worried about paternity

[Jen8910]

Hi all just a question to ease my mind, although I am quite worried.
Split up with my husband last yr for around 3 months, ended up having a silly one night stand in this time on the 28/08/09. I found out I was pregnant mid november and was put at being 6 weeks on the 25/11/09. I have counted back numerous times and it puts my date of conception in october sometime, and i know its most likely my husbands but I just cant stop worrying about it. Im currently 37 weeks and it just keeps playing on my mind, is there any chance it could be from the one night stand that got me pregnant?! Is there anyway my ultrasounds could be out by weeks? Arghh Im so worried, reassurance needed thank you!

Your U/S said you were 6 weeks around 12 or 13 weeks after the one-night stand, is that right? So you're asking if the U/S could be out by 6-7 weeks, making you 43-44 weeks pregnant now.

No, it can't be out by that much - there's an enormous difference between a 6 week foetus and a 13 week foetus, not just size but development of limbs, etc. You're worrying needlessly.

Good luck with the birth!

No way at all. A 12 week old is so far removed from a 6 week old foetus that they don't look like the same species, as tortoiseonthehalfshell says. Google scans from it? I had a 12 week scan as I bled, and you could see a yolk sac, and then a kidney bean with a blip-blip they said was going to eventually be a heart. The 12 week scan was recognisably a weird looking babym waving little arms and legs and hands and feet. Completely different.

This baby is 100% definitely your husband's.

Sorry, sorry, middle of the night and feeding and knackered - I meant a SIX week scan due to bleeding, and then a 12 week one.

And you are v v v unlikely to be 44 weeks pregnant now, which you would be if it were the one-night stand.

Scans at 6 weeks are accurate to the nearerst couple of days. If you conceived during the one night scan you would have been 12 weeks then - no way could it be that out.

Thanks everyone, it just keeps niggling at me that maybe they're wrong, maybe the sperm stayed in my body for a bit longer! But I spose its more or less impossible isn't it? The babys definetly my husband right?! What's wrong with me!? Ha

Forgive me, but why on earth did you not use a condom?

No excuses, just was very drunk and very stupid. Now I just can't stop worrying about it and I know its my own fault but its getting me so down!

it's your husbands - sperm can only live in the body for about 3 or 4 days, and after that they degrade.

It is totally impossible for them to live for weeks! So relax, stop with the guilt and enjoy your new relationship with your husband.

Thank you everyone and thanks for not judging me!

So you were split up and had sex - hardly the crime of the century is it?!

It's over and done with and now is the time to move on and enjoy life with your husband and new baby.

Best wishes.

Would u not recommend a dna test just in case? I'm kinda comin round to the fact that its virtually impossible and I've not really worried about it all pregnancy, I read somewhere that in the last few weeks u worry endlessly about nothing! I just need to drill it into my head that my baby was concieved in october! God I'm a pain, need this baby out now! Ha

You don't need a DNA test. Truly, you don't. For a scan to be 6 weeks out is just not possible. And as someone else has said, you cannot be 44 weeks pregnant, either - that's impossible as well.

Don't worry. This is just a silly fear. Not possible. A DNA test and worry about all this now is just going to drag up a messy time and potentially harm the relationship between your husband and his - HIS - child. Let it go, and just be glad that you were lucky and didn't get pregnant at the wrong time. Enjoy your pregnancy and your baby, and let your husband do the same thing.

Thanks evryone just another question tho, if sperm can live in the body up to a week how long does implantation take?

Love, you would be 45 weeks pregnant now! You're not gestating a baby elephant!

Sperm can live up to 6 or 7 days in the most ideal conditions, but some sources put it more like 5 days. Either way, they can't impregnate you unless an egg is released as well.

Implantation (where the new clump of cells, called a blastocyst at that point, attaches to the wall of the womb) takes place between 6 and 12 days after ovulation; or, about a week after the point at which the sperm and egg join.

So at maximum: you have sex, the sperm hang around for up to 7 days at which point you ovulate. The one weak remaining spermotozoa, hanging on for grim death, manages to impregnate the egg. The cells start dividing and multiplying, but are still free-floating at this point. Around a week later - so, at maximum two weeks after the sperm enters the body - the blastocyst attaches to the womb. This is the point at which the bodty starts producing the hormone hCG, and some early pregnancy tests show a positive.

(As an aside, many many egg-sperm combos don't ever attach, and are merely expelled by the body in the manner of a period. This is why the whole idea of when conception occurs is so contentious. But I digress).

Did you not have a period in August or September?

No your right I'm sorry my minds all over the show, I did a silly thing by googling and some sites have told me that sperm can live for two weeks then implantation can also take two weeks! Its crazy as I've not even thought about it all pregnancy but it just keeps going round in my head!
Anyway I shall stop being so bloody stupid now and concentrate on the birth of mine and my husbands baby! Sorry!

You're not annoying me at all, I promise. I'm gently teasing you.

Implantation can take two weeks, but that doesn't mean that you conceived four weeks after having sex. Implantation happens 7-12 days after sperm meets egg. Ultrasound dating doesn't date from implantation, but from sperm-meets-egg (plus two weeks) so it doesn't matter when it actually attaches to the womb. I know where you're going with this, but it's a total red herring.

But really, did you not have a period in August or September?

End of sept yeah I would of already had one in august before I had sex, I just can't seem to get it out of my head but your right shouldn't google things tho, I assumed that it was dated from after implantation! I just wouldn't want to be wrong about it and do that to my husband but your right I just needed reassuring!

Your reassurance can be the fact that as tortoise says, you can't possibly be 45 weeks pregnant!

They date a pregnancy from the last menstrual period or 14 days before you ovulated (guesstimate). So if you were told it was a 6 week pregnancy on 25/11, your conception date - as in, sperm-meets-egg - was probably in reality around 1/11, and your last period before that would have been mid-October.

Implantation isn't measurable and a pregnancy can't be dated from there.

You don't have a period between sperm-meets-egg and implantation, either, so if you had a period in September then you cannot have been pregnant prior to that. And by that I mean sperm cannot have met egg prior to that.

I'm hesitating over whether to say this, because I know you're panicking and heavily pregnant and all of those things, but here it is anyway:

This is very, very basic biology stuff.

A period is the body expelling an unfertilised egg. Therefore you can't have had a fertilised egg prior to the period in September. Did you not get taught about periods in basic sex ed in school?
And, how did you not know when they date a pregnancy from? Did your GP/MW not explain this to you?

I'm not having a go, but honestly if you are so worried about something like this, it suggests to me that you have never been told anything about reproductive biology, or how a pregnancy happens and works. Which makes me wonder how much anyone's explained to you about the birth itself? I'm concerned that you're not getting basic information about your body.