Pregnant with married affair partner of two years.

[IrinaM]

Here's what you need to consider:

if you keep this info to yourself and move along with your life, all the cost of raising this child is on you. I have no idea how parents manage to even put food on the table, let alone diapers clothes health insurance etc. You are in for a bumpy next twenty years. if you ever imagined a comfortable retirement for yourself, kiss that dream goodbye.

if you tell him, he's not going to be happy. he will drop you immediately. the only way you will get help to pay for this child is if you file for child support with the state. He's a CO, according to an earlier post, with a whole separate family, so you're looking at maybe 300/month. that's if he doesn't have any physical custody of this kid. but he will, because his wife will stand by his side, and they will fight you together as a team. she will likely convince him to get as much custody as he can, in order to lower his child support payments and as revenge against you. Think about how you will feel when the two of them roll up to your house twice a month to take your baby for the weekend. imagine how you are going to feel when your kid tells you he wants to go to dad's house, because he has an xbox at his other house. The BW will probably force herself into a liasion role, too, to keep you and her WH from bonding over this child. So imagine how you are going to feel when you have to talk to his wife and make sure she knows what outfit you want your kid to wear for picture day, because they're the ones sending her to school that Monday.

those are your options outlined above. i don't really have any advice.

[LShalcy]

11 hours ago, Prudence V said:

If you’re choosing this route, you’d best find out what the implications are for your job. Will you get maternity leave? Will you be allowed to teach, heavily pregnant by a known MM that has no intention of leaving his W or involving himself in a “legitimate” R with you, or will you be forced to take unpaid leave once your pregnancy becomes obvious? Will you have the savings to cover yourself and your kids for that period - as well as any time afterward until you are allowed back or find a new job? 
 

Last time you put your career (and your kids financial security) at risk over this guy, you got away with it. You might not be so lucky this time. 

I will of course be granted maternity leave for at least three months. Why would the status of my relationship with the father of the child have anything to do with whether or not I am eligible for maternity leave? How would the school/school board even know the status of my relationship with him? I am not going around telling my colleagues that the man I am seeing has a wife 😑

at this point, I still have yet to tell him and I’m only four weeks, so have a few weeks left until I can even make it into a doctors office (can’t really be seen until you’re 6+ weeks). 
 

im not sure what I will do yet, but I know his reaction will play some sort of role in what I ultimately decide to do. 

[introverted1]

16 hours ago, vla1120 said:

I am not sure any advice I can give you would be helpful because I voted for you kicking him to the curb the DAY you found out he was married. So instead, I'll go over what I think your options are:

1. Abortion - if you do not want to have his child and/or raise this child on your own. 

2. Have this baby, stay involved with him as the OW (without officially seeking child support) in your current capacity and be satisfied with whatever little time he might carve out for you and your baby (at the risk of him dropping you like a rock when he finds out you are pregnant.)

3. Let his wife know you are pregnant with his child and tell her you plan to seek child support from him, hoping his marriage blows up and he leaves her for you, then the two of you can decide together whether to keep this baby and be a family - again, at the risk of him dropping you like a rock.

4. Have this baby. Cut him completely out of your life and plan to raise this child on your own.

I think we need to add

5. Tell him and he leaves his wife to be with you...  until baby is born and then the reality of a newborn + 2 step-children + too-exhausted-for-hot-sex-LShalcy hits and he decides to return to his wife.  Then begins years of him being in and out of the child's life, being late/partial with CS payments, anger/shame/embarrassment from LShalcy's older kids, and the realization on LShalcy's part that she was just a side piece, and not this guy's love destiny.

[pepperbird2]

op,

A good guide post here would be to do whatever you think i best for the potential new life. There's lots of resources online  that can help you make your decisions, and you do have choices.
If you don't feel abortion is right for you, and you don't want to be a single parent, adoption could be a possibility. It may look very different today than it used to, and you could still be in your child's life, if that's what you want.

Whatever decisions you make, I would do it assuming MM isn't going to be around. Talk to a lawyer-find out about the "legalities" of being a  single mom. Gather as much information as you can so that you will be choosing from a position of information ans strength, not desperation and fear.

 

[Allupinnit]

Regardless of what you decide, @LShalcy - your relationship with him won't be the same after this.  If you decide to abort based on his reaction I can't imagine the resentment you might feel if you want this baby.

If he hasn't left his wife yet, there's really not a chance he will, because he hasn't left of his own volition and I can't remember a time an unplanned pregnancy served to sway a man's heart; I feel like most times they run away in fear the other way.

Nobody comes away from this unscathed.  There will be deep hurts all around no matter what you decide.  

[stillafool]

3 hours ago, LShalcy said:

I still have yet to tell him and I’m only four weeks, so have a few weeks left until I can even make it into a doctors office (can’t really be seen until you’re 6+ weeks). 

This is not true.  You can go into the doctor's office today and get a pregnancy test.  You cannot have an abortion performed until after 6+ weeks.

[stillafool]

3 hours ago, LShalcy said:

I am not going around telling my colleagues that the man I am seeing has a wife 😑

Does MM live in the same town as you?  If so, they will find out.  Also the BW may tell or someone will find out and tell.  It's hard to hide this information because by you being a single, pregnant school teacher, someone there is going to be noisy and try to find out who the father is.

[LShalcy]

16 minutes ago, stillafool said:

This is not true.  You can go into the doctor's office today and get a pregnancy test.  You cannot have an abortion performed until after 6+ weeks.

Yes, I can go to get a test yet, I have taken over five pregnancy tests, I don’t need to go to a dr to confirm. I can’t get seen to check the baby until 6+ weeks. 

 

3 minutes ago, stillafool said:

Does MM live in the same town as you?  If so, they will find out.  Also the BW may tell or someone will find out and tell.  It's hard to hide this information because by you being a single, pregnant school teacher, someone there is going to be noisy and try to find out who the father is.

He does not live in the same town and I work in a large suburban/urban school district. I doubt anyone would be interested in who the father is. 

[mark clemson]

16 hours ago, Prudence V said:

If you’re choosing this route, you’d best find out what the implications are for your job.

Very good point!

[Estes]

Well one thing's for sure, you'll really find out what he's made of when you tell him you're pregnant with his child.

 

 

[Wiseman2]

5 hours ago, LShalcy said:

im not sure what I will do yet, but I know his reaction will play some sort of role in what I ultimately decide to do. 

It's your decision, not his. Hopefully you did not have unprotected sex in order to create this scenario with the hope that it manipulates him into anything. It doesn't matter what he wants.

If you want to be a single mom, great, if you would rather not, great. It's entirely up to you and your doctor and no, don't stall until it's too late to have options.

[BaileyB]

39 minutes ago, Wiseman2 said:

If you want to be a single mom, great,

She is already a single mom to two children. The question is, so you want to be a single mom of three - including two children under the age of five?

[S2B]

Tell him. But don’t base ANY of your further decisions on what he may or may not do.

you’ve handed this MM all of YOUR power and your future too!

dang, my money is riding on “he won’t change a thing”

[Prudence V]

7 hours ago, LShalcy said:

How would the school/school board even know the status of my relationship with him? I am not going around telling my colleagues that the man I am seeing has a wife 😑

You won’t - but his BW will. Once she finds out you’re pregnant, she will not stop until she knows who you are and what you do... Read these boards. There are countless stories here of what BW do after DDay, even without a pregnancy. 
 

7 hours ago, LShalcy said:

Why would the status of my relationship with the father of the child have anything to do with whether or not I am eligible for maternity leave?

In itself, not. But if it leads to the termination of your contract, then it definitely will. If they fire you, you may or may not be eligible as part of your dismissal package - please check on that. You need to make an informed choice here with all the information in hand.

[Prudence V]

1 hour ago, BaileyB said:

She is already a single mom to two children.

The difference is her xH is paying child support for the other two, and seems to be an interested father. This loser won’t be. To get CS for this one, she’d need to prove he was the father, and get it ordered through the courts. I don’t know what prison guards earn in the US but in most countries it’s unskilled low wage work - he already has another kid and a wife to support, so there won’t be much available for an OW child. 

[Prudence V]

3 hours ago, stillafool said:

 You cannot have an abortion performed until after 6+ weeks.

Though there are other things you can do - fit an IUD, which may prompt miscarriage, or if not, have it removed, which likewise may prompt miscarriage. Or have a D&C, which will expunge any foetal matter. 

[Wiseman2]

29 minutes ago, Prudence V said:

To get CS for this one, she’d need to prove he was the father, and get it ordered through the courts.

True. Married men are usually not delighted by this type of news.

Edited January 11, 2022 by Wiseman2

[lana-banana]

50 minutes ago, Prudence V said:

Though there are other things you can do - fit an IUD, which may prompt miscarriage, or if not, have it removed, which likewise may prompt miscarriage. Or have a D&C, which will expunge any foetal matter. 

The abortion pill exists for exactly this purpose. It's readily available, although some states are trying very hard to crack down on it. She could go to a Planned Parenthood and be done with it this afternoon. That being said, it's hard to believe OP would do this, because she's engaged in this behavior for two years with no precautions. OP, if you were hoping a pregnancy would force his hand, here you are. I just think it might not work the way you want it to.

[RebeccaR]

See the first page of the thread “Pregnant from my Affair” by Mayday2016 for a similar situation 

[stillafool]

15 minutes ago, lana-banana said:

That being said, it's hard to believe OP would do this, because she's engaged in this behavior for two years with no precautions. OP, if you were hoping a pregnancy would force his hand, here you are. I just think it might not work the way you want it to.

Also I don't know OP's age but she may not want to abort because of age and time.  This is definitely OP's chance to find out how MM really feels about her.

[LShalcy]

16 minutes ago, stillafool said:

Also I don't know OP's age but she may not want to abort because of age and time.  This is definitely OP's chance to find out how MM really feels about her.

Agreed. 

[S2B]

When do you plan to tell MM?

[LShalcy]

5 minutes ago, S2B said:

When do you plan to tell MM?

I have no idea.
Maybe this weekend. 

[stillafool]

Does he already have children?  Are they boys and girls?

[LShalcy]

1 minute ago, stillafool said:

Does he already have children?  Are they boys and girls?

He has one daughter.