How to deal with pressure

[shulou]

Hey not sure if I'm posting in the right place so please let me know if it would be better somewhere else.

How do others deal with the pressure from other people about having a baby? Every time I see my father in law all I get is are u pregnant yet? Feel like saying will you stop asking me because your starting to annoy me. Not sure how to do deal with it or just to ignore it? Just feel it's so rude! What if we find out we can't have children? Just making me feel worse about it even thou we have only been trying for 4 months!

Thank you for any help.

Tell them that it’s none of their business.

W head this with some of dhs family. We’d been married for 6 years by the time ds came along. I had it all:

• “why haven’t you had a baby yet?”
• what’s wrong with you?
• do you hate kids?

Then the knowing looks if we went to a family thing and I wasn’t drinking (because I was driving etc). And the “hmmm ok then” if I said I wasn’t drinking because of driving. they were happy to assume a lift back though

It was absolutely infuriating and at some points upsetting.

It is so frustrating. I get it at work sometimes too like if someone has just had a baby. Oh it will be your turn next? Or you got some catching up to do? Or your getting old so have to think about it soon! I'm 32!

@shulou I know how you're feeling! I've had this for a couple of years now. I had my SIL asking constantly 'when do you think you'll get pregnant", "do you want children" etc and even after I had gone to a friend's baby shower one day my SIL said "does it make you sad when all your friends are pregnant or have babies and you still don't?". It caused a huge row in the family and I can't stand to be around her now! I also used to get if a lot at work off people and when my husband and I were doing our house up people used to ask "which room will be the baby room". We had trouble conceiving and I was about to start my first round of chlomid but I did actually fall pregnant naturally in October but I suffered a MMC in December and was signed off work for 3 weeks due to feeling unwell after and being depressed. While I was off sick there were apparently comments being made in my office with people presuming I was off because I was pregnant and "she probably has morning sickness or something". When I returned to work I was so worried somebody would say something inappropriate or ask me if I was pregnant and make me cry so I sent an email to my entire team telling them what had happened and that you never know what is going on in somebody's life so nobody should ever speculate if somebody is pregnant or question why they don't have children because it is a sensitive subject and no ones business. I received a lot of apologies from the people who had recently questioned me on if I was going to have children and my manager spoke to me in my next 121 about the email and told me he thought it was brilliantly worded and thanked me for sending it as felt people would act differently in future. People have been nice to me since and I haven't received any inappropriate comments.

Maybe you should sit them down and tell them that you feel pressurised to get pregnant when they ask and would prefer them not to ask? Good luck with trying. I have heard that on average it takes people a year to conceive. I highly recommend temping and I use the Natural Cycles app which excellent! x

@kittycat01 thank you for your advice and I'm sorry you had such a horrible time. I think I might have to say something soon as I don't know if I could cope with him asking all the time. Can I ask what temping is? I use the fitbit app to track my periods and fertility window atm. X

@shulou temping is where you take your temperature every morning as soon as you wake up. You then enter it into an app and it works out when you're likely to ovulate and when your period is coming. It worked so well for me after my miscarriage. I had the D&C operation so I didn't know when my next period would be. I started temping after the operation each day and after a couple of weeks the app predicted when my period was going to be and it was correct! It's £4 a month or £40 for the year and they post the thermometer to you and you just download the app! I highly recommend it! However, ovulation sticks are just as good, they just weren't as accurate with me as I have polycystic ovaries.

Good luck and I wish you well xx

This is awful. My family have actually been really good. It's more friends that surprise me! I suppose I've always said I've wanted kids, but for all they know I'm trying (I've just started!) And it can take ages. I don't want to say "actually yes" because it's personal and may not work!

For what it’s worth I was 32 when I had ds. (Now 17 months) And am now suprise pregnant again due in July.

Ever since I got married I have found that my fertility has been an open forum for discussion - people assume that it’s okay to openly ask the most intimate questions and it bothers me. A friend at work who doesn’t know I’m ttc kept telling me over and over last week that I’ll be having babies soon I’ll get pregnant next year and I said well I’m not sure you just decide and it happens that way (aka I’m 8 months in without so much of a hint of a bfp) and she insisted that I’ll get pregnant next year. This left me feeling a) irrationally paranoid that I will have failed to conceive for at least 18 months and b) feeling quite sensitive.

Thanks @kittycat01 I might look into that. It does feel like if you don't then you feel like a failure. I was feeling quite depressed a couple of weeks ago as I honestly thought I was but my period started a couple of days late. Everyone was like what's wrong etc but I couldn't say anything. I swear people have no filters! Congratulations @ememem84!

I also have this, but with work colleagues and people I'm not particularity close to. Thankfully our families have been very good and haven't said anything to us. However, after getting married early last year I have been inundated with people at work asking if I'm pregnant or raising eyebrows at me when they think I am. If I feel tired, put off my food, not feeling myself I MUST be pregnant. I recently had a sickness bug which everyone assumed meant I was pregnant. I cant breathe in the wrong direction without someone asking if I'm pregnant. It amazes me how people think it's acceptable to ask if I'm trying for children or what are plans are, especially when its not close friends. It also annoys me that even if I was pregnant, I don't feel like I would tell someone this because they asked me if I'm pregnant. All of this has stopped in the past two ish months though after I ranted to a few members of staff about how it is annoying me that people keep asking, and I think word spread around, so if people are speculating about me having a baby, it's not being done to my face at least.

We’re now getting the “ooh are you having a girl?” (Not sure yet) “if it’s another boy will you have another so you get your girl?” (No! - I wasn’t at all ready for this one and am stopping at 2) “will you be disappointed if it’s a boy?” (No. Ds is great. Why would I be disappointed if it’s a boy?)

What happens after you’re done having kids? Are there more rude questions?

We had it before we were married “ooooh you’ll be the next one. I know he’s going to propose on birthday/Christmas/valentines/Wednesday”

The worst offender for me is my older brother! The whole family says we're really similar and so we know exactly how to press each others buttons!

He is always asking when I'm 'going to get up the duff'. At a family wedding over Christmas, he even snatched my drink out of my hand, took a gulp, and handed it back saying 'just checking you're not lying about that prosecco'. Little did he know that AF had come unexpectedly early that day and I was absolutely gutted.

Next time he says anything, I will remind him to think about how it felt for him and his wife when they were trying to convince their first, because I know it wasn't easy for them. I just hate that he is so insensitive!

Oh yeah I'll imagine the next set of questions will be like do u know what ur having? Will you want a boy or a girl more? Blah blah. Tbh I don't think I would want to know what I was having as that's half of the surprise! Why would it matter anyways? As long as the baby is healthy that's all that matters.

Exactly. But you’ll get the questions!!! And even if you don’t find out people will think you’re going that thing of finding out but keeping it a secret....

Ffs. People need boundaries!!!!