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A woman took to Reddit this week to share how her daughter reacted when she shared her honest feelings about being pregnant.
The post, which has been voted on over 9,000 times was written by Redditor u/tolddaughtermytruth on the subreddit "Am I the A**hole."
The Redditor explains that her 28-year-old daughter is now pregnant with her first child due in June and is "very, very excited." Though she is very excited to be a grandmother, and is happy for her daughter, it is the "opposite" of how she felt during her own pregnancies.
"The truth is I hated being pregnant, with both my children."
In 2021, Tiffany Parker wrote about why it's OK "not to love being pregnant," for What to Expect.
She writes that though she is "so grateful" for her three children, pregnancy can be hard and the pressure to present as if it's enjoyable 24/7 can be "frustrating."
"I now know I can be thankful for my children and my ability to have safely carried them for nine months, and at the same time not have loved everything about the experience."
Beyond the emotional toll a pregnancy might take, Dr. Todd Liu, chairman of the OB/GYN Department at Southern Ocean Medical Center, told Hackensack Meridian Health last year that approximately 70 percent of women in his care experience at least one side effect due to their pregnancy with about 30 percent possibly requiring close monitoring.
"Almost every pregnancy has some issues, a few are easier to remedy than others," Liu said.
The Redditor says that in her experience pregnancy was scary and caused anxiety.
"I hated the feeling of being so heavy and limited in movement, on top of all the normal pregnancy symptoms of fatigue, nausea, swollen ankles, hemorrhoids, sore back and feet etc. And then don't get me started on the childbirth which was next level," she writes.
"Don't get me wrong, I was very excited to become a mum and I love both my children, they are my absolute world. I just didn't like the process to get there."
She explains that her daughter has started a memory book for her upcoming baby with pictures of her growing belly and ultrasounds. She said her daughter recently pulled out books made for her and asked why the pages documenting aspects of the pregnancy like "20 week bump" and "first ultrasound" were left blank.
The Redditor said that after telling her daughter the truth, and explaining how happy she was that she was not having the same experience, her daughter became quiet.
"Later that night my son-in-law called me to say my daughter was very upset about what I said. Apparently I made her feel unwanted, like she was a burden to bear," she wrote. "I was shocked and upset to hear that myself, because that was the opposite of how I felt and told my SIL that."
The Redditor ended her post by saying though her son-in-law seemed to understand where she was coming from, her daughter was still upset. She worried sharing her feelings was not the right thing to do as she does not want to add stress to her pregnant daughter.
Commenters supported the Redditor saying it was important that she was honest about her experience.
"I applaud you. Women need to be honest with other women about pregnancy, childbirth, and motherhood," one commenter wrote. ESPECIALLY the non-halmark[sic] moments. I am very honestly with my own daughter about because I felt lied to by my own mother about the entire process. NTA."
"NTA. I think the disservice that women have done each other is not being honest about what pregnancy is really like. We have created an environment where women feel as if they are horrible human beings if they don't enjoy their pregnancies...," said another.
u/tolddaughtermytruth told Newsweek over Reddit that she decided to post about the experience at the advice of her son.
"He was joking about it, but reading other posts on Am I The [A**hole] made me realise there were [genuine] people out there facing socially moral [dilemmas,] and sometimes it does help to get an outside opinion," she said.
She was surprised by all the attention the post received and especially how many people supported her.
"It was strangely comforting and brought a tear to my eye. Back in 'my day' (my goodness am I old), the way pregnancy was handled was to only tell the good things and keep the negative to a minimum. You didn't stress a pregnant lady out you see, so you only shared the good stuff," she added.
She said she has not spoken to her daughter since the incident a few days ago but plans on reaching out this weekend after giving her some space.
