why do i feel jealous of my pregnant friends???

[stephanie21]

i'm not usually a jealous person,but i find myself getting green with envy when i talk to my friends.3 of them live in hull (i'm in wales) and one lives opposite me.ive got 5 kids so it cant be that i'm broody!(5 is more than enough!!)my last pregnancy was twins but one died at 12 weeks,and i dont know if subconsciously i'm 'missing' the baby i lost?one of my hull friends rang last night and we used to talk for hours,but last night we were on the phone not even 15 mins!and my friend across the road just popped over with a book for me (havent seen her for ages despite only living opposite!),and i was short with her aswell.(kept looking at her belly!)(think am still angry with her as she was going to have abortion as she doesnt want this baby,she gave her first one to her mum,kept her second one and is now saying she is giving this one away.told her she is irresponsible and shouldve kept her legs shut!think thats why i havent seen her in ages!)has anyone else ever felt like this?have to admit,am totally ashamed of myself for feeling jealous of friends when i should be happy for them.

I know how you feel stephanie. I'm a single mum and have a 9month old daughter and i get really jealous when i see other people are pregnant. I always used to before i had her but i just put that down to the fact that i had a miscarriage. I still feel like it though and i dont know why. Maybe its just the fact that i know that i'm not going to have another one for ages.(i always planned that i would have 3 kids, each with no more than a 2 year age gap between them) But now i'm on my own so i know it isnt going to happen. i think its very likely that your missing the baby you lost cos i think that was my problem, dunno whats wrong with me now tho. You shouldn't feel ashamed, its understandable why you are jealous,especially since your friend has been so irresponsible.

stephanie and nik, I think that you may be right about your feelings stemming from the babies you lost. My first child, a son, was stillborn at 32 weeks gestation, and although I conceived again very quickly and ds2 was born just 9 months later, and I now have dd, sometimes it is still hard for me to hear about others being pg. Usually in the circumstances you have described. My SIL has an almost 6 yo and twin 17mo, and when they visited at xmas announced she is pg again. I took this really badly for a number of reasons, and am not proud of it, but can't really help the way I feel. She made it worse by saying how she cried and cried when she found out, because it wasn't planned and- let's face it- she'll have a lot on her plate. I felt it was a bit disrespectful to say that to me- ditto friends who know about ds1 but tell me they disappointed to be having "another boy". That's how it is for me, I understand what you are feeling and sympathise. I think it's a lot to do with such news reminding us that we won't ever really be complete again, no matter how happy we are with our living children. When people seem to flaunt their pg and not appreciate it it can make you feel this way. Hope you both feel better soon, it does pass, and doesn't make you a bad person.