Why I Waited So Long to Announce That I Was Expecting

On May 16, 2019, my husband and I found out that I was pregnant. This pregnancy came as a complete surprise and was not in my personal "plans" at the time. We were not actively trying, but also weren't careful enough to prevent obviously. By May, I was only 3 months removed from deployment if that counts for anything. Other than that, it was just God's plan. After 39 weeks of mostly pregnancy bliss, our beautiful baby boy was born on

January 13, 2020. Many of our friends and family felt like my pregnancy zoomed by, but that's because by the time they found out about it, I was nearly halfway to the finish line already! We waited over 4 months to announce that we were expecting...even to our parents.

So here's the scoop. Our son, Jaithan, is our little rainbow baby. A "rainbow baby" is a baby that is born after a loss. In 2017, my husband and I were expecting and that pregnancy resulted in a miscarriage. At the time, we were not married and still just dating. That loss was detrimental, it was heartbreaking and it almost broke our relationship as well. The most compelling reason I desired and intended to wait to share the news of my next pregnancy was because of the tragedy of having experienced a miscarriage before. The first 12 weeks of pregnancy is such a critical time, as miscarriages are more prevalent and most likely to occur within that time. When I was expecting in 2017, the news of the pregnancy had been shared amongst my family (thanks to my mom) and a few of my friends (thanks to me). Likely, when at 11 weeks I found out in the emergency room that my baby lacked a heartbeat and had stopped growing at 8 weeks gestation, sharing the news of our baby not making it was inevitable. But when it came to sharing that I was expecting in 2017, once I confided in my parents with this information, my mom's excitement led to her decision to disclose this information to my aunts (her sisters) and quite a few of my cousins, without my knowing or permission until after the deed was done. It was shared so fast it almost could have made my head spin. My family and friends shared in the excitement of the news and I started getting congratulatory messages left and right. It was blissful but short lived. Seeing my family members'  xcitement even came as a real shock to me, for the fact that my family is full of devout Christians and considering that my partner and I weren't married at the time (although it's not like I was the first in the family to ever get pregnant outside of the sanctity of traditional marriage). However, I still remember expressing my surprise about their excitement to my mom and her saying, "well they know you aren't a little girl anymore, you're grown." When tragedy struck though, they shared in my grief as well and their support never wavered. I received just as much reassurance, comforting messages, and prayers. Even with their outpouring of love and support of the good news - my pregnancy - and then the bad news  thereafter - my miscarriage - just in case things didn't work out the next time around, I decided I was going to wait until I at least escaped the first trimester before I told anyone, no matter the circumstances. It was a ME thing. It had everything to do with my personal inhibitions rather than with anybody else's actions. Though I appreciated the prayers, the check ins, the visits, etc that I received as a result of losing my baby, I didn't want a do over of the excitement from everyone followed by the outpouring sympathy, in the event things didn't work out again this time. So when it came to sharing something so special to us (and special for a number of reasons), I essentially wanted more control of the situation. To that end, after the miscarriage, I decided the next time I was expecting pregnant, I wasn't going to tell a soul, other than the person with whom my baby was conceived (in my case, my husband), at least until we made it past the first trimester. I was determined to do it MY way this time. Because I had experienced miscarriage before though, I actually lived most of this pregnancy in fear, but it didn't stop me.

We did not intend to get pregnant as early in 2019 as it happened because our calendar was already marked with other significant events for 2019, namely my bachelorette weekend and our big wedding. As bad as I wanted a little human, I still had my own ideas of how and when that should happen and by now I should have learned a major lesson in making plans, especially when God isn't in on them. Nevertheless, as far as an ideal timeline for conceiving, we had discussed waiting until after our wedding in August. On multiple occasions, I shared with my husband that I wanted to thoroughly "enjoy" the bachelorette trip and the wedding. I was anticipating the turn up that was to take place at both events, especially after returning from a 6-month deployment in a dry country overseas... Needless to say, I intended for most of the year to be a LITuation! But as luck would have it, pregnancy stopped that right in its tracks. Furthermore, because certain activities were to occur on my bachelorette trip, keeping my pregnancy a secret from my friends who attended wasn't exactly possible nor realistic. My girls eventually caught on to the fact that I was ducking and dodging adult beverages, even in my failed attempts to be discreet about it. But I mean, how discreet can you be when people are constantly offering to buy you drinks because the goal is to get you slammed and you're denying free drinks? My friends aren't blind or stupid; plus if you're someone who is known to usually partake, it's practically impossible for people not to notice when you aren't. Making the announcement to them was circumstantially necessary; and I intended for any subsequent announcements that had to be made before I intended to share the news with the masses, to be made under similarly compelling circumstances. As a result of their newfound knowledge, they were sworn to secrecy going forward. Fortunately, the plan I devised with my husband for us to keep our pregnancy under wraps remained pretty solid outside of the people on that trip.

Maintaining such a high level of secrecy proved difficult and even became stressful for me. The joy and excitement combined with a very active social life are credited for that difficulty, but I stuck to my guns and my husband was always on board with the idea. We decided that we would finally make the grand announcement to our guest of family and friends at our wedding in August. We decided to inform my parents 3 weeks before the wedding through a special, personal reveal. They were also sworn to secrecy until the wedding, which was extremely difficult for my mom. The closer we got to our wedding day though, maintaining the confidentiality of this news became an even more difficult task for us too. Thing is, neither of us intentionally lie to people (which is a good thing obviously, but it made for awkward situations sometimes too). I know there were others who suspected I was pregnant before we even shared the news, like a few of my in-laws since I clearly had started refusing offerings of adult beverages at the family functions as well, where those kind of beverages are never lacking in availability; or I would accept and discreetly pass them off to my husband.

As the saying goes, "if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans." God's plans always far exceed our own and I couldn't be more grateful for this blessing he has bestowed upon us. While I had plans to not even get pregnant until a certain time, my plan to not tell anyone about it barely even succeeded, considering I was compelled to tell a few people early on. Because of God's plans for us last year, 2019 easily became one of my favorite years of the decade. And if I could do it all again, I still wouldn't have announced my pregnancy any sooner or on any other occasion!

P.S. - Be reminded that God is intentional and he never fails. That's a blog for another day saints.