It’s Whiny Wednesday, your chance to gripe about the issues you’re dealing with this week. This week’s suggested topic is one we’ve all had to deal with:
An over-abundance of work pregnancies
I can relate to this one. When I was trying to conceive, I managed a small department of about eight people. One year we had three simultaneous pregnancies…and none of them was mine.
Whine away!
I have so many pregnant women in my office! and guess who has to take on more responsibilities at the go on maternity leave? Yes, that would be me. So frustrating. They get fussed over and adored and I get more work.
Amanda
I work with about 22 teachers. At any given time during the last 5 years there are about 4 to 5 women pregnant at one time. The current number is 4. They stand around the lunch room, hallways, classroom rubbing their tummies… (Insert eye roll here). I share a classroom with two other teachers – one is 50 and has no desire to be pregnant again, but the other is 26 and has been trying for 4 months to get pregnant. When she does, it’s going to be terrible for me. To see her walk in my room every day with a big belly will damn near kill me. – The last pregnancy announcement at work came from a teacher who confided in me that she had an affair on her husband…. Now she’s pregnant- that one hurt! Sent me running to the bathroom to “have a mini-cry” until I could get home and have a real cry! — Not sure how I will handle the news when the 26 year old does get pregnant. That will be difficult. We have a great relationship now, but I know it will break my heart to see her tummy and hear her complain about the “woes of being pregnant” and that will change how I feel about her. I”m less than 3 months into accepting a life with children, so I’m still grieving. – sigh…
Thanks for listening and understanding!!! Xoxoxo
So sorry. I teach, too, and had to learn to opt out of the baby showers in self-defense. The moms-to-be I work with are actually way less irritating to than a couple of self-declared “grandmas to all” who just will not shut up on every aspect of pregnancy/birth/child-rearing. I’ve just walk away when things get granny-jacked. It helps that they annoy the mommies, too. 🙂
Have you considered talking to the 26YO now, while she still remembers what it feels like to be TTC and unsure of the outcome? She might cut you more slack when you need a break later if she knows in advance that you’re rooting for her, but it hurts. Just a thought. Best wishes.
NicoleH you make a really good point! – She does know because with the last donor egg/pregnancy I had a double pulmonary embolism (due to the ivf meds) and was hospitalized (then I miscarried), so everyone at work knows… but I hope through her joy she remembers! – ty for the support! xo
The tummy rub is so irritating! My neighbor is pregnant, and every time she walks past my window she’s rubbing her damn bump.
On another note, I work with a teacher who’s TTC too. I’m not looking forward to happy news either.
Had an Ovarian Cyst burst on Friday – ended up in hospital overnight and they put me in the Women and Children ward …. that is the same ward where women give birth and 2 doors down from me was a brand new babie that would cry at all hours of the night. all the while i am next to a woman who had a Hysterectomy and I know I will have one in next 9 years because of family history of cysts getting worse and worse.
My whine is siblings who keep track of what you DON’T do for their children, rather than appreciate what you DO for them. For example, I couldn’t make it to an out-of-state birthday party. The response didn’t go over well and I was sent a hurtful email with a list of everything I’ve missed regarding their children. (We live in different states!) I didn’t receive a “thank you” email or call for the gifts I sent. This just tells me they don’t appreciate the thought, time and money that I spent on trying to get nice gifts. Maybe if they’d show appreciation for what I do for them, I would be more willing to make some of those expensive trips! But I truly feel even if I did that, they would find something else to complain about!!!!!
Annie, I have the same problem with my sister’s family. We took their son, my nephew of course, to NYC and Hawaii, and they want to complain about the track meets we missed. We don’t live in the same town so we can’t just drop everything and go to a track meet because we both work. I have sent money for his birthday and holidays, but all of this has gone unappreciated. Because they feel that all that we have done for him doesn’t replace missing out on his activities, we no longer speak. Now we have no children and no family.
Sherry, how frustrating! I’m sorry to hear that your generosity has been so unappreciated. Their children are still very young, so I can’t imagine going through this emotional stress and non-appreciation for many years to come. We definitely have our periods of not speaking, and I really hope that doesn’t last too long. It’s just not necessary. I can’t imagine expecting that much from a sibling…and just being so rude to another human being…let alone a sibling!
I sympathize with sibling issues. My sister knew I was going through infertility and that it was hard. Once day she emailed me she was pregnant with her second child. I didn’t respond. Then she wrote back later that week to say she was upset with me because I hadn’t said anything and that because she was pregnant, she wanted people to be happy for her. I then had a huge crisis in my life when the baby was born and she got mad at me that I hadn’t been to meet the baby quickly enough.
Not exactly a whine, but my heart is aching right now for a former student for whom fertility treatments are not working out.
She is lucky to have a friend like you who understands.
I have started a PhD program this fall. (Yup, filling up that hole).
While I haven’t had to deal with an abundance of pregnancies, I am being drawn into projects which are all connected to maternal health in some way. (The school I am affiliated with doesn’t have a global health stream working with older adults). Sigh…maybe I should just propose a project dealing with families who were unsuccessful in the TTC and adoption journey. I just don’t know if I can heal while looking at that topic.
Where I work, at 35 years old, I am the youngest woman. I have never had to deal with pregnant coworkers. But because I am younger, everyone is expecting me to get pregnant. They are always asking sly questions. I laugh. I make it sound like I don’t want children, just to get them to stop asking/hinting. But, I work at a medical college. Every time I walk to the hospital side to go to the cafeteria I see pregnant women and newborns. Every time. Sometimes they look so young. And just by looking at them, I judge them. I wonder to myself–why do they get to have babies?
I can relate too. Here’s a post about the worst Christmas party ever (which does relate to the topic at hand):
http://theroadlesstravelledlb.blogspot.ca/2007/12/worst-christmas-party-ever.html