Partner a little upset about pregnancy timing

[LouLouPat]

I’ll start with some background, I’ve been with my partner for 3 years, his wife passed away 6 years ago. He has a 17 year old daughter, she’s an only child.
We have been talking about having a baby, we expected it would take a while so I came off the pill in September, I’m now 9 weeks pregnant, due in August. We will likely only had this one baby, I’m 38, he’s 46.
August is also when his daughter turns 18, although not until the very end, and it’s when she will get her A-Level results and prepare to move for uni. Obviously this isn’t ideal timing for a new baby but we weren’t expecting it to happen so fast!!
My partner is super nervous about telling his DD, he thinks she may react badly or feel replaced.
I wouldn’t say she’s a normal teenager by any means, in fact I think she’s quite incredible. I’ve lived here for a year and her room is always spotless, she works part time, her school work is exemplary, she doesn’t hang out with people likely to get her in trouble and is very independent (she’s in a long distance relationship, every holiday they meet up sometimes all the way down in London or Devon (we are in the north west).
I honestly don’t think she will have a bad reaction she’s very sweet and just a lovely girl.
However It is making me sad that my partner isn’t excited to tell anyone, it’s making me doubt if he even wants this baby. It’s really getting me down.

So AIBU to feel down? Is the timing really so awful? How can we approach this tactfully?

Please don't invalidate my lived experience.

Fair enough @ncforthisthreadonly24

It is New York, not Australia. The flight time is 7hrs. If there is a medical emergency he can get back and someone would be with her meantime.

I’m sorry your experience was so bad. But it is exceptionally rare.

People can have a multitude of rare negative health issues, most do not orchestrate their lives around rare risks.

OP I hope you can ignore the crazed posters who attacked you for having the temerity to be pregnant when your partner’s child will turn 18 and have other milestones.

the contortions around her situation are nuts. Yes:she lost her mother but she is not an orphan. She has lots of people-including you and future siblings! In her life celebrating her and supporting her. She does not need her father risking his connection with you/your child to prove to her that she matters.

people have to live with their losses. That is the courage she needs modeled for her not this bullshit sentimentalizing if the sacred bond between her and her mother while you and your child are treated like dirt. And, by the way, the bond between you and your partner and the new baby is radically undervalued and disparaged.

Its not a rare event in the UK right now. The stats on medical issues for pregnant and post partum women are incredibly bad right now. Its in all the papers in case you missed it. . And of course pregnancy and childbirth are historically exactly something where people plan for the worst case scenario because the downside risk is extreme even if it is slight.

@Neurodiversitydoctor

im not. Surely you can acknowledge that you were very lucky to have the experience you did and that for most women it’s a different story?

As I said most peoples experience will be in the middle. It was a pity people were so pessimistic beforehand, I kept waiting for it to get really bad. I think people don't talk enough about about good birth experiences and how easy it can be. It's all doom and gloom.

My stats maybe slightly out of date but about 40% of first time women have uncomplicated vaginal births, another 20% have a planned c-section, which can also be a very positive experience. So maybe around 50% of women have a "good" birth. People talk like PTSD is inevitable.

Bloody hell have you never met anyone else who’s given birth? your stats sound very wrong to me.

@pikkumyy77

Journalism can be biased and unreliable. They are there to sell papers.

Post birth outcomes are strongly linked to mode of birth and thus an informed judgement can be made post birth as to whether to travel.

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1186/1471-2393-12-138.pdf

@Neurodiversitydoctor birth trauma is around 1 in 4 and yes that includes purely psychological. 70% of first vaginal births have tears and they vary in severity a lot. Even positive c sections require lots of recovery! Have you actually had one?

Even if your stats are correct 50% is very high!

Anxiety disorders/PTSD occurs in 1-6% post birth.

It’s rare.

Also op is on the older side!

@Newsenmum

No one is suggesting he go if she has a severe vaginal tear or major surgery (caesarean).

If it is a straightforward birth and she and baby are fine there is no reason to stop the trip. She is 94-99% likely to be mentally sound after birth!!

21/22

Even if your stats are correct you are asking someone to be alone (with no family support) based on 50/50 chance that things will be OK. Fifty fifty?!

That's absolutely batshit! Find me a medicine that works on a 50/50 rate, you won't cos it would never get licenced for ordinary usage - never! Acceptable failure rates for anything like that are incredibly low. You're looking at extreme Russian roulette.

Completely agree with the pp who's on the misogyny tip, the absolute nonsense in this thread is wild & also very unique to mumsnet. If you stopped random ppl in the street about this you simply would not get the nasty deluge of BS you're getting here.

50/50?? Come tf on.

What's your source for this?

And what about all the women who don't report or seek help until long afterwards due to stigma / worry that their baby will be taken away / any other reason that means they keep their postnatal struggles to themselves? They won't be captured in this statistic.

I imagine that statistic is a vast underestimate.

@ncforthisthreadonly24

in the paper I posted above.

Identified ones - there's always been a huge problem with women feeling able to talk about what they are going thru after birth.

I didn't.
Daughter 'in law' didn't (we all recognised it & stepped in)

Historically no women did!! Sure it's better now but it's still stigmatised. We all know how to fill in the form with the HV so we don't look like we're falling apart inside.

Or this one

Meta-analyses suggest ptsd affects 3.17% of women after birth at diagnostic levels and around 15% of women in high-risk groups, such after preterm or stillbirth (Grekin & O’Hara, 2014).

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02646838.2015.1030250

I don’t know, the reality is that if the first child were hers they would be splitting parenting between them as most do.

Ie I’ll stay with baby, you do xyz with the other one. And you find a way round it.

OP needs to decide what is better, coping for a ten day period (with doula or other support at home, provided straightforward birth), allowing boyfriend to take daughter on anticipated trip (which should smooth over the baby taking limelight and thoughts of being replaced).

Or insisting he stay home, which could be the start of building resentment, deterioration of relationship and issues with the daughter.

She’ll know how to play it once the daughter is told and care options are assessed; if her reaction is disastrous and other support is available, throwing petrol on the fire is probably not a great idea.

@Justia

Those studies are 10 years old or more - understanding of postnatal well health and well-being has likely advanced in the past decade.

However, regardless, these studies only capture those who reported their experiences. There will be many, many women who do not. There is unfortunately still a degree of stigma around postnatal mental illness, and this likely adds to a reluctance to seek help / report symptoms.

The authors of the 2012 study you linked to actually comment on the response rate for their study (only 55%), as a limitation and a as result they conclude that their results may have underestimated the prevalence of MH difficulties in new mothers. I agree with the authors entirely. The rates of poor maternal MH in the postnatal period are likely far, far higher than any study that relies on self report / women seeking help, can capture.

@ncforthisthreadonly24

We can agree to disagree. I know you will be hugely biased because of your personal, horrific, experience.

Post birth wasn’t a walk in the park for me first time either - I did have a complicated birth/caesarean. Elective caesarean better.

Beyond the 2wk paternity period my DH was at work and I breast fed so really he couldn’t do much other than cook and clean - badly 😂 (batch cooking is possible, cleaners are available).

That’s why I can’t understand why someone with a straightforward birth wouldn’t be able to get on, provided other support available - because this is so so much more than most have.

@Justia

I am agreeing with the authors of the paper you shared a link to, in that they acknowledge they likely underestimate the prevalence rate of poor postnatal maternal mental health, due to the 55% response rate. They acknowledge that they aren't capturing all the data there. And I agree with them. It's a huge limitation of any large scale study that relies on self report / people opting in and being honest about their experiences.

I hold that view not only as a result of my personal experiences, but as a PhD researcher in a science related subject (not maternal mental health specifically but a psychology related topic). I know from my own research experiences how limited research can be, and why. So I speak from both those points of view, actually.

But absolutely, we can agree to disagree.

More up to date stuff from 2022
Chances of uncomplicated VB are 48%
From this table.
With luck baby will be a couple of weeks old before this trip.
It can always be cancelled at the last minute.

From this document, worth a read for anyone giving birth this year.