To not understand how a baby can be a “suprise” unless contraception failed

Yes, I just mean, once someone says it's a surprise do you really ask about whether their condom split or their coil shifted?

Yeah, this is a good point, when someone says they have a surprise pregnancy it could be for any of the reasons OP and others deem as legitimate but they might not want to go into their contraceptive failures, or the fact they thought they were menopausal or previous infertility etc. Maybe we should just take people at face value?

Even if you are very purposefully planning there is no control over when it will happen and it can be surprising when it does but most people wouldn’t label it a surprise pregnancy. Technically even with an ivf transfer you don’t actually know if it is going to work and when you will be pregnant.

As someone who’s coil had moved and was no longer effective, I don’t judge anyone who says they’ve ended up with a surprise pregnancy or had a contraception failure 🙃

Yes, I guess so. I feel like surprise would more appropriately explain the scenario where you arent trying for a baby, but are ok if it happens, or contraception failed etc. Vs someone who is purposefully planning for a baby, checking hormone levels and most fertile dates etc. When people say surprise, i think obviously it isnt a complete surpise that it could ever have happened. Its a nice of way of saying, unplanned, or only half planned.

I guess every pregnancy is a surprise pregnancy if that’s the case

I guess like a birthday present, you know your birthday is coming up, you dont know what time the gift will be given or what the gift is going to be!

It normally means they were careless.

Actually, when the sperm get there, it takes the combined battering of multiples of them, before one gets in. One alone can't do it.

My husband has an issue with one testicle, which affects fertility precisely because more sperm makes a difference.

And a significant number of those babies come from women with no access to contraception and no right to refuse their husbands sex.

OP - when all my friends were giggling and bragging about falling pregnant first time every time, I didn't really want to talk about how it had been almost two years. I talk about how it was a surprise that month because it was so busy and we hardly had sex.

Has it ever occurred to you that unless you were actually there in the room with them every time, you don't actually know if your friends are sharing the truth?

Well, having sex while EXCLUSIVELY breastfeeding has the same pregnancy risks as using condoms so people who do that are putting on their metaphorical riding hats.

There are of course people who ride bareback with no helmet on difficult horses who have higher risks. There are also people who do everything right, wear their riding helmets and only ride within their capabilities and still have accidents. That's the nature of risk and why I think the analogy is appropriate.

We used the pull out method. As prevously posted, our first was a drunken "mistake", the second wasn't but we lost that baby, the third was a direct result of my GP telling me that I wouldn't have a period for 6 weeks after miscarrying and me believing him. When it got to 8 weeks, I wasn't feeling great and went to another GP in the practice, who was aghast at what I had been told and told me to take a test. I did. I was pregnant. We have been with each other for 43 years and in all that time, the method we used produced 3 pregnancys. One, mistake but grateful for it, two, lost that baby, three, due to bad advice - but again, grateful.

It does work.

We didn't do it 3 times, which resulted in 3 pregnancies. But it worked for the rest of the years that I was fertile!

Had sex tons and tons to try to conceive dc2. Coming up to a year.

dc3 was a surprise baby that happened after 1 occasion. It’s easy to think that lots of times of having sex doesn’t equal a baby so the likelihood is how especially if it’s outside your fertility window

You are entitled to label it as a surprise, I suppose, as it's your experience, but I can't understand how a couple not using contraception and presumably having sex somewhat regularly could react with surprise at ending up pregnant!

I hate to admit it but I used the pull out method for a good long time and never got pregnant. I think the main risk is that you are relying on the man to get out on time which is pretty risky. I did use condoms over the years as well and always got emergency contraception if there were any accidents. Got pregnant first month of actually trying .
I have so many friends who got pregnant on the pill. I just don’t believe that they are all in the small percentage that the pill doesn’t work for. I might be flamed for this but I think some women do indeed get pregnant on purpose and use the pill failing as an excuse. I don’t know anyone who said they were using the pull out method and got pregnant (or admitted it even ).

Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe those of us who were lucky enough not to have any trouble conceiving see this differently to those who struggled. In my case I've been pregnant twice - both times the first month we were trying (i.e., not using contraception). I know I'm incredibly lucky in this, but I also know that if I did have unprotected sex (even now I'm in my 50s) there would be a chance I could end up pregnant and it wouldn't be a surprise. Well, maybe it would be somewhat of a surprise at my age, but I'm still not going to take the chance!

Both our kids are surprises.
But if you are a couple being sloppy with contraceptive then either you are being idiotic or you actually do want kids together and have discussed it and aren't bothered if you get pregnant, just not planning it or putting any effort into deciding ecactly when. We were the latter. Discussed it, agreed we wanted kids, came off the pill and then forgot about it for a year until I got pregnant. Same with the second. I am not the type to plan, was kind of, if it happens it happens and were ready if it does. Then it was a nice surprise when it did happen.

Of course it's not incredibly unlikely! It only takes one sperm to fertilise an egg. There are well over eight billion people on Earth; how do you think they all got here?

I'm being a bit tongue in cheek. In the case of 2 of the women I knew, their marriages weren't in the best place and they thought another baby would "keep their man". The DH in both cases very much did not want another child and it actually had the opposite affect.

I disagree that having unprotected sex means you're TTC. It does mean that you shouldn't be too surprised if you get pregnant, but it doesn't mean you're actively having sex with the intention of conceiving.

I was 18, drunk and daft. Definitely had no intention of having a baby (wouldn't change anything now, mind).

Agree, it may be for some people that they want to avoid judgement. And agree with other reasons people gave.

Ultimately, i don’t care if anyone calls their pregnancy a surprise. It doesn’t take away from anyone else, there are enough ‘surprises’ to go around. As long as they parents are happy and willing to care for the child.