I'm the one that is conflicted. B is grieving our loss but he's done.
Whereas I'm grieving but it's an open question to me on continuing to pursue a sibling for D.
My heart has kept tugging at me. I so badly want a sibling for D. And it's created inner conflict that feels super unsettling.
The question I've kept coming back to though is: why haven't I done anything about it??
It's perplexing. Usually I'm always all ready with Plan B and I get going on it. I was ready to do that within a week of losing the baby, the pregnancy. And then I knew we needed to allow time for grief.
Ok, so we've done that, at least a fair amount. In therapy two weeks ago, it felt extremely cathartic to have a big cry, a cry that lasted all session. A cry that continued when I told B about the letters I wrote to baby A and to our little D.
I had therapy again this past Friday and it was really illuminating. We didn't get to it until the end but I realized the reason I haven't done anything about it and the reason I could potentially get to a peaceful place about it all:
Pursuing a sibling for D would mean not just work, and not just emotional work but also the risk of potential loss. With adoption, it could be the family changing their minds and with donor egg with a surrogate, it could mean miscarriage.
Both of those options would likely have a positive result too, but as B said, if you had told us that the last 5 embryos wouldn't turn into babies and that 3 of them would be miscarriages, we wouldn't have believed it. We would've thought, and in fact, we DID think - this is bound to work.
So... I think I could live with: I did always want a sibling for D, my heart ached for it, but I couldn't go thorugh with the risk for continued potential loss.
And I know there are other benefits too:
- I wouldn't have a part-time job anymore (of pursuing another child)
- I could get off my meds and feel better physically (weight-wise, libido-wise)
- We could focus on D (even though we already do)
- We could have closure
- We could pay off our surrogacy debt even though it would be worthwhile to continue to be financially in the hole for another child
But none of the benefits on this list was making me feel settled UNTIL I got to the part about:
- We wouldn't risk future potential loss
Which is really what I think would be too painful.
I also talked to my good friend, A, who IS an only child and I never thought to ask her from her perspective what it's like - my most worrisome thing is having D not be alone in decision making for us later on. And she said she's got her spouse to help make those decisions. And not that it's a guarantee that D would have a partner, but he'd have friends, cousins and others he could bounce his thoughts off of. So that made me feel better.
She also said that growing up she loved being an only child. She liked having all the attention. And now having two girls, she knows that it's that much harder to save for two college educations, etc.
And I also realized that my negative thoughts around D being an only child all stem from my mom's experience.
Growing up, she didn't have a great childhood and always said she wished she had had a sibling. And then when we moved far away, she felt guilty for leaving her mother "all alone". She emphasized to us that we were all my grandmother had. She encouraged us to call her often and write her letters.
The truth is we weren't all she had. She had 3-4 other sisters she was close with and lived near her. She had a niece who was in the hospital with her for 3 days before my mom could get there before my grandmother passed away.
So all of this made me feel better that D being an only child doesn't necessarily have to equate bad, and in fact, there are lots of positives to it.
And I do think I could come to place of peace about it. After all, I haven't made any steps forward and I'm unlikely to.
It's also made me understand my best friend, J, and how she had always wanted to adopt and after their 2nd child, I kept asking her and finally, years later she said, you know if a child just landed in our lives, we'd take it but I don't want to do the work to go and get it.
And that's how I feel. In a heartbeat, I want and would take a baby if it were placed in my arms but I can't do the emotional work right now and I don't think I can withstand the risk of potential future loss.
So for now, I'm enjoying it being the 3 of us. It's happy. It can feel peaceful (ha, I say that knowing it's peaceful in a way that includes all the loud happy moments and the tantrums!). And it's us.
xoxo
