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I'm scared
Have just had a long phone conversation with my mum about Big Sis.
Big Sis was told years ago, in her teens, that it would be really dangerous for her to have children and therefore she has always accepted that she couldn't and has had more than half her life to get used to the idea. There are lots of complicated reasons for this to do with her lipid problems, pancreatitis, gynaecological troubles and crumbling spine. I always thought she had accepted it.
But now she is married, with a broody husband, and they have moved to a new area and registered with a new doctor who has taken a shine to them as a couple and wants them to have a baby, and has been giving her all kinds of hope that it could actually happen, changing her meds etc. And now, she casually drops into conversation, he's taken her off all her meds and told her to go out and get pregnant! My reaction was the same as mum's. "WHAT?"
Nice though it would be to be an aunt, this is terrifying. All the reasons it would be dangerous for her to get pregnant before still stand, and a new medication that lowered her cholesterol for a couple of months isn't going to have made that much of a difference. Her cholesterol could still shoot back up (it was terrifyingly, heart attack high, when first identified as the cause of many of her health issues, way back when). She still has a crumbling spine in need of surgery that would in no way be able to withstand a pregnancy (only last summer she was in such agony with it that she could barely stand. Or sit. Or do anything, in fact). She still has ongoing gyny troubles (it's only a few months since she was told she was at stage 3 of the 5 pre-cancerous stages) etc.
I'm scared now. I know she and Brother-in-Law would love to have a baby, but it isn't worth sacrificing her health and mobility for.
/rant over.
Big Sis was told years ago, in her teens, that it would be really dangerous for her to have children and therefore she has always accepted that she couldn't and has had more than half her life to get used to the idea. There are lots of complicated reasons for this to do with her lipid problems, pancreatitis, gynaecological troubles and crumbling spine. I always thought she had accepted it.
But now she is married, with a broody husband, and they have moved to a new area and registered with a new doctor who has taken a shine to them as a couple and wants them to have a baby, and has been giving her all kinds of hope that it could actually happen, changing her meds etc. And now, she casually drops into conversation, he's taken her off all her meds and told her to go out and get pregnant! My reaction was the same as mum's. "WHAT?"
Nice though it would be to be an aunt, this is terrifying. All the reasons it would be dangerous for her to get pregnant before still stand, and a new medication that lowered her cholesterol for a couple of months isn't going to have made that much of a difference. Her cholesterol could still shoot back up (it was terrifyingly, heart attack high, when first identified as the cause of many of her health issues, way back when). She still has a crumbling spine in need of surgery that would in no way be able to withstand a pregnancy (only last summer she was in such agony with it that she could barely stand. Or sit. Or do anything, in fact). She still has ongoing gyny troubles (it's only a few months since she was told she was at stage 3 of the 5 pre-cancerous stages) etc.
I'm scared now. I know she and Brother-in-Law would love to have a baby, but it isn't worth sacrificing her health and mobility for.
/rant over.
no subject
Especially since, your sister's situation aside, I am personally really sick of people with the opinion the 'women MUST breed' or their is something wrong with them. NOT having children is not a crime. Do you know how many kids out there need adoption? Do you know how overpopulated the Earth is? Do you know how many kids get abused or neglected because they aren't really wanted?
Sorry, this really sets me off... Just ignore me. I REALLY hope your sister makes the choice that is right (and safe) for HER, not for someone else. She is lucky to have you in her life to love and care about her - I'm sorry it will be so stressful for you (it's very hard feeling so powerless when our loved ones are in danger.)
no subject
Adoption is something we know all about anyway, since Little Sis is adopted (and boy, what a rollercoaster ride that was), and also because my mother worked for Barnardos for years, on a mother-and-baby unit, and a lot of those children ended up in care/adopted out. That's where Little Sis came from, in fact!
Big Sis and Brother-in-Law have discussed adoptiong as an option previously, and I thought that was the road they planned to go down, in the future when they were more settled both financially and health-wise. But now this new doctor has given them hope and it sounds like they are just going to rush into it. That's my sister, though - she has to do everything yesterday, without stopping to think. It's just really worrying.
But since she has gynae troubles, it might not happen anyway.