Has anyone had a surprise baby?

[Thighofrelief]

By which I mean you went into labour with no clue you were pregnant.

It must be so shocking.

I can understand how someone might not look pregnant but how can you not FEEL a 7 pound baby moving about inside you? When they’re smaller it’s even more obvious-they wriggle and kick, elbows sticking you in the ribs,weird lumps and bumps protruding out of your stomach as they turn. There’s nowhere else that baby can be-everyone’s uterus is in the same place! Yes a baby can sit higher or lower but they’re still there!

My cousin had a ‘surprise’ baby. She was 17 and my aunt (the witch!) had warned her never to get pregnant or she’d be out! They thought she had appendicitis but was actually in labour. I’d seen her a week before and she’d hidden it well.

Terrifying. This is my worst nightmare.

I know someone who it happened to many years ago (back in the 70’s). She went to hospital with what she thought was gallstones and came out with a baby, it was her first and she had no idea she was pregnant.

It happened to me. One missed period so did a test which came back negative and then everything kicked back into normal. Am quite active and didn't develop a bump. Put on a bit of weight around what would have been my seventh month and went onto healthy eating. Went to the hospital with crippling pains and turns out i was seven cms dilated, had to have emergency section as baby was tucked back in awkward position and my placenta was blocking me feeling any movement. It happens and am sick and tired of people saying that i must have known because i genuinely didn't!

Midwife in training here and I'm quite shocked by some of the judgmental comments on here. It's a lot more common than you would think and there are a whole host of reasons why and how it happens, none of which are to do with denial. Having seen some of the genuine shock and disbelief on these women's faces I find it incredibly difficult to believe that it's faked. Surely any baby is a blessing, regardless of whether they knew or not.

I know 2 people who this happened to. One was massively overweight so you couldn’t tell but the other was my sister in law who wasn’t overweight at all.

I'd like to know how it affects the bonding process and whether it contributes to pnd. I suspect it would and hope these women get plenty of support! Even a 9 month pregnancy doesn't really prepare you for what's to come the first time around. In fact, even with my second I spent a good part of the first trimester asking whether I really wanted another baby!

When I was 16 and at a party a friend pointed out another 16 year old girl to me who was apparently pregnant. She was wearing super tight jeans and her tummy was flat so I assumed she was only recently pregnant. She gave birth the next week. Some people with tight tummy muscles or whatever don't show like other people do. My sister's tummy muscles were so tight (from exercise before falling pregnant) that her little boy did not turn head down in around in the womb until the day he was born.

If you have an anterior placenta (at the front) it can absorb lots of the kicks and movements. I knew I was pregnant but hardly ever felt my second moving due to this issue. Totally understandable how someone who doesn’t know they are pregnant and has an anterior placenta doesn’t feel any movement.

Another with an anterior placenta here I knew I was pregnant but I felt nothing I was up the mau being examined or monitored nearly every day as I couldn't feel her kicks, my son was a complete different story he was fine kicking. However my aunt I use that term loosely. KNEW she was pregnant and didn't tell anyone as she wanted to continue partying and taking drugs every weekend until she was induced as everyone "found" out after she thought she was in labour. Her son is disabled now and she doesn't have the intelligence to realise it's her own doing.

@autumndear, not knowing you are pregnant is usually associated with women and girls who may be vulnerable in some way. I used to be a midwife and then health visitor and have met women who say they didn’t know they were pregnant, but when questioned about symptoms, they often agree they experienced them. If a baby is healthy it will move inside you and is very difficult to ignore.

It happened to my DD. She has eds and has frequent dislocations and often feels like she is being beaten up from the inside due to her condition. She found out she was pregnant at 32 weeks. She had been using contraception and had even had surgery when she was unknowingly 6 months pregnant. She was studying in America when she started feeling unwell, continuous vomiting coupled with constipation. The doctor took bloods as routine and she was in shock when the results came back especially as she hadn't been in a relationship for months. She had to arrange flights back home immediately and deal with moving continents. The baby was born by caesarian 6 weeks later. So in 6 weeks she had to come to grips with pregnancy, motherhood, leaving university and telling the Father. She had coped with everything remarkably well and has now returned to her studies although in the UK now. Telling the father was horrendous and on the day she come home from hospital she received a solicitors letter threatening to have her charged under section 5 of the public order act if she dared to contact him again. The baby is beautiful and very much loved.

@bevelino all cryptic pregnancies are not necessarily associated with vulnerable women. It is most common in women with busy or stressful lives, women who've had previous difficult pregnancies, women who suffer from some form of hormone imbalance or reproductive issue etc etc. All of the women I've met have gone to GPs with their symptoms and been told they have some sort of stomach issue and written it off as such. Apart from obvious symptom of a missed period which for some of these women is completely normal or they then mistake normal pregnancy bleeds as periods as they already have irregular cycles, are on the pill or suffer from PCOS. I agree there are some women who are vulnerable who ignore or deny their pregnancy and those are the ones who require the most support and not judgment. To write all cryptic pregnancies off as such is not something I'm comfortable with.

Terrible twos - I know someone else this happened to. She was about 40, she and her husband had tried for a baby for years without success. She was tall and overweight so didn’t pay any attention to a little weight gain. Also her periods were irregular and she thought it was the start of the menopause.

She works in the control room for the ambulance service, so fortunately there were plenty people there who knew what to do when she stated to have abdominal pains at work. She’s didn’t find out she was in labour until she was examined in A and E.

She and her husband were very shocked but overjoyed. She had a healthy baby who is now 18. Her colleagues got a lot of teasing for not spotting that she was pregnant. Especially the paramedics .

I also know of three causes of concealed pregnancy - where the woman knew she was pregnant but didn’t want to be and so just ignored it / was in denial. They had all put on weight, wore baggy clothing etc and their families / colleagues were concerned that they were depressed or unhappy ( which of course they were ).

None of the people round about them suspected pregnancy and they weren’t stupid.

One was a teenaged girl living with her parents . She was a goth and wore big baggy black t shirts and weird make up . She went into labour in the house , which is when her mother realised. Her parents were very angry as they were very religious and it brought shame on the family . She wasn’t allowed to keep her baby .

Another was a probationer teacher. She turned up in work one Monday and told everyone in the staffroom that she’d had a baby at the weekend but wasn’t keeping it so it was fine. Her colleagues thought she was mentally ill ( as in making it up ). She was very very angry when the head teacher insisted that she got some medical help and wouldn’t allow her to stay in school that day.

Everyone was shocked when it turned out to be true. That’s when I discovered that a two week maternity leave is compulsory , it’s illegal for an employer to have a woman at work before then. She didn’t go back to that school and the staff never found out what happened.

I feel very sad for that young woman and sometimes wonder what became of her and her baby.

The third was a student nurse on a gynacology ward . Again none of her colleagues noticed the pregnancy , including my friend who was the nurses supervisor. Again, the doctors and nurses on the ward got a lot of teasing about that one.

She didn’t go back to work and no one found out what happened .

@bevelino there is a vast difference between concealed and cryptic pregnancies, the latter I believe is what OP is asking about

My grandparents heard knocking on the door in the middle of the night. When they ran downstairs, it was the next door neighbour who said, ‘ I need your help, my wife is on the toilet and she’s giving birth’. My grandmother went round and tried to help but sadly the baby was stillborn. Their neighbour was absolutely devastated as she had been trying to have a child for years, with what appeared to be no success. She had no idea that she was pregnant, and she was full-term when she went into labour. She didn’t look pregnant, but was an apple shape and I think that helped to conceal pregnancy. This happened during the summer, and I’ve seen photographs of her in a bikini taken only a few days beforehand at a barbecue in my grandparents garden - she didn’t look pregnant at all. She also had periods all the way through, and as they were typically short and light, there was no apparent change. She never got over the loss of her child and was unable to conceive again. Absolutely tragic.

I found out in month 5. 3 doctors had felt my tummy because of weird pains and discomfort and I was prescribed ibs meds and painkillers and told to her more exercise. They barely touched my tummy before assuming I was wasting time. I did a pregnancy test despite having periods and being on the pill. The midwife declared with absolute certainty that I was less than 6 weeks and miscarrying when I turned up with bleeding. The next month they said it was my imagination, grossly presented bloody pads and then they kept me in. Then said it happens. My point is I knew something wasn’t right but medical professionals weren’t saying pregnancy. I had no sickness, food issues, heartburn or any other pregnancy symptoms.

I know a woman who said it happened to her. It was her sixth baby though and everyone had been telling her not to have any more when she said she wanted another. I'd guess she just concealed it - she was quite big so the bump wasn't really noticeable. She's had two more since then and let everyone know from the start.

When I had my son in February the woman in the next bed had just had her 6th baby and had no idea she was pregnant. She just keeled over in agony in Iceland apparently and only just made it to hospital.

One of my veterinary nurses will shortly be having her surprise baby. Since March she has not been right, I have trained her well so she POAS 21 times all negative. In the end they thought it was IBS and sent her for a scan. No IBS just a 32 weeker. She is size 8 and has a tiny like slightly bloated tum.
This is the second veterinary nurse I have known this happen to.

I worked with someone that had twins, and didn't know until she went into labour. She was a bigger woman anyway and didn't get noticeably bigger and she wasn't in a relationship. Her flatmate (who we also worked with) was in total disbelief. There was a lot of media interest, so she agreed to be featured in one national paper.

Some people with tight tummy muscles or whatever don't show like other people do. My sister's tummy muscles were so tight (from exercise before falling pregnant) that her little boy did not turn head down in around in the womb until the day he was born.

My friend has crazy tight tummy muscles (yoga teacher) and she didn't show for AAAAAAAGGGGGEEEEESSSSS, basically at 6 months she had less of a bump than I do after a bowl of pasta.

Her baby hasn't turned though despite that maneuver thing the Drs do so shes going to have to have a c section.

My mum's god daughter found out she was pregnant 3 weeks before giving birth at full term. She'd been having back ache and pain for weeks and GP eventually sent her for an MRI due to concerns about a possible growth. She is absolutely tiny, size 6 at most. The investigation showed up an 8 month foetus in a very retroverted uterus tucked right in towards her spine. She had some physio or something to relieve spinal pressure and her bump did pop out a bit. He was born 3 weeks later and is now a healthy 4 year old.

I can understand how someone might not look pregnant but how can you not FEEL a 7 pound baby moving about inside you?

My daughter was 9lb, I knew I was pregnant and had a bump. I felt butterflies in the early days and then later on little elbow taps and a few rumbles but nothing that I would immediately identify as baby movements and that was my fourth pregnancy so I would know. She was breech, behind an anterior placenta, facing my spine, and had her feet wedged in my pelvis so all of her movements were either restricted or made in places where I couldn't feel them.

A friend of mine fell pregnant 12 years after she had gone through early menopause. She didn't find out until about six weeks before the birth. She had been to the doctors numerous times about aches and pains she was having. Her GP and consultant tested her for lots of different things and did a pregnancy test as a last resort, just to tick the box saying they had done one. It was a huge shock to everyone. She already had two grown up children, so to suddenly go back to baby days at the age of 41 took a lot of adjustment for both her and her husband of 23 years.