Thank you all so much for your replies and kind words.
I don’t really feel like I need counselling right now... I’m really quite good at processing things on my own, after many years of developing that skill! I just feel I would like to chat to people who are in a similar situation really, so I don’t feel so isolated and ‘different’.
InDreamland, I’m so sorry you suffered a recent loss too. My heart goes out to you. It really sucks, huh.
I came off Facebook a couple of years ago because I felt it was doing me more harm than good, for lots of reasons, not least seeing all those happy family showreels and all the ‘my kids are the best thing that ever happened to me’ type posts. Even worse was seeing posts from people moaning about their kids.... they just have no idea how shitty that sounds to someone who can’t have them...
... life is soooo much easier without Facebook!
I hate it when people ask me if I have kids, and when I say no, they say ‘ooh, lucky!’ And all I want to do is say (in the most sarcastic tone possible, obv) ‘Yeah, I’m REALLY lucky... lucky to have gone through cancer and infertility and a f**king miscarriage, you thoughtless, ignorant twunt ’...
... but of course I don’t say that, and I immediately feel bad for even thinking it, because how can I expect them to know, or to understand something they’ve never had to face? They are just human beings, reeling off those standardised small-talk phrases as human beings so often do, and holding it against them isn’t going to do me any favours.
In any case, I know deep down that having kids ISN’T all warm and fuzzy... and I try to remind myself of that when I’m going around with my rose-tinted spectacles on. Every time I feel sad at how I will never experience that dreamy, idyllic skin-on-skin, new baby smell, seeing that first smile, walking around proudly with my little papoose bundle, hearing them say ‘mummy’ for the first time, I think about all the sleepless nights and the tantrums and the absolute exhaustion and the strain it can put on a marriage and the trying to juggle everything and the shit it does to your body and how your life can be turned absolutely upside down and inside out for YEARS. I think about that, and while it doesn’t make me feel ‘better’ exactly, it does help put things more in perspective, I guess. It’s so easy to over-idealise the dream, it’s like the more out of reach it is, the more we tend to idealise it.
Anyway, I am ranting, but I’m finding it helpful to write this down :)
I just kind of wish it was easier to make new friends who I can relate to. My friends have gradually diminished over the past few years and I only have a few left now, and none of them are local to me. I wish there was some kind of meetup group for childless people in my area - like an alternative to making friends at NCT classes! (I was looking forward to that bit, dammit).