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I posted earlier today about how to trust a WH again. Our R has been a work in progress, definitely moving in the right direction, but only six months into it. Everything's still very fresh.

We originally wanted to start TTC (trying to conceive) this summer. I still want to. Well, I go back and forth, but it's not just because of WH's actions, it's the idea of starting all over (our son will be 5 in July.) We had put a time limit on having a baby next year, because I will be 35 next Oct. We do the hippie dippy birthing (aka outside of the hospital) and insurance won't cover it once you turn 35, because you're considered "advanced gestational age" and automatically high risk.

Because of the rocky last year WH and I have had, I do have concerns about having another baby. The first one was hard, as most of you can attest to. It's not easy becoming parents. It's a hard road to hoe, especially when you're sleep deprived (and WH lost his job 3 months after our son was born.) It's tough to adjust to a baby in the home.

I worry that because of my difficulty trusting my WH, it will make the process even harder. I want to expand our family, WH wants to expand our family, our son wants to expand our family. Things at home are good, WH is trying so hard. I do worry that the intimacy will be even harder to come by (we're still struggling with that aspect of the R.)

Would I be stupid for TTC right now? Should I just forget about having another child and resolve myself to the idea that we'll only have one kid from here on out? Or should I just let go of my concerns and go for it? No marriage is perfect and there's never a perfect time to have a baby... maybe this will help the R process? I just don't even know.

Im struggling with this to. I didnt want my daughter to be an only child, I am 33. I couldnt bear the thought of carrying his child right now knowing what he did to me. I dont know if that will change

[This message edited by sparkle09 at 4:47 PM, February 25th (Tuesday)]

No marriage is perfect and there's never a perfect time to have a baby

Agreed. I think that having your WH prove that he's trustworthy is going to be a work in progress, and one that you should feel as settled in as possible under the circumstances. Transparency and a new track record of faithfulness and humility will go a long way.

Having a baby is a very personal decision. I don't think it's stupid to consider TTC now. Our age, the age of the kids we have, all that weighs heavily on us.

My DD is almost 4, and I had always wanted to have 2 children a couple years apart. Well, thanks to the A that project got put on ice during my ideal window.

We're back to considering it, but the "dumb" factor in my case would be the fact that we still haven't ironed out some core issues in our relationship. I've asked a lot of people from different venues in my life what they think about our going ahead and TTC even though the M is sometimes shaky. (In fairness, FWH is a good person and a great dad, we just have some issues relating that are really hard to get through sometimes.)

My IC says "Hell no, do not have a child now."

Two of my closest, most level-headed friends say, "Go ahead - you'll both love the kid no matter what and DD would be an awesome big sister."

My ObGyn says, "You're going to be 35 in a couple months. Either crank one out or call it a day." (Shopping for a new doctor, incidentally )

At the end of the day it's up to your gut. It's your life, it's your path.

We are closing in on 3 years in R this spring and have been TTC for about 8 months now. I'm glad we waited for a while and also glad we stopped waiting. It's very personal to each couple, but I am grateful that we waited until we were at a point where emotions were not quite so raw, and more importantly, till we got to a point where our communication has really improved.

I've been really stressed that it hasn't happened yet, and got very emotional about it last month. It helped that we are in a place where we are much better at supporting each other.

Thanks for the input all. It's nice to know I'm not the only one struggling with this decision. I think WH and I need to sit down and really have a long conversation about this.

We found ourselves QUITE unexpectedly expecting following HB BC failure, at 41 years old and with 2 teenagers..... Advanced maternal age aint no small potatoes, it is definitely harder on your body as you age. And the baby had a spinal cord birth defect, and our R was rocky without all that and maybe slower because of all that. But, when folks ask if she was planned, I tell them she definitely was.....by one much wiser than us.

I never would have chosen to get pregnant then. I cannot imagine my life without her.

If the worst thing about waiting is not being able to have your baby out of a hospital, I say wait another 6 months. Half of year from my SAWH confessing to his A, things were still so shaky, so unsure, so uncertain. I'd hate to have added pregnancy hormones to that. 35 years old or 35 1/2 years old. Honestly, there's little difference. Yet 6 months, in the life of a reconciliation, can tell you A LOT about the direction it's going.

Let's face it, when you're pregnant/post-partum/breastfeeding/sleep-deprived, you'll feel very vulnerable. If you and your WH don't have more trust and intimacy under your belts, your R may falter. He may feel ignored, you may feel unattractive, your older son may feel supplanted . . .

I'm the mother of 4 and couldn't do without any of them. I love them dearly. I understand the feeling that your family is incomplete. But I also think each month of R will give you a more clear picture of what you and your spouse's weaknesses are and how you can anticipate those feeding into your M & R throughout the pregnancy and post-partum months/years.

I am pregnant right now. I think I can say that we are in a very good place. Possibly happier than we have been since newlyweds. This has been the most supportive he has been through any pregnancy. We are 15 years out from a PA D day and five years out from D day of an EA that occurred during another pregnancy, which certainly affects my feelings but that is five years of building and being in a really good place for more than 3 years.

And yet, here I am new to SI because I am having a difficult time with things I thought I had overcome. I can't remember the last time I had really thought about things. I had even forgot where I saved some of my evidence because it had been so long since I had thought about it. I realized it's because I'm pregnant. Pregnancy can make even confident women feel insecure. I feel really vulnerable and almost trapped and I can remember hurting so much when he was lying to me while I was carrying his child. This would be so difficult to go through if we had not made the progress we had first. It's hard enough and like I said, we are the best we've been in a long time. Trust me, it was torture being pregnant and dealing with it when things went down.

I think I would wait a little while longer and make sure you are in a healthy place. In the meantime, I'd save up to pay out of pocket for the birth I want regardless of age.

By the way, I'm 35 and I have a 12 year gap between my oldest and youngest. And it's been an uneventful and relatively easy pregnancy.

Do what you feel is right. In this day and age, women have babies older and healthier everyday. I hope you find the right choice for you and best wishes!!

When I found out about my fWH's A I was 10 weeks along with my second pregnancy. We have a DD that is 8 so it was something we were both very excited about and had hoped for a long time would happen.

I wound up miscarrying a month later and we wee both devastated. In a funny way it actually brought us closer and helped me to really see my husbands remorse for everything that happened. He let me know quite clearly that he still wanted this marriage and everything in it and how ashamed he was for what he did. I think when you see just how presidiums life is it makes you think hard about y

When I found out about my fWH's A I was 10 weeks along with my second pregnancy. We have a DD that is 8 so it was something we were both very excited about and had hoped for a long time would happen.

I wound up miscarrying a month later and we were both devastated. In a funny way it actually brought us closer and helped me to really see my husbands remorse for everything that happened. He let me know quite clearly that he still wanted this marriage and everything in it and how ashamed he was for what he did. I think when you see just how presidiums life is it makes you think hard about your decisions.

Anyway, we both realized that we wanted a second child and that maybe we would explore getting help to make it happen again. Our MC is supportive as long as we keep our visits up.

Bottom line...do what you need to to for your family and yourself. Just make sure you're both on the same page.

[This message edited by NothingIsCertain at 2:34 PM, February 26th (Wednesday)]

Six months is so new into this journey. I had, what I thought was, the most remorseful WH in the world from day 1.He was doing everything right! Oh I bragged about that At 8mos out, I found out he was still lying. I'm not saying you will find out new info, I have no way of knowing that. But a 6mos remorseful WS, isn't a guarantee. That's all. And life is a leap of faith!

Year 2 is described here as a horrible, painful place. Even with R going really, really well... life starts to settle into a *normal* - for a lot of us, normal was where we were when the A happened, so it can be difficult.

I feel like I'm rambling (I'm tired today), but be sure your life & M are built on a new, firm foundation before bringing a new baby into the mess. And lots of women have babies in their 30's. Heck a lot of women aren't even getting married/committing to a relationship before 30!

Don't focus so much on the calendar, focus on where you are in healing and rebuilding. No matter how old your first child is, they will have a bond that is special between siblings.

My philosophy is that as long as you can financially support and raise the child/children on your own with no help from the father, then have as many as you want, when you want. If you can't, then wait until things are more stable and R is firmly in place.

I'm having the same struggle. I am only 6 weeks from DDay, so I know nothing will happen any time soon, but I'm already 35, and I feel like time is running out. I don't have any kids yet, and its something I've always wanted. The R is going good so far, but it's still really new. In some ways, I'd still like start trying this year. If things don't work out, I know that I could be a good parent on my own. If we break up, and I'm single, there won't be enough time to meet a new person and get serious enough to talk about children.

Why did this have to happen now?

I have no good advice, but I am in the same boat.

My DDay was 4 years ago. My youngest was a newborn. I had always wanted 5 kids and to have them all before I was 35 (because of that high maternal age thing)

Well, I'm 35 now and still just have my 2. I have plenty of friends who say, "You have the perfect kids... 1 girl, 1 boy... don't have anymore..." Even before the A, people were telling us not to have any more kids, that 3 is too hard, they wish they had stuck with 2.

Well, I still want more. My WH's diagnosis of bipolar disorder makes me think twice about having another, since a component of bipolar is genetic...

I thought April 2014 I would start TTC, but now that is a few weeks away, yeah, no. I'm just not ready. (reasons being trust issues, not the bipolar thing)

I wonder if you would consider changing your birthing style, if a hospital delivery is an option for you... Just so you would get insurance coverage and have a little more time to decide (I am an AP parent myself, so if a hospital birth is not for you, I totally understand...)

My dday was 4 days after finding out I was pregnant with our second child. As long as things keep going the way they are now we will have another baby in a few years. I'm not ready to be done having children yet and I'm not going to let my husbands A take that from me. As long as we can provide for the child and our marriage is in a good place. My pregnancy with DS came at the worst possible time but we got through it. I'm actually excited at the possibility of getting to have a baby with the man my husband is becoming :)

I got pregnant (unplanned) 6 months after Dday. Here is the good, the bad, and the ugly:

1. I felt incredibly trapped and incredibly vulnerable. That exit plan that allowed me to feel good about not divorcing? Out the window. Suddenly, I was going to be a mother to a newborn again. Think back to that time again, now think of doing it by yourself. To say it was a stressful pregnancy is an understatement.

2. In some ways our R got fast tracked. We knew we had 9 months to work our issues out before things were going to be tabled for a period of time; and so for 9 months we went to weekly IC and MC, weekly dates, and almost nightly talks.

3. In other ways, our R was totally thrown off track. My pregnancy (and I firmly believe stress played a major role in this) was far more challenging than my previous pregnancies. I was in and out of the doctor's countless times and on modified bed rest for the last 6 weeks.

My husband stepped up big time and viewed this pregnancy as his final chance to "get it right." He also was very remorseful, and kept working on A issues. And it was still incredibly stressful and difficult. I wouldn't choose to do it that soon after Dday, but we made it work and my daughter is a blessing that has brought us closer.

FWIW, my second daughter was born at home, and we hoped the same for this baby; but because of pregnancy complications, I was deemed too high risk. I chose a hospital with a well respected midwifery practice, and hired an incredible doula. The birth was beautiful and peaceful, actually the best overall birth experience of the 3. Don't paint yourself into a corner. You have time.

I got pregnant with my second during HB. Got drunk VDay 2013 and 6 weeks later my nausea started and didn't end until my 3rd trimester. I was constantly spitting and ended up in the OB/ER to get hydrated 4 times because I had hyperemesis gravidum. Trying to reconcile while pregnant is no joke and made it impossible for my WH and I to heal. Getting pregnant made me needy and I couldn't 180 like I wanted. I really believe that getting pregnant made us rug sweep and now we are in limbo . At one point he accused me of trying to trap him and getting pregnant while we were having an argument.

We discussed this VERY seriously after my affair. We both needed something - something big to happen and we had our four kids in 3 years when very young. We WANTED to be older parents and give it a try again.

I was 42 and hubby had had a vasectomy years earlier. Our youngest at that time was 18!! We did a little preliminary doctoring and then decided against it. We both very much regret that decision, considering how things turned out for us, especially him.

I am 39 yrs old and have 4 kids (7,5,3,1). Before finding out about the A it had come into my heart that I would like to have 5 kids. We were debating about having 1 more because my H doesn't feel like he has the energy for another, and I get extreme varicose veins during pregnancy that are almost debilitating plus I am getting pretty old. We know that love of the child would never be a question.

I am grieving right now because I feel like we can't even discuss whether or not to have another baby now because the question is just off the table as a result of the A. In our situation, although I think R is going pretty well, I think it would be selfish of me to get pregnant after the choices he made and our current instability. I just can't do it and the time is now or never. In our situation, I will not plan a pregnancy at age 41 or 42....if God chooses for us to get pregnant anyways, that is different .

You need to look at your situation, talk to your H and, as others have said, go with your gut instinct. Everyone's situation and needs are different. (((Good luck)))