Hellobee

Somewhere along the way since deciding to have children, I had the number three in my mind. There’s no big reason why, it was just a feeling. Many people liked to say, oh just wait until you have kids then you may (*will) change your mind. Two kids is the perfect number! One for each parent, one for each bedroom in your house, it’s just more manageable. After we had Ohana, I still thought three sounded good. Then my wife, Missus Scooter, tried to conceive for over a year and it was a pretty terrible experience. After conceiving our blessing baby, Romi, (part I and part II) Missus Scooter and I had several conversations about it being a sign that she was meant to be in our family and that our family was likely complete.

Having one vial of our original donor’s sperm left, however, it was hard to feel like the door was closed on the family being complete. We lightly talked, while I was pregnant, about the probability that we would use the last vial at some point. Having a challenging and not very enjoyable pregnancy, I was fairly clear I did not want to TTC.

But a couple months after Romi was born, I was having baby fever. How could this be??? I had a newborn in my arms! How could I be thinking about another? Many of my friends said this was a common experience for them as well. I didn’t put much energy into it, however, because I caring for my newborn. When Romi was about five months old, Missus Scooter casually said, “I think I’ll be ovulating soon. Should I order some ovulation prediction kits?” I was sort of shocked but instantly excited at the possibility. She got some tests and a few days later she got a positive test. We talked about our options – do it now, do it later – and needless to say, the next morning we ended up in the fertility clinic.

The next two weeks sucked. They always did and this time was no exception. Missus Scooter was on edge and anxious and I was instantly thrown back to that crappy year of TTC. I was moody and I just couldn’t wait for the results to be in. We talked a lot about being happy we tried earlier rather than later. This was our last original donor vial, and we agreed that this was the end of our fertility road. If she ended up being pregnant, we would be overjoyed. If she was not pregnant, then we would have clarity that two children was enough and we would close that chapter in our lives. Mostly, it was appealing that the open question would be decided. I am a decisive person who likes to know the plan. Just knowing seemed so comforting to me.

But when her test came back negative, it was a very heavy feeling. We said all those things above again. I found myself saying the words but not exactly feeling them. We didn’t really talk much about it beyond the first couple of days after the negative test. Why would we? We had agreed this was it. I put it out of my mind. But for two weeks after the negative test, I was just off. I was tense and distant and in a funk. It wasn’t until we saw our therapist yesterday and started to talk that I realized I was holding on.

The thing is…we make plans for how we will feel about stuff in the future. I will be so happy when XXX happens. I will feel relieved when YYY happens. If we can just get through XXX, I can relax. I’m going to be really pissed if YYY happens. I can’t wait for XXX, it’s going to be the time of my life! But sometimes the thing happens and then we don’t actually feel like what we planned. In my head, it made perfect sense to feel closure. It made sense to feel gratitude for the two healthy children we have. It made sense to feel that our family was complete. But my heart didn’t agree. I felt like I was betraying a pact I had made with my wife. We agreed after the last vial was used, we would be done (and subtext: we would be happy about it). I felt guilty looking at my two girls and thinking my family wasn’t complete – – why couldn’t they be enough?

Our therapist…(LOVE her)…walked us through the issue and in the end simply gave me permission to feel the way I was feeling. She gave me permission to sit with it without making any plans or decisions right now. It simply wasn’t necessary. She said it was ok that I didn’t feel the way I thought I would feel. Sometimes this happens. So simple…yet so powerful.

So that’s what we are doing. We are sitting with it and leaving it open. We have agreed we will re-evaluate in 6 months. Maybe things will have changed: life will feel complete with just my two girls. Maybe things won’t have changed: does Missus Scooter TTC or do I? Things we will consider…later.

Have you ever experienced this? How did you know your family was complete?