Basic Trope: A character thinks she may be pregnant.
- Straight: Alice's period is late, and she freaks out, thinking that she's pregnant. How will she tell Bob? What will her very conservative parents Charles and Diane say? What about school?
- Exaggerated:
- Alice and Bob used a condom, spermicide, and Alice is on the Pill. But Alice still worries that she might be pregnant.
- Alice has a Pregnancy Scare every month, whether there's a good reason to, or not.
- Alice is a virgin, or at least has not had any sexual partners recently enough that pregnancy would actually be a concern.
- Alice is a lesbian, and the only sex she's had recently (or ever) is with other women.
- Alice has had a tubal ligation and Bob has had a vasectomy and Alice is on the Pill for unrelated reasons...yet she still thinks she could be pregnant.
- Alice is postmenopausal; her last period was 3 years ago, and she still worries that she could be pregnant.
- Downplayed: Alice goes to the drugstore to buy the morning-after pill, just to be safe.
- Justified:
- Alice and Bob had unprotected sex.
- The condom broke.
- Alice finds that she missed a pill.
- Even the best birth control has a failure rate.
- Alice and Bob live in a society where premarital sex and/or out-of-wedlock pregnancy are taboo.
- Alice is sexually active, and PMS symptoms do somewhat mirror early-pregnancy symptoms, since they are both the result of increased levels of estrogen and progesterone.
- Alice has been cheating on Bob with Charles, and is worried that she's pregnant...but she isn't sure which of these men is the father, if she is indeed pregnant. (May be compounded by a potential Chocolate Baby scenario.)
- Alice and Bob are using a birth-control method not known for its reliability, such as the rhythm method, or pulling out.
- Alice, due to faulty or lack of sex-ed, is misinformed on how one can get pregnant
- Alice is a Half-Human Hybrid, and can't tell the difference between a real pregnancy and the pseudopregnancies her nonhuman half has in response to her pack-alpha being pregnant (assuming she even knows the latter is a thing).
- Inverted:
- Alice and Bob desperately want a baby, and have been trying for months to conceive. Alice worries that she's not pregnant, as she waits anxiously for the pregnancy test to process on top of the sink.
- Alice is pregnant, but believes she isn't.
- Subverted:
- Alice wakes up one morning with a slightly bloated belly and feels a little bit queasy, but she chalks it up to last night's taco binge.
- Just as Alice is beginning to panic, her period starts.
- Alice is in a good place in her life for a baby: a stable relationship/marriage, a comfortable income, a decent place to live, etc. So she isn't worried.
- Alice finds out she is pregnant, but then either has a Convenient Miscarriage or an abortion, and life goes on.
- Alice looks at the calendar and freaks out, because her term paper is due (and she hasn't started it yet, or she's only completed some of it.)
- It's just an Imagine Spot or All Just a Dream.
- Double Subverted:
- But later on, she starts to worry that she's pregnant.
- But then her friend Carol informs her that some women do experience bleeding during pregnancy, and urges her to see a doctor for an official test.
- Until Bob announces that he got laid off, and Alice realizes that even with both their incomes, they were barely scraping by.
- Some months later, Alice thinks she may be pregnant again.
- Then she realizes something else is late.
- Not too long after that, Alice finds out she really is pregnant.
- Parodied:
- Bob thinks he might somehow be pregnant.
- Alice is a virgin, and freaks out when she misses her period, not realizing that many factors can throw even the most regular woman off.
- Alice throws an "I'm not pregnant!" party
- Alice goes through this every month.
- Zig Zagged: Some months Alice panics, others she doesn't.
- Averted:
- Alice is not sexually active. (She might be a virgin, or she might not have had any sexual partners in quite a long time.)
- Alice is a lesbian.
- Alice is past menopause or has not yet had her first period.
- Alice wants a baby and is in a good place for it.
- Alice got herself sterilized.
- Enforced: Rule of Drama, Law of Inverse Fertility, and sometimes Can't Get Away with Nuthin'
- Lampshaded: "Oh, God...what if I'm pregnant?!"
- Invoked: Alice and Bob engage in some Auto Erotica at Make-Out Point, and the condom breaks.
- Exploited: Alice tells Bob she's pregnant, in hopes of trapping him into a Shotgun Wedding.
- Defied: Alice has a backup method of birth control, so she doesn't worry.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Implied:
- Alice is seen disposing of a negative pregnancy test, breathing a huge sigh of relief.
- Alice looks at the calendar, panics, puts on lacy white panties, and pleads for her period to show up.
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