Parents-to-be are no longer waiting until the 12-week mark to share their pregnancy news, with many telling family and friends just seven weeks after conception.
Traditionally, women have been advised to wait until after their first trimester passes to tell people they are expecting because of the high risk of miscarriage in the first three months of pregnancy.
Dr Alison Gee, who works with fertility clinic Genea, says technology is behind the growing trend to make pregnancies public earlier.
“We can have earlier imaging of pregnancy now,” she told the Daily Telegraph. “We have a scan at seven weeks and they see a foetus and a fetal heart (beat) and that is very encouraging.
“Some pregnancies are still lost between having a positive scan at seven or 12 weeks, but we have more information about pregnancies earlier on and that gives patients a bit more confidence to share pregnancy information.”
But University of NSW head of obstetrics and gynaecology Professor William Ledger has warned that the risk of miscarriage remains high until the 12-week milestone has been reached.
He added that sharing conception plans — which 67 per cent of women now do, according to a national study by pregnancy and fertility test company Clearblue — can put added pressure on a couple
“People often don’t realise the average (time to become pregnant) is between three and nine months, even for young couples,” he said.
“So if you announce to the world you are trying and then if it doesn’t happen quickly, you could be announcing there is a fertility problem, which not everyone wants to share.”
Your say: How and when did you tell your friends and family you were expecting?
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