Why I Chose to Conceal My Pregnancy Until the Very End

When I shared the news of my youngest child’s arrival on social media, a close friend, whom I had seen just a couple of weeks earlier, reached out to me in disbelief. She had no idea I was pregnant.

While I hadn’t gone out of my way to hide my pregnancy during our last get-together, I also hadn’t brought it up. I wore a pair of shorts and a loose T-shirt, lying back on the couch to ease my discomfort. I honestly thought my baby bump would be noticeable, even in that position, but I just didn’t want to discuss it. Announcing my pregnancy would draw attention, and I was barely holding on. Having shared my pregnancy news twice before, this time felt entirely different.

I was measuring small — eight weeks behind, to be precise. During a routine prenatal check, my urine test came back with high protein levels, leading to a preeclampsia diagnosis. Ultrasounds indicated I was carrying an IUGR baby (intrauterine growth restriction) and low amniotic fluid. In my mind, I was carrying a baby that might not survive. Some may call that an exaggeration, but my doctor understood my fears.

Just three months before conceiving this child, I had given birth, but I didn’t bring my baby home. My daughter was taken to the morgue, while I left the hospital with only a cardboard box of keepsakes. To say that losing my daughter shattered me would be an understatement.

I had announced my previous pregnancy at twelve weeks, following the conventional timeline. Everything seemed perfect until it wasn’t; a fever landed me in the hospital with sepsis and the heartbreaking reality of a stillborn baby.

Experiencing such a public loss is a strange ordeal. Society hasn’t quite figured out how to support those grieving the loss of a child. At my sister’s wedding just ten days post-loss, many avoided my gaze. A few expressed their condolences to me but not to my husband. I even found myself uninvited to a baby shower.

In the loss community, we often discuss secondary losses and traumas. The reactions to my loss and the absence of support constituted a secondary trauma for me. We had no funeral or acknowledgment of the profound nature of our loss. I realized that if I were to become pregnant again, I needed to share that news on my own terms. I wouldn’t hide the loss, but I wouldn’t expose myself to further trauma until I felt prepared.

So, when I became pregnant again so soon after, I wasn’t ready to share the news in the first trimester. As the second trimester passed, I still felt unprepared. Some people pressured me to tell them, while others guessed, but I held off on making any public announcements. Many remained unaware.

By the time I reached the third trimester, complications arose: IUGR and preeclampsia. I was undergoing clinic visits twice a week and had one frightening trip to Labor and Delivery when I stopped feeling movements for over an hour. My heart was bracing for another loss instead of welcoming a new life. Although I had initially planned to announce in the third trimester, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

Measuring eight weeks smaller than expected certainly helped me keep my pregnancy a secret. The image above shows me just before my induction at 37 weeks. My oldest child was filled with excitement to welcome a living sibling, and I was desperately trying to hold onto that glimmer of hope.

Despite my earlier fears, we joyfully welcomed a healthy baby boy in July 2018, exactly eleven months after the birth of his sister. He is truly the light of our lives.

This experience has shown me the complexities of pregnancy and the importance of discussing loss. For more insights into this topic, check out one of our other blog posts here. If you’re exploring artificial insemination, this resource might be helpful, as they are an authority on the subject. You can also learn more about the process of artificial insemination here.

Search Queries:

In summary, my journey of hiding my pregnancy until the very end was shaped by past trauma and the desire to protect myself from further pain. But ultimately, it was a path that led to joy and new beginnings.

Keyphrase: Concealing Pregnancy Until Birth
Tags: [“home insemination kit” “home insemination syringe” “self insemination”]