Telling Your Parents You’re Pregnant….Again

Dear MrsM-My fiance and I just had our first baby (a boy, who was unplanned) in August about two weeks after my 18th birthday.  Our families had a hard time at first, but now they get along great with the idea of having a grandson.  The problem is we just found out that we are four weeks pregnant again!  I can’t believe it!  Does this happen to a lot of other people?  What do we tell our families? Help!

Take a deep breath.  Actually, yes, this does happen to quite a few people-one of my sisters and I are 12 months and 4 days apart!  It happens for many different reasons.  Some women believe that you can’t get pregnant while you’re breastfeeding…and a lot of women with children 15 months apart will tell you how untrue that is!  There are also women who believe you can’t get pregnant because of your hormone levels after you have your baby-essentially saying that your body will still think it’s pregnant and stop you from getting pregnant again.  This is also VERYuntrue.  In fact, some studies show that the opposite is true and that a woman is actually at her most fertile directly after childbirth.  Then, of course, there are those who believe that you can’t get pregnant again after pregnancy until you get your first period.  This belief has lead to a lot of super-close-in-age babies since conception actually happens when you ovulate, and ovulation almost always comes beforeyour period….well, you see the problem with that.  You are definitely not alone in your situation!

As for how to tell your families, that is up to you.  I would say though, that honesty is the best policy.  Once you and your fiance have talked about it and feel comfortable and ready, I would just invite your parents over for lunch and let them know.  They’ll find out eventually anyway, right?  They may be upset, but remind them that your son was a surprise at one point….and look how well that turned out!

Good luck, and congrats on both of your babies!