Are we just old school

[Highlandgal]

I was out with a group of friends and we got talking about pregnancy as one of her daughters is trying. Her daughter had what she said was a chemical pregnancy and her daughter got upset when she said in her day it would have been classed as a late period. It got us thinking that these days with all the various home tests that are available we feel for the younger generation that there’s pressure to have sex at certain times rather than just relax and have fun. Is this really the case or are we just old and not moved with the times. I’m not judging just curious.

Just sounds like her daughter was emotional and anything at the time would set her off. Regardless of wording.

I have never been pregnant so broadly speaking have no idea what I'm talking about. However I too wonder about the pressure of day 1 testing. But each to their own.

Just relax vs tracking various things and timing depends on how long you've been trying rather than being "old school".

I think tests being able to detect a pregnancy sooo early these days is a blessing and a curse.

Fancy saying that!!! That's not very nice at all. If a woman is trying then every period which doesn't arrive 'could' be a baby.

I don't know how old you are but I'm 54 and certainly remeber the pain of trying over and over - taking fertility drugs and watching my friends get pregnant around me. There wasn't any relax and have fun unless I wasnt trying to get pregnant. You and your friends sound dismissive

Comparing to someone's miscarriage as a late period is awful and very insensitive. Especially from her own mum.

Doesnt matter if it is true or not (i dont know). The daughter knew she was pregnant and now she is not so has suffered a loss.

Plenty of couples conceive by accident, and soon after deciding to have a baby. Of course if it is taking longer people may decide to track fertile window, perfectly sensible.

A chemical pregnancy is what happens in the first 5 weeks of pregnancy and so yes I agree I would just call that a late period and not acknowledge it as a proper pregnancy. Most people have them without even realising.

And I do think these early testing causes a lot of issues and unnecessary heartbreak.
You always read it on here about women constantly testing after they’ve had sex and getting their hopes up.

However, technically a late period is just that - your period is late.
Whereas a chemical pregnancy does mean the egg was fertilised.

So there is a difference and if the woman cannot seem to have a normal pregnancy then the difference between the 2 is important for doctors to know - is it that the egg isn’t getting fertilised or it is but her body is rejecting it.

Its not the thing to say to sommeone who has just lost their hope.

But I do think the tests which detect a change in hormones before the period is even due really dont help women. DD1 is only 14, but even then the advice was to wait 3 or 4 days after period due for best result.

However when you are hoping... every little change in your body seems massive.

They make the choice to use the tests. I had my youngest 4 years ago, so not that long, but I never saw the point of testing early and repeatedly. I figured if I would know once my period was actually late but there was no advantage to knowing before then, as it wouldn't affect any choices I made. I didn't bother tracking cycles either. I did for a while, but then decided to relax and figured nature would decide, if it happened then great, but if it didn't then we would have been happy too. But I am an older mum and have never been desperately broody, for me it was just nice if I got pregnant but my identity didn't revolve around it. Some people really dwell on it and get obsessed.

We’re all early 60s. It was not said with any malice at all, more just a comment.

I would have probably found it mildly insensitive, but my mind is absolutely blown by the ‘Am I pregnant?’ and ‘The line isn’t getting darker!’ threads on here, and people buying dozens or hundreds of tests and continually retesting. DS is only 14, so it’s not the Dark Ages, but I did one, single pregnancy test, when I was already pretty sure, and it never occurred to me to test again.

It can’t be healthy to continually test and retest.

When was "your day" the 1800s ? How callus to say that to her child, my god.

Early testing is very stupid, I agree. But since they're available now, people are unable to resist using them. And then they find out earlier, and they start thinking they're going to have a baby, and get all hopeful. Then the embryo fails or doesn't finish implanting properly, and to them it seems they've lost the 'baby' they were going to have.

You can understand the feelings they have whilst privately thinking they were stupid to do the early test and foolish to put so much stock in early test results. Both things can be true at once.

I had a super late period and bled clumps when I was about 18 (had risky sex). It did occur to me it might have been early pregnancy but as I didn't know there was no attachment.

Better not to know I think.

A chemical pregnancy is still a pregnancy.
That's extremely cold and unkind to say it's just a late period, it's not.

I remember being told at school in PHSE that 60% to 75% of fertilised ova don’t lead to a baby being born and over 40% don’t even implant so you don’t even know it happened. It’s typically due to chromosomal irregularities, your body knows that it won’t work out. Which is kind of amazing when you consider what a tiny blip a fertilised egg is!

Stuck in my mind because it is a huge percentage. And also always made me think how wondrous it is that that egg and that sperm do go on to successfully produce a whole human being who becomes my cheeky son or academically-driven daughter. It’s all so random, and yet so perfect.

Early testing is not very stupid. I wouldn’t have my children if I hadn’t tested early, on the advice of my expert consultant, and got the drugs that stopped me from miscarrying so I could stay pregnant long enough to get a baby.

In your day I’d have kept losing pregnancies until I died or gave up.

But different people feel differently about these things. A friend of mine got very impatient with people behaving as if she’d lost an actual child after she had an early miscarriage.

You are not wrong, but it was unkind to say it out loud.

I think it's another sign of us being so quick to look everything up on the internet.
You go to do anything now and you google it, so start trying for a baby = lets google how to get pregnant, you get the list of Do's and Don't then the pressure starts straight away.

I read the threads on here and think that it’s the test manufacturers who benefit from the obsessive retesting. I am old enough that when I had my first baby there was a home test but you had to be two weeks late for it to work. Things moved pretty fast over the next few years though, and by the time I was trying for my third baby three years later the tests were pee on a stick type instead of test tube, and there were ovulation sticks as well. I feel for anyone struggling, my daughter has a baby through IVF, but it’s not healthy to be obsessing so early on because so very early miscarriage is so common. I had two, but still was lucky enough to have three healthy babies which I don’t think is unusual. It was an insensitive thing to say but it probably just popped out because it’s true and it is debatable whether it’s useful to know so early.

Sure, but you had a specific medical reason to do so. I don’t think anyone’s suggesting that early testing isn’t a godsend for some. You weren’t buying 100 tests on the internet purely so you could obsess online about the line not getting darker.

I’m old and even I think that’s pretty insensitive to say.

falls in the category of you might think it but don’t say it.

Early testing and early scans have their place @AnneLovesGilbert

But they can also cause more trouble than they are worth for some people. As other posters have said there are numerous threads on here where women are taking test after test, pictures of tests taken at different intervals over the day, over many days. Desperately searching for a line. Again with early scans, going to get a private scan after only a few weeks, then worrying there was nothing to see but an empty sac. Many of these women have just started to TTC, so not having to do it under medical advice. They are doing these things because they can but surely it just causes more worry and can’t actually be healthy

As another poster said the proportion of eggs being fertilised and then implanting is scarily low. I remember watching a programme possibly by Professor Robert Winston who explained the odds. It was fascinating (and obviously hard for those with fertility issues)

And many women (even now early tests are available) will have had chemical pregnancies and assumed they were a late period as they didn’t test. The mum was just telling her daughter that fact, don’t think she was telling her it’s only a late period get over it.

You're right. There is definitely a place for "knowledge is power" testing if you've been trying without success, to check if there are recurrent chemical pregnancies. But it would still be wise to check your emotions until a later test, as so many pregnancies are lost early.

I am glad you got your babies 🥰