First Time Dad

[DC905210]

Hi everyone, sorry to invade Mumsnet, I can not find anything of much use on the Dad's side of things.

My wife is 4-5 weeks pregnant, and she does not want me to tell anyone until the first midwife appointment I understand the reasons for that (lots of people to tell if something goes wrong etc) but there are two elements of it I am uncomfortable with / frustrated at.

Firstly I work for a very small company where you can just tell if something is on someone's mind there is a calendar month today before the appointment. Is it normal to sit in an office with two other people (who incidentally I 100% trust to keep it to themselves) for a month pretending nothing is happening?

Paired with this the company is very flexible and such as the first midwifes appointment they would almost certainly let me work for home and fit around it but instead I will have to take a day off (which I assume for a new Dad could come in handy later on) to pretend I am doing something else. For what?

Secondly, she does not want to tell any family.

Between us we don't have Dad, they have both passed away and we do not speak to her Mum. My Brother has a two y/o little girl and a little boy due in November and I have a lot of stuff to ask him, my Mum as well will be our overriding principle support in everything we need help with, it is reasonable that I should accept not telling them for another month? They too are 100% guaranteed to not tell a sole.

It is not like (god forbid) if something did go wrong we would not bother telling them, the point is just lost on me.

Please don't take this as a moan of like "poor men" or anything but we don't have the support that woman have. I have read frightening sounding things about labour for example and I am anxious about it. I don't want to start adding to the pile of worries that my wife has about it but I am just expected to live with it for a month.

Littlbear,

If you were in court for a complex contactual matter worth £20m (which is the value of one I am doing at the minute) and your lead consultant decided 8 weeks in to drop out and they have to start from scratch after paying you company thousands per day for you to pull a case together for them.

What would you say if they did that because there wife was pregnant but you didn't tell them at the start because it is bad luck. So not impossible no but unacceptably wreckless and enough to never work for that client again.

If I take work on I am effectly stuck with the job to the end.

I can rile over ten days per year too which I think is quite significant.

Well look, if you want to make that case to her and see if she agrees, sure. But you don't get to overrule her.

You're looking for us to tell you that it's OK to ignore her (entirely normal) wishes, and that's not going to happen.

Also why on EARTH do you think you'd have to drop out of work because she's pregnant?

If you're panicking this badly at this point I am not sure how you're going to cope sensibly with an actual baby.

Pancake,

I was explaining to someone else that I can not back out of a contract easily once it starts, I wasn't say I would do that.

I would not drop out of a contract part way through. I was just responding to someone who said it won't be impossible.

Gotcha. So what are you going to do, given the feedback you've had?

I am simply not going to bring it up at all with her and respect the 12 weeks without mention to avoid the pressure.

The potential of getting stuck on a contract that goes beyond the birth is a worry though given my wife has no (supportive) family.

If people think that is a not a valid and thoughtful concern and not sensible thenI dunno :-/

There is no such thing as bad luck OP. It's not that it's bad luck to tell before 12 weeks, but before then things can go wrong or you find out at the scan that something isn't right. It's got nothing to do with jinxing it. That's why people wait until 12 weeks, as you have your scan, get the reassurance that everything is ok, you get a picture and you share the news. Obviously you can tell before then. I mc at 5 weeks. We had only told parents, I certainly wouldn't have wanted to untell everyone.

To be honest I know some people who have suffered losses get quite offended by the 'bad luck' thing.

We didn't buy anything until the anomaly scan at 20 weeks, just incase we got bad news. But it was nothing to do with 'jinxing'.

With the feedback I have I am going to just leave it at 12 weeks for telling anyone.

I can just pay my Mum as normal, we wont be too short.

I will have to put up with having no male peers to talk too for the the few months between now and then.

And work is what it is.

I have concluded there is nothing more important than making sure my wife doesn't feel any pressure.

Could you ask your work to keep you on contracts that fit the bill over the next year/18 months for personal reasons?

It sounds nuts but in theory, anyway, there's no actual reason why they need to know what the specific reasons are. Worth a try?

OhEm,

The reason my wife doesn't want to tell anyone in her own words is "it will jinx it".

They are not my words or opinions.

OP you keep asking but you are only going to get the same answers. If you wife does not want to tell anyone, don't tell anyone.

Unusually for mn, we are unanimous on that.

Btw, what is a pregnancy log book?

Getting stuck on a contract past the birth is a legitimate worry, but is there a reason you couldn't do this at 12 weeks? Surely something could happen to anyone at anytime.i don't think out of my antenatal group the Dads stopped going away for work during the pregnancies.

Btw I found doing Nct a really great method of support during and after pregnancy, for me and my DH. I know not everyone on here rates it, and it does cost but we both thought it was worth it. If your wife wants support it's a good way of going about it.

Apologies if you've already said this, but are your brother and mum close by? If the worst comes to the worst, and you're stuck on a long contract away from home, will they be able to help?

But there are going to be times when you have to go away. Unless there are any other circumstances that you haven't mentioned, there is no reason to think that your wife won't cope perfectly well.

OP I'm an ex construction lawyer, I understand the type of work that you are involved in. I understand why you are worried. But all you can do is discuss this with your wife. Is she aware that there is a chance you may feel put on this job? Could you explain to her why you want to tell work and let her weigh it up? Although again, the final decision should be hers.

Meandjulio,

I could yeah but bearing in mind one guy is close to home because he has lung cancer and one because his wife tried to kill herself and got sectioned I think me declaring unspecified personal issues would be doing those people a bit of a disservice.

Especially on superstitious grounds.

OmGee I now realise Happy knows how long these things can rumble on.

Do me a favour happy and confirm I am not making this up. We are essential Quantity Surveyor Consultants / Delay analysts who work with lawyers in quite tightly locked teams. If one of the big two Arbitrations kicks off next week and I take lead I am stuck with it, for what can easily be a year. My wife does fully understand all this.

My Brother and Mum are close yes, around 14 miles away.

We didn't tell until 12 weeks, but my boss knew at 6 weeks (had to take 2 days off for bleeding) and my SIL twigged at 8 weeks because we had a family do and I not only drove, but when we got back to theirs I still didn't drink (live 2 streets away).

No one else knew, its actually a precious secret for you and your wife before you start getting bombarded from all sides with well meaning advice and comments about labour, never sleeping again and your life changing.....

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!

If I were your colleagues I'd be hacked off you want local jobs just because your partner is pregnant. Your time at home is no more precious than anyone else's.

I have a toddler, I'm 27 weeks pregnant and my DH and I are both still traveling in the UK and Europe (and U.S. And Asia for him). I am intermittently on crutches, have a low lying placenta and had hideous morning sickness. At times I have had to use sick leave as I've not been up to work. But, I'm pregnant not ill, I have a job and responsibilities.

My husband told work after 12 weeks and he will have a travel exclusion period. If there is an emergency before that then work will have to cope. They will understand if that happens, although there are many jokes about lawyers they are aware you are actually human and that there are circumstances you cannot control.

I'm sorry you feel got at, it must be hard to have people give you their perspectives when they are so different from your own.

It's good that you can plan in advance staying at home at all OP. DH works away 2-3 nights a week, did so throughout this pregnancy (we have an 18 month old too) and will continue to do so when DC2 is born.

You're doing the right thing but to be honest you're coming across as a little petulant about it. The other two people have excellent reasons to be assigned work close to home. You would, if you were nearing her due date. Until then, you don't.

You could, as some have suggested, raise the possibility of telling one single other person, in strict confidence) for support (a close friend, maybe your brother although that's difficult because family are often inclined to spill when they shouldn't) - I understand that it's a big life-changing thing, it is for me too! - but I am still at a bit of a loss as to why a) it won't wait, and b) why you feel you can't talk through your feelings with your wife?

Whatabout,

No one is going to get hacked off, it is just not like that where I work, we just sort of club together for the greater good really.

There is a guy just finished a Masters for example who has had a few years not travelling too much. They wont totally alter the business direction for someone but they will take me into account when planning. Until now I have been more than happy to go wherever.

I am lucky not to work for a company where everyone bitches at each other.

If you had the option for it to be taken into account that your wife was pregnant when your work was planned you would take it no? (I know you are a female, it is a hypothetical question).

I am not asking to save my wifes feelings but under normal circumstances I would be crazy to not say something had changed at home.

You could pay for a private scan at say 10 weeks. That's only 5 weeks away, right? Honestly that's no time at all.

I refute the suggestion I am being in any petulant about it I am sorry.

There are four of us who have for years said we are fine working away to make it so others don't have to.

All I will be doing (after 12 weeks) is saying XXXX is pregnant now so if you could avoid me working away that would help. Don't forget decisions with be made in the next few weeks that dictate where I will be working on and beyond the due date. I am sorry but it is quite offensive that you label that petulant. I have explained numerous times work allocated now will go over the due date.

I think it's hard for you to understand the "it will jinx it" because obviously, rationally, it won't. But I'm normally a rational person – I don't believe horoscopes, I'm not even religious – but I was scared to tell people for that reason.

Breaking it down more logically, I think what it is is that when you tell people, they will congratulate you and all be misty eyed and happy. Then if you have a MC you have to go through all their pity and sorrow as well. It's not that it makes a MC more likely, it's just that there would be so much more pathos about it and that's what I feared.

I think when you get pregnat, especially the first time, for some people they need that 12 weeks of privacy to come to terms with it in their own way. Another thing you will soon discover is how some people like to appropriate the pregnancy and will never stop with the unwanted advice, horror stories and interference. It's actually nice to have a period of time when just you two know.

I don't think you sound petulant, so much as really unable to put yourself in another person's shoes. You seem able to only think about your view, your feelings, your work situation.

FYI my partner goes away a lot for work, did so throughout my pregnancies and when our first baby was 5 weeks. I coped fine (and I don't even have any family support, at all).

Grotbag, it is not my "fault" others can't stay at home though. And I am not that lucky because I am not going to tell them so won't be working at home etc.

Bramble, not long until ten no but my wife is of the opinion that telling people before twelve weeks is bad luck.

And I could be allocated work in say three weeks time.