Talk to me if you've decided to stop trying

[BipBippadotta]

Hello. I think I have to stop trying to have a baby or I will ruin the rest of my life. Can someone give me some advice or a handhold or something about how to do this?

I am currently waiting to miscarry for the 3rd time in under a year - this after the full-term stillbirth of my daughter 18 months ago due to a ruptured umbilical cord. I'm 39.

My life has ground to a halt. I don't want to keep tearing myself apart trying to have a baby, particularly as it becomes exponentially less and less likely to work out with every month that passes.

I do not want to use donor eggs / sperm. I don't want to adopt (obligatory explanation here: I don't think after so many traumatic losses my DH and I are robust enough to take on a child who's already had a very tough start in life, possibly with obligations to maintain contact with their family of origin. Nor could I bear trying to adopt internationally, waiting interminably, etc. I think any of these things, at the moment, could destroy our sanity and/or our marriage, and those are the only two things I have left at the moment).

Since my daughter's death I have been so focused on having another baby that I don't know how to turn things back around. I have grieved for my daughter - I have grieved like you wouldn't believe - but there has simply not been the time to sit back and come to terms with it all like everyone says you should do before trying again. Given my age, I had to try again immediately or give up the possibility of children forever - and that's a fucking hard thing to do when you've just buried your only child.

I don't know how to keep going. I can't take any pleasure in anything. I can't face seeing my friends, as I don't have anything to say for myself anymore that anyone wants to hear. The only thing that has been giving me any sort of forward momentum is trying to have a baby - and I have to make myself understand that it is not going to work.

How do you know when to stop? And when you know, how do you stop? Do I have to hit rock bottom, and have a complete nervous breakdown, before I know for certain I can't do this anymore? Is there a way to stop trying before you go mad? How do I claw my way back to something that feels like life?

Hi Bip. I used to be on the mind numbing boredom thread and I'm so sorry that you have had such a massive pile of shitty luck. I just wanted to say that you don't have to make or even consider this decision right now, especially while you are still waiting to miscarry. Please give yourself a break, I know you won't be able to stop thinking about it completely but you really don't have to decide yet.

monkeytree I'm so sorry to hear of the loss of your son. I know exactly what you mean about the 'massive blur of hope and disappointment and major sadness and going through the motions'. It feels as though nothing that's happened in the last 18 months matters or counts. I was knocked flat when my daughter died and every time I try to get back to my feet I'm smacked down again. I don't feel quite so much a sense of failure as humiliation somehow - as though there's something distasteful and a bit pitiful about my miscarriages, and the fact that I keep trying.

I do think if I give up it will be giving up for good - the reason for all my miscarriages has been chromosomal abnormalities, and while DH's poor morphology might have something to do with this, it's far more likely that my eggs are just too knackered. There simply would not be any point in having a break and trying later - it would just make it even more of a fool's errand.

MiniMover thanks for your thoughts. I'm not sure I believe grief can be 'worked through' to the point that it doesn't frequently overwhelm you when you have a living baby who does all the things your lost one can't ever do - however long it is after the initial loss. I've talked to women who have waited anywhere from 3 months - 6 years to try again after a stillbirth, and they all had very similar experiences of terror & sadness as well as joy when they had their next baby, regardless of how long they'd devoted to grieving. I was basically faced with a decision to (a) grieve for my daughter forever and possibly go on to have a family or (b) grieve for my daughter forever, and also grieve forever for the family I was never able to have because everyone said I needed to grieve my daughter 'properly' first. And it's impossible to know what 'grieving properly' looks like (particularly when everyone around you has strong and diverging opinions), or when / whether it ends. Unfortunately in real life you don't always have the luxury of doing things in the 'right' order. I do know that I am grieving the loss of my daughter. Oddly I also know I am not grieving my miscarriages - I'm just not able to right now, possibly because I'm too numb / can only handle one grief at a time / too busy trying to survive from day to day. It's on my to-do list for when my heart thaws out a bit.

KittyandTeal I remember your story, and I am so sorry. Thanks for your words.

Sesame hello again . It sounds like you have a limit set, which I suppose give you a bit of time to get your head around the possibility of shifting gears. Got everything crossed for you for this cycle.

LH testosterone gel? Tell me more... (and did it make your hair fall out?)

So sorry to hear of your losses. I too am making the decision to stop - but really it's a decision to stop before I start. I'm 39 as well, very low AMH, have been told that we'd have a 10-15% of IVF working and so it seems idiotic to start. I've tried to start the process, but the snotty nosed tears at even booking the first appointment seem to have told me I'm not meant to do it. And yet I fear there will ALWAYS be a small voice in my head wondering why I didn't give it a go.

Having to make this decision - whether or not to try this or that, to try or not - is one of the worst things. It's such a pressure. Added to that your immense loss and grief - life has dealt you a shitty hand. I honestly don't think people with kids realise how lucky they are. They see us childless women as somehow freaks, without realising that they are just incredibly lucky.

I think a decision to stop is a really healthy one. It will allow you to move on as much as you can, and to MAKE PLANS that don't involve TTC. No woman is only a mother, or only a not-mother, and you deserve some time to be a wife and a friend and all the other things that you are. You deserve a rest, to heal, and to allow yourself some joy, in whatever form that will come.

You probably will never 'get over' what's happened, it will always be a part of you. But only one part. You are not only your experiences of infertility.

I am also in the process of trying to move on though I have to say Mother's Day was a kick in the guts and I'm losing touch with my friends with kids. And I was never even in the Child At All Costs camp! It's such a strange and difficult thing and NO ONE can tell us how we should feel.

I really would welcome a group for those of us who have decided that pushing forwards with interventions etc is just not Right for us. Other posters are right - MN seems to be full of the Baby Camp and I have to say the Gateway group 'Rocking the Unexpected life' doesn't really appeal either. (I don't want to Rock anything!)

I wish you all the very, very best.

YY to not feeling particularly like 'rocking' anything (except possibly a rocking chair). It is bizarrely difficult to find something between the 'don't ever give up hope' stance and the defiant jollity of the child-free and lovin' it. I bottled it the first time I was meant to do IVF as well. Just couldn't make myself do it. Got the courage up the next month, and here we are, 5 weeks on, £13k worse off & nowt to show for it. I think if you're someone who feels excited by the prospect of IVF (and some do) then carrying on trying is probably the right decision. But if it gives you a horrible sinking feeling like you're about to allow something horrible to happen to you for no reason (which is how I felt) maybe it's time to stop.

I think that the whole rocking thing is just the name of the book that the founder of Gateway women wrote. fwiw the meetings are not like that at all, but I guess 'Quietly getting on with it whilst chatting and having a drink' is probably not so catchy.

Horrible sinking feeling. Yes, that's what it is. It feels OK when it's 'in x months' time' but when you're looking at starting in a week's time and about to take delivery of a bag full of crap you're supposed to ingest - no. Just, no. You may as well have given me a chainsaw and said 'yes just take an arm off. it's no bother.'

Yes, 'quietly getting on with it' not so catchy, but I do agree that there's a lack of a perceived third way. I don't want to celebrate but I don't want to dwell. Funnily enough most of my friends now are childless - rather than going to a group for it I seem to have found a lot of childless women and have a 100% child free life. Which is how it always was. I am trying to get to grips with knowing I will miss out on a big chunk of life's experience. I am starting to try and look at children in supermarkets etc as if they are exotic and expensive and time consuming pets. I'm not sure if that makes me awful or just self-protective, but it's one way of coping!

Bip, I'm sorry if my post sounded awkward. I certainly don't think grief can be worked through and then be all better. I haven't lost a child so I cannot comprehend the enormity of that. But I did lose my mother to a drunk driver within hours of having my baby. She was on her way to see us. That was 12yrs ago and whilst not as raw, it still jumps up and smacks me on the face quite often. I'm sorry for your loss and I'm sorry if my post came across as trite. It just appeared to me that your grief meant that your decision was more complex. Not that I imagine it's ever an easy decision for any couple.

You didn't come across as trite at all, MiniMover - so sorry if I gave that impression. I think I'm probably still smarting from a thread on AIBU a few weeks back where various posters (thankfully a small minority) were loftily pronouncing on when & whether it was appropriate for a bereaved mother to have another baby in order not to inflict massive psychological damage on her family, and how / for how long she should grieve. I think that's been on my mind a lot and your perfectly kind & reasonable comments reminded me of the philosophical musings about grief I'd been storing up since that thread.

I'm so, so sorry for the loss of your mother - and in such circumstances. That must have been absolutely devastating.

My own parent's death and my grief fell right across my most fertile married years. If I had started childbearing sooner, maybe things would have worked out differently...? But there are no rules with grief and I know that I wasn't able to do anything other than what I did.

When you know you can no longer continue, then you will stop.

Hi Bip, thanks for saying I sound sane...it's not how I feel much of the time
Loving the thoughts shared on this thread, will drop back when I have more time.

I just wanted to say that 'the fix' for the PLC Zeta is 'Artificial Oocyte Activation' done together with ICSI. (No fix for natural trying unfortunately). Not every clinic does this procedure which is frustrating. The test for the PLC zeta is not available in all clinics as it is still in the research phase. My clinic (Ninewells, Dundee) was participating in the trial through Oxford Fertility Unit in London, so we were entered into it due to the lack of fertilisation. Just wanted you to have the full story.

Hope you're doing ok x

Thanks, Wooty. Looks like my clinic does offer that, which is food for thought.
I've realised that at this stage I'm actually afraid of improving my IVF 'stats'. The way clinics talk sometimes it's as if you're making progress towards having a living baby by improving the outcome of this or that part of the process, e.g. by having more eggs or more embryos or more blastocysts. But that's only 'progress' if your fertility problem is mechanical (getting sperm into egg) or hormonal (releasing mature eggs). If your problem is poor quality sperm / egg, however many blasts you get, the likelihood is that none of them will become a healthy baby. We could get enough embryos to do PGS, which would seem like progress, and probably make me optimistic and even excited for a couple of days - but if they are all shown to be abnormal, having produced a huge bounty of embryos is really neither here nor there. We'd still be no closer to having a baby, and would have spent fuckloads more money just to learn a little bit more about precisely how doomed our efforts are. Which we have a pretty good idea about anyway.

I almost wish there were fewer options, or that my consultant would just say to me, 'look, you're fucked. My experience suggests this is never going to work for you. Go spend your money on something that will make you happy instead.' I would like someone to give me clear, authoritative instructions to abandon hope.

Bip I have just read the whole thread and I am so sorry for your losses. You write about your feelings so eloquently and beautifully. I struggled for many years with this question - how will I know when it's the right time to give up - and talked to many people about it and I think perhaps the short answer in the end is that you don't know, not for sure. And the specialists don't know either, as much of this whole journey is still such a mystery. It's the hope that's the worst, exactly as you say. I don't have any wise words of advice I am sorry, but I wish you all the very best and a big hug xx

Totally agree Bip and wish IVF were not an option. Then I wouldn't feel guilty about deciding not to put myself through it.

I was thinking of you today as I thought it's probably taken me about a year to get my head around the thoughts of not trying any more. Now I wonder how I would feel if I DID get pregnant. Probably just terrified.

Unfortunately, NO ONE is going to give you clear instructions. I'm almost tempted to go to a palm reader just to have them tell me I won't have kids and then I can believe that (! I know, I know...). The doctors are bound to try to give you options because they think that's what we want to hear but don't realise it would be kinder sometimes to say that it isn't going to happen.

But don't believe it's abandoning hope. It's changing the emphasis of your life, and that is NOT abandoning hope. It's just putting it in something else.

Viewofhedges I love your palm reader idea. I once asked the same question of a virtual magic 8 ball on the internet, but I got one of those nothingy answers - 'it is not clear...' or 'ask again later' or something rubbish - which made me cross. So I found another internet magic 8 ball and it said 'no'. But I didn't like that answer either and decided you can't trust virtual magic 8 balls. A palm reader definitely has more gravitas.

Dannygirl thanks for the hug! Have you stopped trying, or are you still puzzling your way through it all?

I did once try asking Siri:

'Will I have another baby?'

Pause...

'Looking for fertility clinics in your area'

Ha!

I would like someone to give me clear, authoritative instructions to abandon hope.

Not exactly the same but someone gave me a piece of advice as I embarked on IVF - decide how many cycles you're having and stick to it. I did and although it was tempting at times to keep going I stuck to my pre-determined number and don;t regret it.

I was just writing about this on another thread but I had secondary infertility and 4 MCs. I was then diagnosed with cancer which led to full blown infertility and I was actually relieved.......relieved that someone else made the decision for me to stop. All that TTC, monitoring, thinking, hurting, bleeding, crying, obsessing, reading, stressing. I had my life back and could look forward without feeling like I was treading water with no end in sight and I felt so free from the pressure to keep trying. I find it really insulting when people say that their friends, aunts, sister in law relaxed and their miracle baby happened because it just made me think miracles were only for other people. Be kind to yourself and whatever you decide will be right for you xxx

Hi Bip, I was actually quite excited that the PLC zeta thing could be a fix for you but I totally get the reluctance to see hope in anything for yourself. I used to be fired up with hope and scouring the internet for solutions, constantly. (also the screaming banshee phase). Now I just feel a bit dead inside. I'm aware of the almost certain futility but I'm still going through the motions of trying. I'm not sure why. Sometimes I wonder if on some subconscious level my brain already knows that my body is fucked and my eggs are all duds and that's why I feel different. Or am I just worn down by it all?

When you said that you wished someone would tell you that there's no hope for you.....you're actually making me face some unpleasant truths about my situation (that I need to face!). I would actually have said that your IVF 'stats' looked pretty good but what do I know I'm an idiot. I have actually had a consultant tell me pretty much that, that I have no hope! What kind of idiot person ignores that!

The only thing is that they also told me that there was nothing wrong with DH's sperm and the lack of fertilisation was an egg issue (for years).... and then we discover the sperm thing.... It's of course probably still the case that my eggs are crappy but doubt in their opinion rears...and you can't help but get excited when you get embryos for the first time too, it feels like progress. You are so right though, a blastocyst does not equal a baby.

Sometimes I feel so old and tired and think god forbid I actually got pregnant, people would point at the old lady in the street with the pregnant bump. I'd be like the local circus freak and gossip fodder in the village (everyone here has babies in their 20's). Oh how did I end up here I wonder... at this age and still not pregnant. Totally shit.

On that cheery note...

Agree on the miracle thing George. Of course I want one, who doesn't, but it just adds another layer of sadness - it's not helpful to hear about other people's miracles. Sorry to hear about your cancer, that must have been awful. I'm glad things worked out for you in the end.

Off to see if Siri / magic 8 ball / or a giant crystal can offer something definitive or useful... Great tips ladies

I couldn't physically give up, my body/ mind literally wouldn't let me. I had one loss at 16 weeks due to a congenital disorder, another loss at 17 weeks then two further miscarriages. I already had one child and was a bit younger, but was desperate to be able to give up and focus on my life after each loss and just couldn't. I even considered hypnotherapy to make me want to give up.

Op, I took the decision to stop ttc but I can't offer you any advice. I grappled with it for ages. The losses were powerful but not enough in themselves to make me stop. I questioned what I was doing to myself by continuing and weighing up the varied and damaging toll the losses put me through. I thought about various futures and what I could be happy with. I did it without talking with friends and family, not even my oh. He was all in but not desperate to have children himself. I didn't speak about it because everyone would have told me to keep trying, hold out hope, etc., I've also had a lot of therapy. I'm a few years on from that decision. It took a long time to settle but, strangely, I never changed my mind. Just kept thinking of new reasons why it was ok to go down that path. I regret that things aren't different, but I don't regret my current, very good life. This is just how my life is. I still have not told friends and family of my decision. My oh worked it out. I don't know what they make of it but it was a very personal process and talking about it, putting words to it, even here, doesn't really describe it. Good luck to you.

Wooty it's funny, sometimes I feel hopeful that I can try again and something might work, and other times I feel so aggressively anti-hope that I can turn any piece of information into an apocalyptic omen of doom. I swing between the two. My dh pointed out that actually having more blastocysts does increase the chances of one being OK - but I'd fast-forwarded to what seemed to be the inevitable outcome of yet another expensive failure.

I think that all the time about being the old weird wrinkly pregnant crone - where people would look at my bump and think it was some sort of geriatric tumour of the abdomen. I felt that keenly enough at my NCT class, where at 37 I was a solid decade older than everyone else there.

George I am so sorry to hear about your cancer diagnosis. Where are you with it now? I can also see how knowing for certain it's not possible anymore can be a relief.

I wonder if there's a particular tipping point where the stories about the people who had a baby when they least expected it cease to give hope and begin to give you fits of stabby rage.

Dudsville, Tolly, it's really good to hear your experiences - goes to show how hard it is sometimes to know what is right for you / to articulate it to others.

I'm so pleased to be hearing from so many different people in different circumstances about this. Thank you all.

Hi op.
I've skim read the thread and I just wanted to add my experience.

I had three rounds of IVF after 3 years of trying. The third ended in my first ever pregnancy but I lost that at 13 weeks.
We always told ourselves that we would only have 3 tries.

The loss was now just over a year ago and I can honestly say that we have never been happier. Looking back now I realise that we spent 5 years in limbo. We didn't know what was going to happen in our lives.
Now we do. We know there will never be children so we can get on with our lives. We can go on holiday, plan things, not have to think about saving money.

It has put a huge strain on our sex life though and that is still getting back on track.

Still, for us, that is the hand we have been dealt so we have to play it.

Bip read through this last night. it really is utterly heart wrenching and I'm so sorry that you've had to go through all of it. I'm also sorry that people IRL are on the whole such shits. I never do this but and I really hope you'll get to a point where you can find peace - whether that means continuing or stopping.

Hello Pipbin - I remember you from the mind numbing boredom thread - it was really encouraging to hear from someone who had decided to stop and felt happier for it. 5 years in limbo is exactly it.

Sounds like deciding a set number of IVF cycles is a good way of putting a definite limit on it. At the moment I have a visceral feeling that I can't do another cycle. I've got a consultation booked with a new clinic on 18 April and the thought of it makes me feel cold and sick and beaten down.

Perversely, the thing that terrifies me the most is the prospect of a successful pregnancy; after so many losses I can't believe that we are capable of creating a healthy baby. I keep thinking that if I continue to try we will end up having a child born with a condition that causes lifelong pain. Something they can't test for antenatally. And I will have caused that suffering by my selfish determination .

If I could go into treatment with the innocent excitement of thinking it might result in a happy healthy family - thinking that it would give me the same sort of chance as other people - I might be up for it. But I can't believe that anymore. I don't trust my luck.

Plus, statistically we've been more successful trying on our own than with IVF! (3 natural pregnancies in 9 months vs one chemical pregnancy out of 11 eggs with IVF). Makes it seem even more of a pointless rip-off.

Sorry, I'm full of bile today - last day of holiday and it makes me gloomy to think about going back home. But fuck it, I can plan holidays in exotic countries now I don't have to worry about vaccinations or the Zika virus.

Tolly I also meant to say earlier that I'm so sorry to hear of your losses. That sounds just heartbreaking. I've sometimes wondered whether the closer you get to a full term delivery the more obsessively you try afterwards - it feels like you're still waiting for that baby to be born alive somehow. That's how it's felt for me at any rate. Are you still trying?

I know exactly what you mean Bip. Given my age we were so afraid of having a child that had a severe disability. It was almost a relief when I lost it as it meant we didn't need to make that decision.

The choice of three rounds of IVF was made for us really. We were very lucky to have them on the NHS. Just as we lost the pregnancy I inherited enough money that meant we could have had three more. People thought we were mad not to do it but our mind was made up.
I'm sending this right now from a $250 a night hotel room in the states.
I'm not saying that material stuff is more important but having gone though something like that gives you a different perspective. We have become 'live for today' people as we spent too much time worrying about a tomorrow that never came.