Coping with secondary infertility grief

[ScoutFinchMockingbird]

Following IVF failure last month, and unable to afford another round, my DH (in particular) and I are finding it hard to move on. It's as though a little ghost is always there in the background, making their presence felt. Although we both love and cherish our DD, we are both mourning not being able to provide a sibling and sharing our love with another child. How do others cope with this? Does it get better?

Hi Scout. I don't know the answer to it but I'm going through something similar at the moment. It's tough. I seem to be around a lot of pregnant people right now too. I had a cry a couple of weeks ago. Here is a handhold.

Oh thanks sarah - it is so hard isn't it? Especially this time of year.

I know what you mean about everyone seeming to be pregnant. And then there's the questions about when you're going to get on and have another.

. Try to keep cheerful. I keep trying to tell myself how lucky I am to have a happy, healthy little girl. (But I'll always miss her sibling too).

I'm a little further on than you. Three failed ivfs with the last one in September. Definitely can't afford any more and I'm just getting too old for carrying on with this shit. All the way through I've been exactly as you describe- teary and feeling utterly obsessed and desperate for it to work, and seemingly surrounded by other people with two children or getting pregnant. Weirdly after the third failure, I seem to have reached some kind of acceptance. I still get occasional waves of sadness, but my head seems to have come round to the knowledge that we're a 3 person family and that that's actually not so bad. I think it's partly a time passing making it easier thing. And also watching a friend struggling with a newborn and remembering how tough that was! And then I applied for (and got) a new and full time job that actually I don't particularly want to leave for a year's maternity - I can really throw all my energies at it. Distraction I guess. I'm also feeling massively grateful for the one I do have and the ivf process has made me much more aware of how lucky we are to have been struggling for number 2 not number 1.

Not sure if there's any advice in there. Time and distraction seem to have worked best. And focusing on the good points of only having an older child in terms of what we can now do. I remember only too well how horrible I've felt for the last few years of trying though and as I said, it still comes back sometimes. But then it passes and I can focus on the good stuff.

There's a lovely thread in the one child families topic about the benefits of having one DC its a nice read.