Out of the blue

My DH isn't brilliant at keeping in touch with people (at least, not without some heavy prompting from me). So although he sees one particular friend as his best friend, he sees nothing unusual in going months without having any contact with him.

Last time DH met up with his best friend, they discussed IF matters. Their entire conversation went something like this:

DH: "We're having trouble having children."
BF: "Us too. We've been for tests."
DH: "Us too. Do you want another drink?"

This was over 18 months ago, and I've been nagging him to contact BF ever since. When he came home and relayed the conversation to me, I asked him for more details, but he didn't have any. After a couple of months had gone by, I said that even if he and BF didn't want to talk about it, BF's wife and I could be a support for each other, if we were going through the same sort of things.

Last week DH finally got round to calling BF. I was out working all day, and came home in the evening exhausted. The first thing he said as I walked through the door was, "I spoke to BF. Guess what? His wife's 8 months pregnant. IVF - first attempt. On the NHS."

I'm not sure how long they'd been actively trying, but when I first met them, before we were even engaged, DH told me that the car they drove had been specifically bought with a view to it being a family car. They had said that they weren't trying yet because the time wasn't right with their jobs, but who knows whether that was just an excuse to avoid having to talk about it?

I don't think I was as excited by the news as he might have hoped. In fact, I felt like he'd punched me in the stomach. Maybe if we'd been in touch with them while they were going through all the testing and then the treatment, I'd have felt more in tune with her and been as excited as she was when she got her BFP. To get as far as going through IVF, there must have been some pretty major bumps in the road, and some times when they thought it was never going to happen for them, and they must really have wanted it to happen - and as someone who knows exactly what it's like to go through all that, I should be delighted that they've finally got what they wanted.

As it is, I'm left with the feeling that they've had it easy. One minute they're 'having tests', and the next thing I know, they're popping out a baby, courtesy of the good old NHS. And once again, we've been left behind.

Am I allowed to admit that I'm a teensy bit jealous? And that I won't be quite as insistent on nagging DH to keep in touch with them over the next few months?