My husband told me, «Your pregnancy disgusts me. Stop talking about it.» His reaction when I took his words literally was priceless. We’d been trying for a baby for years. So when I was finally pregnant, I thought Tom would be as excited as I was. But he never seemed interested in baby names or nursery plans.
And when the morning sickness hit hard and I mentioned feeling nauseated at breakfast, he slammed his coffee mug down. «Stop talking about gross things while I’m eating,» he yelled. «I’m so sick of hearing about your stupid pregnancy symptoms.»
«You’ve become boring and disgusting, and all you talk about is how you’re pregnant. Just stop talking about it completely.» I stared at him in shock.
Eight years of marriage and three years of fertility treatments. And this was his response to the baby we’d supposedly wanted together. I put down my crackers and said, «Okay, I won’t mention the pregnancy again.»
Tom looked relieved and went back to his phone. When I started staying at my parents’ house most nights because of smell aversions, Tom initially enjoyed the peace. But after a week, he started texting, «When are you coming home?» When I just said, «Soon,» his text became frantic.
«Is something wrong? Talk to me.» But I didn’t. He specifically asked me not to.
The neighbors noticed and started asking Tom if we were separated. He had to keep explaining I was just visiting family. But nobody believed him.
And soon everyone on our street was whispering about Tom driving away his pregnant wife. By week three, Tom was showing up at my parents’ door. «Just tell me what’s happening,» he’d plead through the door. «I need to know.» My dad would tell him I was resting and couldn’t talk about it.
My sister threw me a baby shower at the country club during Tom’s company golf tournament. His boss’s wife was at the shower and asked where Tom was. And when my sister explained he’d told me to stop talking about the pregnancy, she immediately told her husband.
Tom’s boss confronted him on the ninth hole about what kind of man tells his pregnant wife she’s disgusting. Tom had to finish 18 holes while everyone stared with contempt. The shower gifts included a stroller from Tom’s own mother, who’d found out about the party from my mom instead of her son.
Tom had been calling me daily by then, leaving voicemails. «Please just give me updates. I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean it like that.»
«Tell me about the appointments, the baby, anything.» His mom confronted Tom at Sunday dinner, crying about how she’d failed as a mother. His aunts and uncles told him how disappointed they were, and his grandmother actually wrote him out of her will that day.
When I went into preterm labor at 34 weeks, I spent three days in the hospital on bed rest. My dad called Tom’s office to let them know, and Tom’s secretary was horrified he hadn’t mentioned it himself. Tom burst into my hospital room, shaking.
«Why didn’t you call me? This is serious.» I simply looked at him and said nothing about the pregnancy. He grabbed my hand, tears in his eyes.
«Please, I’m begging you. Talk to me about our baby.» I turned away.
HR called him in to ask if he needed time off for his wife’s medical emergency that everyone except him seemed to know about. The preterm labor scare meant strict bed rest, which Tom discovered only when he came home to find a hospital bed in our living room. He stood frozen in the doorway.
«What is this? What’s happening? Is the baby okay?» When I just nodded without explaining, he punched the wall. «Tell me about the pregnancy! I take it back, okay?»
The delivery guys had told all our neighbors about the poor pregnant woman whose husband was never home, and people started leaving nasty notes on his car.
My mom posted updates on Facebook that went viral in our community because she wrote about being the only support system for my daughter since her husband finds pregnancy disgusting. Tom created multiple fake accounts trying to comment, «That’s not the whole story. She won’t talk to me. I apologized.»
His best man from our wedding publicly wrote that he regretted standing up for such trash. His brother became the godfather and attended all appointments with me.
Tom followed us to one appointment, standing in the parking lot with flowers. But I walked past him in silence. When my water broke at 2 a.m. at 37 weeks, I quietly left with my mom.
Tom woke up at his normal time, went to work, and spent the day in meetings. He only found out I’d given birth when our doorbell camera sent him a notification of my sister arriving with balloons that said, «It’s a girl.» He called me frantically, and I answered on speaker while surrounded by nurses.
«Why didn’t you tell me you were in labor?» he screamed. And I calmly replied, «You said stop talking about the pregnancy. So I did.»
The nurses all gasped, and one actually said, «Oh my god, what a monster.» Tom rushed to the hospital but had to walk past medical staff who’d heard what he’d said, all glaring with disgust. When he burst into my room, he was calculating, not angry.
He pulled out his phone and showed me a recording. «Good thing I have you on tape saying you’d deliberately keep me from my child’s birth,» he said. «My lawyer says that’s parental alienation.»
I stared at him in horror as he smiled for the first time in months. «Now,» he said, «let’s discuss custody.» I looked down at Luna, the baby I’d prayed for and suffered three years to have, and realized I might lose her to the man who couldn’t even stand to hear she existed.
My whole body went cold staring at his smiling face while my mom grabbed Luna from my arms and backed away toward the corner of the room. The nurses who’d been checking my vitals froze, and one of them reached for the call button while another stepped between Tom and the bed. Tom’s lawyer walked in behind him carrying a leather briefcase and pulled out a thick stack of papers that he placed on my bedside table.
He told me these were emergency custody papers and that I had seven days to respond before the hearing where they’d prove I deliberately kept Tom from his parental rights. My hands shook as I looked at the papers claiming I’d endangered Luna by not telling her father about the birth. Tom stood there recording everything on his phone while his lawyer explained how my admission proved parental alienation and that no judge would let me keep primary custody after what I’d done.
My sister grabbed her phone and started scrolling through her contacts while talking fast to someone about needing an emergency family lawyer right away. My mom still held Luna tight and refused to move when Tom stepped toward them, saying he wanted to hold his daughter. The nurse who’d hit the call button told Tom he needed to leave because visiting hours were over and I was still recovering from delivery.
Tom’s lawyer said they had every right to be there, but two security guards showed up and told them both to leave immediately or they’d call the police. Tom pointed at me and said this wasn’t over and that he’d see me in court before walking out with his lawyer following behind. My sister hung up her phone and said her friend from college knew an amazing family lawyer named Lauren McKnight who could meet us tomorrow at my parents’ house.
That evening after the hospital discharged me, I sat in my parents’ living room holding Luna while Lauren spread Tom’s recording and the custody papers across the coffee table. She listened to the recording three times and then looked up at me with a small smile, saying, «Context was everything in family court.» She explained that one recorded statement wouldn’t override months of documented behavior showing why I stayed silent about the pregnancy.
Lauren pulled out a yellow legal pad and started writing down everything we’d need for our defense, starting with every single text Tom sent me during the pregnancy. She wanted copies of his voicemails begging me to talk about the baby after telling me to stop, screenshots of my mom’s Facebook posts about being my only support, and statements from everyone who witnessed Tom’s original comments. My sister had already started a folder on her laptop with screenshots of Tom’s fake accounts commenting on social media posts and his frantic messages asking when I was coming home.
Lauren spent three hours documenting every detail from the past few months, including the country club shower Tom missed and his mother giving me the stroller. She made notes about Tom’s boss confronting him at golf and his grandmother writing him out of her will after that Sunday dinner. Two days later, Lauren called to warn me that Tom had filed a motion claiming I had postpartum depression and wasn’t mentally fit to care for Luna.
