u/Accomplished_Flan838

Hi - this is complicated so hold on to your hats. I have three children, my last child is 13 months old and was an IVF baby. I am 46 years old. When my last baby was around 6 months old I started thinking of having a fourth child - we had some embryos left. My husband was never fully on board and we discussed it back and forth for months. Then, we scheduled an embryo transfer for the day after my son turned 1. I was too anxious to go through with it and canceled - then did that exact same thing two more times. Each time, I liked the idea of a fourth, but something in my instincts told me that it would be too much for me and my husband (he is 53 years old) and that things are perfect just as they are. Some of the anxieties included that the fourth child might have special needs (which would be too much for us to cope with), that we are getting too old for another baby, that it might cause problems in the marriage and - most importantly - my husband struggles with alcoholism and while he is amazing sober, he is unreliable when drinking - and the marriage has been very rocky at times as a result of his drinking (and he hasn't really ever got help). nevertheless, I continued on to schedule a fourth transfer. I was almost too embarassed to cancel it and so went ahead, thinking that it was only a 30% chance I would actually become pregnant and then I could stop torturing myself with "what ifs". I figured if I did become pregnant it would be clear to me whether to proceed or not (but truly, didn't think I'd fall pregnant). Well, guess what.. a glaring positive pregnancy test. I am truly, TRULY at a loss of what to do. I felt absolutely sick when I saw the positive test. I have a million reasons not to proceed with the pregnancy, but there is a small part of me that thinks four children might be wonderful and I'm scared of regretting terminating. What do I do? I'm only about 3.5 weeks pregnant at this point, and my husband doesn't think it's a good idea to proceed.

Hi - this is complicated so hold on to your hats. I have three children, my last child is 13 months old and was an IVF baby. I am 46 years old. When my last baby was around 6 months old I started thinking of having a fourth child - we had some embryos left. My husband was never fully on board and we discussed it back and forth for months. Then, we scheduled an embryo transfer for the day after my son turned 1. I was too anxious to go through with it and canceled - then did that exact same thing two more times. Each time, I liked the idea of a fourth, but something in my instincts told me that it would be too much for me and my husband (he is 53 years old) and that things are perfect just as they are. Some of the anxieties included that the fourth child might have special needs (which would be too much for us to cope with), that we are getting too old for another baby, that it might cause problems in the marriage and - most importantly - my husband struggles with alcoholism and while he is amazing sober, he is unlreliable when drinking. nevertheless, I continued on to schedule a fourth transfer. I was almost too embarassed to cancel it and so went ahead, thinking that it was only a 30% chance I would actually become pregnant and then I could stop torturing myself with "what ifs". I figured if I did become pregnant it would be clear to me whether to proceed or not (but truly, didn't think I'd fall pregnant). Well, guess what.. a glaring positive pregnancy test. I am truly, TRULY at a loss of what to do. I have a million reasons not to proceed with the pregnancy, but there is a small part of me that thinks four children might be wonderful and I'm scared of regretting terminating. What do I do? I'm only about 3.5 weeks pregnant at this point, and my husband doesn't think it's a good idea to proceed.