Was/Is anyone pregnant and not happy?

[milupa]

I am 12 weeks now and still can't get over that split condom. Has anyone heard of antenatal depression rather than postnatal!!!
I read all those threads about how happy most if not all of you are being pregnant and I am thinking, what is wrong with me?

I am going to make myself unpopular but highlander - have you considered adoption. My sister is your age and would give her right arm to have a child. She is going through the adoption process but not many babies out there.
(btw i dont mean yours)
There is nothing wrong in not wanting children and you may feel differently later but if you really dont want your v
baby lots of people do.
hope things work out for you.
excuse one handed typing.

Highlander: most people can still safely go mountain biking & running while pregnant (I sure did). Although I (personally) wouldn't do high speed off-road descents on my bike when 8 months gone.... I think skiing is also discretionary.

Mind you, having a C-section would probably be a sure way of slowing down getting back to those things!

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Highlander you sound rather self indulgent at the moment and in that frame of mind the life as a parent is not for you. Youmyst condsider your post natal options.

HOW you think a c section is dignified I do not know. I remember 4 hours post labour hoofing off around the wards watching th c section women piss into their catheters....

ps are you confusing missing your dh with this pregnsancy related depression?

If you'd seen the ttc thread you'll have seen how hard I was trying to get pg. For the last two weeks I have been in a totally bummy mood, and found out last Wednesday that I am finally pg. So I have now figured out that it is a huge hormone hit which is making me this way. I am either very lethargic or very bitchy (or both) and feel overwhelmed by things (especially the potential baby) very easily. And I wanted it to happen!

In my view the hormones (which I guess are meant to bring out our severe self-preservation instincts) will make anything we are not happy about ten times worse. It's meant to make us fight off wolves and wild boars, but in modern times the equivalent is split condoms, overseas moves and demanding bosses!

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Hard to tell, Highlander, whether you really don't want the baby or if all the more negative aspects are just at the front of your mind right now. If you really dont want to be a mother, you don't have to be - have an abortion or give the baby up for adoption.

I too have been obsessing about all the negative aspects of pg. I have decided to take basic professional advice and then decide what level of risk I am comfortable with (food, sports, etc).

Don't engage in conversation with people about your pg or pg in general unless you want to. (I tell people that I don't want to think about labour yet at all. Every single person so far has immediately changed the subject.) Change your GP if you feel like crap after you see her. Hire a consultant and skip the midwives, if their politics get you down. (As you say that you have elected for a CS so perhaps you have done that already?) If you are living overseas you will probably be able to afford to hire a nanny to help you so you don't feel oppressed and isolated by motherhood.

Pardon me, but it sounds as if a lot of this is about guilt feelings. There is no sense in fighting for your right to do it your own way, then feeling guity and miserable about it! The motherhood guilt thing will eat us up if we let it.

I can perfectly understand your resistance to stopping sports and diet changes. People go way over the top and get simplistic about everything. But I don't really get your resistance to folic acid. So what? Either take a vitamin supplement or monitor your diet to ensure adequate nutrient intake.

ps - what kind of job was withdrawn? Unless it's extremely physical, it sounds like a violation of human rights to me.

Good luck

hi Highlander

Can totally understand people who don't want a baby, but it needn't be the end of everything you like doing. I was terrified of losing my "life" but I have two small dds and still have a career I like, time for sports, social life and lots of sleep. it is possible.

If that job offer's not around you can (I imagine) get another job, get childcare, and get back to all the sports etc you like doing pretty soon after the baby is born. it doesn't necessarily mean endless sleepless nights either.

And very importantly if DH is keen on the baby make sure he gets to do at least half the childcare too! make him agree now if he's enthusistic about keeping the baby.

Milupa,
Hi was also the same as you although I planned the pregnancy.

When I found out I was pregnant I was over the moon and couldnt have been more happy. But then at 14 weeks pregnant I dont why but I started feeling some negative feeling's towards being pregnant. I became very tearful about everything, I kept imagining that my partner would leave me because I was so miserable and I would become a single mum and how would I afford it,This would then make my family ashamed of me. I became very depressed and wished that I hadnt got pregnant and that maybe something would be wrong with the baby so that I could have a termination. I stopped talking to people about the baby and couldnt even think of planning for the future. I thought that if I didnt do or think anything to do with babies it may go away. My growing stomach just added to the disgust I felt. I was jelous of pregnant women who seemed so happy.
I eventually confessed everything to my mum who was so supportive and took me to the doctors. After some consideration the doctor perscribed antidepressants. He said that the risk of taking them far outweighed what I was was going through. I even contemplated ending my own like as I was so unhappy with everything. I have been taking the tablets now for 10 weeks and I also have weekly counselling sections. Both of these have turned me around. Yes there is such a thing as pregnancy depression and it is more common than the doctors originally thought, but there is help out there for you. I now look back at those few dreadful weeks and think 'thank god' I found the support and help I needed. I have now started to plan for this baby and take more of a interest in getting the nursery together and talking about it, I even had a scare a few weeks ago where I thought the baby may come early and that worried me so much I realised how much I did want it and how excited I am to be given such a wonderful gift. I know that I will love the baby no matter what and that it was the depression was making me feel bad. My family and midwife know that I am supseptable to the depression and it is caused by the pregnancy hormones as I have never felt depressed before.
You will be fine, You do have choices over what you want to do and if you decide to keep the baby please see the doctor and tell him how you are feeling and get some support.
Let me know how things go.
Thinking of you
xxx

If you've never been maternal, never been remotely interested in children, never wanted to be pregnant and never wanted the hassle of it then you're not going to change once the baby comes along. Things might be rosy and new to begin with but as soon as they start crawling the moaning and whining starts too and never stops. Dont expect a great whoosh of maternal feelings to come over you as soon as it pops out because it just wont happen. Despite what people say, life does stop when you have a child. You can no longer whizz off on a whim on your bike or go skiing. It all takes so much hassle to arrange even a modicum of time to yourself it rarely seems worth it. Despite hubby being happy about junior's arrival, is it worth sacrificing everything you enjoy and possibly your marriage to bring something into the world that you dont desire or want and may feel resentful towards for the life that you had to give up as a result of a bad mistake. I have never been maternal and never wanted children and stupidly didnt listen to my instincts and go with my gut feeling that the whole thing was a terrible mistake. Make your decision now, you cannot afford to wait.

Highlander, you don't know now how much it is possible to love your child. Nobody without chidren knows. It is the great secret of motherhood, and most people with children don't tell their childless friends because it would seem awfully rude. The other day, I was looking at my two year old son and my I realised my heart was literally beating faster at just the sight of him. I am having a passionate, physical and emotional love affair with my son. It's as exhausting, wonderful and overwhelming as the most intense love affair of your life. He makes me laugh all the time, pays me ludicrously extravagant compliments, is beautiful to me beyond words, and has taught me so much about love. This evening my dh and I have been playing him Bill Withers and Marvin Gaye and drinking wine together (not ds). Life with a child can be such fun. I do think you sound pretty depressed and are hiding it under a veneer of cynicism and denial. Folic acid supplementation is not a waste of time, though yes, it is too late for you to worry about it. Have you considered pre-natal depression? You don't have to live a totally different life after having a child. There are other (better) jobs and you can still do sport etc if that floats your boat. But the funny thing is, you often want to lead a different life. And how fantastic that it changes your life. What a dull life it would be without change.

BTW, my son doesn't moan or whine (he's the most cheerful person I know) and my life has never been happier. He gave me the impetus to work for myself, which I love, and I look forward to doing all sorts of wonderful things with him. But I suspect that maybe Highlander isn't ready to a mother. I think all children deserve to be wanted and loved.

I also have a stepdaughter of 12, and she doesn't moan or whine either.

Highlander, just a thought but I think the comment 'What if no-one listens and I harm my baby' is very telling. I would say (and please tell me to bog off if I am wrong) that this is at the root of your worries.

Sometimes it is hard to believe that you could ever be a good mother. It is a terrifying responsibility. You sound like the responsibility of it frightens you - hence the reluctance to take folic acid etc - you are being made to feel as though you are already having to take care of someone else. Do you think this could be something to do with it?

I actually don't think you are depressed BTW, just having problems coming to terms with the finality/responsibility of it all - and if your dh is working away you must be feeling very 'left with it'.

If it makes you feel any better, my children are actually very good company and have been since the day they were born.