My husband and I were married in last month after being together for six years (engaged for two). We didn’t want a long engagement, but when we got engaged, my husband’s brother was also engaged and already planning his wedding for May 2024.
Per my MIL’s request, we were asked to wait at least a year after his brother’s wedding so we wouldn’t “take the spotlight” from them. It sucked, but we agreed and scheduled our wedding for December.
Between his brother’s wedding and our own, my husband and I found out I was pregnant. I have PCOS and had been told conceiving would be difficult, so this felt like a miracle to us. We were so excited and had already started dreaming about becoming parents. Something we wanted more than anything.
Right before we were about to tell his family, I miscarried. It completely shattered us. We didn’t talk about it with anyone and pulled away from family while we tried to survive our grief.
At our wedding at the end of December, I was wrapped up in the joy of marrying the love of my life and completely unaware of anything else going on. The next morning, my sister-in-law had planned a family breakfast at 7 a.m. which we couldn’t attend because our reception had gone until 1 a.m. and we were exhausted. We left for our honeymoon shortly after, and when we came back I was sick with the flu and missed Christmas gatherings.
Later, we found out that my brother-in-law and sister-in-law had announced their pregnancy at that breakfast the morning after our wedding to extended family, and the again on Christmas Day to my in-laws.
We then find out until New Year’s Eve, when my husband was suddenly asked to meet his brother.
That’s when everything hit us at once.
My husband and his brother already have a difficult relationship, and we feel like this made it worse.
We feel hurt that they chose to share their news so close to our wedding, especially after we were asked to wait so long for ours.
What makes this harder is that I should be pregnant right now too. Their announcement reopened a wound that never really healed. I feel ashamed for feeling jealous, because I know their happiness has nothing to do with our loss—but it still hurts in a way I can’t explain.
We are very happy for them, and I don’t want to take away their joy. I just wish the timing had been more considerate.
My husband and I both agreed if they had waited a few more weeks to share the news we would’ve felt the grief of our loss but it wouldn’t have stung as bad from being close to our wedding.
