5 Ways to Tell Your Husband About an Unplanned Pregnancy

Regardless of the relationship status, it can be difficult to tell your partner about an unplanned pregnancy – even if it’s your own husband. These conversations can be very difficult to have, especially if you have already discussed this potential situation before. Even if you’re already married, this doesn’t necessarily mean that you two are ready to have a child. 

While there is no right or wrong way to tell your husband about an unplanned pregnancy, there are ways to help ease the difficult conversation. After confirming your pregnancy with absolute certainty, you can begin to make a plan as to how and where you will tell him. Be honest and share your feelings with him. Regardless of how he is reacting, you have to remain calm as the goal of the conversation is to make a decision together.

This article will help give you ideas on how to best tell your husband that you’re pregnant unplanned.

How to Tell Your Husband About an Unplanned Pregnancy?

1. Confirm

Before you even decide to tell your husband about the unplanned pregnancy, you should go out and confirm it. It is highly recommended to be completely certain regarding the pregnancy before telling your husband about it. If an unplanned pregnancy would lead to an uncomfortable conversation, then it’s best to at least make sure instead of having that conversation and finding out that it was a false positive anyway.

Although pregnancy tests that can be bought over the counter are highly reliable, you can always go to a doctor and have some bloodwork done. This will yield the most accurate results.

2. Make a Plan

Once you’ve confirmed that you are indeed a hundred percent pregnant, you should begin to plan how to tell your husband about this unplanned pregnancy. This means you shouldn’t just go ahead and tell him at once. You’d need a plan to help ease the conversation.

Making a plan to tell your husband about the unplanned pregnancy includes finding the best time for the conversation. For example, it might not be the best time to tell him about it when he had just returned home from a bad day at work as the topic might give him too much to stress about.

Perhaps it’s best to have the conversation at home to give the conversation the level of privacy it needs. When big news like this is dropped on people in public, it can get awkward and uncomfortable really quickly. You might also want to even practice what you’re going to say. While it doesn’t have to be an exact script, you can have some important talking points to remember.

When you finally have him at home, it’s also recommended to have a strategy prepared when actually telling him about it. Instead of just blurting out the news, you could tell him that you want to have a serious conversation with him. Although it might make him worried and concerned, it will put him in the right mindset for the conversation. You can then begin by telling him about all the strengths you two have in your relationship.

3. Share Your Feelings

After this, you can then let him know about the pregnancy. It is important to be completely honest with one another, and you might have to get the ball rolling. Once you’ve mentioned the pregnancy, you should let him know your thoughts and feelings about this whole situation. How do you personally feel about this whole pregnancy? What do you want to do with it? How do you want to proceed?

By letting him know your thoughts about the pregnancy, you’re letting him understand your thought processes about it. It is important to share your feelings with each other as this can be a very difficult time for both of you. By having an open line of communication, you let one another know that you’re both in on this together.

4. Be Prepared for His Reactions

Unplanned pregnancies can be quite the news to drop on someone and you really can’t predict how one would react to it. Understandably, many people can react quite negatively to such news. Hence, it is important to be somewhat prepared for the possible reactions your husband may make. If it helps, try to think back and remember all the emotions you felt when you first found out. This might help you empathize with how he will react when you tell him about this unplanned pregnancy.

There are a variety of different emotions that husbands can have after hearing about an unplanned pregnancy. Some may be filled with joy and excitement as they’ve always wanted to become fathers. Some might be in shock with such big news. Unfortunately, some can get angry and frustrated while others can get scared.

While you can’t control how he’d react to the news, you can control how you’d react to him. It is important that you maintain your composure and levelheadedness if he’s not – even if he’s saying awful things. It is important to remember that he might need some time to process the situation. You need to remain calm when he gets frustrated because two frustrated people will not be able to make sound decisions.

However, if your husband is continuing to become very negative, you have all the power in the world to leave the moment you feel unsafe. He may need more time to process the news, but if it becomes too difficult, then he’ll have to process it on his own. In the event that the discussion was left open-ended, you will have to decide to discuss it at another time.

5. Make a Decision Together

Regardless of how the conversation went, it is highly recommended to reach a conclusion together. This may be a more difficult situation for partners who aren’t married but since you’re already together, it is important you both make a decision that satisfies both parties.

At this point, you have a few options. The first option is to have the baby. Many couples may not be prepared for a baby but are surprised to find themselves deciding to keep the baby. Another option is to terminate the pregnancy. Discussing abortion can be a very difficult conversation to have so it is imperative to be sensitive when it comes to this topic. Lastly, you can also decide to push through with the pregnancy but ultimately offer the baby up for adoption.

Deciding what to do with an unplanned pregnancy is incredibly difficult and it helps to ask yourselves several questions. For example, how would a baby affect your lives? Are you ready to raise and provide for a child? Are you supported by your friends and family if you decide to keep a baby?

Understandably, it may take some time to reach a decision. However, if you’re seriously considering abortion, then your window to talk about it is limited. Abortions are typically better done early as it would be difficult to find a doctor comfortable performing an abortion on a pregnancy that is beyond the first trimester.