Overwhelming internal struggle at “trying again”
It’s coming up on 6 months since my TFMR of my first pregnancy for my son with acrania at 13w1d on January 2nd, 2026 after finding out 2 days before Christmas. When I drove to an out of state clinic, had a protestor tell me my baby with a fatal diagnosis deserved to live, and a new staff member (allegedly) not realize we wanted our son cremated and disposed of him.
The first 3-4 months were full of crying. At work, in the car, in parking lots, in the shower, in bed alone, walking past kids at the playground.
I had originally told my husband we would wait the 3 months for the folic acid to build up in my system and *reevaluate* where we were. Since that 3 month mark, he’s been non stop about “trying again”. I put trying again in quotes because part of writing that makes me feel like a massive failure—that I have to try again to have a baby because my body failed my first one.
I’ve gone back and forth so many times about if I was ready or not. Truthfully, I wasn’t ready the first time and those short 13 weeks pregnancy (I knew since 4w1d so I guess 9 weeks) were a gut punch. I was throwing up all the time and couldn’t keep food or water down some days.
One of my good friends, who is 36 and has been with her husband for 10 years, told me yesterday that she has cervical cancer. They did a surgery and it was unsuccessful and they plan to do a second surgery. If that doesn’t work, then chemo, and if that doesn’t work, a hysterectomy. My heart broke into a million pieces for her when she told me that she had been trying to conceive for over 6 months before going to see her OBGYN. If anyone in this world deserved a baby and would be a loving couple, it’s her and her husband. They have worked so hard the last 10 years that the window for having biological children is narrowing.
It made me think to myself “gosh I want to have as much time with my own children as possible” or “what if I am diagnosed with something later on that makes having children physically impossible and then it’ll be too late.”
BUT THEN (cue the internal struggle)
If I were to “try again” (again I don’t like this phrase), I just know how hard it would be for her to see another woman get pregnant when she cannot. Her own sister had her tubes tied and then got pregnant and gave birth to twins shortly after her cancer diagnosis— her sister nor her parents know.
It’s such a guilt inducing internal struggle I’m facing. Get pregnant again and make my husband happy even though I’m not sure I’m emotionally ready after this trauma, or wait, which would make me feel better and somehow make myself more “relatable” to my friend during her awful diagnosis.
The rational thing to me is to wait until *I* am ready, but my husband has thrown the “wait 3 months” in my face many times and told me that if I had changed my mind about having children that it would be a dealbreaker for our otherwise happy marriage.