Radiation shields and keeping secrets..

Thanks everyone for your lovely comments on my 2nd beta :)

This post is a bit mixed in terms of content, some of it makes slightly difficult reading, so just wanted to give you a heads-up...

My partner in pregnancy was also at the clinic on Saturday getting her 2nd beta (this is the girl who had her collection and transfer at the same time as me). I was a little surprised to see her already wearing her maternity smock. But in China, this is not uncommon. As soon as women get pregnant, they begin to wear a 'radiation shield' smock.

There is some debate about the make-up and purpose of these delightful items of clothing. At first, I thought they were worn to announce your pregnancy to the world and encourage people not to push and shove you on the subway/bus. Also, it makes it more likely you'll get a seat on public transport!  But people have also told me that they are made of some kind of metal fibre that protects the wearer from radiation.. imagine the lead aprons they wear to shoot X-rays. I've done a web search and there does seem to be some evidence to back this up... evidence that they are sold as radiation shields that is, not that they actually do anything!

But this all got me thinking about announcing pregnancies. It's clear that, here in China, lots of people do not keep this secret to themselves until the 2nd trimester. It's public information from the start. This is backed up by an awful example of an Chinese ex-colleague of mine (CAUTION - sad story ahead). She and I were supposed to attend a meeting together one day. She sent me a text message saying she couldn't attend, because she'd had an abortion and would be off work for a week. Once I picked my jaw up off the floor, I presumed that there was a translation problem and she meant a miscarriage - after all, she was recently married and I knew she wanted children soon, though I hadn't known she was pregnant. I was surprised for her to share something so personal and as it turns out I had presumed wrong. I later found out that there had been a problem at a scan and she'd been advised to end her pregnancy. This was backed up by her email auto-reply, also stating that she'd had an abortion. I was horrified.. horrified at what she was going through, but also that it was now public knowledge all around our large company and possibly to external clients.

But should I have been so shocked? Should the biggest events of our lives, whether happy or sad, be kept from others? Why do we choose to keep this particular secret, yet other societies clearly don't? Does it come from living in such close proximity to one other in countries like China, where privacy is hard to find and not necessarily desired? I mean, in the olden days (and still in some parts of the world), several families lived under one roof and 'bodily functions' such as sex, just went on under the cover of darkness, not in a separate room. 

This doesn't mean I'm about to run out and buy my smock (though I have considered wearing one to my clinic, because seeing them seems to give others hope)... I'd not even planned on telling my siblings or my Bloke's parents yet, though that might be difficult to avoid this week for reasons I'll explain in another post. But this certainly got me thinking...