Announcing Pregnancy to Spouse
For the four years of our marriage up until we conceived, I knew exactly how I wanted to tell my husband I was pregnant. What I did not factor was that in actively trying to conceive, I would talk about my cycle often so he knew when I would ovulate and thus when I would be able to take a pregnancy test. In order to pull it off as a surprise I had to lie to my husband, whilst also hiding the onset of morning sickness, mind you - for 12 days and it was pure torture.
Let me back up and share with you the the moment I decided how I would tell him I was pregnant. It was longer ago than you might think. Before our wedding - Before our engagement even - all the way back to just a few months into dating. It’s a good story I promise.
Our entire relationship was long distance. He lived in California and I lived in Washington. We talked on the phone almost daily and we were both smitten pretty quick. I was adamant that the first “I love you’s” were not going to just be said over the phone unable to look each other in the eyes. He is creative and often just said things like “Im going to bread, I loaf you.” to be cute and get his point across. After a few months dating in May 2014 he came home for memorial day. For the entire weekend I had a brass key in my coat pocket that had “heart” etched into it (yes cheesy, I know) along with a note - explaining where I had gotten it and why I carried it on my keyring for years. Out on a walk in Washougal, we stopped under an overpass bridge to get out of the wind for a moment and I knew it was the perfect time to hand it over. Upon reading it, he gave me a funny a look and laughed as he pulled an old house key out of his pocket which held great importance to him (it belonged to his childhood home) and he had planned to give it to me that day as well. Once Keys were exchanged and we said I love you - I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with this man - the next thought that followed was that I wanted to one day tell him I was pregnant at the very same place.
Fast forward to January 30th 2019 I found out I was pregnant and wanted to follow through with my plan from years before. Valentines day was two weeks away and it would be the perfect day to tell him! So I got on Etsy and ordered the sweetest little customized card pictured below - and Amazon for a set of wooden toy keys. Now, the sneaky part was trying to convince him to go for a walk on Valentines day, in the rain on a cold winter day in the Pacific Northwest Ha!
A couple of days into February my husband had started asking me “have you taken a test yet?” to which I told him it was too soon (lie). When he asked again a couple days later I mustered the most disappointed face I could and told him I had started my period so it was a no this round (lie). This was the only way I felt I could throw him off (my husband is notorious for guessing and and all surprises I plan). My morning sickness was really starting to hit as the days went by and I was running out of ways to excuse myself and disguise why I didn’t want to eat - so, I caved and decided to tell him as soon as I could get us to that walking path. February 12th my husband had a free day so requested we go to coffee at Washougal Coffee co since we’d been wanting to check it out. Coffee in hand, I asked if ‘that bridge we said I love you under’ was close by? (knowing that he would show me just how close it was) but of course I already knew it was around the corner.
It was raining and gross outside but under the shelter of the overpass once again, I handed him a card to open and a set of wooden keys. He looked at me with shock and joy - we embraced and then made a run back for the warmth of our car Ha. All the way home we joked about how he had just that very morning came to terms with the fact that I was not pregnant this go around and had felt really sad. For the first time in our entire marriage I ACTUALLY pulled off a genuine surprise and it was the best thing ever.
