What was your reaction to finding out you or your partner's unplanned pregnancy?

I was 20 and had been dating my boyfriend for about 5 months when I found out I was pregnant. I was shocked. Of course I wasn’t ready for a child at such a young age. My boyfriend had also been told he would more than likely never father any children after an accident he was in several years before. What shocked me even more was the reaction from my boyfriend when I told him. He was excited! I couldn’t believe it. I thought for sure he would run.

My boyfriend became my husband 5 months later. We have been married for 20 years now and our son is a junior in college. We also have another son that just started college and a daughter in 3rd grade. The odds have been against us this whole time, but we managed to survive and give our children a happy home.

lol… a day late and you call that a scare? :P

I’ve thankfully not been faced with this scenario, although I too have had several scares in my life (usually a week or more late rather than a day, lol). While it would be incredibly poor timing right now, I am on much more stable footing (as is my current partner) in our lives, and we would genuinely be able to care for a child, as opposed to say a few years ago while we were still in college. I dunno how it would play out though. I didn’t plan on having kids until at least 30 (3 years away), and she doesn’t want to have a biological child period. Neither of us is opposed to abortion, but given that it wouldn’t severely screw up our lives or lead to the kid having a less than stellar childhood, it would be a decision for sure.

Guess I should just count my blessings that I’ve not been put in that place to date.

It’s not uncommon for a period to be a day or a few days late when you’re been having intercourse. That said, if you had this scare, it’s a warning to you to start using birth control, or else next time it won’t be just a scare and you’ll have some serious decision making to do.

Remember, this was almost 40 years ago. We stopped birth control and just let nature take its course. I was surprised, scared, and happy all at the same time. My wife, a maternity nurse knew what was going to happen and was just concerned that she was properly drugged during the process. The idea of a “natural childbirth” was and still is abhorrent to her.

When my wife was found to pregnant 25 years ago it was a way out of the dog house for me at the time. After destroying my left arm in a grisly dirt bike wreck she was plenty pissed at me. This gave us something else to focus on. Apparently my sperm was a better rider than I was at the time. Not so any more

@jonsblond left out the part where she let me know she was pregnant when I came staggering in around 3 am. I was presented with a white stick bearing a ‘plus’ symbol and the question, “You know what this means, don’t you?”.

I said, “I’m really drunk right now. Let’s talk about it after I get some sleep.”

The rest of it went exactly like she related it to you above.

@jonsblond . . . like the other two were planned. love you baby.

@Blondesjon I try to only remember the good times, love.

I was 19, and in a pretty new relationship when it happened. I came unhinged, to be honest. Having grown up with a single mom who had me at 19, I saw my future becoming the mirror of my mother’s life – and my child’s future mirroring my life, and it was terrifying. We were dirt poor, she was miserable, I’d been abused… it wasn’t a pretty picture, that’s for sure.

I was torn between the logical idea of aborting, and the fact that if my mother had done so, I wouldn’t even be here to make this decision. My mother said that while abortion wasn’t for her, she thought it was the best thing to do in my case. My boyfriend voted for abortion, but said he’d support whatever decision I made. Every time I saw a baby, or heard a baby, I cried. Trying to decide what to do was agony.

Long story short(er), sometime before 8 weeks, I ended up in the emergency room with horrible pain in my stomach, and they thought I might be miscarrying. Due to my age, they asked me if they should try to save the pregnancy, and I was finally forced to make a choice. I said “No”, and sobbed my head off. As it turned out, I wasn’t having a miscarriage, but the fact that I’d been forced to choose in the moment let me see what my course of action should be. My boyfriend accompanied me and I had the abortion. It was heartbreaking, and still is sometimes, but I still think it was the wisest choice for us at the time.

The boyfriend and I ended up getting married a year later, and eight years after that, we started having planned children. Three wonderful daughters, who’ve had a much better childhood than I did. Even though we’re now divorced (after 17 years of marriage), we still work hard to be good parents to our children.

@jonsblond and @Blondesjon I’m so glad it worked out for you guys. <3

We were not using any sort of prevention, so when I got sick a few weeks after we were married, everyone thought I was pregnant, and we were all happy. The baby was born 10 months later, two weeks before our first anniversary, so I was actually sick with the flu at first, just as I told them.

22 years ago, I was 24 and started graduate school on Monday and confirmed that I was pregnant on Wednesday. My boyfriend was 31, had been at his job for several years. We had been dating for nearly 4 years and we planned to get married once I was out of school and established in my career. Needless to say, I was terrified. Everyone asked what we were going to do. I didn’t know. The following Monday, I went to my academic advisor’s office with my head hung low and told her. She said, “Congratulations!!!” I was taken aback. She was the first person that said that, which gave me hope that maybe it could work out.

My boyfriend and I decided to get married, since we were planning on doing it anyway. I took my full course load those fall and spring semesters, and my professors gave me extensions for projects. I finished my last final exam of the spring on Monday, and gave birth on Friday. I delayed my practicum and went part time for the second half of the program. In hindsight, it was for the best, because I really had a lot of time to spend with my son during the first year while he was nursing. I worked part-time until he was 3 years old. We were broke because they started collecting my student loan while during my second year—I was part time, the bank didn’t care that I also had a newborn.