Leaving the cat in the bag
You took a HPT. Two little lines showed up. The second one was light, but it was definitely there. OMG, it is actually happening, you think. I am pregnant. Congratulations! You did it. You got pregnant. Now what? You tell your husband obviously, but who else do you tell and when? The age old accepted protocol is to wait until after your first trimester to spill the beans, except possibly to immediate family and maybe some close friends, but dude, you are excited! You got knocked up and you want to spread the word, and you were never superstitious anyway. So what should you do?
People have been reluctant to share the news of a pregnancy until they have safely crossed over into the second trimester for good reason. Statistics vary but it is generally recognized that your chances of having a miscarriage are drastically reduced after the first trimester, and you may be surprised at the number of pregnancies that are actually lost in those early weeks. People don't like to talk about it but chances are there is someone you know, probably even someone in your family, that has experienced a miscarriage.
So, should you wait?
Well, the truth is, it is complicated and there are pro's and con's to either approach. Let's see how the scenarios could play out:
You tell everyone right away.
If you tell people you are pregnant right away and go on to have a successful and healthy pregnancy, there is pretty much nothing wrong with this approach, and one of the pros is that people are more likely to hear it from you than through the rumor mill, and believe me, the rumor mill gets going fast. The first time people see you taking a vitamin, looking a little green, skipping coffee or passing up happy hour they'll start speculating. Depending on what you do for work, it may also help ease expectations about how much you should be doing, whether you should be sent on business trips that require air travel etc. (This could go both ways if you feel like you may get left out of the cool work if people think you are pregnant, but let's just assume you'd be happy to get a little break from doing some of the heavy lifting at your job for a while.)
The problem with this approach really arises only if things don't go so smoothly. The worst part of having told everyone you have a bun in the oven is trying to explain what went wrong. In my case, I was lucky that I had a good friend at work tell most people for me before I returned--and thank goodness for that. It was hard enough for me talking to people who already knew without having to actually tell them myself. When people asked me how I was doing, I was at a complete loss at how to respond. I wasn't OK. I was a mess, and every visitor to my office was a reminder to me of what a mess I was. But even though I was a mess, I didn't think breaking down in the office was the professional way to handle what I felt was a personal loss. In any case, by far the WORST part was when someone would come up to me that didn't know. I had no idea how to articulate what happened. Oh, I am not pregnant anymore, didn't sound right. It was too casual, like I had just changed my mind and decided to hit edit, undo. But saying I had a miscarriage felt like saying a dirty word. It was awful and I think in those early weeks I probably closed the door to my office and broke down sobbing a million times a day. (If you go through this and can find a friend to relay the bad news for you, at least to the less important acquaintances in your life, take my advice and call in the favor.)
In the days after my miscarriage, I I kept thinking over and over again, if only I had not told everyone I was pregnant. I knew it wouldn't make things normal, but at least I could have pretended they were normal.
So you should suck it up and wait to let the cat out of the bag for as long as you can no matter how excited you are, right? That would certainly eliminate some of these problems and would be the typical way of going about it. So let's examine how that scenario plays out.
You don't tell anyone until your second trimester.
Again, if you go on to have a successful pregnancy, the only problem with this approach is maybe some people that you wanted to tell yourself have already figured it out but they'll understand--waiting is, after all, the accepted norm.
But what if something goes wrong? The problem with no one knowing you were pregnant when you have a loss is that, well, no one ever knew you were pregnant. Many women find it awkward to bring up the topic of having a miscarriage with someone you never told you were expecting in the first place. I wasn't in this situation, but I imagine that they feel that they are burdening someone with bad news that never got to enjoy the good news. Maybe they are worried these people will be offended that they weren't important enough to be included in your inner circle at the outset; kind of like asking someone to help you move but not inviting them to your going away party.
But if you are unfortunate enough to ever have a loss, the one thing you will need to help you move on with your life is time. And the other thing that will help most women is the people in their lives. Not necessarily the random people who are going to ask you when you are due on a conference call the day you get back to work after a D&C, but the important people in your life that will bring you dinner, listen to you when your husband cannot watch you sob again, wrap a baby present you bought for friend when you realize that pink wrapping paper makes you hyperventilate, and so on.
One woman on the bump I think put it the best when she said:
"As with our first we did not tell anyone yet of the pregnancy “just in case something happens” but not expecting anything to happen at all. We had a healthy ultrasound at 7 weeks with a strong heartbeat and we were getting ready to let everyone know and start planning for the new arrival.
I realized as I awoke this morning how much I wished I had told everyone in the world the exciting news and been able to talk freely about how wonderful it was and how happy we were to make Stella a big sister. More than anything I wish I had told everyone because then we would not feel so alone in our grief." - Mrs. Mugsie
No matter what you do, if you experience a loss, it will be hard, and when all is said (or not said) and done, the fact of the matter is that only you can evaluate what the pro's and con's mean to you and what approach to take. But I hope that this piece well help you think about what you want to do when you do get that wonderful BFP.
Wishing FTTA!
People have been reluctant to share the news of a pregnancy until they have safely crossed over into the second trimester for good reason. Statistics vary but it is generally recognized that your chances of having a miscarriage are drastically reduced after the first trimester, and you may be surprised at the number of pregnancies that are actually lost in those early weeks. People don't like to talk about it but chances are there is someone you know, probably even someone in your family, that has experienced a miscarriage.
So, should you wait?
Well, the truth is, it is complicated and there are pro's and con's to either approach. Let's see how the scenarios could play out:
You tell everyone right away.
If you tell people you are pregnant right away and go on to have a successful and healthy pregnancy, there is pretty much nothing wrong with this approach, and one of the pros is that people are more likely to hear it from you than through the rumor mill, and believe me, the rumor mill gets going fast. The first time people see you taking a vitamin, looking a little green, skipping coffee or passing up happy hour they'll start speculating. Depending on what you do for work, it may also help ease expectations about how much you should be doing, whether you should be sent on business trips that require air travel etc. (This could go both ways if you feel like you may get left out of the cool work if people think you are pregnant, but let's just assume you'd be happy to get a little break from doing some of the heavy lifting at your job for a while.)
The problem with this approach really arises only if things don't go so smoothly. The worst part of having told everyone you have a bun in the oven is trying to explain what went wrong. In my case, I was lucky that I had a good friend at work tell most people for me before I returned--and thank goodness for that. It was hard enough for me talking to people who already knew without having to actually tell them myself. When people asked me how I was doing, I was at a complete loss at how to respond. I wasn't OK. I was a mess, and every visitor to my office was a reminder to me of what a mess I was. But even though I was a mess, I didn't think breaking down in the office was the professional way to handle what I felt was a personal loss. In any case, by far the WORST part was when someone would come up to me that didn't know. I had no idea how to articulate what happened. Oh, I am not pregnant anymore, didn't sound right. It was too casual, like I had just changed my mind and decided to hit edit, undo. But saying I had a miscarriage felt like saying a dirty word. It was awful and I think in those early weeks I probably closed the door to my office and broke down sobbing a million times a day. (If you go through this and can find a friend to relay the bad news for you, at least to the less important acquaintances in your life, take my advice and call in the favor.)
In the days after my miscarriage, I I kept thinking over and over again, if only I had not told everyone I was pregnant. I knew it wouldn't make things normal, but at least I could have pretended they were normal.
So you should suck it up and wait to let the cat out of the bag for as long as you can no matter how excited you are, right? That would certainly eliminate some of these problems and would be the typical way of going about it. So let's examine how that scenario plays out.
You don't tell anyone until your second trimester.
Again, if you go on to have a successful pregnancy, the only problem with this approach is maybe some people that you wanted to tell yourself have already figured it out but they'll understand--waiting is, after all, the accepted norm.
But what if something goes wrong? The problem with no one knowing you were pregnant when you have a loss is that, well, no one ever knew you were pregnant. Many women find it awkward to bring up the topic of having a miscarriage with someone you never told you were expecting in the first place. I wasn't in this situation, but I imagine that they feel that they are burdening someone with bad news that never got to enjoy the good news. Maybe they are worried these people will be offended that they weren't important enough to be included in your inner circle at the outset; kind of like asking someone to help you move but not inviting them to your going away party.
But if you are unfortunate enough to ever have a loss, the one thing you will need to help you move on with your life is time. And the other thing that will help most women is the people in their lives. Not necessarily the random people who are going to ask you when you are due on a conference call the day you get back to work after a D&C, but the important people in your life that will bring you dinner, listen to you when your husband cannot watch you sob again, wrap a baby present you bought for friend when you realize that pink wrapping paper makes you hyperventilate, and so on.
One woman on the bump I think put it the best when she said:
"As with our first we did not tell anyone yet of the pregnancy “just in case something happens” but not expecting anything to happen at all. We had a healthy ultrasound at 7 weeks with a strong heartbeat and we were getting ready to let everyone know and start planning for the new arrival.
I realized as I awoke this morning how much I wished I had told everyone in the world the exciting news and been able to talk freely about how wonderful it was and how happy we were to make Stella a big sister. More than anything I wish I had told everyone because then we would not feel so alone in our grief." - Mrs. Mugsie
No matter what you do, if you experience a loss, it will be hard, and when all is said (or not said) and done, the fact of the matter is that only you can evaluate what the pro's and con's mean to you and what approach to take. But I hope that this piece well help you think about what you want to do when you do get that wonderful BFP.
Wishing FTTA!
posted by priyahowell at 9:42 PM
1 Comments:
Just wanted to add who I told this time around, after having a loss. I told everyone who was really there for me during my pain and who I would have told if god forbid the worse happens again. I told my Best friend who I can never keep something from, and Our parents and siblings. That is it until I make it to 13 weeks. One more way of telling is to Just tell the one's who you would tell if the worse happen, so That they can join in the happiness.
-WearingRed-
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