thefuture

Thanks everyone, this is good advice. You reminded me that this is something good. I've been so worried about how this could affect my career that I haven't had much of a chance to be happy about it. anxious_one, I do have a sense of the anti-children hardliners are and, unfortunately, one of them is my advisor. I have a great relationship with him, so hopefully that will count for more than my "accident" (and that's really what it was). fuzzy, the students in the department who had children during the program are male (there's a double-standard there), so it was more or less overlooked. It would still be good to talk to them, though. I'm not that far off from finishing and I don't think this will slow me down much. I will post an update when I decide to tell my advisor. Meanwhile, I'll try to wear loose clothing.

Thanks for your encouragment. I should clarify, I don't think it's so much that I'm scared about handling it, personally (I'm in the candidacy stage; in my late 20s; my boyfriend has a good income; and we've been together for many years and both want children). The problem is that my department openly discourages female PhD students from having children and I've known this from day 1. I've spent all this time being a professional, diligent and competent student and now I'm worried about being written off because I'm pregnant. This is what I'm afraid of. It's early in my pregnancy, so I've got some time, I'm just wondering about the right way to approach this.

I recently found out I am pregnant. It was unexpected and I did take measures to prevent it. That being said, I've been with my boyfriend for many years and we did plan on having children in the future, just not while I was doing my PhD. I am at the "candidate" stage, but I am really scared to tell my advisor and committee; I don't think they'll be happy. I am very stressed about this and would appreciate any suggestions for how to handle this situation.