Hey Kirsty,

I hear you regarding the nice to ***** in 2 seconds flat scenario!! I was all over the place and I swear DH never knew what to expect from me from one minute to the next. One minute I would be leaning on him and crying and the next I would be screaming and yelling and the next I would be cuddling him! The thing is that it is always easiest to lash out at those closest to you, so of course that means DH is the no. 1 target! I know that a certain element of it is hormonal (and god help anyone who said that to me at the time because that really made me want to rip their heads clean off as it felt to me like they were trying to brush aside my grief!) because in all honesty I know that your hormones are going a bit haywire after this kind of tragedy, but there is so much grief in there too, which when combined with so many other mixed emotions of guilt, anger, saddness, loneliness etc - it makes for quite a nasty outburst at times and I too felt like I simply did not have the strength to do it anymore. In time those feelings retreated just a little bit....and then a little bit more....until I was in a space where I could think about what to do next. These feelings you are going through right now are just so all-consuming and it feels like one long nightmare that just doesn't seem to end. One day it will start to feel a little easier....maybe not today, or tomorrow, or next week or even next month, but in time I'm sure you will. I don't think anyone ever gets over the loss of a child or a loved one, rather they learn to cope with it IYKWIM.....and by that I mean it becomes a bit easier to get up in the morning and to go through the motions. The pain becomes a little less intense, but you never EVER forget or stop loving or missing them as much as you do right now.

I'm like you in that because of my experiences I don't see the 12w mark as some kind of magical point in a PG. Whilst my losses have been before this time, I still don't ever feel that there is a 'safe' point - I worry about every little thing and don't think I will ever be stress-free.

I think you should be really proud of yourself for how you handled the situation with your new nephew. I cannot possibly imagine how hard that would have been for you, and the fact that you held it together at that time is a tremendous achievement. Don't feel bad that you weren't so good afterwards - it's totally understandable that it would make you think even more about Alex and that 'that should be you soon'. To tell you the truth, even though I am now approaching 24w on Thursday, people still seem to make the mistake that just because I'm PG and it's going along ok, that it somehow makes everything better. It certainly doesn't. I still see little newborns and I think how I should have given birth in February and that I should already be pushing a pram. I'm always thinking 'that should have been me'. I'm so eternally thankful for our little tiger and always will be, but I still miss my little angels each and every day and I don't/won't/can't see our little one as a replacement for them - that's simply not possible. I guess from all of that I'm trying to say that it seems fairly common for those of us who have been down this path to have these feelings of 'should haves' and 'what ifs' and that if/when you TTC again, you probably still will. I don't mean to frighten you by that, and I can tell you that they're less intense, but still there, or at least they are for me.

Don't ever apologise for using these forums to vent - it's exactly what they are here for and sometimes it really helps to be able to get things off your chest. Just know that we care and will read your posts and support you in whatever way we can.