Posted on 08/24/2006 10:28:15 PM PDT by beaversmom
● DEAR ABBY: I'm 26 and have never wanted children. Last year, however, two lines appeared on a pregnancy test, and 41 weeks later, the girl was born. I pleaded and begged my husband throughout the pregnancy to sign adoption papers with me. He refused. He is in the military and was gone most of the last seven months. We now live thousands of miles from my family, and I am miserable, stuck with a colicky baby who still doesn't sleep through the night.
I find no joy, no pleasure and no love being a mother. I can't sleep knowing I must wake up to a crying baby and the same routine of feeding, diapers, baths and bottles. I have become more and more detached from the girl and have nothing to enjoy. I can't even enjoy a cup of coffee without looking over my shoulder to see where the girl is. I don't want her to touch me, and I can barely hide my revulsion.
I am exhausted beyond belief, and my thoughts are turning darker every day. It's not the girl's fault she was born, but I can't help feeling resentment and anger toward this little person who more and more resembles a block of concrete on my feet.
We can't afford day care, and we have no friends or relatives close by. These long stretches of crying have my nerves shot and my hands itching to shake the girl until she shuts up. (I have never shaken her.) I'm scared of my feelings. What's wrong with me? Why can't I love my child? Should I put her in foster care? My husband can't stand her either, but he's adamant that we keep her. Yet I'm suffering, and so is she. She deserves a mother who loves her. — Going Crazy in San Diego
DEAR GOING CRAZY: It's not a crime not to feel maternal — not everyone is. In a case like yours, adoption might have been the better option. I can only recommend that before another day goes by, you contact the doctor who delivered your daughter, or her pediatrician, and repeat what you have told me. You may be suffering from postpartum depression, a hormonal condition that is treatable, and you may need a respite from motherhood. Once your chemistry is balanced again, visit your family for a few weeks. If you leave the baby with your husband, he may begin to see the wisdom of placing her with a family that really wants her and is willing to accept the responsibility that goes along with having a baby.
Amen to that. I've lost a baby (miscarriage at 11 weeks), and I can't imagine feeling the way this woman does about her living child. Hopefully it's not true.
Send the baby to me, I'll take care of her. I'm a sixty-year old woman who has raised a son who is now 40 years old. Somehow I managed and would be glad to care for a baby either for good or for a while to give this woman a break from her perceived burden.
I'm not her judge, but this situation sounds bad for everyone concerned. The years get by so fast, and, too soon, children are gone and the house is SO quiet. If one has alienated their child or children, I would imagine that the silence in a house would be deafening if a kid had been treated so miserably they never came back home again.
Jesus said it right, the times are so evil that the love of many has grown cold, and the abortionists have created a climate where natural affection is a shadow of what it once was.
How can I debate such a ridiculous premise.
I am willing to bet that "Dear Abby" will get a barrage of those kinds of letters. So many couples would do just about anything to have a baby, do not have the funds to adopt overseas, and wait impatiently on adoption agency lists for a baby in the US. I know couples like that, myself.
This baby needs and deserves love. There are so many families that would welcome her with open arms. I would fly out to get her, myself.
I do have to admit, though, that it does have all the hallmarks of an agenda letter. If it is a hoax, and the result they desired is a "poor woman. You should have had an abortion. Your husband is off fighting an illegal war, and he is a typical military brute yada, yada, yada...", I think they will be surprised by the outpouring of concern for the child. That's IF "Dear Abby" would allow those letters to be published. Big IF.
That people are being told their feelings (or happiness) trumphs their responsibility is another big one.
That husband is in the military and very likely doing a stint in Iraq. What would you say to him if he didn't follow through with what he said he would do?
Concerning not wanting children, when a boy and girl get together children become a big possibility whether they want them or not. It may be that this woman is such a loser, that it's best for all for the husband to leave with the child. But if so she does not deserve an iota of sympathy much less respect or honor.
What's really despicable is the advice she's getting.
Maybe, but he did and he's the one in the right in this case.
What?! Taking control of one's own sexualty is ridiculous?!I'm surprised hearing that from a FReeper. Both of them are equally to blame for getting themselves into this mess and equally responsible for getting themselves out of it. I agree with some of the other posters who have said that the husband should either put the child up for adoption for divorce his bratty wife.
I disagree. He should be open to putting the child up for adoption for the sake of his wife or open to divorcing his wife for the sake of the child. He's not 100% in the right in this matter.
It's because of attitudes like yours that people do not seek help for mental illness.
SHE WAS MARRIED...they were taking precautions...she got pregnant anyway. Are you saying married people should never have sex unless they want children?
I don't believe they were taking the obvious precaution of abstaining from sex during the time of the month when one is a woman is most likely to get pregnant. I think for this particular couple, they never should have had sex. They obviously aren't mature enough.
You didn't read my later posts, where several of us discuss our own personal experiences with Post Partum Depression, so I'll forgive you for not knowing what I actually did say.
Two miscarriages have left me wanting a baby more than ever, so the idea of a woman who refers to her baby as "a concrete block around my feet" makes me angry. But I also said this woman needs love, and needs to know that she is loved. I suppose that you didn't read that in the folling posts...
but let me get this straight. It is not wrong for a woman to tell the whole world she hates her baby - but it IS wrong for me to be horrified by it? She can say she is repulsed by her baby, but I cannot say I'm repulsed by her? I'm not supposed to judge her harshly, but you can judge me harshly for judging her? She is allowed her opinion on this board, but I am not?
I'm confused, but I suppose you know best - I'm not fit to judge her, but you are fit to judge me?
Unfortunately, if I judge you for judging me for judging her, then it's going to be even MORE confusing...
A hug for you, arizonarachel. I have had two miscarriages in the last four years, so I understand. My last child was lost one year ago this week - when Katrina hit.
It is so hard to lose our children, or to try to explain to others how something so small, so unseen by them, fills so large a space in our hearts...
You gave your unborn child love. Surely that life, however short, was a beautiful one!
"One of the three essential components to a valid marriage: openness to bringing children into the world."
I am a widow in her 60's. Some day I may wish to marry again. I can no longer have children. Does this mean that if I marry again it will not be a valid marriage? How narrow-minded can you be?
My deepest sympathy in both of your losses.
My husband's mother lost her first two children, but with him the doctor started her on vitamins and minerals and my husband was born in 1929. Since then much has been learned about optimum nutrition in pregnancy. Of course, I don't know how much care either of you was giving to nutrition, and Katrina was a terrible stressor.
Here are some thoughts if you are not already aware of this information. It is advisable for a woman to optimize her health and nutrition for a year before conception, and six months for the husband so he will have really healthy sperm. An excellent book is "Let's have healthy children", by Adelle Davis. I followed a lot of her advice with both my children, but especially the first. He is now 36, fighting in Afghanistan, and has never had a cavity. At any rate, better success in the future.
Please give your son our love and tell him we are praying for him! I'm a military mom too (daughter just deployed to Iraq)...
Thank you so much for your kind words - I am in my early forties and during both of these pregnancies I was so thrilled to be pregnant. But I was also surprised at the reaction of some of my closest companions when they found out about my pregnancies: I was "too old", I had "no business getting pregnant at my age" - thank God for my husband and my daughter, both of whom were so wonderful to me and made me feel so glad to have my family. Then, of course, we were devastated to lose these precious children.
I am very blessed to have living a daughter, 21, and a son, 8, both of whom are such wonderful blessings to me. I understand that there may never be any other babies for me. But there always will be a cradle in my heart for these unborn, ephemeral children who lived in me if for only a few weeks...
they are my children, too.
You are normally a sane, sensible poster, but this is just nuts. You are advocating child abandonment. What is this woman supposed to tell her husband when he returns? "Honey, I seem to have, uh, misplaced the daughter." Very, very, few fathers would simply accept that. Most would go ballistic. I believe that your "dump the baby at the hospital" trick is legal only during the baby's first three days of life, though California may have different laws.
This woman, if she is real, may well have post-partum depression, which can often be helped with with therapy. If the mother's condition is treated and reversed, she has a good chance of a normal relationship with her daughter. Isn't that worth pursuing? Since the depression might be the source of the "he can't stand her either" comment, shouldn't the father be given a chance to confirm that he doesn't want his daughter, before she is taken away from him permanently?
Come on, Wolfstar, you are better than this.
Why be married if she didn't want kids? Isn't kids the point?
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