Well-Intentioned People

I was talking to an IF friend about the fact that we had stopped "actively" trying to have a baby. She said she had also reached that point, but she still got annoyed at all the ass-vices and questions that "good intentioned" and or "nosy" people directed at her. After all, in Indo it's pretty common for people to ask questions about babies 'coz it's still "taboo" for couples to live together before marriage and when they do get married, they're "expected" to have babies soon. But then again if they get a baby "too fast", they'll also be talking about it behind their backs. Indo society is still like that.

I live in Finland and the culture here is different, so I'm rather safe from other people's questions and ass-vices. However, I'm RELUCTANT to go back to Indo now that we've been married for over 3 years 'coz when I go back there again, I'd have to deal with my IF scars again and again and again. My parents' neighbours will definitely ask me about "when are you going to have a baby?" or "still no baby yet?" and even though we're not actively TTC anymore, that doesn't mean that such a question is a welcome.

Just now I got an SMS from a friend who asked me (for the umpteenth time) when I'd get pregnant. I didn't feel the sting that I felt when he asked that question to me beforehand, so I just wrote back: "Only God knows whether I'm ever going to be a mother or not. Right now I'm helping out at a daycare and I'm happy."

Another ex-elementary school friend posted her baby's 4D ultrasound pics in Facebook and I told her that he looked like an angel. She then said, "Come on and make one quickly." I'm happy to say that I was in a good mood, so I didn't feel anything bad when I read her response. I just replied like this, "We're diligent in making it he he he..." However, if I lived in Indo and MANY MANY people kept on saying that to me, I may be bothered still. Or at least fed up.

I've been thinking about WHY those well-intentioned and nosy people's questions might still bother us, even though we've surrendered to the possibility that maybe we'll never have our own kids. Here are some answers that I've found:

1. When other people say "why don't we try this and that?", it makes us feel like there's something WRONG with our state of "surrender". It DOES make sense that they want to "help" 'coz they'd naturally assume that we want to have kids, but when we've reached that point of surrender, when they keep on asking such a question, it feels like our decision is not respected.

Reaching that decision alone has produced enough conflicting thoughts and emotions inside us, so listening to other people's questions only makes us feel defensive. Because in turn it makes us FEEL like we have to defend our decision and it's going to take a LONG time to explain to them why we've reached that decision and there's NO guarantee at all that our long and winding explanation will make understand what we've been through. So that thought alone makes us frustrated, coupled with the fact that it's not our fave topic to share with others (why we've come to that decision), esp. if they're not really close with us.

In Indo, the "easiest way" to answer this question would be, "Just keep on praying for us", but after being asked again and again and again, you'll get fed up anyway and would want to pretend not to hear that question.

2. Somehow when other people insinuate that we should do "more" to be able to conceive, it makes us feel as though we're NOT ENOUGH in society's eyes, like there's something that we need to FIX. They don't understand that just the two of us can be a complete family already, EVEN IF at first we had also shared with them that we wished to have kids.

That's all I can come up with for now...we'll see if I can find other reasons later on.

P.S. LOVE this graphic below!!! God does answer prayers in many ways, sometimes in ways that we don't like he he...

glitter-graphics.com