Care & Feeding: Apprehension About Pregnancy

[minoanmiss]

Having MSN as my work launch page is bad for my soul but it delivers several advice columns. Content advisory: LW is extremely apprehensive about pregnancy.

Dear Care and Feeding,

I’m a lesbian, married to a trans man. We’re both in our early 30s and have been talking about starting a family for years. We have so much love to give, stable jobs, a home, and community support, and we adore our nieces and nephews, to whom we are godparents. If a baby or three turned up in a basket on our doorstep tomorrow, I would be over the moon. The problem is that, because my partner is trans and because of some other health issues, I would be the one to carry. And I’m terrified.

I cannot get past a firm feeling of “this is not who you are.” I have read books. I’m in therapy. I have talked with friends who have gotten pregnant. I’ve talked with my mom. But no matter what, when I think of myself pregnant and giving birth, I think of my agency being robbed; of becoming someone I’m not; of being seen by others in a way that makes my skin crawl. I don’t have a single positive thought about it, except for the result, which I want very much. I suspect this is partially a gender thing—I’m quite butch and love existing in a state of androgyny—but I know other butches and even trans guys who have gotten pregnant and don’t seem to have all this angst about it! My spouse is not pressuring me in the slightest and I know he’ll support any decision I make. I’ve researched adoption and it seems so difficult to do in anything approaching an ethical way. Surrogacy makes me feel like a coward (should I really pay someone else to do something I can do but am scared of?). I’ve had some initial tests and have every reason to believe I am healthy, fertile, etc. Is ANYONE excited for pregnancy? Is it normal to feel soul-deep dread? If you do feel it, do you get over it? Do you just grit your teeth for nine months?

—Why Can’t I Just Grow the Baby in A Pod?


Dear Why,

I can’t answer the question of whether “anyone” is ever excited for pregnancy itself (but I’m willing to bet that some people must be, because that’s the answer to every question about whether “anyone is” anything). I myself enjoyed pregnancy (which surprised me) and I’ve met others who have, too. But that doesn’t mean that you would, or that you should become pregnant if you hate the thought of it.

I don’t know the answer to whether you’ll get over it, either (though my guess is no—not when the feeling is “soul-deep dread”). And, honestly, I think you know better than to ask if something is “normal.” What even is “normal,” anyway? We feel what we feel, we are who we are.

If you want badly to have a child, but you deeply dread pregnancy and childbirth, then I would seriously consider adoption. Yes, adoption can be traumatic. But that doesn’t mean that it can’t be done in an ethical way, or that children in need of parents, whose first parents are unable to raise them, should be left parentless. When adoption is child-centered—undertaken by adoptive parents who understand that they will have to help their child in different ways at different ages to understand the implications of having been adopted; who support their curiosity about, and relationships with, their first parents; who support their racial/ethnic identity, which may be different from their adoptive parents; and who educate themselves (and who will get professional help when/if needed) about helping their adopted child deal with adoption-related loss and trauma—it is not unethical.

Is it harder to proceed with an adoption if you’re aware of how difficult it can be to do it in an ethical way? Yes. But it’s harder to do anything when you are aware of the risks involved than it is to do it with your eyes closed. It’s harder at every step along the way as you face those risks head-on. Harder, and smarter. And better for everyone involved.

If you and your spouse want children, and you are going to be good parents to any children you have, you should have them. But you shouldn’t force yourself to go through the physical transformation—for it is a transformation, which I think is one of the reasons you’re so frightened of it—of pregnancy and childbirth if the very thought of it turns your blood cold. Become a parent in another way. My wish for you is that you do become a parent, in whatever way that you are able to. I’m crossing my fingers for you.

Comments

[lomedet]

I think this is great advice. I'm an AFAB/cis queer lady who imbibed enough moon/womb/earth feminism at an impressionable age that I thought I wanted the experience of being pregnant, but for whom getting pregnant was both Not A Good Idea and also highly unlikely to occur without major medical intervention. My AFAB/genderqueer partner was able to get pregnant with very little effort (like, so little effort that it shocked the OB). Our kid is awesome, and I'm glad we chose the route we chose, but pregnancy was really, really destabilizing to my partner's sense of self, and there are parts of their pregnancy-related dysphoria that are still with us, almost 13 years later.

tl;dr - LW, there are lots of ways to become a parent, and just because you have a spare womb doesn't mean you have to use it.

[castiron]

It's one thing to try for a pregnancy when you're apprehensive about what it'll be like. Pre-motherhood, I was very apprehensive about pregnancy and birth. I ended up finding many aspects cool and occasionally awe-inspiring, but there was a lot that sucked too, and I had mostly uncomplicated pregnancies and fast labors. For me the good parts outweighed the sucky parts; I'm glad I had the experience and even glad I got to have it more than once. It also firmed my opinion that pregnancy is something a woman should only have to experience by choice and not by force.

But LW isn't apprehensive. LW genuinely, deep-down, does not want to be pregnant. And LW shouldn't have to be.

I assume that LW's spouse has had the relevant parts removed, since LW goes straight to "I'd have to be the one carrying". But if spouse did still have a uterus and the capability to grow a kid, I'd point out that LW wouldn't expect their spouse to carry a child if that would cause dysphoria, and that LW deserves to give themselves the same consideration.

[dissectionist]

I had a pregnancy where I was sick the whole way through but excited about being pregnant, and then a pregnancy where I was sick the whole way through and dysphoric about my pregnant body. Accidentally catching sight of myself in a mirror was like getting hit with ice water. I tried to look down as little as possible. It was a hell I couldn’t escape from for months and months, and it was a very bad time.

LW, I agree that the adoption industry is incredibly predatory, including when you go into it with your eyes open. I couldn’t do it myself with what I know about it. But going through a pregnancy when you already feel this bad about it is going to cause trauma that may or may not end when you give birth. If you decide it’s worth it to you to suffer for what will hopefully only be nine months, then do it, but be aware that it might not only be nine months. The trauma may last for years or longer afterward, and there’s no guarantee that your suffering will result in a child; 25-40% folks experience miscarriage, so you might deal with all the difficulty for a couple months or longer and then be right back where you started. There are no easy paths forward here.

[conuly]

If your thought of pregnancy involves the word "dread" then the experience is not likely to be better than you imagine. Even people who loved being pregnant really have to admit there's an element of body horror to all that.

So the two options are surrogacy and adoption. Neither of those is cowardly.

Since LW feels that adoption is generally unethical then I'd ask if LW has any friends or family who would want to carry a child for them. That might go down more easily to LW than paying a stranger.

[zana16]

Ugh, I feel for this LW. I had no idea how my first pregnancy would fuck with my mind and body - and it took a few years (and a less traumatic second pregnancy and birth) to recover. It upset the delicate balance of the peace I’d come to about my gender. I still haven’t figured it out.

All I can say is if they do decide to go forward, there is a really hard time but also there is an “other side” where things settle down eventually.

[ethelmay]

I think surrogacy has the capacity for some horrible outcomes in a different way from adoption. I cannot imagine what it would be like to think you were fine with surrogacy and then experience life-threatening complications, or become disabled. In the case of adoption the risk to the birther is already in existence or already happened, it didn't come about due to the desires of the adoptive parents.

It also matters where they live and whether a surrogate could get appropriate care there (e.g., for a late miscarriage or fetal demise).

[laurajv]

I have a sister who had this kind of soul-deep dread about pregnancy, and decided to do it anyway. She hated it but it wasn't as awful as she thought it would be, and she felt enough better about it afterwards to do it again.

I thought it'd be fine and hated it so much that I get shudders thinking about it to this day, and then I did it again with a lot of soul-deep dread going on.

I don't think LW should press herself through the dread in the hopes it will work out, but I don't think there's any clear way to handle this. Like. She could push through it and find out it was fine, like my sister, or she could find out it was just as bad as she thought, or even worse, like me. There isn't any way to predict how it'll go.

[azurelunatic]

I felt approximately like LW about the whole concept but considered that I might be okay with a one-time immersion in full-body NOPE if I found a person who I was enthusiastic about being a co-parent with.

The day I got my medically necessary hysterectomy, the moment when I woke up and realized I was now without it, was one of the best days of my life. The sheer joy of it would have bowled me over if I hadn't already been lying down. Nobody could ever threaten me with pregnancy as a tool of control; it wouldn't happen by accident.