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It depends on your job, really. I work in a lab developing antibioics, which means human pathogens and compounds not tested for their side effects are a daily part of my routine. So, if you are pregnant they want you to tell them right away so they can give you more administrative work to limit risk. If you have a desk job, i'd wait till 3 months or so unless you feel super sick all the time!
Would it be wrong not to tell anything until the boss sees the bump? I'd like to see my boss struggle to bring this up (hmm are you preggers or just fattening up? ) lol!
I didn't tell until almost 20 weeks. I figured it was nobody's business unless I was missing work or having problems...
My manager got promoted to the manager position and found out she was pregnant days later.... She told our district manager right away, it was just a funny situation, how they both happened at the same time.
I didn't say anything until 6 weeks, and that was because my boss asked me if I was okay because I was spending so much time in the bathroom! I told her, she told one other supervisor, and then it stayed under wraps with the rest of the office until probably 14-15 weeks.
I think it depends on your job! Mine requires extensive travel so I told the person I work with the most early around 8 weeks (although he has 3 kids and had figured it out already!) and others at 12 week. Primarily I need them to help me find more local work because even now extensive travel is just exhausting. If you have a job that requires a lot of manual labor or other things that are harder during pregnancy and you feel like you have good job security, I say earlier is better so others can cut you some slack!
I have a desk job...and actually, I don't really come in contact with my boss that much...I just wondered if i were to get pregnant, would it really be odd if I didn't tell anyone I was pregnant until i was almost about to deliver...lol
I'm in a unique situation because I would for a 3 person company. It's been just the 3 of us for 8 years now and my boss is like family. Plus I was super sick early on. I think I told my boss around 6 or 7 weeks. I started working from home a lot around that time... it's just nicer to get sick at home then out and about :)
I always wonder about this for when it happens to me. I work at a law firm and I am my boss' only employee besides other attorneys.. I am the only one here .. so I wonder about what they will think when I have a DR.s appointment every month.. lol. so i dont know how i would go about it?!!
My boss figured it out almost right away; I think I was at 6 weeks when she asked if I was pregnant. I was really sick in the beginning, though, and my boss was super supportive. :) Plus, we didn't tell anyone else at work until the second trimester.
From an HR standpoint, I do think it's important to give your boss adequate time to prepare (20 weeks is fine, but 30 weeks is a too close). Plus, you'll want to start planning maternity leave in the second trimester, and you'll probably need to talk to your boss about the company policy, returning to work, who will do your work while you're gone, etc...
I actually had to tell my boss just shy of 7 weeks because I had a scare and needed to go to the doc immediately so it was hard to explain to the boss that I had to leave work early and not returning when I looked totally normal. As expected, he was excited and practically shooed me out the door. Because of his past experience he didn't me to take any risks.
Preferably, I would have wanted to tell him after 12 weeks. I would have had no choice as I was starting to show and he sits right next to me. I know I wouldn't have been able to wait too long as it is just him and I that run the department so both of us cannot be out at the same time. It was just easier to discuss my maternity leave and get things situated sooner. Oh and only a few short weeks later, he announced that his wife was preggie too.
I told work at 12 weeks, since some people I believe had started guessing, but I made sure to tell my family first even though it was not a surprise to my boss when I told him. I didn't want work to know before my family. Luckily I have a desk job so there was no risk involved with holding onto the secret, but I might have told earlier if I had felt very sick but I only missed one day. I also would have told earlier if I had had some type of scare like you did Roddybride.
I'm not pregnant or planning to be for some time, but here's a funny story:
I grew up in a really little town in Oregon, where my dad was the primary small animal veterinarian for the area. I worked for him all throughout middle school, high school and my first two years of college, along with usually two or three other women who were vet techs, receptionists or both. Anyway, when I was in high school, two long time workers both moved away, and my dad had to hire some new employees.
Of the three people he hired that year, all three of them discovered they were pregnant within a week of working. They all told him immediately, and all three worked there well into their pregnancy, had their babies and came right back to work after a couple of months.
My poor dad gets teased all the time about the amount of estrogen in his office already, so this was a funny turn of events. And, even more so, one of those three women still work for him, and she and another new hire this year -- who also became pregnant very soon after beginning to work for him -- just had their babies this last month within two hours of each other.
We say it must be something in the water.
Wow, this is a good thread. I don't know when I would do it.
Do you think there is a difference if your boss is a man and a woman? Or whether they are single or married.
Not that I think, anything bad about my boss but he is single and I would think he would have a different view of it, let's say if he was married.
Hmmm, well he and I have both mentioned about babies, after my wedding. (kinda a sort of jokingly?) That I'm going to wait 2 years before having them. So I'm sure he does think about it. I'm sure he wouldn't be shocked but I'm not sure what he really thinks of it. He would proably have to think about hiring a temp to replace me while I'm on leave.
I had a coworker who waiting until she was 4 months along to tell people. It was such a joke though, becuase she started showing at just a couple weeks and had just gotten married, so we were all sitting around waiting for the announcement. It was actually really awkward because she is short and thin and wears tight clothing so when she gained 20 pounds, filled out in the face and got a belly everyone had to pretend like they didn't notice. I don't know, it's not like you have to tell anyone once you start showing, but you should definitely take that into consideration since people DO and WILL notice.
My wedding was two months ago and my office already has a betting pool going on when I'll be preggers... so Idon't think I'll be able to keep it a secret long.
personally I would wait until probably around 3 months or maybe before if I was feeling sick
UPDATE: WOW...so I applied for a position within the company that I work for and i'm probably going to get and I found out that I was pregnant after I applied. Now that I might get the job, I wonder when I should tell my "new" boss...i'm pretty small so I probably wont show for awhile (I hope!) but I just wonder how they will take it...or if I should act like I just found out myself...
It DEFINITELY depends on the kind of job you've got...if your boss needs to get a temp to cover your time away from work or even the divided concentration from being the best vessel for your child & doing your 100% best at your job. I know that, as a teacher in an inner-city, at-risk high school, with a VERY dedicated staff, I'm probably going to let everyone (boss, fellow teachers, front office, & students/parents) almost as soon as I get confirmation from my doc that I am pregnant. I want my students & parents to know why my gradebook might not be updated every week; I want my front office to be prepared to call in my preferred subs for my students in case complications come up or I have to go in for more often check-ups due to my fibroids; I want my coworkers to understand why I may skip a grade level meeting or two in order to NOT miss classes due to sickness. With so many of us giving our all, I'd want my fellow staff members & those I'm serving to KNOW that, while I'm going to do my absolute best for our students, I'm going to my absolute best for my own child as well. With such a family oriented workplace (both my principal & vice principal are fathers, front office are all parents, & obviously my students' parents are parents), they've been incredibly understanding & supportive with all other family starting teachers (whether male or female), so I'm sure they'll continue to be the same with me...but they won't do so if it just looks like I'm slacking & they don't know why (we've got HIGH expectations of our teachers - and students and administrators - at my school).
it's up to you.. i do x-ray's and work with hazardous chemical so to protect myself/baby i am going to tell right away. but there is no law saying to have to tell ever!
I work in a lab and I'm around chemicals and reagents and biohazards so I'll need to say something pretty early on.
I am not pregnant but I am kinda like you, not charting (yet) but not using contraceptives of any kind. I always kind of thought I'd mention it when need be (if I was sick/had to go on bed rest/etc). I would say after the 1st trimaster sometime.
I work from home and only see my office/co-workers quarterly (4x per year). However, we are all friends on Facebook so I decided to tell my family at week 14 and my boss at week 15. For that one week in between, I disabled my wall on Facebook and was so afraid the news was going to leak to my co-workers.
My boss was totally shocked when I told her and very happy for me. When I told my other co-workers, this one girl I hate implied that she "knew" already. I think she was just being annoying- there is no way she knew sitting in her desk 3,000 miles away from me- my own mother didn't even suspect and I see her every day. But of course I'm totally paranoid and wonder if someone leaked the news to her prematurely...I guess I'll never know!
@andreaandchinelo: Wait until after the final decision on the job is made. There's nothing unethical about it and it prevents them from nicely discriminating against you ("She'll be so busy with the new baby, more responsibility would just be too hard").
Our company's guidelines actually tell you you can wait until after your yearly review.
I told my boss today and my direct reports over the last few weeks. One of my employees is super sweet and very intuitive, so when she noticed I'd been out of the office in the afternoon a couple of times in a couple of months, she got worried and told me she'd be praying for me and hoped it wasn't anything chronic or terrible. I didn't want her to think I had cancer so I 'fessed up.
I told the other two bc I felt like a jackass leaving for appointments or not working all evening when they were (we're under tight deadlines for two products). I didn't want them to think I was slacking while they were killing themselves.
I told the boss today because a) he's going on vacation for the next couple of weeks, b) I'm to fly to Seattle for my yearly review in late March (as in, I'll be 20+ weeks) so waiting until after that would be awkward and c) our reorgs are done and I know nothing big is pending for me, so my work girlfriends and I thought it would be fine.
I'm 15 weeks 5 days today. I work from home so I could have waited longer, but it was starting to feel uncomfortable not to be telling people. I'm not telling coworkers, but letting my direct reports spread the word for me. One of my managers did that when she was pregnant and it was great.
Me: Are you telling (my male coworkers)?
Her: Um, no. Telling the boss was weird enough. Would you just spread it around so I don't have to?
Me: Sure, give me 20 minutes. To coworkers: Hey, Michelle's pregnant, mat leave starting in July. She's excited. <done>
I've always kinda thought I would tell my work after the first tri-mester. When it's "safe".
I really wouldn't personally wait much longer for all the reasons @Mrs. Spring: stated.
I'm not sure who to tell first though? At my firm there is the principal (owner) and 3 partners. 1 of the partner is more the HR person. I feel like the right thing to do is tell the principal first. But he is always SO busy and his office space isn't a "closed door" office perse. So I'm not sure how easy it would be to get him alone to tell him that.
Then next would def be the partner that handles HR so we can get all the maternity leave/scheduling talk out of the way.
For those of you that actually have coworkers who are also good friends. What did you do? Did you tell them first or your supervisors first?
I just told my boss at 5 weeks. I really didn't want to--especially since I had a miscarriage recently at 7 weeks--but my doctor applied for me to be on preventative leave (because my work might be considered "high risk" to the baby). I didn't want him to find out from a phone call from my doc or workers' comp.
Now, I have to wait a week or so to find out if I'm on leave, and if I am, I'll need to tell lots of people I work with. Not my ideal, but one of those "you do what you have to."
i told my boss right away, its a smaller office and i wanted her to know in case anything happened where i wasnt feeling right hse would have an easier time understanding, i dont get what the point of waiting is.
I haven't had a baby yet. But, i would wait until 3 or 4 months. Just because there are possibilities of miscarriage the first 3 months and you don't really want people to know at work.
i just started telling people at work around 13 weeks. i work at a large organization so i told my supervisors first, then a few work-friends (i told them they could feel free to spread the word on my behalf). the HR dept is pretty far removed, so im waiting until i switch doctors to tell them because i think there is some time sensitive paperwork i have to submit.
I'm in a way different situation that what I've read so far. I work directly with my FI and my parents are technically our bosses, so my bosses would know way early. FI may tell the rest of the people we work with, as he is their supervisor, but I don't really talk to any of them so I wouldn't tell them. It would just be weird for me to come in and say something like that to a bunch of people I really don't know.
Um, I told my boss about 5 minutes ago when he got nosy and picked up a book on my desk. It's called Origins: How the nine months before birth shape the rest of our lives (fascinating, go read it!). He looked at the cover and then looked at me with the biggest grin and said "Are you?..."
I said "Shhhhh. And yes."
That's what I get for leaving the book out after lunch, I guess. I don't mind, actually, he's a father of 4 and great and I know he'll let me tell everyone else when I'm ready.
@roxy...there is a chance of miscarriage any point in pregnancy. I dont know why everyone is so negative about miscarrying...maybe that is why so many people do? I think waiting 3-4 months is disrespectful to your boss, he/she really needs to know whats going on so she can be a little more flexable with you for appointments/sickness.
I told my boss at 8wks.
there is a chance of miscarriage any point in pregnancy.--Exactly why I wasn't scared to tell family and friends at 10wks. I had a friend miscarry in the "safe" 2nd trimester.
@msmamabear...i agree. i plan on everyone knowing by 10 weeks. This is my first pregnancy and im estatic, i want to share it with the world! I think 10 weeks is more than reasonable.
@BabyBee1104: as someone who has had (and was open about having) a miscarriage, I assure you it was not because I was "negative". It's a little disrespectful to make such comments about something that is so painful and has happened to so many women on this board. A negative attitude doesn't cause a miscarriage. People are negative about miscarrying because it's horrible.
I wasnt directing anything toward you specificaly. I understand a misscarriage in horrible, but just because theres always a slight chance for one, i dont see that being a reason to hold something in when its so beautiful to begin with.
very strangely, my boss ended up being one of the first people i told! i think it was like a day or two after i found out myself! i'm not sure why - we were talking in supervision about future plans and when i get licensed in a few months etc etc and it just sort of popped out. but it was good because she recently had two kids and gave me good tips about some local hospitals and doctors and other resources.
my other boss i told a few weeks later - she commented on how i looked so tired and was constantly yawning during a meeting. she was like "are you feeling alright?" and i just popped out with "i'm pregnant." i think i shocked her and then i felt a little bad for just dropping it like that on her....
it totally depends on your work environment and your relationships with those people. i felt comfortable and safe and they're pretty supportive.
I work at a Nuclear Power Plant.... as you can imagine I told my boss almost right away... 6 or 7 weeks I think. I'm only an Admin but sometimes the Admins have to do walk through's of the plant and I can't go into specific areas (obviously) so she had to call and deactivate certain zones I could no longer go into.
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I'm not pregnant yet, but were are definitely in the kinda ttc category...(not charting or anything, but not using any form of protection) I wondering if/when we do get pregnant, when should I tell my boss? So i'm curious to find out when you told yours?