to be furious that MIL's friend accidentally announced my pregnancy?

[mamansnet]

I'm 12 weeks pregnant. We told both sets of parents at Christmas when I was six weeks, otherwise we have been waiting for 12 weeks to tell people because I had an MMC last year.

We were with DH's parents for a week over New Year, where they had several people staying. Particularly their best friends from home, a place they left in June to move to another town an hour's flight away. No point hiding I'm pregnant because I wasn't eating pâté or drinking champagne for the whole week, both of which everybody knows I'm a very big fan of. We told everybody that we weren't announcing it yet so to please keep it quiet.

DH's best friend (and our DC1's godfather) lives half an hour away from this old town. He and his wife have been TTCing for a DC2 for some time now and have had several rounds of IVF. We were waiting for 12 weeks in particular to tell them because I know what it's like to suffer infertility (the night she had her DC I sobbed into my pillow because, while happy for them, I'd just been told after TTCing for 2 years that I would never have children naturally - although I later did). My plan was to text her tonight to let her know I was expecting, give it a few days and then tell the rest of our friends.

Except that at lunchtime today, DH's friend bumped in to one of MIL's friends from New Year, who blabbed.

Now, I completely understand that it's been 6 weeks and they will have forgotten that we weren't telling anyone yet. I can even understand that they would assume DH's close friend would have known. I can even appreciate that MIL's friends are completely ditzy and prone to memory lapses.

But I'm furious that that our friends have found out this way. They are going through a horrible time having intrusive tests, IVF and so on, and we wanted to be sure of ourselves before telling them. Also, my due date is 2 weeks before their wedding, so I probably can't attend.

DH says I'm overreacting but I believe MIL's friends owe us an apology.

Who IBU?

I agree with the others

If you really don’t want others to know. Then don’t say. Any type of tablet could cause strange food aversions and not drinking alcohol. I’ve taken one where it made me so nauseous and was asked before taking to not drink ANY alcohol at all. Otherwise I’d be sick

'm sure it'll be ok in the long run, but I know exactly how she must be feeling. She probably doesn't even care how she found out.

^^ this is the important bit. Yes ideally you'd have control of how they were told. But it got away from you. Let them deal with their feelings (whatever they might be) and, at a good time, explain everything that you have explained here.

I think you are over-thinking this. Its not like you can hide a pregnancy forever- you aren't responsible for anyone else's feelings. Its nice you are being sensitive but your friends would have found out soon anyway- what difference is a couple of weeks going to make?

Of course its good to be sensitive to people's circumstances but you cannot live your life in fear that your news is going to upset people- you are just living your life- which you have every right to do.

Sorry should have use quotation marks for the first bit!

New year's seems quite a long way away at this stage. I'm sure your mil's friend isn't keeping track of how many weeks you are (nobody outside of the family is that interested in your pregnancy!) so she assumed that since she knew for a good while, it must be common knowledge.

I don't understand why you felt the need to tell your mil's friend that you were pregnant. Surely she wouldn't have noticed if you weren't eating patê or drinking champagne. Telling immediate family, fair enough. Telling in-laws friends weeks before your own friends was always going to be risky.

Disappointed, ok. Furious is OTT though. You told them 6 weeks ago. They probably thought the news was out by now, or just didn't think at all.

As other posters have said, once you start telling people outside the family, it isn't going to stay a secret for long, although it isn't like she ran off telling people the next day.

I can see why you are annoyed and upset but tbh over the years my experience is that it NEVER works if you tell some people but not others - someone always forgets it is still a secret. It isn't as big a deal to them as it is to you. If you felt you had to tell your inlaws' friends you are pregnant (and honestly I can't see why you had to - people don't notice what others eat or drink) then I think you should have just started telling everyone.

Call your friend and explain. And congratulations on your pregnancy.

YABU if you don't want anyone to know, don't tell anyone. I told no one for 20 weeks and managed to find convincing excuses for not drinking or eating banned foods .

And I think a family friend is unlikely to question why you're not eating seafood or
pate.

If you didn't want to want to announce it until 12 weeks then you shouldn't have told anyone until then. Parents and in laws first followed by family then close friends. Secrets always spill out.

Fgs there is so much more in life to get stressed about. Stop being so dramatic and crack on with your pregnancy...

It's done now so best to stop making such a fuss.

I feel for you in that I would be really upset if it had come out like hat for us.

However, I think you could have stuck to your guns and said you were sick and not able to eat /drink and hump them - once you said it it was out there and in this day and age it was a tad naive to be so certain that the news would not travel.

@mamansnet Sorry your MIL blabbed, and YANBU to be annoyed.

Bu seriously, NEVER tel anyone something you don't want other people to know.

No-one is 100% trustworthy. Seriously, NO-ONE.

Congratulations on your pregnancy BTW!

Well, your MIL blabs. So now you know who should always be the last to know anything.

Also, Christmas was over 6 weeks ago!

Unreasonable to expect them to keep your secret for so long.

YANBU, not their news to tell and you made it clear you didn’t want anyone to know until 12 weeks. They should have waited until you felt ready to tell.

It was always going to be shit telling these friends. I got my bfp literally 3 hours after I'd sent her a bouquet after she had the same exploratory surgery I had while TTCing DC1. I've been thinking about the best way to tell her for weeks. If only they'd seen them tomorrow and not today, it would have been fine

As someone who spent 17yrs ttc I would have found the above incredibly patronising. It's actually worse knowing that your friends and family don't feel they can share their news with you. I was always happy to hear it, even if I did cry later.

And a secret isn't a secret the minute you tell someone so there's no point being furious with anyone.

MIL didn't blab. MIL's friends - who were told 6 weeks ago that the OP was pregnant - said it to someone. In fairness to them, since the OP told several people she was pregnant 6 weeks ago, they probably thought it was general knowledge by now.

To be fair, you couldn't even keep it a secret yourself, so why would you expect others to!

Never trust anyone to not blab. As I had been unwell and my family knew I was pregnant dh insisted that we had to tell his family, which we did when I was only 8 weeks pregnant, with strict instructions not to tell anyone! The following day we were in the town centre talking to friends (who obviously didn’t know) when the receptionist from the local optician came up and congratulated us! MIL had been there in the morning and told her. She couldn’t even keep it quiet for 1 day!

Sorry your MIL blabbed, and YANBU to be annoyed

MIL didn't blab. (It's in the title!!) OP told her MIL'S friend at New years eve. WEEKS ago.

Mil's friend met DH's best friend today, and assumed if she knew, surely he must know. She didn't blab. She said, isn't it great No2 is on the way.

Making a fair assumption that they would have shared the news with their own best friends at this stage if they'd announced it to friends of MIL 6 weeks ago.

I think, OP, they would be a bit hurt whenever they found out. It's difficult news to hear when you're struggling with fertility. But it's not mil's friend's fault.

YABU

Going against the grain here - if you are told information and told it's a secret and to keep it to yourself, you dont mention it to anyone until you are explicitly told it's ok to do so. Your MILs friends absolutely should not have said anything, regardless of how much time they thought had or hadn't passed. They obviously didnt know the impact it would have, but that's why they were asked to keep it quiet.

I'm sure it'll be ok in the long run, but I know exactly how she must be feeling. She probably doesn't even care how she found out

If this is the issue, I'd have told them before now.

I get that being furious was OTT. That was my initial reaction, mainly because I was upset for Friend. As I say, I've calmed down now and am just sad, as is DH. Thank you for the replies putting that into perspective.

It turns out that MIL's friends didn't even know who our friend was. They were all at our wedding years ago and Friend recognised them from a photo, so went up and introduced himself as a friend of DH. So they had no idea to whom they were telling our business.

I honestly don't believe my pregnancy would have stayed secret for long at New Year, for many reasons. It made MIL happy to be able to celebrate the news with her close friends, who she no longer sees, and we thought it couldn't get any further. They're not on social media and DH doesn't know anyone in that entire area apart from this one friend, who lives a fair distance away. We couldn't have imagined that they'd randomly be in the same restaurant, in the same town, at the same time as Friend and that Friend would go up and say "I know your friend's son".

That's life I guess. Lesson learned and hope Friends will understand that we were just trying to be sensitive, because we've been there.