My doctors told my husband (30M) and I (31F) that our baby has many birth defects. I want to abort, he does not.

This was a planned baby and I’m absolutely devastated. Me and my husband met in college and have been married for 6 years now. We have one son who is now 4 years old.

I know some people are gonna wonder, but yes we did discuss our moral/political views before even getting engaged and we’re both pro-choice. When we were 21 and 20 we made a stupid mistake that ended in a pregnancy. We were both flat broke and not at all ready for kids. I decided to terminate and he fully agreed with and supported me.

He loves our son so much and is an amazing father. He confided in me that he loved the idea of having a daughter as well. Luckily we’re in a good financial place so I agreed and we started trying for a 2nd baby. We conceived fairly quickly and were overjoyed.

We also soon discovered that we’re having a girl. My husband was so excited. As soon as he was told he went all out and started to plan her nursery. He asked our son to help him pick which shade of pink he wanted, which crib to get, what the theme should be, etc. It was all so adorable.

I don’t want to reveal any personal medical history, so forgive me for being vague with the descriptions. At our last doctors visit a few days ago we were given the news that our daughter has severe birth defects. They think that she would survive the birth, but any life that she gets to experience will be painful for her.

There have been medical cases of babies with the same conditions to survive from early childhood to even the teenage years rarely. These poor children suffer with so much pain and the uncomfortable their entire lives. They are very low-functioning and need around the clock care, as well as several uncomfortable surgeries to try and give them a better quality of life.

We were both heartbroken and cried for hours together in the car. Then we drove home in silence.

Neither of us said anything until my husband began to quietly mumble his thoughts. He was going on and on about how we needed to schedule another doctors appointment so we know what medical equipment we’d need to buy for her, and I’d we should renovate the nursery again so we could care for her more easily.

He said that he’d definitely have to talk to his boss so he can take a longer paternal leave. He wants to be by her side in the NICU until we can take her home. He talked about how we’d have to ask his mom to babysit our son more often while she’s a newborn. He even said that maybe we could sell one of our cars, move to a smaller house, and take our son out of private school so we’d have more money to pay for our daughters care.

I was silent until he asked me what I thought. I was blunt and said that I think we should terminate the pregnancy. Now I feel bad for saying it that way but I was still frazzled from the news. This made him very upset. He began to cry and ask why I don’t want our daughter, even with disabilities? I mentioned our previous abortion. He said it was different because it was unplanned and we had no way to take care of the child. Now, we’re in a pretty good place financially so theoretically we could shoulder the cost of our daughter.

I have a bit of personal history with this type of situation. My best friend in high school was at my house all the time because her parents were way to busy with her severely autistic older brother. They did love her, but she was pushed to the side her entire childhood. I told him this story.

He said that we’d do better by our son and daughter. My best friends parents were stupid for having a 2nd kid after they already had a disabled one.

He then seemed hopeful for a minute and asked if I was just afraid. He promised that he’d be by my side the whole time and we could do this together.

I told him it’s not about fear. Our daughter will be in pain constantly if she’s born alive. It would be a short and painful life for her. I love this baby so much already, I don’t want her to suffer like that. He began to yell that even if she doesn’t on-line long we could still pour our hearts and souls into making her life as fulfilling as possible. I didn’t respond and he stormed inside. It’s been a couple day now and he won’t even look me in the eyes.

He sits in the new nursery for hours. Our son is very confused. I know he’s grieving, but I really don’t want to go further with this pregnancy. I love him so much, I have no idea what to do now.

TLDR: husband and I learned that our planned daughter has many birth defects that would devastate her quality of life. I want to abort in order to save her from an existence full of pain. My husband wants to keep her so we can love her for however long she lives.