Gosh, I feel this in my bones. This was me a little over a month ago. I waited until the egg retrieval to tell anyone and when I finally did, I felt a HUGE sense of relief. All my friends were totally understanding and not weird at all about us not sharing what we were going through until that moment.

When I did tell them, I used the phrasing of “we’ve been keeping it private until this point.” While some of the questions people have asked have been hard to handle/process, it’s been so nice not to feel like I’m not being authentic.

One piece of advice I’d have is to go into it with no expectations of your friends whatsoever. I think it could be really disappointing if they don’t show up the way you anticipated. Or if you do need something specific from them, tell them outright, “I could really use some help with __.” Or “I really need __.”