My daughter was stillborn three months ago. The moment after I learned she had died I wanted another baby. I felt that way for the first few weeks, now I'm not so sure. The therapist I'm seeing keeps saying that having another baby is the most helpful thing I can do. I'm freaking petrified of being pregnant and delivering. And really, I just want my daughter back. I'm worried that if I was able to have another living child it could make all this worse or not help, I don't know. However, The sadness and pain is so terrible, that if having another child could be helpful, I might be able to do it. Any thoughts or advice ?

I'm so sorry about the loss of your daughter. Our daughter died at 37 weeks just over 3 years ago. Its so so difficult.

Our daughter who died was our first child and my wife and I very much wanted a family. Trying again to have a baby was never a question. We wanted to parent a living child (turns out we got two at a time!). TTC was horrible and the pregnancy was very difficult (high risk with twins and other things), but I am extremely grateful we did it. Did it make the pain of Alice's death better? Yes and no. I look at my boys and I am SO happy they are here and living with us. I worry about them constantly and having them here has taken the edge off of Alice being gone. Still, its very painful that she's not here to be with them and there are moments when I'm with my boys that I am struck with pain that I never got to do these things with Alice or to learn what Alice was like. That said, we are 3 years out now. Our boys are almost 1. We are in a completely different place than we were at 3 months. Your grief is very very fresh. It might be good for you to take a few more months to make this decision (even up to a year). If there is no rush due to age, or health, etc. then perhaps that would be a good thing. Let yourself grieve your daughter before you try to manage the high anxieties that come with a new pregnancy. Believe me, a subsequent pregnancy is hard enough without being in the active stages of grief.

I will say this... nothing will bring your daughter back, but you can experience joy again, with or without another baby. For us, having our sons has helped us experience joy more easily, etc. Still, we miss Alice terribly. The pregnancy was tough. The anxiety was beyond measure and I was scared every day (I wasn't even pregnant!). Still, time passed and we made it. During the pregnancy, I also really struggled with imagining that this pregnancy would bring Alice back. It was like I expected a toddler sized Alice to appear after birth. But...she didn't. That was hard. Now, we have our sons. They aren't Alice and they are their own wonderful beings. We think about trying to get pregnant again (and there is an age concern) and so so much about it terrifies me. Still, I wonder what another new life would bring us. Its conflicting even now.

I think your therapist is wrong that having another baby is the *most* helpful thing. In fact, to me that sounds like trying to find a substitute. A new child is not a substitute for your daughter. You can find healing without having another baby. Its just a different path. Good luck to you! I'm sorry that you are struggling so.

I'm so sorry you find yourself here and I very much agree with what Carrie said. No rainbow, or 20 more for that matter, will ever make you heal completely or solve your grief. You will forever miss your daughter. I struggle with how my grief will be with me for the rest of my life, but there's no other way for me to live because that is my life now. I have a son that died. I sometimes irrationally want 20 more babies ever since he took his last breath because that void is so vast and nothing feels like it will ever be enough to fill it. I realize nothing ever will. I screamed and cried to my husband so many times saying, "I just want him back." I still do sometimes, but 2.5 years out it is far less frequent and far less raw. It will never stop being awful. I will never stop missing him. However, right away, we both wanted to try for a rainbow. We knew we wanted a living child.

What helped some for me was accepting that it was never my choice that he died. It was never my choice that he wasn't born healthy. I won't ever accept or be at peace with what happened, but I have accepted that the only choice I had afterwards was how I moved forward. That doesn't mean my grief didn't own me. It held me down and suffocated me for months. However, at some point, little by little, I was able to creep out from under it and start to try to live again. I am not the same person I was before, but choosing to try for a rainbow, getting pregnant, and thank the freaking heavens or whatever - having a healthy rainbow who's now 18months old has helped us immensely.

She was born by induction just 3 days before the anniversary of my son's death. Having her in my arms made that first anniversary easier to bear. I have cried countless tears over her not getting to know her older brother, about how many cute little things she does that I wonder if Griffin would have done or what different things he would have done that I will never see, and about her little personality from the beginning and how different it was from her brother's. Nothing will ever bring him back or give us a glimpse of who he would have been. But having the joy and light that our daughter brings to us on a daily basis kept us moving forward better than anything else could have I think. I almost envision it as bright, beautiful colors representing the joy I feel flowing right along side the dark shadows and pools of my grief as I move through time. I came to realize that you can experience both simultaneously.

Our daughter was a terrible sleeper for over a year. I won't pretend that every minute of the last 18months has been easy or perfect or beautiful. We never knew what sleep deprivation could really be like, and I've dealt with insomnia since I was 14, until she came into our lives. I tell you this because despite how challenging having a baby can be (some get lucky with a good sleeper at 12 weeks! and others get a colicky baby for the first 3 months) she really has been a huge gift and treasure as we continue to mourn our son. Like Carrie said, you can find healing w/o having another baby. It is not THE solution nor is there one out there. But for us, yes, it helped. Follow your own path and do what feels right for you. There is no right way to live after such tragedy.

Thanks so much for the replies. Up until she died, my life was so good. I felt like I had things under control. In the last three months, I've said, "I don't know" more times than I think I ever had in my entire life. It is all so confusing. At least knowing how it was for you both may shed some light on how it may be for me IF we are able to have a healthy baby to take home.

I do have one living child, so I need to consider him in this too. My last pregnancy was hard on me physically, which was hard on him. Also, losing her has really impacted him too.

Mostly this all just pisses me off.

Seriously, thanks though.

I think Carrie and Jessica summed it up so well. They are both beautiful writers. I'm not going to be as eloquent as them, but here is my story. My third daughter was stillborn at 39 weeks in September of 2013. I really, really wanted another baby as soon as possible. My arms were so empty. I am also advanced maternal age and felt like time was ticking. My doctor wanted me to wait three cycles, which I did. I had our rainbow in October 2014.

The pregnancy was very hard. I wasn't happy, the way I had been with my others. It was basically a really long grind punctuated by sadness and fear and a little hopefulness. I had had a silent abruption with no obvious cause and was really fearful it would happen again. I was induced at 37 weeks, basically because I begged (and the baby passed the tests the hospital required). I have never been so relieved as when she was born alive.

The baby has brought me and my family a lot of joy. My sadness is still with me, of course. i still miss my third daughter so, so much. I think of her every day and cry frequently. Having the baby didn't take that pain and loss away. But having the baby did bring so much happiness. My other living children love her so much and I think having her helped their grief a lot. (As a side note, my living children would say things like, "what will we do if this baby dies too?" during the pregnancy a lot. So hard.) Having our fourth daughter has brightened all of our lives. Having her definitely didn't "heal" us but did make our lives better.

I agree with the ladies above. There are many paths to healing and your grief is very fresh. If you are not sure, and there aren't other concerns, I would recommend taking time. One of the MFMs I consulted post-loss said that he always recommends waiting one year to start trying for mental health reasons. (He didn't recommend that for me because I was 38 when I lost my daughter.)

I'm so sorry for your loss and that you even have to think about this issue. It is terrible and sucks.

My living daughter is the light of my life. I cannot imagine how my grief path would have been without getting to raise a living daughter. That being said she did not heal my grief, she did not replace her sister, she did not "make me better." There are still parts of me that are broken, and likely always will be. Exactly what I missed with Grace is staring me in the face every day. I think that so many people, who have not experienced baby loss, think that if you just have another child all the hurt and the grief will disappear. That you will be whole again, and it is just not true. Have another baby if you want to, when you are ready to, as Carrie said that pregnancy is scary and long and not innocent, you need to be ready. We got pregnant 5 months after Grace died (I am older and we have a history of infertility so waiting was not an option we felt comfortable with). I cried when the test was positive, and not from joy, I was so scared that Grace would think we were replacing her or that we would forget her. My husband had such a fear of ultrasounds that he had to be treated for post traumatic stress just to make it through the pregnancy. I hope that whatever you decide, whenever you decide it, it gives you some peace.

I'm so sorry for your loss and that you are here navigating this rocky road with us.

I had a 2 year old living daughter and we lost our Shelby at 20 weeks.

For me, it did help to have our rainbow. I had this longing in my heart to parent another living child. And after we lost Shelby I obviously had such a huge amount of grief.... but on top of that there was fear I wouldn't have another baby and that longing still in my heart for the opportunity to parent another baby.

When we had our rainbow, the grief was still there (but not to the same extent as it was almost 2 years later that he was born) but the fear of not having another baby, the worry about another pregnancy, the longing for a baby...... that was gone, because I had done it.

I hope that makes sense. I hope you can come to a decision that brings you peace x