Ok, so "I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant?"

DragonflyBelle

My MIL says she didn't know she was pregnant until she was 7 months along with my H. She is extremely overweight, never had a normal period, andplusalso was very young and naive...married at 16, no mom to speak of.

While shopping in Target yesterday, I overheard a woman talking with a sales associate claiming she had just found out that day she is 32 weeks. It was her first child, she is just dumbfounded and has not had any care, etc etc. She is OBVIOUSLY pregnant. She is thin and fairly fit and there is no way she could mistake that for something else. She also said she is 35 and all of her sisters have kids....how could she NOT know?

Has this happened to you or anyone you know? What's your take on it?

lauriebyronm

I believe it can totally happen, but i'm very regular so it wouldn't be an issue with me. Plus I also stuffer from poas syndrome lol

gnomemom

Oh, the power of denial, I guess. I find it really hard to believe she couldn't know. If she was obviously pregnant, didn't she have strangers commenting on her pregnancy all of the time? Not to mention friends/family/coworkers? She had to have been feeling, and maybe even seeing, movement. That's just nuts.

Brags0607

Both of my sisters with their first pregnancies would somewhat fall in that category. My older sister was 30 weeks when she found out, after my mom convinced her to take a pregnancy test. Younger sister was 22 weeks when she found out & tried to hide it. The twist to that one was that I was (knowingly) pregnant at the time & no one wanted to tell me because they thought I would be mad, especially since she was due 6 weeks before me. I guess when you convince yourself that it's not possible you ignore the signs. 

Venus04d

I absolutely believe this happens. You never know the personal circumstances that led them to believe they weren't, but it happens.

white318

My mom actually didn't know with me until she was 5 mos along.  She worked as a nurse in OB and had regular cycles through her whole pregnancy.... and was sick all the time.  She actually lost weight... not gained from being so sick... and I was born a month early and weighed a little over 5 lbs...

I can see with a first child how it can happen... or if you have irregular cycles... or are overweight.

mrebecca

I think it would wonderful to have such an easy pregnancy that you don't know it's happening.

penguingrrl

When I was a TA in grad school the professor I was working with had had a student unknowingly pregnant the semester before. One day she was having a horrible stomachache, called 911 and ended up delivering on the ambulance.

She was a college athlete and skipped periods all the time because she was underweight, so she didn't even think about her missed periods. She was very tall, so didn't gain a ton in the middle (baby moved up instead of out) and just assumed the rest of the gain was from being in the off season and not working out as hard and a bit of a beer gut. Baby and mommy were totally healthy and she actually commuted to campus from her parents house. Her parents were totally supportive and since mom was a SAHM she took care of the baby while her daughter finished school.

Other than getting a huge belly and insanely sore boobs I have few to no pregnancy symptoms, so I could totally understand how she missed the few signs.

isacdimi10

It can happen. I know a very intelligent woman who I worked with who was in her Senior year of college.

She went home for thanksgiving. Woke up the next day thinking she had food poisoning. Got worse as the day progressed she went to the ER thinking she needed fluid and pain meds. Her pee test popped + so the Dr was concerned she was having an ectopic. Went to get an ultrasound with the trans vaginal wand. Tech informed the Dr she was really dilated. Turns out she was 8cm and in transition. 

She gave birth to her son within the hour. He was termed a late term preemie. They estimate around 34 weeks.

She said she gained some weight but assumed it was just because she returned to college life. She never felt him kick, never gained a big ole baby belly.

judahsmommy1

I knew a woman who was very overweight who this happened to. She and her husband had tried for years to get pregnant. She had PCOS so she didn't get her periods regularly. She started feeling sick and after a week someone asked if she had taken a pregnancy test. She had months ago and it was negative but she took another one and it was positive. They assumed she was just a few weeks along. When they went to their doctor she was 37 weeks. With the combination of things and having had a baby personally who rarely moved, (My DS would go for days without moving and I didn't feel him very much.) I can understand how it happens on the rare occasion. She obviously wasn't in denial since it was something they both desperately wanted. Some people, however, I think are just in denial or just don't want to admit to other people that they knew... Like it somehow makes them more responsible if they didn't have any idea.

KZBurnworth

A girl I went to school with had her son in the toilet, he just turned 3 last week. She did gain weight but just thought it was from eating crap all the time. She was on some kind of BC where she didnt get periods so she never even thought about possibly being pregnant. The day she went into labor she passed out at Sam's Club, she thought she had low BS so she got something to eat and went home to lay down. Later woke up and thought she had the flu. She went to bed that night just feeling sick and woke up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and had him in the toilet.

Kristen050

This happened to a girl at my work in October. I worked side by side with her 3 or 4 days a week. I didn't know and no one else did either. She suspected something in August or September, made an appointment for a few weeks later. Thats when they told her she was 8 months. She had him 2 weeks later.

secretsout

I worked closely with a woman who was in her late 30s, was told she wouldn't be able to have children, and who was having a lot of mysterious health problems.  Missed periods, weight gain, fatigue, etc.  She was so sure that she couldn't be pregnant that the thought didn't cross her mind.  One day her husband suggested she take a test just to see before they went on with further testing.  She was 6 months along. In her case, she was just so convinced it couldn't be pregnancy.  Though I'm not clear on why her doctors wouldn't suggest such an easy test as a pregnancy test just to rule it out.

I also think that sometimes denial can be a powerful thing. 

Kitiara5512

My mother was four months along with me because of her irregular periods before she found out since her clothes were fitting too snugly. She was 19 and married for three years and they had been ttc.

kllrbnny

I don't personally know anyone who has experienced this, but that show is fascinating.

shortstuff15

I met a lady at the nail salon one day who had an "I didn't know" story.  For years she was told she couldn't have kids so her and her husband had never used any sort of birth control and she had never been pregnant.  She had just adopted a kid and then started to have mysterious health problems.  I don't think she got regular periods, but for some reason she never did a pee test but the doctor ordered all sorts of different blood tests and they were thinking she probably had kidney cancer so she was scheduled for an ultrasound on her kidneys and that is when they found out she was pregnant.  32 weeks pregnant and developing pre-eclampsia.  She delivered 3 days later by emergency c-section and now has 2 kids 5 months apart. 

Because of her, the doctor she was seeing has changed her policies and now does a pregnancy test first if a patient doesn't know what is wrong.  Go figure really.

kllrbnny

dhviel:

I met a lady at the nail salon one day who had an "I didn't know" story.  For years she was told she couldn't have kids so her and her husband had never used any sort of birth control and she had never been pregnant.  She had just adopted a kid and then started to have mysterious health problems.  I don't think she got regular periods, but for some reason she never did a pee test but the doctor ordered all sorts of different blood tests and they were thinking she probably had kidney cancer so she was scheduled for an ultrasound on her kidneys and that is when they found out she was pregnant.  32 weeks pregnant and developing pre-eclampsia.  She delivered 3 days later by emergency c-section and now has 2 kids 5 months apart. 

Because of her, the doctor she was seeing has changed her policies and now does a pregnancy test first if a patient doesn't know what is wrong.  Go figure really.

I thought that was kind of standard with women. I fainted once and the first thing the doc asked was if I could be pregnant. I said no but he still checked.

whitebre8

I'm a lurker but I just had to reply to this one. I actually have a coworker who did not know she was pregnant until she she was in labor and had gone to the hospital. She had only gained 10 pounds and she carried the baby really high and far back. I saw a picture if her the day before she went into labor and she doesn't look pregnant at all. She said she never felt any kind of movement. Her mom passed out when she got to the hospital. The baby had dropped by that time and she had a baby belly all of a sudden. The child is 15 now.

Spookster

I was 29 wks - it happens to real people and having 8 wks to prepare for what others do in 40 (typically) is terrifying. When your overweight and have irregular periods and go months without one, that is your norm. No one at my work could tell...until I hit 35 wks. My clothes still fit, and I had lost 60 lbs on WW between Nov '09 and April/May '10..

I decided to test when there was this funny goldfish feeling in my gut, at first I thought it might be body function, but it didn't go away. I never had any symptoms that I noticed them. I had no M/S, I felt fine. I did get headaches though, and I chalked it up to my new desk job I had recently gotten. It was from coffee, and it would make me sick so I quit drinking coffee. Well like I said that feeling in my abdomen didn't go away so, I went to the grocers and got a cheap test, no mistake +. I was in denial hardcore. I thought I would never have kids. I bought 6 more HPT and THEN went in to my doctor for one. No mistake about it she told me, I had no GD or HBP either. That was the day my daughter literally saved my life. 

 Makaia was 8lb 10oz born via C-sec due to excess amniotic fluid and not staying engaged in the head down position, and was breech and nestled up under my ribcage. I deliberated through tears and logic for 5 hours with my then FI, 50/50 success was not worth having a version done, especially when the extra fluid let her be a gymnast in utero and no signs of giving birth anytime soon so they would have let me go until 41 wks before trying any inducing methods.

 Anyway this got rambly but when I see posts about this it hits a soft spot because it happened to me and though I do think some stories are overly embelleshed; I don't like being lumped together with a group of people that are being side eyed...I don't even know if this makes sense anymore ...

violaplayer

I think it does happen. Physical things can hide it but the emotional denial is even stronger, I believe.

jess60

I believe it can happen.  Two of my friends directly know people it happened to.  One found out when she was going into labor.  She was on active duty in the military (Air Force, I think?) & they initially thought her appendix had burst.  Her husband was stationed overseas & they rushed him back to the states.  At that point no one knew what was wrong with her & when he arrived....Surprise!  You have an 8 lb, healthy, baby girl.

Another found out late 3rd trimester.  I don't know the details to this one but two girls I know worked with her & they had no idea she was pregnant either.