Is a test necessary

[georgiam901]

I had an affair in May of 2018. Not my brightest moment. I’ll post my dates as follows:

Mirena in place - June 2014 - May 25th or 27th 2018.
Unprotected sex (pull - out) May 21st - 27th (I’m almost positive it was the 21st, but my memory doesn’t always serve right)
***this was the last time with mr.wrong
-because of my guilt conscience, I allowed my husband to remove my Mirena on May 30th or June 1st, being completely naive to the fact if mr.wrongs sperm was still in me, I could become pregnant.
-Withdrawl bleed - two days after removal.
-Period or another bleed June 6th or 7th. It was short, only three days.
Because of my worrying of pregnancy from mr.wrong, I took many pregnancy tests throughout the month of June.
Positive test - June 29th.
*** note - I have a picture of the test, it was blue dye. I know when I took it, it wasn’t super dark. But I don’t know if because I took the picture the next day it dried, it a pretty solid positive.
- July 7th 2018. First ultrasound. (Transvaginal) No fetal pole. Irregular shaped gestation sac and a yolk sac.
- July 15th 2018. Second ultrasound (Transvaginal) Fetal pole detected measuring 5 weeks and 6 days. A due date of March 11th, gestation sac no longer irregular.
- baby grew accordingly from this day forward.
March 4th - baby born naturally 7lb6oz -19.5 inches long.
I never really worried much about paternity as my dates make sense to have conceived in June and not in May. But I unfortunately ran across a picture of mr.wrong as a toddler age on fb and coincidently noticed a similarity with my child. I don’t know if it’s a perception issue or maybe my dates are to close and I should have went ahead with the dna test. I’m so irritated with myself that I had become so naive to think, ok removed the Mirena, I’m obviously not pregnant by mr.wrong, let’s have a baby to clear my conscience. I have read into the depths of the internet. I know early ultrasounds are fairly accurate. I’ve also read that some women who have dates like mine do a dna test and the man the dates don’t match with ends up the biological father. I don’t know how I could have been pregnant almost 30 days prior and not have known or had gotten negative pregnancy tests until late June. Am I making things up in my own mind? Should I have gotten a test done to know for sure who the father of my child is? Help.

[georgiam901]

Ridiculous question; but the insight would be helpful. Can a child have a different toe shape than the parents?

[AnnieBrooke]

You're going to let worries about toe shape overrule the medical evidence provided by the ultrasounds?

[georgiam901]

No, I was just generally curious. It’s not even the child that I had questioned before hand. I wasn’t sure if there was a genetics forum to ask. Sorry!

[AnnieBrooke]

I don't think we have a genetics forum, but it would be easy enough to google the question of whether toe shape is generally considered hereditary. Probably like all similar things, it's possible but the child could get their inherited traits from anywhere in the gene pool, i.e., parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and unless something was really genetically dominant it would not show up consistently. Don't know if toe shape has genes that dominate. :-)

[georgiam901]

Information is all over the place on the internet. After my “scare” with my third pregnancy, I’ve researched a lot more with things that are hereditary of course and just found an interest in it all. For example: my first and third have double crowns. I don’t have one nor does my husband, but MIL does. They’re a pain to deal with lol. But interesting that they both inherited it.

[AnnieBrooke]

Double crowns? Is that whorls of hair on the head? Who knew that this would be inheritable, but on the other hand it's hard to see why it wouldn't. :-)

[Worrywart29]

You can take antidepressants when pregnant they just changed it to a safe kind of anti depressant during pregnancy. I took sertraline. They said to whenever off close to birth if I wanted because could cause agitation of baby when first born. But once I stopped taking it 6 weeks before birth I went down a depressive rabbit hole. I ended up coming clean about my situation after I got dna test. I showed him it and he was willing to stay and fix our relationship. May not be best time with your pregnancy to do that. Only you know if its best to come clean or live with it in your relationship. Mine was best with honesty because I couldn't live in my relationship with dishonesty no longer.

[Worrywart29]

wene off medication

[georgiam901]

I appreciate this. This scenario is almost three years old. I still at times live with the uncertainties that my child may or may not be my husbands. But, my dates were pretty far apart and I live with bad anxiety, which obviously makes it worse. I have other children that I need to protect, hence the reason I’ve tried to move forward without a word said. I guess if I had slept with both men around my date of conception, I would have said something immediately. But knowing there is nearly 30 days in between intercourse with Mr. Wrong and my date of conception made no sense to destroy my family or children. The bond my husband has with the child I had questioned just isn’t worth the heartache I could potentially cause if I feel I need to come clean for my own benefit. It’s not about me, it’s about the health, love, and safety of my children at this point. I try to move forward and realize science is science. Sperm doesn’t live for weeks. Early ultrasound are accurate. I trust my doctor. I specially asked my doctor at my early ultrasound if I could have conceived a week before my conception date and he said maybe, but unlikely and the intercourse with Mr. Wrong was almost three- four weeks before that. I have no reason to discount my doctor. I don’t have PHD or MD attached to my name. So I’ll continue to tell myself those things and move forward.

[Worrywart29]

Yes if you don't think it will ever come out and its been that long it could be best. You could always do a secret paternity test if it ever becomes too much. My boyfriend was the dad and I still told him but with the assumption he would leave. But all of our significant others could react differently. I personally was crying looking at my baby knowing every day that I knew I hurt him so I chose honesty in my case. But I completely understand the reasoning for your choice. I was on the fence of what direction to take. But yes I would say your husband is the dad too but other options to determine paternity without his knowledge if you can no longer calm your fears. Mine knows and won't take dna test just says he will trust me but I still have unreasonable fears even with the dna test saying the other guy is not the dad. So it might not even help because you won't just believe even the test.

[georgiam901]

I’ll really never know if something will be said until it happens. I only pray that it doesn’t. But it will be something I deserve if it ever does. Honestly, I believe that is the reason I won’t let it go. Knowing the pain I’ll cause to my husband and children. It’s probably best I stay away for a while, rereading all of this and bringing it up just causes a peak of anxiety for me again. Good luck to you.

[georgiam901]

I don’t know if my current pregnancy causes an overload of anxiety for me, but I’ve been an anxious mess for the last few days...

[AnnieBrooke]

See your therapist. In this forum, all we can do is say you're being irrational, but a therapist can help more than that about your obsessions.

[AnnieBrooke]

Oh, and p.s., of course pregnancy can increase anxiety. That's part of the whole story of pregnancy -- hormones, hormones, hormones. I just wish you could see that your mind can think up more bad crap in a half hour than will ever happen in a lifetime. Thoughts mean nothing. :)

[georgiam901]

Thank you. My mind is definitely my worst enemy. I’ve had to quit taking all of my medication Bc of my current pregnancy and it’s thrown me for a serious loop. The what if questions always come back. Or when I look at my daughter I swear I see the other man features. Just ridiculous things. I know they’re ridiculous, but my mind perceives it totally different..

[georgiam901]

Is it normal to dwell on something that makes no sense? My anxiety peaked high today due to this. I’ll have a good couple weeks and go straight down a rabbit hole for a few days. There is always something that triggers it though. I keep trying breathing techniques and meditation. It causes me to become completely lazy and depressed. I feel like I’m always a blubbering mess and feeling sorry for myself. I don’t want to feel like this anymore. :(

[AnnieBrooke]

No, it's not normal to dwell on something that makes no sense, and I wish there was something you could get from the Internet to help you snap out of it but there really isn't much. See your therapist; when in a spiral of obsessive searches for reassurance, there stops being room for logic, fear runs the show. When that happens, you need emotional assistance, not logic and explanations of calendars and dates. Please see if you can at least get a phone appointment.

[AnnieBrooke]

I don't think anything in your story suggests you need to get a test.  Your descriptions of the ultrasounds indicate quite clearly that the other guy is not the dad. If you were to google what a 5th week embryo looks like and compare it to what a 7th week embryo looks like, you would see that no doctor would have looked at your first ultrasound and mistaken it for a baby conceived earlier.

If your anxiety is getting worse as an adult, can you find some counseling? Anxiety is a horrible life companion, and it can be handled if you have professional help.

[georgiam901]

I have a therapist. I recently fell pregnant again. I’m due in November. So I am no longer able or willing to take any of my current medication. If because I was measuring almost 6 weeks, if I was in fact pregnant by the first man, wouldn’t I had been closer to 9 weeks or even later? I’m trying to understand implantation. It’s confusing. Sperm life 7 days, implantation up to 12 days, so that’s 19 days, with a few days to rise hcg, so around 21 days after intercourse I should have had a positive pregnancy test... I’m assuming.

Thank for the input btw.

[AnnieBrooke]

I can't see any reason to need it due to your medical evidence, by your story you would have to have conceived pretty much on the day you had your Mirena removed, or possibly up to 2 days later. (Sperm is said to last only 4-6 days in the woman's body, and even by the 6th day it is questioned whether it is strong enough to penetrate an egg.) It doesn't sound like you ovulated then, but like you ovulated about 12 days after the Mirena was removed. However, if you can't stop being anxious about this, you could do a DNA test if it would actually be something you would believe. Will the other guy test with you? And, more important, will you be convinced by a test? A lot of women write in on this forum so worried that they get a DNA test and then don't believe it.

[georgiam901]

I haven’t had any contact with mr.wrong for about two years and I’d prefer to keep it that way. I would have contacted him right away, had I thought I had gotten pregnant by him. But I was pretty positive at the time, that he was completely out of the scenario. I need to move forward and on. Thinking about doing dna gives me even worse anxiety thinking the results could be the complete opposite.... :(

[AnnieBrooke]

Yep, you're "making things up in your own mind." If you google what ultrasounds look like at the early stages of pregnancy, and you will be able to see see that a baby from 30 days earlier can't be confused with a baby that is from 30 days later. Embryos simply look very different week by week in the first trimester of pregnancy. Does your child also look (at the toddler stage) like your husband and yourself?

[georgiam901]

I don’t really think. I guess parts of her do. Looks like she has my husbands lips & nose. My eyes & chin. But honestly, I have other children and neither of them really resembled me or my husband as toddlers either. My first daughter doesn’t even look like she was made from us, lol. It’s so hard to tell. I went to my mom after freaking out about it and was honest with her and she said no, absolutely no resemblance at all. So I hope she was being honest...

[AnnieBrooke]

One way to judge is to look at photographs of the baby and photos of yourself and your husband at the same age as the baby in the photo. It's hard to judge when you are looking at a photo of your childhood and a living, wiggling kiddo, but it is easier to see when you compare a picture to a picture. My husband and my son happened to both have photos taken at the same age (3 months) and the two were so identical they could have been twins. But if you looked at them in person you would not have seen it.

Saying "I hope she was being honest" is kind of in the "making things up in your own mind" category. Why on earth would your mother not be honest? :) Try to relax.

[georgiam901]

I have done that. Unfortunately, I only have one picture of mr.wrong and one baby picture of my husband (18 months). So it’s hard to compare her sometimes. Do you think that maybe I should have did a test? Was I being completely naive and my dates are too close?

[georgiam901]

Also, I do believe my mom. She’s very straight forward, but she also knows the anxiety I’ve dealt with my entire adult life. It has put a huge damper on my way of living and even being a mom sometimes. I tend to dwell on things and have a truly difficult time letting them go. So sometimes I worry she says things to spare my feelings and anxiety. I’m so ashamed that I ever got myself into this situation in the first place.