Mom-to-be has every right to say no to baby shower
Carolyn Hax
Dear Carolyn: I am happily transitioning into my third trimester of a rainbow pregnancy (a pregnancy after a loss). I really don’t want a baby shower. There are a lot of reasons: I just moved to a new town, so no friends or family are within three hours of me; my family has been super generous with me my entire adulthood, and I don’t want to take anything more from them (except for baby help, which I’ll need a lot of); a lot of people receive a lot of superfluous stuff/ toys during baby showers; people already are gifting me their secondhand baby items, which I love; after a previous miscarriage the idea of my pregnancy being the center of attention freaks me out.
My husband, family, friends, and coworkers think this is ludicrous, and I am missing out on a key lifetransition experience.
Am I depriving people who just want to celebrate? Or is it perfectly fine for me to just smile and say, “I’m not going to have a baby shower right now, but I’d love to get together with you!”
— Six Months and Counting
Your husband, family, friends, coworkers and any well-meaning others need to butt right out. Immediately. So please tell your husband this explicitly, and ask him please to get the word out.
The pressure for you to say yes to a shower you don’t want would be inappropriate under any circumstances, but it is particularly frustrating when you clearly are sorting through bigger emotional stuff.
My condolences for your loss, and best wishes for a healthy birth.
Dear Carolyn: I have always dreamed of writing a book, in the fictional-romance genre using my personal memoirs as a basis — sexy, but not porn. I have enough plot lines to do a few books; there were many men in my life, as I married late.
My husband is very private and I am an open book. Since I am writing about myself, he doesn’t support the new career and wants me to consider writing something less controversial, like history, travel, cookbooks. My plan was to use an assumed name, but even this doesn’t placate him. My first book is almost finished; should I continue and publish without his knowledge? I’m in a quandary. — Stymied
You are looking at steep consequences regardless: publish quietly and lie by omission; publish with your husband’s knowledge and risk alienation; don’t publish and deny your dreams. Given the high emotional stakes, no one should tell you that there is a right answer. There is only what you can live with.
Maybe you are ready to bare all and bear all, but a pseudonym and some conceptual airbrushing are reasonable accommodations for your husband’s concerns. Is he willing to meet you partway as well? If not, does that change your math at all toward what you are willing to give up for him?
Write to Carolyn — whose column appears on Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays — at tellme@washpost.com.