Once you find out you are pregnant you have this big news and now you get to decide how and when to tell people. The how didn’t seem so important to me. Of course Pinterest tells me to do some grand announcement with professional photos or a funny punch line. This would have been fun but I’m a bit too lazy for all that. The tough question for me was when to tell people. Of course I told Cole immediately. I couldn’t have kept that from him for any length of time. If you want to hear how he responded check out my previous post. Our parents were the next people I wanted to tell immediately but I kept thinking am I actually pregnant? After taking a second test a few days after the first one I felt confident that yes I was indeed pregnant but still when do you tell people? Why don’t you just tell everyone right away? Why do so many people wait until the second trimester? Well the answer to those questions is generally due to the risk of miscarriage.
Risk of miscarriage is much higher in the earlier weeks of pregnancy. Age, health status, whether you have previously had a miscarriage, etc. all play into increasing or decreasing your risk. According to research the rate of spontaneous miscarriage climbs with age. There is a 9% rate among 22 year old which rises to about 18% among 30 year olds (I’m 30) to about 20% at age 35 and it continues to rise pretty steeply from there (Nybo Andersen, Wohlfahrt et al. 2000). Datayze has a lot of evidence based information on the probability of miscarriage and can even take your age, weeks gestation, height and weight and tell you your estimated probability (see graph). March of Dimes also has information on why miscarriages occur, signs and symptoms of miscarriage, treatment and when it is safe to become pregnant again.
I’m sure you are thinking, “way to be a downer when we are talking about exciting news”. I get it, nobody wants to think about miscarriage but it is so common and we need to acknowledge that it can be very painful, it happens, and probably a lot more often than you think. The risk of miscarriage is why we are often counseled to hold off telling people. Widely accepted protocol is to wait until the 2nd trimester when the risk drops drastically. The concern is that you would tell people you are pregnant and then if you miscarry you have to deliver the painful information that you are no longer pregnant. But here’s the thing…..there is no way I was going to be able to wait 12 weeks to tell our parents. We were soooo excited! We sat on the news for about 2 weeks and then told our parents at about 6 weeks gestation. We also told our siblings and some of our closest friends a few weeks later. I know there was a risk we would then have to deliver bad news later but I wanted to celebrate with the people I love. If a miscarriage happened we would have to share that news but I would also want to mourn with the people I love. I told the people I would want to know if I was hurting.
We waited until 12 weeks to start sharing the news more broadly. Between 13 and 14 weeks we started telling patients in the office, everyone keeps saying that had been wondering, apparently I wasn’t hiding my new pooch too well. We also made the big social media announcement at about that same time. If you haven’t announced on Facebook did it really happen?
I’m now at 15 weeks and change, we heard the heartbeat for the first time at my midwife appointment earlier this week (that was AMAZING) and my risk for miscarriage is at less than 1%. I never spent a lot of time stressing about the risks (I try not to worry about the things I can’t control, sometimes I win and sometimes I lose that battle), but they did weigh on my decision about when to tell people. It was the most exciting news to share and people have been so sweet and uplifting.
I encourage people to make their own decisions about how and when to share this important news. I also encourage everyone to be aware of the statistics and know that becoming pregnant and carrying a healthy child to full term is not a part of everyone’s story. I pray that my pregnancy will continue to go well and that we will be gifted with a happy and healthy baby. I also pray for those suffering loses and fertility struggles, that is not an easy road to walk.
Thank you to everyone who has celebrated with us! I have received so many calls and texts of congratulations from family and old friends. This is an exciting time and I am just trying to enjoy the ride.
Be WELL
Xoxo
Taryn
