How do you come to terms with never being pregnant again?

[luckywinner]

What do you do if you think you don't want any more children but still feel quite broody. And also desperately sad that you won't be pregnant again or give birth again?

I have two dc - ds 4.9 and dd 3. I am just starting to get some time to myself and my children get on well and I am really enjoying being a mum now. I didn't enjoy the baby years at all. But I am sad that I won't be pregnant again, or have another baby.

Do I just accept that 2 dc is more 'me' than 3? I like order, am not good with chaos, and I think 3 might just be too much for me. I am so jealous of people who have 3 children and one of my best friends is pregnant with her 3rd and I am vvv jealous. I want to have scans and be pregnant and be excited about a new baby. But I just don't think I would cope with another child.

I am not sure what I am trying to say here, just wanted to offload what has been whirring round in my head!

I have no idea how you get over it - i am sooo broody. We have 4 dcs and dh doesn't want anymore but i can't get used to the idea. Well - i thought i had but got pregnant and nave just had a mc and now it's worse than ever. I can'y even look at newborns/pregnant women without feeling really sad. I guess it most go sometime just don't know when

You could read my birth stories, that would put you off for life .

give it time

I'd love to be pregnant and have more babies (yes, plural), but know I really couldn't cope with any more children

Does that make sense? It's taken me several years to get this far. DH was talking about getting a vasectomy after child #4 before #4 was even conceived! He knew 4 was the limit for him (he'd have felt happy with 3). DC#4 is now 2 and I've only just accepted in the last 3 or so months that this really is it. It's taken a long time and lots of discussion to get my head in the right frame of mind.

Reading back, that sounds like he's brainwashed me! but it's not that. I've had to accept that although my heart would love another baby, it really would be too much for us as a family.

It's difficult I know

numptysmummy, I cross posted with you. I'm sorry for your loss

agree with giving it time.

I always had this thought at the back of mind that I might want more (and I have 4) until the youngest boys got to school age. Now they are all at school and we have so much more freedom I am completely happy with my lot and considering sterilisation.

My dc #4 is 3and a half and i still can't get over it!! I can't help thinking that the oldee my dc's get the worse i'm going to feel - i really miss having tiny ones around me.Oh,and being pregnant - and labour..

Numptysmummy, so sorry to hear about your mc. I had two last year attempting to try for number 3. It is heartbreaking.

Bumpbecky, I am the same as you, I'd love to be pregnant and have more babies but I just don't know about having more children. I keep saying to myself give it time, and then each month, usually round ovulation, i think sod it, lets get pregnant.

Mosschops, I am not sure it would! I feel like a woman possessed.

I am only 34 but in my head I said 35 was my cut off point. And I can see the glimmer of my life coming back. I know I don't have to rush a decision but it feels a bit now or never.

I have one DS (6) we have tried for 4 years to get pregnant, we had mmc 2 years ago and currently have been referred to a fertility specialist (but it will be a long wait). I am 37 my DH 42 - the chances aren't good. I would really give / do anything to have another child.

I have to deal with it, what other option is there? My sadness about not having another child is nothing, I would imagine to those who never can have one.

I am not sure what I am trying to say, but this is something I think about every day.
xx

Northumberlandlass, I am sorry to hear about your troubles. You say your sadness is nothing to those who can never have one, but then mine is nothing compared to yours. I am in a position to decide. It seems you haven't been allowed that luxury, and I imagine that must be so, so difficult. How long have they said the wait will be?

I had to have a hysterectomy last summer so have stopped at 2 dc's. I would have loved 3, but am suprisingly positive about it. However, I do obsess about getting a gorgeous, bounding Newfoundland dog to be my substitute 3rd child .

Am a lone parent too so there is a part of me that realises a lot of blokes may well not want to get in a relationship with me as I can't have more kids

I try to be objective - I miss pregnancy and am nostalgic for it, but I miss my teenage years and am nostalgic for those too - it's natural, but I try to rationalise it like this: if I did have another baby, would I feel nostalgic/broody again when it's a toddler?

The answer is 'probably' - so, in a way, having another baby wouldn't solve my broodiness long-term.

I hope that makes some sort of sense!

I have not enjoyed being pregnant - means to an end for me. This is my last pregnancy. I have had such a rough time this time that the fact that I won't need to do it again has helped me cope with the rough time. I think I will always love kids, and so when mine get bigger I will miss little children. But I will be surprised if I wish I was pregnant again!

Like Ninthwave, I am nostalgic for my teenage years, my youth, my single days when I used to go clubbing. It don't want to be back there though, but just sometimes allow myself to imagine it being so much easier adn therefore attractive....

Time is probably your best thing. And maybe read threads about lack of sleep

Hey Luckywinner - I didn't mean to bring you lovely ladies down. I had some investigations in October / November 09 - which proved my uterus is perfect and they took samples etc and all has come back fine.

I then received a letter from the Fertility Clinic to say we were on their waiting list. I appreciate that it will take a while and I would expect (hope) that those couples without any children will be ahead of me.

We really would love another child. xxxx

I have a DS (2.5). I had a brain hemorrhage just before he was born- seems my pituitary gland reacts to pregnancy by swelling massivley (its supposed to get bigger during pregnancy but mine went overboard), causing bleeding in my brain.....

DS was born by CS under general, all very scarey and at the time I was just glad we were both OK. It was the end of a long road trying to have a DC as I had 5 miscarrages before he arrived.

I have been told a subsiquent pregnancy would risk another hemmorrhage and I may not be so lucky next time. I don't think I am willing to take the risk.

In many ways I am OK about having an 'only' (hate that term), but something about being told that it has to be that way makes it hard to accept. I guess if things had been different I would have liked another, and I hate the implication that somehow our family is incomplete.

Having said that he is a joy (mostly!!), I have to count my blessings!!

I'm with Potporri
I hate being pregnant, I'm rubbish at it -sick twice a day for 9 months, cant face meat including just walking down the meat isle in supermarket wihtout feeling sick(usually complete carnivore!).
Tired, iritable, dont do well without sleep.

I'm a wonderful walking advert!

BUT!!!
I'm on my 4th pregnancy (1 succesful so far) and definately last (either way) - so for me too its a means to an end and the end result is worth it.

Northumberlandlass, you didn't bring us down . It's all relative isn't? I really hope you get your wish.
Wheresmypaddle, that sounds scary. I don't blame you for not taking that risk.
mrsseed, pls keep talking! Perhaps you can help quell my dilemma helping me to remember all the crap stuff.

I think the fact that dd is off to nursery/reception in September is making me think about this more. Perhaps I need to take on a real challenge. A career change maybe. But that's another thread.

My dh had a vasectomy in June - I have a 4.9 year old and a 16 month old - both dds.

I wasn't very happy about it at first as I wanted a third. However, I had a mc in between the two of them - and I think that that made dh's mind up that a second would be the last. He was very anxious throughout all three pregnancies and I don't have easy ones - bleeding in all three, high blood pressure and I developed gestational diabetes with my second dd. I had constant all day morning sickness with all pregnancies - til 25 weeks with dd1 and 19 weeks with dd2 and yest despite all of that I actually didn't mind pregnancy - even the two c sections. However, I had approximately 3 weeks notice for his op and have been thinking none stop about it since - even to the point of hoping that the op didn't work!

He is very much - we have two girls, now lets start the next part of our life with them. I would live one more, but I know that the work/financial side would be a nightmare not to mention my health etc, so I am slowly accepting that there will be no more.

My doctor said to me after I mentioned another one to her, six weeks after dd2, that I didn;t necessarily want another child, just another baby - and she was right. Doesn't stop the feelings though!

I have 3 and feel very lucky to have them. Got pregnant again last year complete mistake and just as I had got round to accepting the pregnacy ( I was 45) I then had a mc. Of course then that sent my hormones crazy for another baby it took months for the yearning to be controlled, even now I think why can't it be possible! Although the baby years can chaotic it was kinda fun. I hated being pregnant and had horrendous times givig birth mad what your brain does to you!

I was introduced to my new baby niece, she was put in my arms & her mum scootled off. I held her for a bit & thought, Now what?
Then she pooped...

A bit later a neigbour turned up with a dachshund puppy - all soft fur, big eyes & huge ears & paws. I was over babies for ever.

(No offence to my darling niece, who is a joy!)

My friend has 2 and was umming and ahhhing about whether to have a third. After ages, they decided together that they would stop there. But they both decided it together. She has got rid of all the baby things. She still loves babies, and even told me that she feels a surge in her boobs when she sees a new baby, or when a baby cries (that hungry cry). But she made a decision and is therefore going to stick with it - she said the decision was the hardest part, the rest just followed

I don't know, I wish I did.

I have an incompetant cervix and both of my babies were very premature, my ds almost died. I can't have another but I always wanted 3. Every month I hope I'm pregnant but I've got a coil. It's just sick. I wish I could turn the feeling off and be happy with my lot but I can't. It like chasing the impossibe dream. I think about it all the time.

So if you find a way of banishing the broodyness please let me know eh

I have two and would love three. DH really only wanted one, although he's now happy with 2 he definitely thinks two is enough.
I had horrible pregnancies and difficult births but really miss the small baby stage.
I know though that really, all of us will have more to live on, less stress and insanity, and lower probability of family breakup if we stop at two. so i know deep down it's the right thing to do. oh and did i mention more space in the house and more sleep and more attention for the children i have already? I know all these things but if i got pregnant tomorrow i would be half ecstatic half terrified.

part of me thinks perhaps i could do with giving birth again to see if i could manage it a bit more succesfully third time around! But on previous form i think not. it saddens me that i will never have a 'normal' birth without induction, monitors, interventions and days on end with hospital food, but that's another thread.
a friend of mine did have a much smoother time on 3rd baby after 3rd degree tearing with DC1 and c section DC 2. she said the whole experience was totally different.

I have two and felt broody for quite a long time, and didn't like it when friends had 3 children!!!

But now my two are at primary and secondary schools, life is "fulfilling" enough without a little one in tow. I also feel old and weary and would be at risk of being called "grandma" in the playground if we had one now!

One positive thing about not adding any extra children is you can do so much more as a family with the one or two you've got - a baby does cramp everyone's style a bit!

So I think you either take the plunge and try for a third or you move on and get over it like I did. No major regrets here.