Not as happy as I should be?

[MousaP]

Hello everyone,

I'm 34 and married and have just found out that I am pregnant and I am very worried that I don't feel the way I should. I don't feel happy or excited. Infact, I feel like i'm in denial. I have a happy marriage and a good job which is a huge part of my life and lovely people who i know will support me. I feel like i should be ecstatic but i'm not. I feel i should feel very lucky - i know i am. The pregnancy was a 'sort of' planned. We were just adopting the attitude what will be will be. Only it happened straight away! Ironically i had just decided to wait to try for a baby until next year as i knew i wasn't ready! I feel guilty for not feeling instantly in love with this baby and I feel bad for my husband who is thrilled. On top of that I have close friends who yearn for a baby and the guilt just goes on.

Has anyone ever felt like me and will it change do you think?

I think it takes a while to get your head around it all. I was the same as you, fell pregnant right away. When

When I did the test I was just shocked. No tears or leaping up and down with joy, just shocked! Also when telling people felt they were more excited than me. Now I'm 21 weeks and I am happy but not jumping up and down and telling everyone. I have no doubt I'll love this baby hugely. Don't feel bad. It is a scary and overwhelming time but you'll get your head around it.

Everyone is different and everybody's reactions are different. I didn't feel excited with my first, I felt apprehensive. I'd never felt broody and got pregnant because the timing was right. While I did all the right things in pregnancy like give up alcohol, I really didn't enjoy being pregnant and wouldn't say that I bonded with my baby in utero.
That hasn't stopped me falling in love with my DS or being a good mum. It's very different being pregnant to actually having a baby to cuddle and love and care for. Please don't feel any pressure to feel a certain way or that you're doing it wrong if you don't, it'll probably be very different when you've actually got a baby in your arms!

I was deperate for a baby, we planned to have one and had been actively TTC for two months. When I got my BFP I wasn't happy or excited. I was just shit scared and couldn't believe i'd just rushed into it! (I hadn't. I'd been with DH for over ten years and were newly married. It was what we both wanted.)

I think it is just a really scary lifechanging thing. Sadly I lost that baby, had a mmc at ten weeks. When we tried again and found I was pregnant I was over the moon. However, I had a fairly horrible pregnancy with hideous HG for the first 29 weeks and there were times when I hated being pregnant. My son (2yo) is now the absolute light of my life and I am pregnant with DC2 due in 11 weeks.

Hope you can reconcile yourself to the pregnancy and find a reason to be joyful. It is the most wonderful thing, being a mum.

Thankyou for taking the time to reply. Least I know i'm not the only one!

Thankyou Pontouf and I wish you a healthy pregnancy this time around.

I'm sure it will! It's easy to get caught up in what you 'should' be feeling especially when people seem to expect certain reactions from you.

It's been months and sometimes I'm still not used to it. I'm not really a jump up and down and get excited type of person anyway, but I'm still privately excited and while I'm not waving my scan pictures around or plastering them all over Facebook at every opportunity it doesn't mean I don't look at them when I'm by myself or share them with my close friends.

Mine was unplanned and I sometimes feel guilty about other women who can't conceive. It's just another way in which life isn't fair, and it's not your fault. You can drive yourself mad with guilt.

Talk to your husband about it :)

I'm now 33 weeks and it took a long time for me to feel anything other than terrified and overwhelmed, despite the fact we'd been TTC for 6 months. I'm now a mix of excited and terrified & I do feel protective over the bubba but don't feel completely in love with him/her yet and I'm absolutely sure this is just a variant of normal! Theres no rights and wrongs with this, it's all about coping in the way that's right for you and not giving yourself a hard time! Right, I'm off for some more gavison!

Thank you kind people for sharing your feelings and thoughts with me. It's made me feel better. I'm so glad I wrote my post.

:)

I was ttc for nearly two years, once I got my Bfp I cried for about two weeks, completely overwhelmed and wondered if we were doing the right thing. I'm now 30 weeks and delighted, but those first few weeks were really tough.

I could have written your post OP. In fact, I did write one very similar when I was in your situation, although we were also debating whether or not to continue with the pregnancy. Several months later and I'm now 30 weeks pregnant and while I still have frequent 'oh god, why are we doing this again?' moments, but I'm mostly happy and excited. It took me a while to feel that way though. I didn't have any real sense of excitement until 20-ish weeks and no sense of 'love' or any other emotion for the baby until I felt it regularly kicking from about 25 wks on. But, that's ok! A someone else said, just feel what you feel. Just because it seems like the majority of people jump up and down with frenzied excitement at the news of getting pregnant doesn't mean that's 'right' or what you should be feeling. I found discovering I was pregnant hugely overwhelming, for example. And I'm really surprised the extent to which my feelings have changed. So, in answer to the last bit of your post - yes, I do think yours could (and most likely will) too. But don't be so hard on yourself in the meantime. (Oh, and congratulations!)

I had an unplanned pregnancy at 16 and didnt feel excited at all. I didnt feel much of anything, just picked myself up and carried on. I adore my son. Going against what most people think happens, he actually had a massively positive impact on my career and socail life and I often wonder if young parents have an easier time of it than parents who concieve their first child in their 30s, as I didnt have an adult lifestyle to 'loose' IYSWIM. All I can say is that your lifestyle will change (temporarily) but it is so worth it. And no-one is 'ready', ever. If you wait until you are ready and your situation is perfect you may never have one.

You're a sensible person. You can't "fall in love" with someone you've never met! That's all sentimental baloney. You know that pregnancy isn't a holiday, that your body and life will never be the same again - it's a daunting prospect. Anyone who is ecstatic is stoopid. Like CityDweller said, you'll get excited when you feel movement, or see your scan pictures, or when someone gives you some little tiny clothes ...

I wasn't exited by any of my pregnancies
I was shocked
Worried
In Disbelief
Scared
Sick
Hungry
Repeat for 9mo
Good luck op
I'm sure your doing fine
Also I liked to just pretend it wasn't happening for days at a time!!

Thanks you all so much. I can't begin to tell you how much your comments mean to me. I am usually a very private person and i didn't really know what I expected to come from this website. I was just so overwhelmed. I don't even know any of you but i think you are all amazing ladies to give your time to make someone else feel that bit better. Thank you :)

To be honest, I think this is not a bad thing. I was very excited and so looked forward to having the baby. I don't think I contemplated how difficult it would be once the baby had arrived - I just got swept up in the pregnancy thing. Then once I had my baby, I didn't understand why I wasn't over-the-moon with joy and happiness. In fact I was down right depressed and unhappy a lot of the time because it was so bloody hard. So I guess I felt similar to you in that I would look around and every other new mother seemed to think it was all sweetness and light and wonderful and I honestly kept thinking "I have ruined my life"!. Now I am pregnant with number 2 and not nearly as excited or thrilled as number one, mainly because I am dreading the new baby stage. But am still a little bit excited because a baby is always exciting. However, I just know that when it arrives, while I will love it, I will have times when I wonder - why on earth did I do this to myself again.

The point of this rambling post, is I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing not to be overcome with joy and excitement because I think sometimes that can lead to a shock once the baby is born. However, that's just my experience.

It is a huge shock even if you are planning it. I found it hard to get my head around the idea I was pregnant for ages.

What has helped me feel closer/more ready is to start getting the nursery ready and having a few baby things around the house so I get used to seeing them and it feels a little bit more "real". (Now 28 weeks). This seems to be helping DH too!

Everyone feels different and I'm sure you'll be a great Mum when you meet the LO.