'Cool girlies don’t announce the pregnancy.' The baby trend sweeping your socials.

When I was pregnant with my first child I was so excited to finally share the news on my Instagram. 

I knew I wanted to wait until I was 20 weeks; I had a caption planned, and I was so looking forward to telling everyone the happy news. It was 2021 and to be honest, social media was a different time.

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Now, some two years later and the landscape has decidedly changed. In fact now, people aren't even announcing their pregnancy at all on social media. Instead: they're hard launching babies.

@abb.ie24 i just know everyone talking about us #newmom #boymom #momsoftiktok ♬ original sound - Exchange Student Community

It's a trend that seems to be sweeping social media whereby expecting parents forgo a meticulously planned announcement for a more low-key, 'surprise, I had a baby' vibe. 

I'm now pregnant with my second child and it wasn't until I saw a TikTok punter explaining the hard launch baby phenomenon that I realised I was unwittingly participating in the trend.

@hifortesa #stitch with @Abigail🤩 #greenscreen #pregnant #pregnancy #pregnancyannouncement #announcement #hardlaunch #mama #momtok #pregnanttok #fyp #foryou #foryoupage ♬ original sound - fortesa latifi

In one video, journalist Fortesa Latifi explained the hard launch baby movement by commenting on how things are shifting online.

"This is so interesting because pregnancy announcements used to be such a big deal," she said. "And they had to be these perfect, like 'we're expecting' style Etsy picture perfect announcements. And now people are just not doing it in the same way."

It made me start to think about the reasons why, at eight months pregnant, I had no intention of sharing my impending arrival. Firstly, it must be said that the way we share on social media has petered off. Gone are the days of posting an album of 58 blurry digital camera photos (cringe) taken on an insignificant night out.

"Cool girlies don’t announce the pregnancy, just the baby," wrote one TikTok commenter.

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In short: it has become kinda gauche to update followers on your comings and goings on social media. Never has there been a bigger spotlight on tracking the 'cringe' things people share on social media (thanks to accounts like The Beetoota Advocate). So to save face many just opt to avoid posting all together. Call it self-preservation in a digital world.

The New York Times says we can also blame this on the corporatisation of social-media. "Instead of seeing messages and photos from friends and relatives about their holidays or fancy dinners, users of Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter and Snapchat now often view professionalised content from brands, influencers and others that pay for placement," writes Brian X. Chen.

Why share something so personal on social media when it's just going to get lost in the void of teeth-whitening strips and hair gummies?

Then there's the issue of protecting my privacy. Ever since I had my first child I instinctively went into extreme mama bear mode and wanted to protect my daughter from everything. Of course this was and remains a futile endeavour but what I could control was keeping her image off social media. Ever since then I've found that this habit has extended beyond my child and I just don't have the urge to share my personal life like I used to.

I guess that's my anxiety speaking out but I don't really want randoms on the internet to know about my s**t, you know? So when it came to sharing my pregnancy on Instagram I thought, 'the people I'm closest to know about it, why do I need to let anyone else know.'

"If you’re not close enough to me to know I’m pregnant, you don’t really *need* to know. My IG friends I made ten years ago aren’t going to be part of his life, so why tell them?" wrote one user in the comments of Latifi's TikTok.

Not to get all 'AI doomsday' on you but the recent rhetoric has meant that alarm bells about our personal data and digital image have been ringing loudly for people. It was only a matter of time before that sentiment seeped through to the way we engage on social media and guarding our personal information is a growing trend because of it.

Then there's the sensitivity of it all. 

Talking about fertility has thankfully become less taboo but as a result we're all hyper-aware of the struggles that many parents go through on their respective journeys. Whether you're longing to be a parent, struggling with infertility or experiencing medical issues, seeing pregnancy announcement posts online can be extremely triggering. And for many who have struggled with infertility, hard launching their baby feels like the safest way to make a public announcement.

"I hard launched when my baby was living, breathing and safe in my arms," wrote another user on TikTok.

So with all of the above considered, I had zero intention of sharing my second pregnancy online. But then last weekend my girlfriends threw me a baby sprinkle (an excuse to catch up over a long lunch before I traipse back into the newborn zone) and part of me knew that people would share pictures from the event online.

In a snap decision I quickly posted a photo of my bump on the main feed and wrote a caption that had little thought behind it. I think I just wanted to control the narrative, get ahead of any questions — and deep down, I think I just wanted to commemorate the moment. Give it a time stamp to look back on. In a way it was a very carefree, late-in-pregnancy soft launch. A far cry from the picture perfect social media post from my first pregnancy.

Who knows, maybe Instagram will be dead in a year and hard or soft launching babies won't even be a topic for consideration. But now it looks like there's a decided shift away from parents sharing their baby announcements on social media and hard launching is the emerging trend. But ultimately, at the end of the day, go with your gut and do what feels right for you.

How did you share your baby announcement? Tell us in the comments section below.

Feature Image: Supplied, Lisa Hamilton.