to bad. It feel like the end of the world.

my idea of how I expected things to turn out is now very different to reality and the idea of struggling is scary. However I don’t take the decision to terminate lightly, it’s possibly a knee jerk reaction however I need time to obviously think about it properly.
I hoped people could help me see the situation in a new way which they have. I’m definitely feeling very torn on the right thing to do for everyone (my family)

@Beseen22 thank you for sharing, that sounds horrendous!

building back your life after a disaster is tough and we have done this ourselves.

this isn’t starting from scratch this time, and actually probably still marginally better off than with my first. However I hate the feeling of dread and don’t want to bring a baby into the world with uncertain circumstances and fear for the future. I’m very worried about the cost of living etc too.

I think people are finding it hard to really understand your situation.

We would like a third DC, however £15k is about the amount we would need to survive the first year. It would cover my loss of wage for 6 months while on maternity and then nursery bills for the next 6 months. Without this money in savings there is no way we could go for it.

People saying you can make do and babies don’t cost much aren’t considering the loss of wage for months, or the £1k nursery bill every month that people just can’t afford.

@Pigsinmuck Sorry to clear things up

this is baby no. 2 but we’d like 3 eventually!

yes that’s essentially it though… the £15k would have seen us though and meant that we would be able to live ‘normally’ until I returned to work, without it we will struggle as my income isn’t going to make up the difference

Most people don't have 15k saved up to have a baby though?

The children that already exist have to come first and if you are already low on resources you shouldn’t be splitting them further. Your existing children will be the ones to suffer due to this. In your position I would absolute terminate.

If you are going to struggle then I would not go ahead. Every day living is going to become more and more expensive and your struggles will just increase.

Maybe in a couple of years it will be a better option. I definitely would not think of having a third

I have been through this.

I had a 10 month old, and ended up pregnant, I flat out thought no way can I do 2 under 2. My husband lost his job
Long story short. Failed abortion, ended up in a traumatic, near death experience Labour at 23 weeks and was made nearly infertile. And baby passed away shortly after birth.
I was told not to get pregnant for a good few years as my body has gone through too much and my womb is too fragile.

Devastated I was. I thought it was my punishment as In my religion it states "do not kill your child for fear of poverty" etc.

Fast forward 4 years, I have a 5 year old and 1 year old.

Now I' highly doubt the situation. Above will not happen to you, but you must know there is always a chance you might not get the option again. Money comes and goes,

A human? Not so much.

I think you need to stop and pause and take a beat. I would be sitting down with dh and working out a budget. Make a list of what you need for baby, expenses and bills etc and then see if the figures add up. If you can make it work then I'd be inclined to say go for it even though it won't be easy you'll just need to be organised, plus a lot can change in 9 months. I don't think there's ever an ideal time to have a baby especially with the economic landscape now peoples jobs etc aren't as secure. So if it were me I think it would depend how id feel if i tried later and really struggled? When we first started ttc I was fully prepared for it to take us a long time due to health issues but we were very lucky and got pregnant straight away. That took a bit of getting our head around because we were so prepared for a wait and it wasn't the ideal time but with age etc factored in we knew we'd do our best to make it work. As for pnd, I'm sorry you had such a hard time before and it's understandable to be nervous of that but you'll know and be prepared for the signs this time, you'll know what helped you before and being in a good financial position wouldn't necessarily mean it'll happen again just as being insecure doesn't mean the same. Every pregnancy and birth is different. Can you start saving hard now or maybe take on additional work etc to bank as much as you can before baby arrives? If you do the maths properly and you know you absolutely cannot make it work and cannot support two children then the decision comes down to you, your health care provider and maybe dh. Noone else's opinion really matters. But I would sit on it for a while you don't need to make an immediate decision. Good luck I hope it works out for you either way xx

If you still want more children longer term then try to find a way for it to work, even if you have to ask family for help. You are still reeling from the £15,000 loss, take a week or so to process that do the two events don't feel linked.

Babies will cost the same in loss of earnings and outgoings whenever you have them - now or next year. As you're still planning to have three, I can't believe that a few months make much difference.

“my partners careers has really take off and we were in a great position. However the loss is related to a business separate to this.”

You know what? I think if you gave actual fugues, you might get a bit of an eye roll. His career has taken off, and you were in the position of being able to study which many can’t. Whilst I’m really sympathetic to wanting security, I have the feeling that your cold hard bottom line is absolutely fine.

Have you factored in child care - and by this I mean in a positive as well as negative way.

The advantage of being pregnant now is that your mat leave may take you through to your free hours kicking in with your eldest (term after their third birthday).

You may be wanting to change his setting at that point anyway so you could save what you currently pay out for a few months. Would that help to offset anything?

What kind of mat leave package will you get?

Sit down and write out everything based on your reduced income and how much you need to save in advance.
Is there anything you can change? Give up a car for a while, extend the term of your mortgage etc?

If it's your husband's income that has taken a hit is that long term of could it change again?

YANBU to have trepidations. Pregnancy is sometimes more unpleasant in actuality than in theory. And finances can be the cause of enormous stress. This is so common that it affects whole birth rate in general. So you are not alone.
But we don't always wait for everything to be perfect before having a baby and it usually works out fine.