How To Be Tactless

I'm having dinner with an old friend tonight. She's one of the very few people I am still friends with from High School and she lives in California now with her husband. They're expecting their first child in December, a boy. I put together a box of things I wanted her to have, some used and some never used. It has a luxe blanket, two lovies, a pair of sneakers, a cloth diaper, newborn socks, a newborn towel, and two sleepers. I expect that she will ask why I'm not keeping these things. The answer is both simple and complicated. I bought them for a hypothetical second child. A child who will never exist. For someone who always planned to have more than one child, and who will almost certainly have more than one child, this will be hard to understand. I expect that I'll have to explain why, which is where things get complicated.

Do I start with the high risk pregnancy? The precipitous labor? The PPD? Should I just cut to the chase and explain the infertility? All of these things are the reason, and yet there is more. When I found out I had an early miscarriage, and that I was suffering for Luteal Phase Defect, I wasn't upset. I was relieved. Even though we were trying to conceive again, I knew I didn't really want it. When the pregnancy didn't take, and when I found out it was highly unlikely that another pregnancy ever would take, I thought, "well, that settles that." I wasn't upset. It was great to have that weight lifted off my shoulders. I no longer have to tell people that we just don't want a second, although that is true most of the time, but that we can't have another. People are much more forgiving when you tell them you're infertile.

This is why I've always thought it tactless to ask anyone when they will have a child. It's impossible to know what someone is dealing with. They may want another child, and are unable to conceive. They may have been on the fence, like we were, and in the face of troubles, chose to retreat. No matter what the circumstance, it just seems so tacky to ask, "so when are you having another?" So, please don't ask me when we're having another. We're not. We can't. We don't want to.