People keep asking if it was planned.  This apparently simple question is actually quite a tricky one. The truth is I don’t really know if my pregnancy was planned. I believe one can plan not to get pregnant, but it’s quite difficult to plan to get pregnant. I mean, despite the impressive medical achievements, some things are still not under our full control, the exact timing of a pregnancy being one of them.

So my answer will be this: yes I went off the pill at some point after my 30^th birthday. Both my husband, Gilead, and I felt satisfied and happy with our lives. We were not desperate in any way to have a child but at the same time, we also felt we were getting older and perhaps also changing  - I suppose ‘mature’ is the word I’m looking for - and that more than in past years we felt that we were capable of coping with the complex challenge of parenthood.

When we made this decision I was already involved with a fascinating new technological idea that had to do with group communication. I had been approached by an acquaintance of mine, a gifted mathematician with a background in computer science, to explore a special technology he had invented. This technology enables the exchange of targeted electronic messages, improving communication within groups and audiences. Being a social psychologist specializing in group processes, I was excited about the opportunity to apply my social science knowledge to the high tech field. I joined my colleague and started dedicating time and energy in attempt to turn his idea into a useful communication tool that would serve people and organizations.  

What has happened since then is pretty much a typical story of the new media industry: two entrepreneurs fall in love with an idea and work on it until it is more than just an idea and it has the power to attract people and become a business. In March 2000 my colleague and I already had a crystallized concept and a working demo of the product. We were then joined by two women - a senior software engineer who led the internet team in a successful high-tech company, and a woman with marketing and finance background and remarkable networking skills. At that point we were already a team of four with diverse professional backgrounds working on a new technology for group communication. We raised funds from private investors, rented an office in west London and founded Linkadoo Communications.

From that day on things started happening at high tech speed. The company hired more software engineers and retained the services of a business adviser who worked with us on the business model to make sure our promising technology is to become a profitable company. We filed a patent application, hired a few more people, and moved into a larger office space, this time in a more central location.  Within months we found ourselves swamped with work, giving numerous presentations, attending multiple conferences and sweating on the development of the application. On the 31^st of January 2001 we will soft-launch Linkadoo’s product, after 9 months of intensive development.

9 months I said? Oops, it reminds me of something. I wrote above that what has happened is pretty much a typical story of the new media industry. Well this time the story has a twist. Because as the company was growing (we are now 14 full-time employees) I started growing as well.

I discovered I was pregnant when the company was still doing its first steps. The pregnancy confused me – my heart was already set on Linkadoo and the pregnancy seemed to have come at an odd time. On the other hand when you’re a happily married thirty-something year old woman, the daughter of Jewish parents who are eager to have their first grandchild, you don’t tend to see abortion as a real option.

As in many times in the past Gilead came to my rescue. He offered to be at home with the baby in the first months after the birth. Being a corporate lawyer on his way to partnership in a large law firm, Gilead’s suggestion was definitely not a trivial one. It meant a change in his priorities and could also result in a career change. I accepted his offer only when I became convinced that Gilead was at peace with his decision, and felt it was not a compromise, but rather a choice.

So I am no longer worried about the baby. I know he’s going to be in good hands with his father. I’m still a bit worried about myself though. How is it going to work out for me? Linkadoo and motherhood – they both seem to be so overwhelmingly demanding! After all there are only seven days a week and 24 hours a day! How am I going to balance career and family life, the classic dilemma of all working mums, brought in my case to the extreme? I feel the lack of a suitable role model, as I don’t really know enough women in my close environment that founded a business and became mothers at the same time.

The pregnancy confused me at the beginning and in a way it still does. At times I’m so focused on work that I can almost forget the fact I’m now 8-month pregnant. At other times, however, I’m thinking about the baby and I’m moved by this so-basic-yet-miraculous process of the creation of a new life.  I still don’t know how I will balance the considerable tasks that await me. But I know I will have all the possible support both at home and at work.  And I also know that by now the baby and Linkadoo are both dear to me, so in a way they will need to learn to live together. As I’m writing now I can feel baby kicking inside. I don’t know if he was planned but by now he’s surely welcome.

Arielle Lehman is the Joint Managing Director and co-founder of Linkadoo Communications. She also holds a doctorate in social psychology, and specialized in personal relationships and group processes. One of the first members of HighTech Women, Arielle's baby is the first HighTech Women baby!

Do you have comments or suggestions or other ideas in this field? Give us you feedback.