AIBU to expect my sister to accept my fourth pregnancy when she is child free not by choice ?

[TheFunnyPoet]

My husband and I have been together for 11 years and married for 9. He is 49 and I’m 38.
He has two older children from his previous marriage, both of whom are still very much part of our household. They split their time between us and their mum, although realistically they’re here a lot. So although this will technically be my husband and my fourth child together, we already have a very full house. We’ve recently announced that we’re expecting our fourth baby together.

I’m obviously over the moon. This baby was planned, wanted and very much conceived because we both genuinely wanted another child. This is our last DH has since had a vasectomy.My sister, however, has taken the news really badly.She’s 44 and with a lovely partner who does have children. She was married for quite a long time to her ex, and apparently he had always told her that he “might” want children eventually. She waited because she loved him and trusted that he would change his mind.He never did.
They eventually separated and divorced and she’s now in the position of being childless when having children is something she desperately wants.

She has said to me that every single one of my pregnancies has felt like a punch in the stomach because I already have three children and am now having a fourth.
I completely understand that she’s hurting, and I have tried to be sensitive. I don't constantly talk about the pregnancy around her I’ve even avoided discussing names etc.
But she has now basically said that she feels I’m being incredibly insensitive by having another baby when I know how desperately she wants one.

This is where I’m struggling.I feel awful for her. I genuinely do. I can’t imagine wanting a child for years and not having one.
But at the same time, what exactly am I
supposed to do? My sister's situation isn't something I can fix. I can't give her my baby, and I don't think it's reasonable for me to not have my baby because she hasn't been able to have one.And, if I'm being completely honest, there is a part of me that feels angry because she chose to stay with a man for years who she knew was ambivalent about having children. She says he manipulated her and strung her along, whereas I think at some point she also had to make a choice about whether to stay.

I haven’t said that last part to her because I know it would be incredibly hurtful.
My husband thinks I’m being far too considerate already and says that while we should obviously be kind to her, our family planning is nobody else’s business.
My mum, however, has told me I need to “put myself in my sister’s shoes” and perhaps accept that she might not want much contact with me during the pregnancy or after the baby is born. I am fine with no contact my life shouldn’t stop for her to be happy.

I’m finding that difficult because we’ve always been very close, and I don't want my sister to resent my baby before he/she is even born.

I’m not asking whether I should have had the baby that ship has obviously sailed. I’m asking whether I’m being unreasonable in expecting my sister to accept that I’m allowed to be happy about my pregnancy despite knowing how painful it is for her.

Why are you entertaining this? It seems that she was never happy for you and she was always rooting for things to go wrong with you.
She made stupid choices, and has to live with them. Looks like she can't take responsibility for her choices and wants to make it your problem. It's not.
(For example, my sister chose to wait until she was 37 to start TTC. She couldn't, so she had to have fertility treatment, which is gruelling. I had my kids at 31 and 33, easily. She has a nanny and lots of help, I did it all alone, which was gruelling. We never blamed each other for the consequences of our choices, stupid or not.)

Safe spaces allow us room to have our feelings. Safe spaces are never about using the proximity to bash the person who you think gave a you a hurty. If someone doesn’t understand that they are not a safe person. I can feel very cross but know full well when I’m about to say something from emotion just to pass on a horrible feeling. That shit’s not on. It’s the same level as breaking up your friend’s Lego house when you were in toddler group because you thought it was better. And maybe that’s a lot of what makes people so different from one another.

I would be inclined to tell your Mum to put herself in your shoes OP, and would also tell her that if she must voice her thoughts on the subject, she should tell your sister, that however much it hurts that you are able to have babies, seemingly easily, she must accept that not having her own, is part of HER life, and not something that you can be held responsible for in any way. Obviously it's a difficult situation all around, but staying with her ex, on the off chance that he might want a baby one day, was HER choice, NOT yours!

I also think that while it's obviously hard for any woman not to have a child if it's something she desperately wants, to take it out on other people is unfair in the extreme.

got to be honest. Her feeling comfortable saying how it felt like a punch to a stomach to you raises the fine hairs on my neck. Her choice of imagery is so, icky.

Infertility is totally different to what your sister has experienced, and I agree 100% that she is child free solely due to her own decisions.

If I were you OP, I'd stop hoping for her to stop being a bitch, and model your older sister, who has her number totally.

There's actually nothing stopping her from trying to have a baby now, if she really wanted one so badly, but she's having a relationship with yet another man who has already got kids and is ,at best, ambivalent about having more, so once again, she's making bad choices...

Enjoy your pregnancy, and your lovely family, and simply leave her be to live her own life, but call her out on any further nastiness she exhibits towards you, or anyone else, about pregnancy or babies. She'll only stop when you make her stop...

Why cant she adopt?

You can be happy and she can be sad. Both sets of feelings are equally valid. Nieces and nephews aren't consolation prizes and I wouldn't go down that avenue if I was you.

You don't understand how painful it is to want a baby and not have one. Some people can accept it and move on, some are consumed by it. You seem to have a great life, husband with a good job who can provide for you and six kids. Enjoy your life but accept she is hurting, it's not your fault but it is a fact.

And you don’t (presumably) understand what it is to have a long term illness that prevents you from doing many things you would love to do. I am in that situation but it doesn’t give me the right to, or excuse me, lashing out at people who can do the things I would love to do.

You can be happy and she can be sad

she isn’t just sad. She’s spiteful. That’s an entirely different creature. This isn’t a woman who’s just feeling a lot. She’s sending aggressive messages to her expectant sister.

Well I've been my husband's carer for almost 35 years. You probably have no idea what it's like to live with those restrictions when you are fit and well. Do what, it has nothing to do with how the OPs sister feels.

A lot of people on this thread who don't have a blessed clue about the pain of being involuntarily childless.

She's in pain and can't help her feelings but expressing them to you helps nobody. You need to enjoy your pregnancy. Put space between you. Focus on your immediate family.your mum should talk to her really.

No I don’t and I am not claiming to. My point is that I have no more right to lash out at those without my limitations than the op’s sister has to lash out at those who have children but for some reason, posters are excusing her appalling behaviour on the grounds that she doesn’t have dc. They are stating that the rest of us couldn’t possibly understand her grief so we should also excuse her.

None of us can truly understand what others go through. However, regardless of what we are going through, it is completely unreasonable to take out our circumstances on others.

Your sister's resentment isn't your problem. If she needs to distance herself then she is of course free to do that. Just enjoy your husband and your new baby ❤️

And yet these people will say that their children are the best thing, brought them such joy. But when someone can’t have them it’s “oh well we all have disappointments in life”.

Absolutely nobody is saying that. What we are saying is that having trauma in your life does not give you a free pass to be nasty to those who don’t have your trauma in their life.

Has she really been nasty though? From the OP it sounds like she was simply expressing honestly how she felt. Obviously the thing about how OP is being insensitive just by having a baby is ridiculous, but maybe it's more that OP was handling it in an insensitive way? Certainly OP doesn't sound remotely sensitive from her comments on this thread (eg it's her sisters own fault she's childless, she should be happy to have neices nephews, and she should just be happy for her and move it along).

The OP's sister sounds like one of those people who don't have much capacity for happiness, but are able to recognise it and resent it in others. If she did have children, would she really be happier or would she just be jealous and miserable about something else?

Your sister is being unreasonable for wanting you to consider her feelings when deciding on another baby.

It’s sad she CBC but part of that was her choice in remaining in a marriage with an unsure man.

That said she is allowed to feel sad and triggered by your pregnancies and if she feels the way to do that is to distance herself from you that’s fair and reasonable.

Your sister wants a baby. She could try IVF or not adopt a child. She is responsible for living her own life. She could embrace your pregnancy and be a doting Aunt.

I would consider her comments to be nasty. And yes, some of the op’s comments are not terribly sensitive although she has clarified the niece/nephew one. The difference though is Drew hasn’t made these comments to her sister.

This sister isn’t involuntarily childless. She could have a child on her own if she chose to. She’s not infertile and until she is in menopause, she can still get pregnant unless she actually is infertile and hasn’t told OP.

OP said:

It’s also sometimes good to recognise that an adult has chosen their own path, she isn’t infertile she had a partner for years who strung her along and she chose to stay even after advice from friends, my and our sister. The part where I do feel sorry for her is the fact that he remarried and has two children with someone else

Her sister can feel how she feels but the snarky, unnecessary comments are not on and juvenile.

It reads to me that she is mad at herself for not listening to friends and sisters about her ex-husband and she’s choosing to take it out on them instead.

Fron what OP has said, she doesn’t come off that great of a sister from the comments made in the past even before children. She makes negative comments towards the other sister as well and complains about the other friends having babies as if they require her say so.

I agree with pps, distance yourself from her. She is making these comments because she knows there is no consequences from you when she does. As you said, the other sister wouldn’t tolerate it so why are you?

This sister isn’t involuntarily childless. She could have a child on her own if she chose to. She’s not infertile and until she is in menopause, she can still get pregnant unless she actually is infertile and hasn’t told OP.

I think people who haven't experienced social infertility have no idea what it's like. W're told this sort of thing: "If you really wanted a child, you'd have had one on your own." Generally said by women in secure partnerships.

It's as complex as medical inferyility, and difficult because it looks so easily solved: just gho to the sperm bank.

But like the OP's sister, it can be tangled up with wanting an actual father for one's child, or wanting a specific father. How terrible!

Having a choild on one's own is still very very difficult, in all sorts of ways: physically, financially, and also emotionally.

The OP's sister wanted a family with a specific man. He cheated her f her opportunity. Have some compassion, or at least try to imagine what some women go through.

It's irrelevant whether it's fertility or social circumstances (until an age that it is too late)- I have no idea why people are fixating on that distinction: Either way, her sister desperately wishes for a child and is unable to conceive.