Anxiety around pregnancy announcement

[elbs125]

Hi all, I have my 12 week scan next week and we're hoping to announce to family on Father's Day that we're pregnant.

DH and I have a lot of anxiety around telling his parents as they're quite selfish about a lot of things and it will immediately become their news, not ours.

We've been trying for 4 years and this baby is the result of multiple rounds of IVF which we've never told them about as we can't trust them not to tell other people.

Given what its taken to get here and the slightly higher risk of abnormalities we won't be doing a big social media announcement and we'd rather not tell anyone other than close family/friends until after the 20 week scan when hopefully we find out that everything is developing normally.

DH's parents live their lives on Facebook and we know they'll want to do a big announcement. If we tell them not to they'll most likely post lots of cryptic hints in an effort to 'accidentally' share the news.

I guess what I'm asking is, has anyone had a similar nightmare with telling family and do you have any advice?
We're definitely telling my parents after the scan so we think it's only fair we tell DH's parents too, but based on past behaviour the thought of it is stressing us out.

Could you delay telling his parents? But still tell yours if you want to? Unsure if the parents are at all pally or speak often or at all. We didn't tell my MIL until I was 20 weeks because I couldn't deal with her telling everyone, until I felt more confident in the pregnancy. I did say to her though even when we told her 'this is our news to tell & we will tell people when we are ready so please keep this to yourself until we say otherwise'. TBF she (as far as I know) respected that.

@dryshampooislife we thought about that, DH wanted to wait until 20 weeks but we just worry they would find out and we would feel guilty for not telling them.

They live a couple of hours away and they're not friends with my parents so it's a possibility, but they'll also make a huge deal about not being told.

The worry is the possibility of some of my mums friends seeing us in public and saying congratulations on Facebook which my MIL would see and figure out.

We're hoping the story of our journey to get here will make them respect our privacy but I worry it won't be enough.

Good to know we're not the only ones with this dilemma though. Sometimes I wonder if we're going mad 😂

You probably won't be showing until around 5 or 6 months so you can get away with not telling anyone for ages. I would.

I’d honestly hold off in telling anyone until you’re 20 weeks.

Stay in your bubble for as long as possible.

Just wanted to say congratulations on your wonderful news after all the trouble you have had. Don't let your in-laws spoil your happiness!

@Jk987 5-6 months sounds quite late. From everything I've read I could start showing anytime so I suppose the worry would be that it becomes really obvious and they find out from someone else.

@justanothermanicmonday1 I'd actually really love to keep it to ourselves until 20 weeks but we'll see all of my family regularly between now and then so they'll all know. We would feel guilty not telling DH's parents, especially because they would know that we had told my family much earlier.

@GladAllOver thank you so much. It still feel surreal but we're so excited. 😁

I think you should just tell people after the 12 week scan. Otherwise folk will guess and your inlaws will be hurt you didnt tell them. Tell them no facebook. And don't make a special announcement on fathers day if you want it low profile.

Huge congratulations! That’s wonderful.

Honestly, if it was me I’d wait until the 20 week scan if you have people like this in your family. I will try to next time as I was so sick of the irritating advice during a time I was anxious (about the 20 week scan particularly). I didn’t want to get excited about it actually happening until later in my pregnancy - but please don’t do this as you should enjoy it! - and it made me uneasy when my mum kept buying clothes, despite my polite request that she wait until later. We didn’t announce until about 14 weeks first time and it was mostly really nice keeping it to ourselves actually. But I can see why some tell their mum or close friend for support of course.

People can be so selfish with this kind of thing in my experience. Eg My best friend’s SIL saw her coming out of the local hospital’s maternity dept in early pregnancy and had told her side of the (close) family well before they announced properly. The couple were even told “Oh we knew as X saw you with your notes!” So maybe I’m being a bit cynical but I reckon people sometimes don’t respect boundaries as we’d expect them to. It can spoil the baby bubble a little, I think.

Or, if you can’t wait, you could tell them and your DH could really stress how you were reluctant to tell anyone until 20 weeks. I’d anticipate things they may do and make it clear it wouldn’t be okay. Eg a comment like “That includes any cryptic comments on social media alluding to being grandparents!”

Good luck! Enjoy every moment - don’t be like I was fretting! It’s a special time.

A lot of people don’t show until around 16 weeks earliest (for first baby) and it’s easy to hide. Do what’s right for you.

@elbs125 we had a similar situation where we were dreading telling my partners family! They were awful about our previous loss so we waited to tell them this time because I just couldn’t bare them to know early. They found out my parents knew much earlier but honestly by this point I didn’t care what they thought. His side also posted it on Facebook without asking us so I know how you feel about the idea they might do that! I was furious and made them delete it but not the point at all! I don’t really have any advice because I just try to ignore them when possible🤣

Huge congratulations OP! We held off telling DH family until 20 weeks due to similar circumstances and issues. We haven't done the social media announcement thing either 💖

Why would your mum's friends know? If you do tell your family at 12 weeks you make it clear they can't tell anyone.

If you don't trust someone not to broadcast the news that you don't want to broadcast, then you don't tell them.

Thanks so much everyone for your suggestions. We've decided to try and hold off until the 20 week scan if we can, it just depends whether I start showing before then as we see my family all the time so it might become too obvious.
We have no concerns about telling my family, they'll keep it to themselves but we just don't want to feel guilty for not telling everyone around the same time.

@Whataretheodds my point about my mums friends was that they might see me in public when I blatantly have a bump and then congratulate us on social media which DH's family would then see.
Totally agree that not trusting someone means you shouldn't tell them but it's not quite as simple as that unless I barricade myself in the house so nobody sees me. I'm just past 12 weeks and already feel like I have a slight bump so I'm not sure how long we'll be able to keep it secret.

Don't worry about not telling everyone at the same time. Sort out your Facebook settings so no one can post on your wall for a bit and go a bit quiet on sm

In that situation I’d wait. And when you do tell, don’t make it an ‘announcement’, tell them privately and be very firm about how you want the news shared or not shared onwards. Surely they know it’s on the card if you’ve been having IVF?

You could have a private scan at around 17/18 weeks if you are struggling to keep it quiet any longer or start to show. We had a private scan and it gave us peace of mind that everything looked ok before the big 20 week scan!

@Blueberrylemoncake that's a really good idea, I think we'll keep that as a backup plan in case I start showing sooner than we'd like so we can tell people with a bit more peace of mind.

@Lcb123 we haven't told anyone we've been going through IVF. We felt like it would put too much pressure on if other people had hopes and expectations so we've kept it to ourselves the whole time.

I'm 16 weeks tomorrow and have been showing for the past week. Not enough to be clearly pregnant, but enough a few people at work have done some double takes and I definitely look like I've been hitting the cakes! Funny thing is, due to sickness I'm 5kg lighter than before I got pregnant still.

Tell your family. Don't tell his. If they get upset, tell them the truth. Tell them you don't want anything to do with the pregnancy and baby on social media, particularly facebook. You still wish for that to be the case, and should you hear about them posting the pregnancy, baby, or 'cryptic posts' they will remain on information diet. If they want to be in the know, they keep it to themselves. Set the boundary clearly now. They might wail but that's tough shit. You're the parents now.