Pregnancy and heavylifting

[photographerlady]

Hi ladies. I just found out I'm expecting and I work in events. Every few weeks we head off for an intense week of setting up stages, it's heavy lifting and 18-20 hour days. Next gig I will be 10 weeks. Worried about telling or not telling my boss. Mainly tell him I'm going to let the others unload trucks and avoid the real heavy lifting. If I don't tell him he might notice as we all muck in but if I do tell him it might be odd as technically I'm under 12 weeks and visibly not pregnant. Sounds foolish but what would you do? How would you go about having that conversation? I'm not going to overdo it and I'm pretty sure he would notice but I guess I'm worked I need to explain myself if I go to him saying I need breaks or make excuses.

You don't have to wait until 12 weeks to notify your employer of your pregnancy - many people choose to as the risk of miscarriage drops significantly following a positive 12 week scan, however there is no reason not to tell them now apart from that.

However, the risks of heavy lifting during pregnancy are causing yourself an injury due to the relaxin hormone your body produces. If you are lifting things that you have done on a regular basis then you should be fine. Alternatively if you don't want to tell him yet, can you claim you've pulled something in your shoulder or similar? Gets you out of the lifting without telling him until after your scan!

What's your relationship like with your boss? When I was pg with dd2 I had a bleed at nine weeks that resulted in an appointment and scan at the EPAU. I told mine at that point because I wanted to ensure that they understood why I was absent that morning.

Told the rest of them at 12 weeks

Personally, I wouldn't tell them you've got a bad shoulder/back: I'd be truthful.

They should do a risk assessment to make sure you are safe to do the various aspects of your job. I would tell your boss before the event and make sure the assessment is done.

I think you have got to tell them given the nature of your work. I told on my first very early due to a threatened miscarriage. I had to go to hospital appointments at the time. I also had some hazardous, to pregnancy, aspects to my job that I needed to address.

Where your role carries risks you do need to say something sooner than twelve weeks so that a risk assessment can be carried out to protect you.
I run a business that has certain aspects that are high risk for pregnant women, I had a placement student earlier this year and halfway through the placement she became 'funny' about certain aspects of the role. This created bad feeling in the team at the time. Of course later it came out she was pregnant not that I ever showed it to her, but I was cross she hadn't told me at the time I could have manipulated Rotas to hit out her in a difficult position and also cross that I might have without knowing put her in a risky position.
If you are a close team who muck in talk to your boss.

It depends on your boss. I get on well with mine, so I told him at about 8 weeks as I wanted time off for scans & appointments, but asked him to keep it to himself. He did keep it to himself entirely.