Cryptic pregnancy is a condition where a woman doesn't recognize she's pregnant till she goes into labor. There are stories out there about women going to the doctor, having negative urine tests, negative blood tests, negative ultrasounds, women who have bled during pregnancy so they swear they're having periods, they didn't gain much weight, and then they go into labor. The women who have experienced these things can't deny that this happened, but the medical profession doesn't recognize it as a true condition. It comes back to science and the way home pregnancy tests work, how ultrasounds work, and why women won't have periods while they're pregnant.
Pregnancy tests (urine test or a blood test) are looking for a hormone called human chorionic gonadotropin that a woman's body starts to release early in pregnancy. Levels rise exponentially until 8-11 weeks gestation when they peak, and then they start to decline. Human chorionic gonadotropin is essential to a healthy pregnancy, so if it's not detected in a blood test or a urine test, then that means you're not pregnant. This is also a diagnostic tool for women who are miscarrying, because if the doctor tests a blood HCG level, and then compares that to a level that they get a couple days later, if it's falling, that means the woman is miscarrying. That implies that if levels are rising as they should, then it will show on a pregnancy test.
Now let's talk about ultrasounds. Evidence of pregnancy can be seen using a transvaginal ultrasound by 5-6 weeks gestation (5-6 weeks after the last period), so it's pretty early on when you can see evidence of pregnancy. Then by using an abdominal ultrasound, evidence of pregnancy can be seen by 7-8 weeks. You can see a fluttering heartbeat in the uterus. That's really exciting when a woman gets to see that.
The next hot topic associated with cryptic pregnancy is that some women say they had regular periods over the course of pregnancy, so they never thought they were pregnant. It's possible to have vaginal bleeding during pregnancy. 20-40% of women have vaginal bleeding, but it's usually a sign of complication. So early on, we look into ectopic pregnancy, miscarriage, pelvic organ problems. Then very early on, around the time a woman might have a missed period, she might have a little spotting, sometimes due to implantation spotting. But if the bleeding is happening after 20 weeks, we worry about other things like placenta previa or an abruption. These are all serious complications that need to be explored if a woman has vaginal bleeding during pregnancy. But it's not due to a period, and here's why. Each month, a woman's body builds up a thick uterine lining to support pregnancy if it happens. It's where the little embryo starts to implant and grow, and it needs that rich lining. So if you're not pregnant, then your body sheds that uterine lining, and you have a period.
Another thing that people bring up when they discuss cryptic pregnancy is a growing belly or a lack of. Some women are in denial. Their stomach starts to get big and they write it off as gaining weight. That definitely happens, but there's also women who are able to hide pregnancy pretty well. For women who have claimed to not know they were pregnant, then they go on to deliver a baby, and that's the first they ever knew about it - there are women who don't gain much weight during pregnancy, or maybe they did start to gain weight and they thought they were putting on a few pounds.
Other symptoms associated with pregnancy are nausea, vomiting, weight-gain, and a growing belly. Women who have claimed to have cryptic pregnancy may not have had nausea or vomiting - 10% of women don't. Or maybe they did and wrote it off to other things - they thought they were sick and never sought help from a doctor. As for weight-gain, everyone gains a different amount of weight during pregnancy and shows differently. That's largely dependent on your pre-pregnancy weight. I can see how there's women who don't gain much weight, they don't get sick - that's a possibility.
If a woman never goes to a doctor and has the diagnosis of pregnancy given, then it would be possible for her to go throughout pregnancy and write off symptoms that she's seeing as something else, whether it be denial or not knowing that those are symptoms, and then she goes into labor, has a lot of pain, goes to the hospital, and then has a baby. If you believe that you're pregnant, take a home pregnancy test once you've a missed period, which is the first sign of pregnancy. If it's positive, call your OB provider and make a prenatal appointment. Proper prenatal care increases the chance of you and your baby being as healthy as possible. For women who don't seek prenatal care because they didn't think they were pregnant, or were in denial, it does increase the chance of complications.
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