Told my mum I’m pregnant and she won’t talk to me

[asislife]

I find out I was pregnant and at 9 weeks I decided to tell my mum as physically I was finding it difficult. I had not decided what I was going to do at the time. I had been seeing the dad on and off for almost 5years and he does not want the baby, it was unplanned.

I told my mum I was pregnant hoping for some support knowing initially she would be disappointed. I am now 13 weeks in and I’ve decided to keep my baby but my mum still won’t speak to me and has said the news has ruined her and she’s embarrassed, ashamed and my life will be very hard. She’s implied I get an abortion.

It’s upsetting because I understand I am looking at life as a single parent now which is already disheartening but I am 25 I work full time with career prospects and I finished uni (as my mum wanted) so i do have some sort of direction and I can definitely make it work although I know it will be very hard.

I do still live at home but I am prepared to move if I have to as I don’t want to burden anyone with my decision. I stay at home to save money and would like to stay at least for after the baby is here. While I understand my mums disappointment, it’s made me feel like I can’t look forward to my baby. Should I feel bad, am I wrong? I feel terrible about it. Any advice or perspective would be great

I would be disappointed too if I was your mother. When you give birth your mother would love the baby but she will always look at you and see how her own baby could have lived a much easier life and settled in a committed relationship with someone decent, established a stable loving home together and then start a family together. Being a mother isn't an easy job and especially doing it on your own. There are many threads here of how hard life it is for single mothers. Maybe she might come around wants the pregnancy feels more real?

Anyway, what's done is done and you need to focus on how you're going to parent and support your own child for the next couple of decades and the first starting point is for you to get your own place. Good luck.

I think your mum will calm down.

I do think you need to absolutely expect to move out as soon as you are able to though, I know staying at your mums once the baby is born would be ideal for you, but I think you need to live without this possibility unless it is offered - it’s a big ask for your mum (and understandably so)

however you do seem to be in a position where perhaps you do have the job stability and child care, so show your mum how you have it all planned out - independently.

Other things to consider...

• Who will provide childcare when they're too ill to go to nursery but you have to work/you're too ill to care for the baby? This will happen a lot. Especially in the first two years.
• How do you cope with lack of sleep? Some nights you won't get more than a couple of hours and there won't be any back up to let you get a break during the day.
• How will you feel about not having a relationship for a while? It's unlikely (although not impossible) that you'll meet anyone while pregnant/with a newborn, and while it doesn't make it impossible to date it definitely makes it harder, and it also narrows your pool of potentials significantly (speaking from experience)
• Have you got the upfront money to cover costs? Everything can be bought second-hand for cheaper but there is still an initial spend on buggy/cot/car seat etc.
• What is your maternity package at work? Is it enough to support you when you're renting privately?

The "you'll manage and you'll love baby and be a great mum!!!" comments are nice and all, but actually some women don't manage. In all honesty I know that I wouldn't have coped without DH. It was hard enough with him, and with a secure financial backing.

But unless you are actually subsidising your mother's housing costs, it is going to cost you an awful lot more to rent a place on your own with enough space for a baby. And your income is likely to be reduced during maternity leave.

Can you afford it?

You sound amazing. Congratulations on your achievements ! This definitely makes me feel more hopeful if you can make it, i can x

I'm sort of in your Mum's situation OP except that DD is in her late 30s and in an established relationship. But she has severe mental ill health, they live in a rented property too small to have a family and neither have secure jobs. She's 10 weeks pregnant and I worry so much for her precarious mental state. Unlike your Mum I have told DD I will support her (emotionally,not financially as I can't afford to) with whatever decision she makes.

• What would be the provisions if, (and god forbid) your child was premature or had health implications. I mean I was 22 and never thought it would happen to me, but I was only pregnant for 6 months. The cost of that was more than I could have imagined, and I needed a lot of support. I worked in a nursery - the space was there, it could have gone so well. It didn’t, I had to quit my job and be a SAHM.

(I obviously don’t want an answer, just truly another angle to consider when you’re planning x)

Can you afford to rent a place, pay the expenses, at for food, pay for childcare etc? If the answer is no, that's why your mum is upset. Child maintenance is rarely significant and it's unreliable so often. If the dad is not on board I'm not sure how you can blame her for worrying

Op, you say you pay your mum rent, but do you pay:

Half of the rent/mortgage
Half of the council tax (which is 100% not 75% of the full rate due purely to the fact you live in the house)
Half of the electric, gas, and water
Half of the internet/ phone bill
For all of your own food shopping and personal items.

If not, she is financially supporting you, either in full or in part.

I suspect you can not be paying your full share, otherwise you wouldn't be living there to save up. You are able to save up living there BECAUSE she is financially supporting you. The fact you don't understand this is leading posters to feel, like your mum, that you don't understand what it costs to run a household, especially one with a baby.

All mums would like their child to be in a stable relationship with a house before kids… it doesn’t always happen that way. I’m sure she will come around. Just wondering if there is a cultural implication or if she’s just old fashioned? My mum would have reacted the same initially and then been ok, especially once baby arrived.

you sound like you know what you want … it is going to be hard. You will have very little free time and it is tiring. I wondered what I’d done and was 30 married and own house and it is a shock to the system. I love my kids and it’s worth it imo but it’s not easy.

There's a shedload of evidence showing that a child growing up in a family with two caring parents will have a better start in life and with that better prospects than a child growing up in a single-parent home. That's largely due to money: sadly so many single parents struggle with finances and juggling work and childcare.

That's not a mean or judgmental thing to say, nor does it make me Tory scum or indicate that I think any less of parents going it alone through choice or necessity. No parent really wants to get their child's life off to a sub-optimal start. We will all know fantastic single parents who've given their child a brilliant life. Sadly we will also all know lone parents for whom the struggle has been devastatingly hard on their physical and mental health. There are single parents on here, OP, who have warned you so that you don't walk into single-parenthood with your rose-tinted goggles on.

As PP said above, what about things like emergency childcare or when your baby is too sick and won't be allowed at nursery? you do need to have a plan for these things too.

I suspect you can not be paying your full share, otherwise you wouldn't be living there to save up. You are able to save up living there BECAUSE she is financially supporting you.
I don’t understand this conclusion
mortgages are typically cheaper than rent.
rent between two is typically cheaper than rent for one.
gas and electricity, internet, subscriptions services etc between two is typically cheaper than one.
that means mum would also be getting a cheaper deal on those things
it’s perfectly possible that op is still saving and also not having her mum financially support her?

im not saying op is paying a full 50/50 split, but simply saying she isn’t or she couldn’t possibly be saving money doesn’t really make sense to me.

Have you done a plan and a budget to confirm you can make it work as a single parent? If not you should both for your own peace of mind and to show your mum you have grasped the reality of this pregnancy.

How will you fund your maternity leave?

When will you get your own place and how much will this likely cost for the deposit, rent, bills etc? Will that leave you enough to pay childcare and travel to work plus feed and clothe you both? If it's not enough are you going to qualify for Universal Credit to help with costs? Will you be able to save for a house deposit or will it now be difficult / impossible to become a homeowner?

Will you need to buy furniture along with the new baby equipment?

Have you discussed maintenance with the father? If he won't willingly pay are you going to use CMS to force him to? How long will it be before you are likely to receive payments from him and how much will that be?

What were your career aspirations for the future and are they still possible? Will you see your earnings rise in the future making it financially easier to be a single parent as your child grows up?

If you can show you have thought it all through and the sums add up then you might find you get more support from her.

I think the point is that she is saving money compared to if she were living on her own.

Even if the OP were living in a house share with a flatmate and paying 50% of all rent and bills, she would still need to consider what her increased living costs would be if she moved out of there and got her own place big enough to raise a child in, with no other adult to share the cost of the bills.

She's not going to be renting a room in a shared house with a baby, is she? She will need a whole property of her own. Of course that's going to be much more expensive than living with her mum.

I had my first at 25 and everyone told me it would be hard etc and there was abit of negativity. Actually it’s the best thing that ever happened to me.

I had a good job and my own place so slightly different as I didn’t live at home. I had a son and he taught me so much about life and I changed so much as a person because of him (in a positive way).

make sure you have some savings behind you and be prepared- family may come around once they see you can support yourself and baby. Mine did.

xx

I absolutely understand this. I did not challenge the fact

Of course but I don’t think that means her mother gets to give her silent treatment because she is ‘financially supporting her.’ She isn’t financially supporting her, certainly not at any cost to herself. But pp are suggesting she is and that op has not considered true costs of living. But Surely by op acknowledging she is ‘saving money’ she has made it quite clear she is aware that living independently would cost more..

I just think she is getting a hard time where it isn’t necessary
by all means mum should not have to live with a baby if she doesn’t want to and by all means mum doesn’t have to be thrilled about the news. But mum doesn’t get a say in what op does with regards to keeping the baby and nor should a good mother he acting or saying the things op’s mum is. I’m surprised so many people are defending it and attacking op

If you were my daughter I would ideally want you to be in a stable and supportive relationship before you had a child. Life with a baby isn't easy and it helps if there is a second parent in the house to help out with the sleepless nights, the teething and all the other caring responsibilities.

You mention that you live with your mum. But not your dad? Has your mum been a single parent? If so perhaps she can tell you about some of her experiences.

I also wonder if part of her disappointment is because, when your daughter is a single parent, a mum is usually the one called upon to help out when things get tough, baby is sick, mum isn't coping etc. if she has been a single parent she was probably looking forward to some time for herself now you are grown up and now your choice to have the baby (because it is a choice even if the pregnancy was unplanned) is going to mean she needs to be on standby for helping out. Perhaps she doesn't want a baby - even her grandchild - to live with her yet she feels she can't now ask you to leave.

You told her a month ago you were pregnant. How have you reassured her since then that you have got this and can manage without expecting her to step in and help?

"bad decisions have consequences"

She was not with you in bed thus she does not have to accept your choices in life.

You are 25, she may come around soon but do not expect her to allow you under her roof or to smile at your decisions.

Op isn’t asking her mum to raise her child.
Her mum has stopped speaking to her and has told her she’s ashamed of her. That is clearly wrong.

@asislife

I had been seeing the dad on and off for almost 5years and he does not want the baby, it was unplanned.

I would apply for child maintenance as soon as the baby is born. Check online for what CMS would formally assess your partner for. If your partner insists he won't pay or won't pay a fair amount towards his child's costs (after all he had a part in the conception) then go through CMS ASAP as, I understand, you can't back claim.

www.gov.uk/child-maintenance-service

Also ensure you claim child benefit as that will count towards your National Insurance and, further, your State Pension payments later on.

www.gov.uk/child-benefit

Also check what other benefits you might be able to claim. Speak to Citizens Advice and/or check on www.entitled to.co.uk.

Remember to claim your 25% single occupancy discount with whatever council you end up in. You can do this online.

Good luck OP. 🌹

Is your mum dependent on your rent?

Op isn’t asking her mum to raise her child.

But OP also isn't showing she has a plan about how to manage alone either financially or emotionally. OP is starting to look a bit naive - she says she will get her own place 'if I have to'. That's not adulting.

What is the situation op? How long has your mum not been talking to you has she said anything about it?
Back in the old days it was things like 'you've made your bed now like on it' or my gran said about her illegitimate brother after he passed away that it was for the best. Has mum said anything to you at all.
I find it sad that child is going to be her grandchild has she already got any.