“Are you pregnant?”
“When are you guys going to have another baby?”
“Are you guys done having kids?”
“You have your hands full as it is. You should stop now?”
These are statements that we hear at least twice a week. Over 12 1/2 years of marriage those questions have became completely normal. A part of our ‘everyday’ life when we are not publicly pregnant. As a couple who went through years of infertility, one failed adoption, fertility treatments to conceive two of our kids, and honest to God count less miscarriages-chemical pregnancies — it still stings when I’d get asked about it. Even if I’ve been secretly pregnant. Something about it unsettles me. When we were pregnant in June I bought our kids Christmas elves. Naturally, I had our unborn baby an elf made too. To see it on Christmas morning when I gave the kids theirs was hard for me. Almost six months has passed since we lost that baby and having had so many losses you do sadly become adapted to the pain. Not that it gets easier each time, if anything it was harder, but you become more and more numb to it faster. However you do still have days, reminders that bring you to your knees. Even years later. Each loss is different. Dates, personal items, pictures, etc remind you of that specific loss and you grief it. It doesn’t matter if you’ve had babies since it or are pregnant again. You still hurt for the life that you’ll never know. You flash back to the weight of the pain on your chest when you’re freshly mourning the news that your baby isn’t thriving and will never be born alive or held in your arms. And with so much loss you begin to expect it rather than to expect a positive outcome.
We made the choice to not rush to announce our pregnancies anymore. We plan to wait until the birth to share the news or at the very least wait until we can’t physically hide it. Not because of the lesser risk of miscarriage the farther along that you are or because we wouldn’t be equally as freaking over the moon about baby #6, 7, 8, plus but because it’s just not anyone’s business unless we WANT it to be. I will share what I want to share and stop feeling pressured to share it all in a timely manner on a Pinterest perfect platter. I also have never waited to announce a pregnancy until birth before so we want to do something different. Something unique and fun. Everyone knows that we plan to expand so no shock there but I love the idea of doing a pregnancy/gender/birth reveal all at once because it’s a new experience for us and will shock people who don’t read my blog that we waited so we are going for it as long as we feel led to.
It will never be respectful to ask someone when they are going to have a baby. Don’t make yourself so comfortable prying into people’s personal lives in such a way. It may seem mindless and harmless but I promise it’s really not. Not just for people like me who have struggled but also for people in general. It’s not a normal thing to ask. It shouldn’t feel natural to bring up another couple’s family planning. Don’t be that person and please keep in mind that the girl that you keep nagging on about having a baby may be dying on the inside because she wants it so badly but can’t conceive or because she’s currently miscarrying in private. She might be pregnant and feels awkward lying about it so she spills in a pressured moment then deeply regrets it. She might not want kids but is afraid that she will sound weird by saying that she has zero desire to be a mom because society says that’s not normal. She might want a baby more than anything in the world but her husband changed his mind and now doesn’t want kids. She might be in the process of adopting because she doesn’t want to contribute to over population. She might want 10
kids but feels embarrassed to say that because people normalized stopping at 3 if you have both genders. She might be actively trying hard for baby #8 but can’t seem to get pregnant again. She might simply just think that it’s rude to be asked that. She might not care at all. Whatever the case may be you wouldn’t feel comfortable asking others what their income is so asking them what their family size plan is shouldn’t feel comfortable either. You shouldn’t feel like your input is what’s best for another family. You shouldn’t feel entitled to comment on whether or not a couple ‘needs’ another baby or should hurry up and start a family while they are young.
As for me and my family, we try to normalize not asking people when they’re going to have kids or when they will be done having kids 👌🏻