AIBU for telling my parents about my pregnancy very late? I just sometimes forget they even exist or that I have parents

[BeBreezyAquaFinch]

I need an objective gauge on this because my mother is currently upset with me, and I’m genuinely struggling to see if I’ve done something wrong.

A bit of background: I (35) am heavily pregnant with my first baby with DH, main due date is in early September but baby could come in August. My husband and I are thrilled and looking forward to being parents. Last week, I was on a casual catch up call with my mother and happened to mention the pregnancy. When she asked how far along I was and I told her, she became incredibly upset that I’d kept it a ‘secret’ for so long. The issue is it wasn’t a secret I just didn’t think they’d care. They’ve never really cared about anytbing I’ve been up to. They came to the wedding I even forgot to invite them till my husband asked. It’s not that I’m upset I just forget that they exist sometimes.

To preface: I am not heartbroken or bitter about my upbringing. I had an incredibly privileged childhood and have very fond memories of my parents taking us skiing, on holidays, I got to see the world from a very young age and picking us up for exeat weekends. But the reality is, I barely know them. We did not have nannys or anything of that sort, there’s 4 of us altogether. They’d pick us up from boarding school, take us out etc but all in all we were kind of left to our own devices, money was never an issue my father topped up our accounts whenever we wanted never questioned what we spent the money on, we’d have parties at their house all the time they never cared.

From a young age, my siblings and I were sent to boarding school in the UK. My parents lived all over the world for work Monaco, Switzerland, the US, Luxembourg. Even when we briefly went to school in Switzerland, it was a boarding school. We lived with them for maybe a few weeks a year. I made friends for life at school and have done plenty of therapy as an adult to process it all. I don't hate them at all, but I view them as distant relatives or acquaintances who happen to have given birth to me, rather than "parents."Because we only ever have superficial chat, it genuinely didn't cross my mind to announce the pregnancy to them. I just didn't think they'd care that much.

My mother thinks I've been incredibly cold and hurtful by leaving it until the final weeks to tell her she's going to be a grandmother. From my perspective, we don't have that kind of relationship.

So, AIBU? Should I have managed this differently, or is her reaction unreasonable given the distant relationship they chose to cultivate?

I genuinely do not hate them I just forget they exist. I even have fond memories with them but due to my upbringing to me they’re just somewhat random people who happen to be my parents. My husband has a very different relationship with his parents and he too attended boarding school. We do not plan on sending our child to boarding school. I was raised by other people and essentially raised in an insitution.

What do you want me to say here? My parents wouldn't but I can imagine it would be hurtful if they did but I can also imagine that the OP wouldn't be surprised by her parents doing it but it would still be hurtful. I think I can get her choosing not to tell them but I'm struggling with the idea of her forgetting and then not realising that her mum would be hurt about not being told until very late.

There's a lot going on. I'm not an expert, I've just given my immediate response to the post that the OP put out there. I'm happy for her that she's pregnant and I'm gutted for her that she wasn't nurtured with warmth and love during her childhood. I'm not a therapist, I'm just some random plonker.

@BeBreezyAquaFinch- I know you’ve had therapy already, but one thing to consider, often becoming a parent can really highlight how shit your own parenting was (or good!). It’s tough for a lot of people. For instance, be prepared for when your child reaches the age you were first sent to boarding school (7 or older?) that you might really struggle to process your parents choices.

Your mum being upset is a natural consequence of the relationship she’s (failed to) cultivate with you.

Gosh I’ve never met academics who could afford 4 sets of boarding fees…shark well and truly jumped on that one

You’re just demonstrating, with this comment, that you lack the imagination to empathise with other people’s experiences.

The OP has explained that she doesn’t have the type of relationship with her parents where she shares information about herself. Her parents lack interest and so she’s never developed that habit. Their conversational pattern is to discuss things like politics. She’s simply continued in that same pattern.

Well she obviously did and decided not to bother.

You come across very cold and quite disingenuous actually OP. It doesn’t sound like you’ve had the closest relationship with your parents - their fault entirely for not being present in your early years. However no one forgets they have parents and no one would forget to tell them a big life event like this. Dig deep into why with therapy. Or I fear your relationship with your future child may also suffer as you come across so cold already

Same here tbh. Agree with all of your post.

What about hedge fund managers? Think they might possibly afford it. At least read all OPs posts.

Seems very strange you didn’t tell them you are pregnant before now, even if you have a more casual relationship with them. I’m sure I told more distant relatives fairly early on as my DPs died before I had my kids.

That question has never come up at all during our plans. We got married in a register office in Islington that was always the plan. Maybe if we had plans for a more traditional wedding that conversation would have come up.

Our wedding plans took us just over a month from the day we got engaged to the wedding we were more focused on our time slot. They attended and had a great time, they like my husband they’ve always liked him. I don’t think they’ve ever really asked him anything in depth about himself it’s all quite surface level. I remember first time I met his parents and they were interested in everything and anything about me then he met my parents and thought they did like him. I just told him pretty much ‘I think that’s just the way they are. If they asked you anything important about yourself I would have been a bit worried because that’s not something they’d normally do.’ Even when they met my husbands parents, DHs parents later on said ‘your parents don’t ask much do they’ aha personally I don’t think they’re malicious I think it’s just how they are with everyone just distant.

If you genuinely forgot to tell your parents you're pregnant, when you speak to them every couple of weeks, I'd suggest you need more than a bit of therapy to get over the obvious trauma.

Or if you knowingly didn't tell them to spite them, and you're just saying you forget they exist to make a point, I think you need more therapy.

Lawyers.

What about them?

I don’t think you forgot - your subconscious withheld this deeply personal, vulnerable and visceral experience from your parents to protect your inner child.

I have known very posh families who effectively relate to each other through formal small talk. I think it can be quite hard to take in how very very repressed and inexpressive English families of a particular class and worldview can be if you havent seen it up close.

Pregnancy, if you’re at all in touch with your feelings, is a deeply emotional state of being, during which you are almost spiritually connected to your baby - and to all the mothers and babies that have gone before (apols for woo).

it’s also a famously time when your own childhood wounds come racing to the surface.

its not at all surprising that, although you have superficially found, or been trained into, a form of pseudo-connection with them that doesn’t rock the boat or force them to confront their failings, your subconscious does not feel the same.

I would seriously consider more therapy - not because the earlier therapy was useless, but because you are emotionally a completely new person once you become a parent, and have access to parts of your psyche that you previously did not. (Psychotherapist not counsellor).

Also, how insane to suggest that you ‘took’ from your parents.

they had money, and that’s all they were prepared to give you, their child.

I don’t think I did it to spite them I just thought oh well they won’t care. My first pregnancy I did think about telling them, then we had a miscarriage, I thought about telling them again but then just thought oh they would not care then time went on and I forgot that I forgot to tell them.

I saw their reactions to my siblings and their children and realised it doesn’t really matter and won’t really make a difference to their lives. I later told them because we were excited and it’s all becoming real now, DH has painted the nursery, we are buying stuff for the baby and preparing. At the start of my pregnancy I thought it would just be another miscarriage so I didn’t share with many. We told people who would care and be supportive if I did end up having another miscarriage.

Yanbu. I haven't read the full thread but if your relationship is distant, it makes sense that it operates at that level whatever is going on in your life.
I hope you have a close and warm relationship with partner and other people in your life, and that you can share with them the ups and downs, excitement and nerves, of what er comes next.
Your mom.is upset - let her manage it and fo us on your priorities right now. There will be time for that in future - your parents did the best thye could and also have to manage the fallout of having a dista t relationship with their children because of those choices ro decisions. It sounds like you have been doing thatbtoo.
Good luck.

I’ve had a similar upbringing but without the money and unfortunately siblings are not close.
My sister told us she has breast cancer in a WhatsApp and I’ve not seen her since (4 months).
Ive done therapy but you can’t change the past so my focus was on drawing a line and moving forward. Parenting was triggering for me especially when I had a daughter.
Be prepared to feel sad for yourself as well as joy for your child. My therapist told me my life will be full of polarities due to my upbringing and it is.

You don’t have to justify your actions but just take note when you speak to people as your adult self or your child self. When your parents trigger you it’s the hurt child they meet. My therapist helped me to meet my family as an adult and not a sad and neglected child.

exactly - so there was no 'forgetting' to tell them about the wedding.

How old are you OP?
Sorry for you loss of pregnancy. that’s hard.
You said your brother didn’t tell your parents till after his baby’s birth.
You also said ‘they’ are good fathers, As another brother must have told them they were going to have a baby.

Your parents were academics and had lots of money and 4 children at boarding school?

She decided not to bother as there was no point.

Read the thread.

They weren’t academic in the sense of teaching at universities my mum at some points was a visiting lecturer but that was never my fathers job. They went where my father went he was a hedge fund manager for a time. They are both academic in the sense that they’re well educated they pursued further education, my father left work for a time to go back to university as he enjoyed learning and my mum in her 50s went back to university too that what I meant. I did explain a bit earlier.

Their conversations with me and many others are mainly to do with academia, politics, economics, philosophy etc. I also haven’t said they had lots of money ? I’m not sure where that’s coming from I’ve barely talked about wealth. I have just talked about my personal experiences growing up experiences I attended a boarding school from 7+ entry all the way through to 18.