“I didn’t know I was pregnant”
No, not me. This TV show on TLC.
I watched it last night. And lest you think this was some sort of joke, let me say the show was in deadly earnest—and quite fascinating.
How could these women have been so stupid, you ask? Easy. Almost all of them were somewhat heavy to begin with (although only one was what you might call obese, and she was not so very obese at that). They gained very little weight during their pregnancies, and several actually lost weight.
All of the women had a history of very irregular cycles, and so the absence of a normal period was normal for them. Quite a few of them also had spotting during their pregnancies, which they interpreted as their own typically irregular cycles. Some had been previously told they were infertile. One had had two negative pregnancy tests. And most of them had very few other symptoms of pregancy, such as nausea.
In fact, their very first symptom was usually labor, which they interpreted as some deathly illness—and which in several cases sent them screaming to the ER. One woman, on hearing there for the first time that she was pregnant and about to deliver, thought (as they were frantically wheeling her to the delivery room), “What kind of hospital is this? How can they be so stupid?”
A few moments later—a full-term baby was in her arms.
My wife works with a woman who was 5 months pregnant before finding out.
The woman is not obese, but she is over 6 feet tall and gained no weight up until the month before she found out she was pregnant.
Upon first meeting her, I found it hard to believe she was even pregnant as she didn’t look it!
Of course, she also unknowingly skipped the first half of the pregnancy along with the generally unpleasant side effects….lol…so she was content with that arrangement.
As the father of five children, I have very vivid memories of the times during each of my ex-wife’s pregnancies when she would tell me to put my hand in a specific place so that I could feel the unborn child moving around. Usually the moving could also be seen. I assume this happens in all pregnancies, so wouldn’t these women have felt the same thing and been made aware that this was not just a case of indigestion or something? Even with obesity, it would seem to me that the internal movements of a child in the womb would still be felt. I know if I felt something moving inside me I would first think of the movie “Alien” and then head for the nearest ER!
Dan Janousek: No, it most definitely does not happen in most pregnancies. Some babies are very inactive. Also, some women carry more internally (in the case of one of these women the umbilical cord and placenta were mostly in front, apparently, acting as a sort of frontal cushion) and whatever movement does happen is not perceived by the woman as fetal movement at all.
It was so interesting, I couldn’t stop watching. I especially enjoyed the lady who had lost her call center job and was fighting her “depression/pregnancy symptoms” by helping her in-laws lug around bags of concrete mix and paver blocks!
Lol…..That’d make for an interesting ER visit. I wonder if the delivery cost is a lot more.
neo-neocon: Thanks for the info. Being a man trapped in a male body, I could not speak from experience, obviously. Also, consider myself fortunate to have been able to feel my children moving before birth. And now that I have your info on the subject, I guess it is possible not to know one is pregnant until labor actually starts. Must be a very traumatic experience for the woman involved.
neo,
Not knowing you’re pregnant is surprisingly common.
My most vivid personal anecdote of a medical encounter with this phenomenon dates back to my internship at the University of Oregon. In the middle of the night, while on call for the medicine service, I got a call from the ED that a woman had come in screaming in pain and speaking only German. Someone remembered — why, I don’t know — seeing me reading a copy of Das Glasperlenspiel, and called me in.
I asked the woman, who was lying on her back on a gurney with her knees up, and a sheet thrown over her, Was ist los?, to which she replied (evidently as surprised as the rest of us) that she was about to deliver a baby. With her consent, I gently began an examination, just in time to catch (what turned out to be) a baby boy, who was, at that very moment, “crowning.”
Jamie Irons
Sorry, only Was ist los? should be italicized; I forgot to close the tag.
Jamie Irons
Please forgive me for I am a woman merely trapped in a woman’s body. While I will never be as smart and well-read and articulate as Neo, I can honestly say I don’t buy this one. I don’t buy the belief that a woman can carry a baby full term and not have some serious suspicions that there’s a life inside her. Sorry to lapse into such dissension. OK, so let’s say she’s 100 pounds over-weight or she’s been on drugs that cause her stomach to Twitter, or has had a lobotomy. But short of some extreme disconnection with herself and her femaleness, I simply don’t buy this.
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I think what has been displayed is the sad state of affairs within our society concerning educating these women about learning an important part of their being human females. Their lack of understanding about female biology and themselves demonstrates the degradation of familial responsibility for the mentoring of ones offspring.
Not only these women, but people in general continue to display their inability to question generically triggered responses encountered in our everyday world and don’t give it a second thought. Things such as going to a doctor and being told you have an allergy, which simply means the doctor has no idea what is wrong with you, should be challenge on its face and further input sought. The Greek aphorism “know thyself” means more than our behavior, morals, and thought. In particular we need to be in tune with our body/mind sync. I can remember being a young recently graduated OCS officer newly stationed with my eighteen-year old bride. Once I had to urgently take her to the post emergency room, and request for her to be examined for abdominal pains. after which she was sent home with a bottle of Mydol. Thank god she had been sexually educated by mom and two older sisters, my bride insisted that Mydol was not the solution, that something was really wrong. I being naive and sexually educated by my father with a one line phrase” never do it with anyone you wouldn’t want to marry”, didn’t even know what Mydol was at nineteen but trusted her instincts. Taking her back to the hospital for another once over, I adamantly demanded that they had missed something which resulted in getting this new “butter bar” paraded onto the carpet of the Hospital Emergency Physician. He patronizingly dressed me down and lectured me about the “young female menstrual dilemma” in front of a subordinate hospital staff to which I responded in such a manner that I was threatened with a court marshal for disrespect , then sent away with my now doubled over in pain child bride, and more Mydol. Upon leaving post I found the first local physician office nearby and begged he examine her. Within fifteen minutes thereafter she was on her way to County General with an erupting tubular pregnancy the size of a grapefruit. At the hospital I was informed that 30 minutes more may have resulted in the loss of her life. As it is she lost her right fallopian tube and we lost a partially developed young male child. Socially families have ignored the responsibility of educating our young as we alone should do. The Greek aphorism ” know thyself” pertains to more than behavior, morals, and thought. It also pertains in particular to the “bio-physiological awareness we all have but need to cultivate from within, starting with family educational responsibility. Unfortunately as displayed by these women in the expose’ people are consumed with outside distraction to such a degree that they have become lost in a place unto itself. Families no longer teach the attributes most important in self survival and awareness and of loving ones self. Society no longer wants individuals to know how to rely on these attributes. It is more to its convenience to rely on it, and be vulnerable to its misconceptions of human behavior.
I don’t know that society in general cares whether we rely on certain attributes or not. But I will say that I knew, absolutely knew I was pregnant every time within 10 days at most of getting pregnant. It wasn’t an intellectual process. But rather physiological, psychological, spiritual change that started happening which were undeniable, long, long before going to the doctor and having tests that confirm what I already knew in my heart. And body. And soul.
Which reminds me of the woman who said that when she told her mother that she was pregnant, the mother replied PREGNANT? What the heck were you DOING???
When my son was being born (in the mid-80s) a woman came to the same hospital to give birth…she was heavy, and didn’t know she was pregnant until she went into labor. Sheesh… 🙁
So these women did remember having sex, they are in excruciating pain, there’s even blood coming from somewhere down below — and being pregnant NEVER entered their minds? You know, a full term baby usually results in your uterus becoming very full and hard as a rock. Contractions are severe and unmistakably different from anything I’ve ever felt before. I find it extremely difficult to believe that these women don’t notice the extreme physiological changes in their bodies. I’ve heard these stories off and on for years. If they honestly had no idea, then they are alarmingly ill-informed…or just plain dumb.
This is even a plot idea at the end of the first season of Mad Men.
lol, good one… I saw one like “I had threesome, who’s the baby’s father??”
Deborah: you can find it hard to believe if you want, but I don’t. Remember: many of these women had had sex for years and never gotten pregnant. They had had irregular (or absent) periods that did not seem to change—they still had what looked to be irregular (or absent) periods while pregnant. They felt fine, for the most part. They did not gain weight. They did not look pregnant. They did not feel pregnant. In quite a few cases, they went to the doctor for minor ailments and pregnancy was not suspected by the doctor. In one case, the woman had been pregnant before and she said the experience had been entirely different, with lots of symptoms. Husbands/lovers did not suspect it, and they saw these women naked. People carry their babies differently; these womens’ uteruses seemed to be placed more internally. The people did not sound stupid when they talked; it sounded quite plausible.
By the way, I had a friend who had been born under similar circumstances. Her mother, an intelligent woman, had been told she was infertile her whole life. She got pregnant during menopause, when she was around fifty. She only gained a few pounds, and ascribed whatever very minor symptoms she did feel to menopause. At a certain point she went to the doctor and was told she was over seven months pregnant. She delivered two weeks later—my friend-to-be. Believe me, no one was the least bit stupid in that situation.
My Aunt found out she was pregnant in her late 40’s in nearly the same way as the case Neo described (six or seven months into it, though she delivered almost to the day on schedule). This was her third kid so I’m willing to bet she knew what being pregnant felt like. Even after the doctor first informed her it took a while before she “knew” (as in felt) like it was actually a pregnancy, though once the diagnosis was given she did all the correct medical/living adjustments.
In fact, amongst the other odd things she gave birth naturally and said it was relatively painless, that she has cramps that were worse (and no, there were no pain killers used).
So I also believe it can happen. Not every birth works the same.
I didn’t watch the show, forgot it was on. I was wondering from seeing the commercials how, or if, this affected the type of bonding that mothers typically feel for their child? I can’t imagine that if you give birth in that method that you have the same feelings that a normal pregnancy would give – at least initially I would assume confusion would be the strongest feeling.
strcpy: In all the cases the parents seem to adore their children. They seemed to think of the kids almost as miracle children.
Growing up on a farm this sort of thing was rare. All of male, and female, children and grownups were aware of natural processes. There is a great variety among female mammals in how they carry during pregnancy and the kind of hormonal and mental changes they go through. Urbanize humans and distract them with TV and Twitter and I’m not surprised that they have no connection to their existence as creatures. They have self concepts that have nothing to do with their biological potential and self esteem which has nothing to do with reality. No wonder they are surprised when life actually occurs.
What bothers me here, Neo, is not that this kind of thing doesn’t rarely, rarely happen as an anomaly. It obviously does. But what bothers me is that you argue for it being entirely plausible. To me is the height of silliness.
Webutante: The height of silliness? I think you are ignoring the evidence I have offered here.
People often believe that they couldn’t be fooled like that, and that therefore anyone who is fooled is a fool. Just because you or I (or most women) experience lots of symptoms during pregnancy, it’s a fallacy to think others’ experiences are all the same.
I repeat: some women do not show at all. Some women have no symptoms. And if a woman is using birth control, for example, or has been told by a doctor she is infertile, and has no symptoms, why would she ever think she is pregnant? And even if she goes into labor, all she feels is horrible pain the likes of which she’s never felt before. Why should she assume she is giving birth? Mental set—prior knowledge and expectations—greatly influences how we perceive things.
In one of these cases, the woman was in labor in the hospital, and even the doctors there who examined her did not know she was in labor and about to give birth. They only discovered she was pregnant because they did a battery of blood tests, and they assumed she was early in her pregnancy.
Thanks Neo for always presentinig your side with lots of clear headed evidence. I still see this whole thing as something that seldom happens which is highly implausible and almost inexplicable. Perhaps all this Obama blogging has made us all a little nuts that we could be having this conversation in the first place.
In all events, best wishes.
Webutante: Yes, let’s blame Obama! He made us do it 🙂 !
(And he made me put that smiley face in there, too.)
Yes! I’m on my way to the ob-gyn just to make sure…..
People often believe that they couldn’t be fooled like that, and that therefore anyone who is fooled is a fool. Just because you or I (or most women) experience lots of symptoms during pregnancy, it’s a fallacy to think others’ experiences are all the same.
We are a flawed species, Neo. Full of foolish dreams and logical fallacies deep in the cavity of the human condition.
But unlike the Obamas and the George Carlins of the world, some still believe we are worth saving, that we still have a purpose and destiny to achieve.
Believe me, no one was the least bit stupid in that situation.
Could be a recessive gene from the barbarian steppes, Neo, or from the central heart of Afrika. Heard they gave birth like animals in the field. Just squat and plob it comes, so survival conditioned was the people ; )
Ymarsakar: Actually, I’ve read some science about that (too busy right now to look for a link). In more isolated and homogeneous populations, head size of the baby was more standard, and women were selected by evolution to have the right pelvis size to deliver those particular babies (wihout so much medical intervention, those who had difficulty died before giving birth, and therefore did not pass their genes to offspring). And so childbirth actually was more likely to be physiologically easier in such populations.
Well, I found out last night that I’m between one and three months along.
Had no idea– highly irregular cycle, no symptoms of pregnancy, had a few symptoms that were totally consistent with what I’ve had happen before in times of stress.
I still wouldn’t know if I wasn’t paranoid by nature about not risking any child I may carry, and test before I plan to do anything that might expose said child to risk– I have some work coming up that is no problem for a normal woman, but can really hurt a kid.
Another problem these ladies might have is that a lot of the symptoms are so similar to stress-interrupted cycles. (I believe there’s a school of thought that the body mimics pregnancy if you’ve got too much stress– kinda like a depo shot)
My mom never had any pregnancy symptoms– or even cramps in her cycle.
Her little sister curses her about that every month. ^.^
My first baby was very wanted and hoped for, but if not for the doctor watching over me, I would not have known I was pregnant until about 7 months or later. We’d been trying for years and I had mostly given up and was thinking about other things at the time.
I’d never had more than one or two periods a year, so I didn’t wonder about missing those. I was still a skinny young twig wearing the same tight-fitted clothes, I wasn’t sick, I wasn’t tired, I didn’t gain weight. The doctors had told me I was likely sterile for some unknown reason and to get a job, go back to school, find other things to be committed to, maybe think about adopting someday.
Based on his eventual birth weight of almost nine pounds, at seven months I probably had a four pound baby sharing those 26″ waistbands with me!
I was just dumbfounded when I felt him move around. Seven weeks later I had a fast labor and a big healthy son. If I hadn’t been under regular medical supervision, if I hadn’t been so thin to start with, if I hadn’t grown up in the country seeing animals go through pregnancies totally oblivious, if I hadn’t been an athlete who was in pretty good sync with her body….. I might not have known until I gave birth.
So I for one can certainly understand how it happens. To balance out the argument, though, after the first baby I caught on to the game and always knew right away. I really doubt a woman who’d already had several children would get caught out like this. But who knows? A few small children can tire you out so totally you could sleep through the conception, even the labor. I’ve seen it happen.
My first son required six years of infertility treatments and finally IVF.
My second son would be one of these IF I hadn’t come down with a really bad cold and my doctor hadn’t insisted on a pregnancy test before giving me antibiotics.
How could it happen?
Well, my first son I “knew” the day I got pregnant (not that obvious. We’d tried IVF before. This was our last chance) and though my symptoms weren’t particularly bothersome, they were there. Plus the minute he “quickened” he never STOPPED. He moved constantly. Also I carried him very high, so as he grew he pushed on my lungs.
I had him and then four years passed with no other baby, despite us taking NO precautions. (We wanted a large family.)
With my second son
a) I had breakthrough bleeding right on schedule very close to a period for the first seven months. Maybe a little light, but when you’re fairly sure you’re infertile, you don’t think of that.
b)We were MOVING and I spent days till the wee hours loading, carrying, etc. boxes No problems.
c)I lost weight. Actually throughout the pregnancy I lost close to 15 lbs. I still have no idea why. I wasn’t dieting.
d) the only palpable symptom was sleepiness, but we were moving and besides I came down with a cold.
e) there was no movement. None. In fact, after the test and until the ultrasound, I was convinced I would have a still birth. Turns out the kid was born with one eyebrow missing from rubbing on the side of the uterus and not changing positions. He’s just very lazy. (Still is, though getting better. :D)
If my husband hadn’t DRAGGED me to the doctor, because he thought the cold was lasting too long and if the doctor hadn’t demanded I have a pregnancy test (all the while I was laughing and saying “I don’t GET pregnant.”) I would have gone the other almost three months in blissful ignorance.
My clothing size never changed.
The worst part is that if it had happened, I probably would have delivered wherever I happened to be, because the pains were slightly less than bad period cramps and the whole birth took slightly less than an hour. In fact, when I went to the hospital I went to be induced (He was three weeks late) and found I was already in labor. I had no idea.
Oh, and I grew up in a rural community and my grandmother was a midwife. So it’s not like I didn’t know the symptoms. It was just incredibly atypical and I thought I couldn’t have kids without treatment.
I thought of another thing– most of these women probably have been on some form of birth control for most of their adult lives.
I know most of the girls in my class at school were, by about age 16.
This may blunt their body’s reactions, as well as making them unfamiliar with a normal cycle *and* making them sure that they “can’t possibly be pregnant.”
I can thank God for about anything that doesn’t kill me. It’s a tough world, after the Fall. There is a Jewish prayer in which a man thanks God for not making him a woman; I would particularly like to thank Him for not making me large and naive, whether male or female.
I don’t see how women on here can say “I don’t buy this.” How would you know? You aren’t in their place. You’re not obese and on medications and such… One lady had just started Depo shots and was pregnant. Now why would she know that she’s pregnant if hormonal injections can give you symptoms just like pregnancy? You might have felt like it in your mind, body, and soul but everyone is not like you. I believe this can happen just as phantom pregnancy can happen. I wish they would do a show on that topic! Some female’s bodies carry on like they are having a baby when they aren’t! The mind can play horrible tricks on the body. (That’s why there’s the saying mind over matter.) If their bodies carry on like they’re having normal day-to-day symptoms then who are we to say they were in denial or being ignorant?
I was 2 months pregnant without knowing. I have a condition called P.C.O.S. which is caused from a hormone imbalance. I constantly felt tired but that was it. Due to my condition, I am lucky to have my cycle 2x a year and I was told I couldn’t get pregnant if I’m not menstrating.. I did however take 3 pregnancy tests all coming back negative. I had no other symptoms. I had a son 9 years previous so I know what it feels like to be pregnant. I didn’t find out I was pregnant until the day my baby, who I desperately wanted for years,fell out of me and died. Was I arrogant? Stupid? In denial? I would give anything to have felt this baby growing and had the opportunity to have had givin birth. People need to account for the other conditions these woman are having because most of us want these babies, and for these rare few, they are very lucky.
I think you guys are a little nuts…chill out.
I think the ignorance lies not in the women who supposedly were out of touch with their bodies and didn’t know they were pregnant, but in those who can’t fathom the possibility that this can happen. FYI – not every body is the same, not every pregnancy is the same. I’ve known women who had terrible morning sickness and breast tenderness during their first pregnancy and absolutely NO symptoms but a missed period the second time around. If your body functions like clockwork, GOOD FOR YOU. But don’t you dare judge or deny the existence of women whose bodies aren’t as predictable as yours just because, oh, uh, it hasn’t happened to YOU. WAKE UP and grow some brains!
It happened to us, and we were not aware that my wife (girlfriend at the time) was pregnant until I took her to the ER (and I didn’t find out until later that morning because it was the early a.m. and, at the time, I was not legally family). I do understand that it is hard to believe that one would have no idea until the day of pregnancy, but it does happen as I can attest to that from personal experience.
First, my wife (who, at the time was my live-in girlfriend, but I will refer to her as my wife going forward) was a larger woman at the time (a size 12 to 14), but not obese. She was also on birth control pills throughout the pregnancy, which contributed to irregular cycles and spotting.
Morning sickness may have been attributed to a cold or bout of the flu going through her workplace at the time.
She carried our daughter more internally, so she did not show as would normally be expected.
What may have been movement was interpretted as gallstones, which she has had trouble with in the past. She did not have insurance at the time, so she did not go to the doctor over any intermittent discomfort.
At about six or seven months into the pregnancy, we had to take my wife to the doctor for an ankle injury. They needed to take an x-ray to make sure that nothing was broken, and the technician asked, I’m sure in part due to the fact that she had already disclosed that she was on birth control pills, “I assume I can check the ‘Not Pregnant’ box?”
Easter was two-and-a-half-weeks prior to our daughter’s birth, and no one in her family noticed. My wife is one of a dozen children, and not the first to be a mother. If nothing else, I can guarantee that a few of my brothers-in-law would have definitely given her the “Do you have a bun in the oven?” grief if she was showing considerably more weight than normal. They were all shocked when they found out that she gave birth just a few weeks later.
We were at a party one-and-a-half weeks prior to our daughter’s birth, and no one noticed anything about my wife’s appearance that made them wonder if she was pregnant. Like my in-laws, they were all very shocked that the woman that they were hanging out with less than two weeks earlier was pregnant.
I know that it seems unbelievable. Hell, you should try living through it. The hardest thing wasn’t adjusting to the beautiful little baby that was now a part of my life; instead, it was the instant change in lifestyle, spending, and the need to get everything that one would normally get over several months in the period of only a couple of days.
It was even harder for my wife. It quickly got to the point that she stopped telling people the story because she got fed up with the, “I can’t believe you didn’t know,” statements or the, “Were you just trying to get him to marry you?” questions. She also began to question her own cycles and any perceived symptoms.
There was one point in our seven years of marriage that followed my daughter’s birth that I asked my wife if she was sure that she wasn’t pregnant. I have never even once considered asking that question again.
Believe it or not, it does happen. Either way, I know that I have the wonderful result of an unknown pregnancy asleep just down the hall from me, curled up with her favorite teddy bear and waiting for one last day of school to be gone before the weekend starts. She is the greatest surprise that I have ever received, and it is just another way that she is the most special little girl in the whole world.
They are telling lies. These women are either telling lies or they are in extreme denial. How bout the one where the lady sits on the toilet and thinks she pooped but got up to find a baby? LIES… ABSOLUTE RUBBISH. YOU MEAN TO TELL ME YOU DIDN’T NOTICE SOMETHING PASSING THROUGH YOUR VAGINA AS OPPOSED TO YOUR RECTUM? Absolutely nothing but women either telling lies or being in denial about the pregnancy in hopes it will go away. Trash. These women don’t deserve the children. Women who deny their own pregnancy have serious mental issues. The ONLY EXCUSE for this would be a tremendously obease woman. On the show there was a woman who was MAYBE A SIZE 4 who didn’t know she was about to have TWINS. SHENANIGANS! Such a load of crap. People will watch anything on TV.
Joe Mayo: You certainly seem worked up about this issue. I have no idea why. And please forgive me for saying that you’re hardly the expert on women and their vaginas and what they might perceive or not perceive in relation to them, since I am assuming you lack one (a vagina, that is, not a woman).
Funny thing, though—these women not only didn’t know they were pregnant, but their husbands and/or boyfriends didn’t know either, nor did the medical personal they encountered along the way. In some cases, the woman was in the emergency room about to give birth and the medical professionals didn’t know until they did a pelvic and ultrasound, or even in some cases until the baby popped out, that the woman was pregnant. What’s more, in all these cases, the parents loved the babies once the babies had arrived, and seem to be raising the kids just fine.