Unlike the name may suggest, there’s nothing racy on this post, I assure you.
Instead, there’s just a lot of raw honesty + inspiration from young mom Emily Urbanski, a student mother to an eight-month-old daughter. Emily blogs at XX Mama, where she says that she believes that “young mamas should be proud of themselves.”
I agree Emily, and thank you for sharing your story! Follow Emily on Twitter and Instagram.
Image property of XX Mama
Finding Out I was pregnant and Breaking the News
The day I found out I was pregnant was on September 27th 2013 - I had been feeling sick every day for about a week before then. So I took a pregnancy test, and as it turns out my doubts were confirmed. I remember the date because it was the day of my 22nd birthday.
My first reaction was shock. I took the test again, and once again it was positive. I couldn’t believe it - I had been using contraception, this situation wasn’t right. It couldn’t be possible.
That night, I was celebrating my birthday at my boyfriends parents place. When we had time just to ourselves, I told him that I was pregnant. We didn’t know what to do. I was never an extremist pro-life advocate, and I was scared. He was scared too. We were burdened by the choice that we had to make without knowing what that choice was.
He told his father the day after, and he asked him what I was going to do. Hugo didn’t know, but we were strongly leaning on keeping it. The problem was - we were both so young, we weren’t financially stable, we were both students, I hadn’t told my family yet, what was going to happen?
The day we went to the clinic to get that first ultrasound was the day I knew I couldn’t back out. I heard this little creatures heartbeat. I remember looking to see my boyfriend wide-eyed staring into space. I felt like laughing and crying.
That night, I told my father I was pregnant. His reaction was very serious. He asked me what I was going to do about it. I told him I was keeping it. He smiled and nodded. I knew then that I had his support. Shortly after, my stepmother walked in and my father broke the news to her, and she came to sit next to me and said: “I’m going to be a grandmother?”, with a huge smile.
I was extremely blessed to have such support.
On the other hand, my mother wasn’t pleased at all. She had also been a young mother, giving birth to my brother when she was 18 and to me when she was 21. She hated the experience, felt suffocated, alone. On top of it, she had moved from Poland to be with my father, and her whole family was in another country.
When I told her my decision - she became extremely angry and scared. I won’t repeat the things she told me, but she tried and almost succeeded in breaking my new little dream apart.
I decided to be the bigger person, to stick to my guns, and take her criticism with a grain of salt. I was not in the same situation she had been in, and if I could have been there for her when she was younger, I know I would have.
My year as a Pregnant Student
Being pregnant, and in university was one of the hardest things I have been through. The fall semester wasn’t so bad - except for the morning sickness, and the two months I had to adapt to my new situation, and move out of my parents house with my boyfriend.
Not so bad, I say. I mean it was definitely unusual.
I remember being in the metro on my way to school and constantly feeling like puking. It was extremely hard to concentrate in class, let alone do all the school work. None of my friends knew I was pregnant yet, and I wasn’t about to break it to them. I felt extremely out-of-place, like nobody in my situation should be pregnant. “We were taught to be so much more”. On top of it, I wasn’t studying anything that would land me a good career afterwards either - philosophy!
I was having a hard time accepting the pregnancy. Everything felt out of place.
We moved out in December. We had only basic furniture and no money to get more.
The next semester of school was tougher. It was my final semester, I wanted to drop it so I could work to make more money for when the baby came around. My parents didn’t let me. My stepmother actually encouraged me to finish because it would feel so much better to accomplish everything instead of “maybe going back one day”. Instead, I’d have a degree and a baby.
The hardest part was walking around pregnant, having other students look at me like I didn’t belong. It was also winter time, and I didn’t have the best boots. I slipped maybe twice (and fell!) with my huge belly because of the ice I had to walk on to get to my classes. The school did clean it up a bit, but not enough for me to walk safely. I hated that.
On top of it, McGill University is set up in such a way that you can have classes on one end of the campus, and you have 10 minutes to walk up a mountain or a really long path to get to the next class. Even when I wasn’t pregnant I had trouble getting to class on time. It was a huge campus and my classes were always set up from one end of the campus to the other.
On a positive note, I had never reached out to professors before my pregnancy. They always intimidated me. Now, I was in a situation where I had to let them know what was going on, in case I went in to early labour, or I couldn’t make it to class for medical reasons. Each and every one of my professors were extremely helpful and supportive. It really gave me a confidence boost. They were probably some of the first people I told about my pregnancy. They even were happy for me.
Suddenly, I felt like it was my life. It was my decision. Telling people about it made me feel good - and it was a step in my own acceptance of the pregnancy.
The last month of my semester, I went into pre-term labour, which they were able to stop at the hospital. I had to be on bed-rest for a month and maybe more. I was scared I wouldn’t be able to do my final exams. Luckily, I had the most amazing profs, who dealt with me fairly. Since I couldn’t come in for exams during the semester, I generally wrote extra essays on similar topics from home.
I’m going to admit that being on bed-rest was probably the best thing for me. It helped me re-focus on what was important, stop worrying about students I didn’t even know and their opinions, and focus on preparing mentally for giving birth and my finals.
I was healthy enough to go in to do my finals at the end of April. Two weeks later on May 16th 2013, I gave birth to Delfina. Two weeks after that, I was standing on the podium receiving my Philosophy diploma with my whole family in the crowd, and my baby in my mothers arms drinking some milk.
I was speaking to the boy in front of me while we were waiting in line to receive our diplomas, and he told me he got accepted into law and was going to start law school at McGill in the fall. He asked me what my plans were: I told him I just gave birth to my daughter two weeks ago, and smiled. He looked shocked. I felt awkward - like it wasn’t something I was supposed to say. I said it. I’m happy I said it.
Other thoughts
On top of it, I have many friends who took a year off during my year off after university. They aren’t more ahead in life than me at all.
Everything still feels balanced, and most of all it feels right. I am lucky that my boyfriend stuck around, and I know there are no guarantees. We are young - but the struggle, I think, keeps making us closer.
I started reading your blog not too long ago, and this post came at a perfect time in my life. I live in Argentina. My husband and I have decided 3 months ago to start trying to have a baby, and as time goes by small details come up regarding our schedules with work and school.
We are both young, both have great jobs, but I am still in college. We were going to wait for me to be graduate, but due to my work schedules and the university being quite difficult regarding class schedules and such, I really can’t see myself graduating any time soon, and I really really don’t want it to be too late to grow our family and have kids. So, we decided to go ahead and work it out together, he is very supportive and I know he will do whatever it takes for me to get things done.
However, sometimes I’m really scared and most of my college friends aren’t very supportive. I can definitely relate to Emily and her feeling “out-of-place”, so reading this post made me feel that I’m not alone and I’m not crazy for making such a big decision.
Thank you so much for sharing this, it really did come at a perfect time. It helped me feel proud and 100% positive that, no matter how hard it gets, I will make it to the finish line, and it will all have been SO worth it.
Amazing and best of luck to you!!
I understand what you mean about walking around in the snow on campus while pregnant. I am not a student, but a professor, but it still feels weird. I never know if students think I am a fellow pregnant student or not, but I get looks and double takes. I have overheard students whispering about how hard it must be to be pregnant in college (ironically I am in my late 30s but look younger).
Being morning/all day sick while teaching classes was definitely no fun. Now that I am having a high risk pregnancy it is getting harder to teach class and I know I will be missing finals. Still not sure what will happen-students expect you to be there and have lots of energy for them. They have no clue how hard it is to be pregnant or take care of a small child.
This could be why your professors were so understanding of your situation. I know I would be.
Love this!!
Hey, amazing story. How did your friends react to your pregnancy? Were they all supportive as well?