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Could planned parenthood be wrong about my EDD?

Sorry this is long.

I went to planned parenthood 2 times (first around 6w and second 9w) thinking about abortion, had an US done both times. They said my EDD was June 22nd-24th and they swore up and down I could’ve ONLY ovulated on 9/30 and my period HAD to have been 9/14.

I’m not fully confident with their date because their ultrasound machine was not that great, the picture they gave me was pretty low quality. I don’t really know if the people who did the ultrasounds were even trying to be accurate since they were abortion consultations and not dating scans.

I am keeping my baby, and I had my first official US(anatomy scan) at 20w, that US lasted an hour of her measuring my baby. The US tech said my baby was measuring 20w 3d and it didn’t match up with my period starting 9/14 like PP tried to force on me. At that ultrasound I was given an EDD June 20th-21st. I’m having a boy.

I started my period 9/11 or 9/12, I’m not 100% sure because I didn’t write it down. My cycles last 30 days regularly though, I know that’s a fact.

I had sex with Guy A on Sept. 25th. Then I had sex with Guy B on Sept. 30th.

If I go by my 20w US, the dates would add up to my period and with Guy A being the father, but am I just looking for a Hail Mary?

Should I disregard planned parenthood’s dates and go by my 20 week ultrasound that was more thorough?

I know the ONLY way to tell is a paternity test but I just want to know if maybe my gut is right in thinking that Guy A is the father and I learned my lesson to be faithful.

Thanks if you read this.
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13167 tn?1327194124
Baby,  in reading both your questions,  I have one small detail to add.  You asked whether it was likely the sperm was waiting for the egg,  and no,  that's not likely.  It's likely the egg was waiting for the sperm.  But that's just "in general".  In general,  if the egg is waiting,  you have a  higher chance of conceiving a boy (male sperm swim much faster than female sperm). If the sperm was waiting for the egg,   it's more likely you'll have a girl child (female sperm swim slower,  but live longer and are capable of sitting there waiting for the egg).  I don't know whether this is in favor of the guy you are hoping will be the father,  it's all kind of confusing,  but just thought I'd add that.  Congrats on your pregnancy and hope all goes well for you.
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1 Comments
Thanks for your response.
134578 tn?1693250592
COMMUNITY LEADER
Hi, Baby2021,

Thanks for writing in, here and on the other post, it helps when someone with these quandaries hears from other women besides me. lol And my answer will probably be longer than your question! (which, thank you very much for your complete and calm job of giving the pertinent facts and your concerns). The short answer is, no, you can't disregard the earlier ultrasounds, even if the later one gives you an answer that you like more. But the first guy is not ruled out either.

The growth rates of embryos and fetuses can vary: some babies grow faster than average and some grow more slowly. Because of this, early ultrasounds are often more accurate than later ones for trying to determine when conception was. (An embryo at six weeks hasn't had a lot of time to grow and diverge from the average, and a 20th-week fetus has had many weeks to develop a little faster or slower than average. In essence, the scan could measure the baby perfectly and then impute a due date from the baby's size based on the assumption the baby is growing at an average rate, when perhaps the baby is not.)

When someone has a 6th-week ultrasound and a 20th-week ultrasound that disagree, I generally counsel them to pay more attention to what the 6th-week ultrasound indicates, no matter how blurry the photograph or what the imputed motivation for the ultrasound. (And regarding that, an ultrasound is an ultrasound, and an ultrasound tech is a trained medical professional. Planned Parenthood provides women's health services for many thousands of women who don't have abortion in mind. There's no "abortion way" or "keep the baby" way to do a scan, there is just scanning the baby. If you're saying the whole place seemed unprofessional or amateurish, that's a different issue, but I'll also volunteer that hasn't been my experience with Planned Parenthood.)

This means that you really can't just disregard the 6th and 9th week ultrasounds. Unfortunately, the sex was in too close succession for any of your ultrasounds to answer the question for sure. (As I said above, the 20th-week ultrasound could be a perfect and exact picture of your baby's size and development level, but a scan can't tell if the baby has been growing a little fast.)

Here is what also could throw off your dates from the various ultrasounds just enough to be a problem when the dates of the sex are so close together. You have a regular 30-day cycle, but most calculations of this type are set up for a menstrual month of 28 days. Ovulation happens around 14 days *before* your next period is due to begin, not 14 days after your last period came. This means your ovulation will probably be a couple of days later than the average woman with a 28-day cycle. You'd have to have told your cycle length to the techs, and they would have to have had a way to compute it in, if they were the ones who gave you the possible ovulation dates. The fact that the Planned Parenthood people gave you a 15-day span between your presumed ovulation date and the first day of your last period sounds a bit like they did have this information, but it's hard to tell.  (If the ultrasound techs only did your EDD's, and then you went home and used a conception calculator yourself to calculate ovulation, you will be dealing with software that uses 28-day cycles and not 30-day cycles, and again, that just won't split the kind of hairs you need to split.)

If your period began September 11, and if you always without fail have the next one in 30 days and it never, ever varies month in and month out for years, you would have expected the next one around October 10. Counting back from October 10 gives an estimated ovulation date of the 26th of September. This sounds promising for the hail Mary pass, except you don't know for sure if that period really came on September 11.

In your shoes, I'd definitely prepare to find out for sure with a DNA test -- if you have the big bucks, call Ravgen and test now with both guys. (Ravgen also has discreet testing, which helps some women a lot.) Or, when the baby comes, run a DNA test at the hospital (again, with both guys) for about a tenth of the cost. I certainly wouldn't tell one guy definitely that he is the dad and the other guy definitely he is not, until you have a DNA test for both guys in hand.

Good luck, I'm sorry that the answer isn't clearer at this point, but mercifully, it will be soon enough. And congratulations! A baby is a blessing even when we have to wait to know what we want to know.

Annie

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5 Comments
Thank you for your response. They are appreciated. It’s nice to have a place where you’re not judged for your mistakes and will get actual thought out answers.

Planned parenthood used a pregnancy wheel to calculate my period and conception from the due date they gave me.
I told them I had 30 day cycles so they took that into account as well. But that’s when they told me I had to have had my period on 9/14 when I don’t think that’s true, I remember already having my period that day. Guess it doesn’t really matter at the end of the day but I’m looking for the slightest thing to ease my mind.

I have used calculators that take into account my 30 day cycle. If I put in the 9/11 or 9/12 period, of course it lines up with Guy A only by the slightest.

I know I’m cutting it so close with the dates and I really didn’t realize how close until I got my first positive pregnancy test. I honestly didn’t think I would end up pregnant.

I’m always looking at my calendar and counting back to 14 days from when my next period would’ve been, remembering that my cycles are 30 days I make sure to count from the 30th day to the 14th day when ovulation supposedly happens.

I unfortunately don’t have the money to spend on a dna test right now. I guess I could talk to my OB about doing one after birth if I can’t tell my looks. I already have a child with Guy A.

Nevertheless I am excited to meet this little man, I already love him that’s why given the circumstance I couldn’t get the abortion. I just hope and pray he can have both parents there to raise him together.


Are you in a position where Guy A doesn't know there's a question?
I'm not trying to be snoopy, just was wondering how dire this is. If the baby is not from Guy A, are you afraid he will be out of your life and his child's life? That would be a lot to worry about.
Yea, honestly I haven’t told him and I do have a lot of regret with not being honest and some days I just want to tell him but I’m afraid of his reaction.

I know it’s the right thing to tell him but it’s not that easy when I feel like I’ll lose everything in the process. It’s really been eating me up, I feel like complete crap.
Well then, I guess when you do tell him, it might help to say it took you a long time to realize there was even an issue with the timing, and that you still don't know for sure, and you feel so awful about the situation that you couldn't face it hardly even to yourself, let alone knowing how to say it to him. This might overstate things a bit but not much, and not telling him because you didn't know isn't as bad as not telling him if you knew all along that there was at least a question, and didn't say anything.

In your shoes, I'd also talk beforehand at least for one session with a counselor that does family counseling. If it does turn out that the new baby is from Guy B, you'll need a plan in mind for Guy A to keep being a father to his child even though the new baby is from someone else. Your two children will love each other, and the two dads (if that turns out to be the situation) are going to have to accept that this love is good for their kids, and suck it up. If you're living with Guy A, he might not want to continue to do that because the new baby's presence will be painful to him, and it would be hard to blame him for that reaction. But at least he should continue to be a parent to his child, and having a plan in mind of some kind will help everyone try to stay level-headed about the good of the kids while working through the emotional minefield. Clearly, it will take a lot of thinking on everyone's part and some patience, to work it all out. A counselor might help you think it all over in advance, so you can be ready with the possibilities.  
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