Your experience must factor into family plan

Advertisement

Advertise with us

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I gave birth to the most beautiful little boy just over a year ago. He is the light of my life and I love him deeply. The pregnancy, however, was the worst experience I have ever gone through.

Read this article for free:


or

Already have an account? Log in here »

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Subscribe and receive a limited-edition Free Press branded hat or tote.

Digital Subscription

One year of digital access for only $205*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles

*First annual payment billed as $205.00 + GST for one year. This annual subscription will automatically renew at $233.00 + GST every 52 weeks (10% off the regular annual price of $259.35). Offer available to new and qualified returning subscribers only. Cancel any time.

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Add Free Press access to your Brandon Sun subscription for only an additional

$1 for the first 4 weeks*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles
Start now

*Your next Brandon Sun subscription payment will increase by $1.00 and you will be charged $17.95 plus GST for four weeks. After four weeks, your payment will increase to $24.95 plus GST every four weeks.

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/03/2024 (924 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I gave birth to the most beautiful little boy just over a year ago. He is the light of my life and I love him deeply. The pregnancy, however, was the worst experience I have ever gone through.

I was a high-risk pregnancy and sick the entire time. I felt miserable and the birth itself was the most traumatic experience I have known. I love my son, but I can’t go through that again.

My husband is unwilling to take any of this into account because we originally agreed to have three kids. My feelings have since changed, but he is insisting we have another child.

I can’t. I don’t want to lose him, but I just can’t do that.

— Once Was More Than Enough, St. Boniface

Dear Once Was Enough: Once you get past a tough pregnancy — high-risk, ill for months, a traumatic delivery — any sensible person wouldn’t be willing to do that again. I have no doubt your doctor would not recommend it, either.

It doesn’t make sense to put yourself through it and take a chance with your life. It also wouldn’t be good for the little one you already have, as it’s hard to be present when you are ailing and in pain. However, given some time, maybe you would consider adoption as an option.

Given the ego your husband has already displayed, you would be smart to get some counselling — first on your own and then with your partner. Even if the doctor says you could chance another one, if your body and mind are telling you no then you have to listen to your internal wisdom.

The point is you have to take care of yourself in order to be able to take care of a child. This is not about using you and your body to build a dynasty for your husband.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: My new girlfriend got back from a vacation and she seems like a different person. Before she left, we were having wild sex, staying up late and having an amazing time with each other. Then she went to visit one of her old high school friends (a woman) in California, and now she doesn’t want anything to do with me.

I can’t help but wonder if she hooked up with another guy while she was down there. It was like night and day when she got back.

What could have happened? She says nothing did and that she has just changed her mind. But in the space of two weeks? What is she not telling me?

— Hurt and Confused, Bridgwater

Dear Hurt and Confused: You and this girlfriend had a wild physical thing happening before she left on holiday, but it obviously didn’t involve her heart. She may be romancing a new California partner long-distance. You’re not likely going to be privy to that information.

It’s hard to get the truth out of people when you sense they have betrayed you, and that’s exactly the kind of person you don’t want to be with for any length of time.

So, the best thing you can do is bind your wounds and when you feel strong enough this spring look for a new mate here at home. Look for one with more depth, as well as a strong attraction to you.

It won’t be hard to do better than this fickle woman.

Please send your questions and comments to lovecoach@hotmail.com or Miss Lonelyhearts c/o the Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6.

Maureen Scurfield

Maureen Scurfield
Advice columnist

Maureen Scurfield writes the Miss Lonelyhearts advice column.

Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.

Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.

Report Error Submit a Tip

More Stories

Former host/VJ Rick Campanelli revisits his gambling addiction in new memoir

Jen Zoratti 7 minute read Preview

Former host/VJ Rick Campanelli revisits his gambling addiction in new memoir

Jen Zoratti 7 minute read Yesterday at 6:00 AM CDT

To many Canadians, veteran media personality Rick Campanelli is better known as Rick the Temp, the energetic, baby-faced intern-turned-VJ on MuchMusic in the 1990s and early 2000s.

But behind that winning smile was a much darker reality.

In his new memoir, Tempted: My Story, released last month via HarperCollins Canada and co-written with John Meyer, Campanelli, 56, opens up for the first time about his struggles with a serious — and secret — gambling addiction, which reached its nadir in 2008 when the then-host of Entertainment Tonight Canada was detained by U.S. Homeland Security for unpaid casino debts on a flight back from Las Vegas.

The Free Press caught up with Campanelli in advance of his Winnipeg launch Monday evening at McNally Robinson Grant Park. This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Read
Yesterday at 6:00 AM CDT

‘Amazing honour’: Winnipeg distribution centre continues award-winning ways for McKesson Canada

Aaron Epp 5 minute read Preview

‘Amazing honour’: Winnipeg distribution centre continues award-winning ways for McKesson Canada

Aaron Epp 5 minute read Yesterday at 6:00 AM CDT

After a three-year absence, the trophy is back in Winnipeg.

Last week, McKesson Canada named its 120,000-square-foot pharmaceutical distribution centre in the northwest part of the Manitoba capital its Distribution Centre of the Year. The award recognizes the facility’s role in helping essential medications reach communities across the province and some of Canada’s remote regions.

This is the fourth time the Winnipeg facility has earned the company-wide award since it opened five years ago. McKesson previously honoured the centre in 2021, 2022 and 2023. The recognition comes with a trophy, as well as a banner that was hung from the rafters on Thursday.

More than 100 employees work across the centre’s day-and-night operations, processing between 80,000 and 100,000 medication units daily. Last year, the centre distributed more than 21 million medication units while maintaining more than 99 per cent accuracy.

Read
Yesterday at 6:00 AM CDT

Puzzles Palace

1 minute read Monday, Jul. 27, 2026

To solve our puzzles, please subscribe with this special offer: |

Your experience must factor into family plan

Maureen Scurfield 4 minute read Tuesday, Mar. 26, 2024

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I gave birth to the most beautiful little boy just over a year ago. He is the light of my life and I love him deeply. The pregnancy, however, was the worst experience I have ever gone through.

I was a high-risk pregnancy and sick the entire time. I felt miserable and the birth itself was the most traumatic experience I have known. I love my son, but I can’t go through that again.

My husband is unwilling to take any of this into account because we originally agreed to have three kids. My feelings have since changed, but he is insisting we have another child.

I can’t. I don’t want to lose him, but I just can’t do that.

MPI lowers speed limit on tech upgrade with ‘IT roadmap’ following Project Nova debacle

Carol Sanders 5 minute read Preview

MPI lowers speed limit on tech upgrade with ‘IT roadmap’ following Project Nova debacle

Carol Sanders 5 minute read Updated: Yesterday at 9:44 PM CDT

Manitoba Public Insurance is now using an “IT road map” and phasing in new technology and systems after pulling the plug last year on its failed $164-million overhaul known as Project Nova, its annual report says.

Read
Updated: Yesterday at 9:44 PM CDT

Telekinetic teen hits small screen

Denise Duguay 4 minute read Preview

Telekinetic teen hits small screen

Denise Duguay 4 minute read 2:00 AM CDT

At desperate times like these, it’s good to be reminded that one person can make a difference. A telekinetic high schooler, grieving lover, ambitious law firm, frantic father and spiritual climber offer a variety of inspiring lessons in this new offering of TV recommendations.

Carrie (series premières Wednesday, Oct. 7 on Prime Video)Famously over-the-top filmmaker Brian De Palma (Phantom of the Paradise, Dressed to Kill, Scarface) directed the 1976 Carrie into its status as one of the scariest films of the time and beyond. It became better known than the debut horror novel by Stephen King from which it was adapted. It even trumped the three adaptations that followed. This new TV series looks ready to challenge that supremacy. Taking the title role made famous by Sissy Spacek, Manitoba actress Summer H. Howell (see Randall King’s interview at wfp.to/carrie) plays a homeschooler thrilled to finally be allowed to attend public high school. But when the mean girls begin circling and blood manifests in scary new ways, the new girl’s telekinetic potential blossoms in spectacular fashion. Also of horrific note as Halloween approaches: Below (Netflix miniseries premièring Thursday) stars Josh Hartnett as a fisherman trying to protect his family and town from a mysterious sea creature; Eternally Yours (sitcom premièring Thursday, Oct. 8, on CBS/Global) is a new vampire comedy; and Crystal Lake (thriller series premières Oct. 15 on Crave) stars Linda Cardellini (DTF St. Louis) as Pam Voorhees, single mom of a tormented kid named Jason, in this Friday the 13th origin story. Boo!

 

Small Prophets (series Canadian première Wednesday, Oct. 7, on Apple TV)Canadian fans of British TV have been champing at the bit for this quirky series since its acclaimed U.K. première in February. It’s a shaggy, quietly hilarious character study in the vein of Detectorists (2014-22, AcornTV), both of which were created by Mackenzie Crook (Pirates of the Caribbean), who also starred in Detectorists and plays a supporting role in Small Prophets. When the new story opens, Michael Sleep (Detectorists’ Pearce Quigley) is living a life of quiet desperation, visiting his father (Sir Michael Palin) and pining for the return of his disappeared beloved, Clea. Until, that is, Dad shares a loony alchemical recipe that sparks hope in Michael that he might be able to summon spirits to then summon Clea to … the garden shed? Not as creepy as it sounds? A tale of hope, frustratingly indirect action, meddlesome and ineffectual neighbours and, of course, true, true love.

Read
2:00 AM CDT