History Main / TheBabyTrap

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->'''Bart''': Cathy, you told me there was no need for precautions!
->'''Cathy''': There was no need. I want your baby.
->'''Bart''': ''You want my baby?'' What the hell do you think I can do, marry you?
->'''Cathy''': No. I did my own assuming. I presumed you'd have your fun with me and when it was over you'd go back to your wife and find yourself another playmate. And I'd have just what I set out to get--your baby. Now I can leave. So kiss me off, Bart, as just another of your little extramarital dalliances.

* In ''Film/TheInvisibleMan2020'', Cecilia had a secret stash of birth control pills because she knew Adrian, her abusive husband, wanted to have a baby to enact this trope. However, Cecilia [[spoiler: gets committed to a mental hospital]] after Adrian [[spoiler: killed her sister while wearing his invisible suit in the restaurant she and Cecilia were eating dinner]]. When she gets a medical check up she finds out that she's [[spoiler: pregnant with Adrian's child, and finds out that he replaced her secret birth control pills with placebos]] shortly before she ran away from the house as away to ensure [[spoiler: that she would return to him]].
* Though it's a recurring point in ''Film/AnOfficerAndAGentleman,'' the movie also tries something different: [[spoiler:Lynette only claims to be pregnant so that Sid stays in a relationship with her. She spills the beans when he resigns from the military to be with her, [[WhatAnIdiot which she didn't want]]. One has to wonder when she would have confessed her lack of pregnancy otherwise.]]

* ''Film/{{Pirates Of The Caribbean On Stranger Tides}}'': Angelica tries to stop Jack from abandoning her on the desert island by lying that she is pregnant with his child; however, Jack isn't fooled.

* ''Film/Unforgettable2017'': After he broke up with her, Tessa intentionally got pregnant with David's baby so he'd stay with her, on her mother's advice as a means to insure this. However, this only extended their relationship for a time, and they got divorced when their daughter was fairly young.

* This was the subject of a ''Series/DoctorPhil'' episode and one couple involved a man having sex with his wife ''while she was asleep'' to get her pregnant. In the same episode, another woman deliberately sabotaged/stopped taking her birth control so she'd get pregnant. Of course, in both cases, the doctor tore right into them.

[[folder:Theater]]

-->'''Sarah''': Have a baby.\\
'''Adelaide''': Have two!\\
'''Sarah''': Six!\\
'''Adelaide''': Nine!\\
'''Sarah''': Stop!

* In ''WebComic/SomethingPositive,'' Faye once considers doing this to her son Davan and his then-girlfriend Branwen, because [[IWantGrandkids she wants grandkids]]. Her husband Fred is rather surprised, since ''she's'' usually the sane one in the family.

* Parodied in the ''WebVideo/FiveSecondFilms'' video "The One". A guy and girl are about to do the deed, and she asks him if he's sure that she's the one for him. He reassures her, and is then shown poking holes in his condom while whispering that he's gonna ''make'' her "the one". Still quite creepy.

-->'''Thomas''': Siri, can you--\\
'''Siri''': Thomas, I'm pregnant and it's yours.\\
'''Thomas''': What?! You told me you were on the pill!\\
'''Siri''': I lied.\\
'''Thomas''': ''Gasp!''

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'', Donna mentions on her blog that she wants a baby, then jokes that she might conveniently "forget" to take her birth control pill before a date.

** Possibly related to this, there is an increasing number of men who have chosen to get vasectomies in their early twenties. Since the childfree are still something of an AcceptableTarget, many doctors will outright refuse to perform them under the belief that the man will always change his mind. For a woman who hasn't had children as well, it is next to impossible to convince a doctor to permanently sterilise her. Many doctors are very insistent that ''everyone really wants babies'', or are wary of being sued by a patient whom they sterilise then later changes his/her mind.

** There was a more disturbing [[https://law.justia.com/cases/alabama/court-of-appeals-civil/1996/2950025-0.html case in Alabama]] where a woman had sex with a man she met at a party ''while he was unconscious'' with the intention of getting pregnant and suing him for child support. The guy produced witnesses who overheard her bragging about what she had done, but it made no difference and the court still ordered him to pay child support.

* ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'': Discussed in a ''Weekend Update'' bit with Creator/PeteDavidson back when he was engaged to Music/ArianaGrande. He's so afraid she's gonna leave him that he considers switching her birth control with sugar pills so she can't.

The character doing this is usually female, often a teenage girl, because of [[MarsAndVenusGenderContrast gender stereotypes]] that say all women are [[MyBiologicalClockIsTicking desperate to get married and have babies]] while all men flee commitment as long as they can. (This is dependent upon several factors within real life, such as abortion rights. These laws can cause a huge imbalance in agency, whereas either a woman has all control over what happens within her body or none at all. This can also put pressure on the father as well, who has to either [[HonorableMarriageProposal make an "honest woman"]] of her or take financial responsibility.) Because of this, female characters who are disliked by their male partner's friends or family may be suspected of plotting to use this trope on him even if there's no evidence of any such thing. The moral tone also depends on several factors, such as the gender doing the trapping and the circumstances in which the sex took place. For example, a man who traps a woman is portrayed as planting something within her body that she ''does not'' want there. The greater problems of {{Double Standard Rape|Female On Male}} and MaritalRapeLicense also create deeper concerns which [[Administrivia/RuleOfCautiousEditingJudgment we will NOT get into here]].

* Music/MichaelJackson's "Billie Jean", quoted above is about this. Namely, all the "Billie Jeans" his older brothers had to deal with when they were together in the Jackson 5.
** The song is ambiguous, though, open to the AlternateCharacterInterpretation that the singer actually is the father trying to dodge the consequences of his actions. "People always told me, be careful what you do..."

* In the ''TokyoGhoul'' sequel, Touka tells Kaneki she’s trying to find a way to keep him at her side, then jumps him while he's emotionally vulnerable and has just confided in her about how much he misses Hide.

-->Worked hard to trap his ass, got him to propose to me, oh my God, then we got married, my dream is coming true, then we got pregnant, and recently we bought our first home together. And two weeks into the escrow process, I learned me that my beautiful, Harvard educated husband was ''seventy thousand dollars'' in debt. And me, with my hard earned T.V. money, wound up paying it all off. [{{beat}}] So as it turns out, he's the one who trapped '''''me!''''' ... Now if I don't work, we die! Why else do think I'm doing this show while seven and a half months pregnant?!

* Downplayed in ''Manga/ShonanJunaiGumi''. Mami tells Makoto she's pregnant (after they broke up) and she wants to get married, but she didn't do it on purpose. [[spoiler:They end up running away to start a new life before she finds out she's not pregnant after all.]]

-->Worked hard to trap his ass, got him to propose to me, oh my God, then we got married, my dream is coming true, then we got pregnant, and recently we bought our first home together. And two weeks into the escrow process, I learned that my beautiful, Harvard educated husband was ''seventy thousand dollars'' in debt. And me, with my hard earned T.V. money, wound up paying it all off. [{{beat}}] So as it turns out, he's the one who trapped '''''me!''''' ... Now if I don't work, we die! Why else do think I'm doing this show while seven and a half months pregnant?!

* A male version occurs in ''[[Fanfic/TheHeartTrilogy Heart of Ashes]]''. Smaug decides to get an offspring with Kathryn to make sure she won't leave him ever again. He copulates with her in his human form several times, but her menstrual period occurs soon after. When he blurts out his intentions in anger, Kathryn is hurt and furious with him for not first talking with her about getting a child.

The character doing this is usually female, often a teenage girl, because of [[MarsAndVenusGenderContrast gender stereotypes]] that say all women are [[MyBiologicalClockIsTicking desperate to get married and have babies]] while all men flee commitment as long as they can. (This is dependent upon several factors within real life, such as abortion rights. These laws can cause a huge imbalances in agency, whereas either a woman has all control over what happens within her body or none at all. This can also put pressure on the father as well, who has to either [[HonorableMarriageProposal make an "honest woman"]] of her or take financial responsibility.) Because of this, female characters who are disliked by their male partner's friends or family may be suspected of plotting to use this trope on him even if there's no evidence of any such thing. The moral tone also depends on several factors, such as the gender doing the trapping and the circumstances in which the sex took place. For example, a man who traps a woman is portrayed as planting something within her body that she ''does not'' want there. The greater problems of {{Double Standard Rape|Female On Male}} and MaritalRapeLicense also create deeper concerns which [[Administrivia/RuleOfCautiousEditingJudgment we will NOT get into here]].

* Subverted in ''Film/TheBigLebowski''. Maude contrives to have what the Dude at first thinks is a casual fling with him. [[OhCrap When he realises she slept with him expressly to conceive a child]], she assures him that she picked him as the father specifically because she didn't want the biological father to have any interest in raising the child.

* Subverted in ''Film/TheBigLebowski''. Maude contrives to have what the Dude at first thinks is a casual fling with him. [[OhCrap When he realises she slept with him expressly to conceive a child]], she assures him that he picked him as the father specifically because she didn't want the biological father to have any interest in raising the child.

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12464607/1/Crazy-Little-Thing-Called-Love Crazy Little Thing Called Love]]'' Astoria, falls in love with Harry while having an affair with him. Afraid that he's going to end it due to feeling guilty, she drinks a fertility potion before their next meeting.

*** A variation when Sheila did not intentionally get pregnant and is genuinely shocked to learn that she is. But sure enough, she uses her pregnancy to successfully drive a wedge between the baby's father and his wife.

* In ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7077352/6/Viper Viper]]'' Ginny was pregnant with her married lover's baby and tried to convince Harry that it was his, despite the pesky little fact that he was (a) no longer in a relationship with her and (b) a virgin.

* Every daytime SoapOpera ever, and nine-tenths of every Hispanic telenovela made. Often paired with FakePregnancy,(in)ConvenientMiscarriage (and if the woman was faking the pregnancy, she will fake this too in order to avoid any suspicions about why she's not showing. In an ironic twist, she will ''still'' use this to ensnare the man, as his guilt will force him to stay with her and bond over their supposed shared grief), and LawOfInversePaternity (at the very least, even if she isn't certain that the baby is another man's, she will ignore the possibility so as to get her hooks into the one she wants).











* Played with in ''Series/Charmed1998.'' After Cole is possessed by the Source, the Seer leads him in impregnating Phoebe, as the child of the Source and a Charmed One will be a being of immense magical power, and if they can control the circumstances of the conception, that power will fall under the Evil alignment. She even provides him with a potion to supercharge Phoebe's fertility and "bypass any precautions she may have taken." And the pregnancy is a major factor in Phoebe's decision to remain loyal to Cole and (temporarily) become the Queen of Hell. But ultimately, the Seer wanted the baby for herself so that she could use it to legitimately claim the title of Source, and even though possessed-Cole willingly went along with the plan, his goal wasn't to manipulate Phoebe, only to have a child (albeit, an extremely powerful one).

* "Stupid Marriage" by Music/TheSpecials is a song about a young woman who does this:
-->He wanted to be something but she knows he never will,\\
She's got him where she wanted and forgot to take her pill,\\
And he thinks that she'll be happy when she's hanging out the nappies\\
If that's a happy marriage I'd prefer to be '''unhappy'''.

* Music/MichaelJackson's "Billie Jean", quoted above is about this. Namely, all the "Billie Jeans" his older brothers had to deal with when they were together in the Jackson 5.
** The song is ambiguous, though, open to the AlternateCharacterInterpretation that the singer actually is the father trying to dodge the consequences of his actions. "People always told me, be careful what you do..."

* In ''VisualNovel/DanganronpaV3KillingHarmony'' during ''Love Hotel'', Miu heavily implies to Shuichi that she was a result of this trope. [[spoiler: And suggests that they do the same thing so that Shuichi won't abandon her.]]

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'', Donna mentions on her blog that she wants a baby, then jokes that she might conveniently "forget" to take her birth control pill before a date.
** In a separate episode, Bobby pranks Luanne by replacing her birth control with sweet tarts. The change was obvious but Luanne and Bobby's parents, tired of the pranking, convince Bobby that the birth control just stopped working, and she would immediately become pregnant, with him as the father, forcing him to "marry" her. But Hank and Peggy one-up them and get Luanne back as well for her involvement by tricking her into thinking that Bill is actually a priest and she really is married to Bobby.

* ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'': Stan and Francine once did this to ''another couple'', who they befriended without knowing the other couple were about ten years younger than them, and found it impossible to keep up with their hard-drinking, active lifestyle. Rather than give up the friendship (knowing that the couple had previously drifted apart from their last friends for this same reason) Stan and Francine tried to slow them down by sabotaging their birth control, thinking that having a baby would make them just as exhausted. [[spoiler: It doesn't work, the couple almost divorces over it due to neither feeling ready to have a child, and when Stan admits what they did, they stay together but never wants to see the Smiths again]].

* Carla tries to do this with Turk in ''Series/{{Scrubs}}''. Later, she and Turk have an open and honest discussion in which they agree they both want to have kids ... after which he starts slipping her contraceptives when she's asleep.
** This is completely inverted with Jordan, who actually lies to Perry and claims the baby isn't his, because they both have feelings for each other and she wants to make sure their relationship is based on real attraction rather than an obligation to do the right thing. They get together anyway, and he bonds with the baby before finding out he's the biological father.
** Also inverted with Kim, who leaves the hospital and fakes a miscarriage rather than have J.D. feel trapped into a relationship. Then he finds out the truth and decides he wants to be with her, then he changes his mind but can't tell her, then he finally breaks off the relationship ''while she's giving birth''.

* In ''Series/{{Weeds}}'', there's a rare male case; [[spoiler:Silas Botwin]] does this to [[spoiler:Meghan]] to keep her from going away to college. Apparently, he thought this would lead to them becoming HappilyMarried. It does not go well.
** Later, [[spoiler:Nancy]] does it to [[spoiler:Esteban]]. This was less about maintaining a relationship than as self-defense against murder.
* Seska, of ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'', uses her pregnancy to manipulate both Chakotay and the Kazon Culluh, telling both of them the child was theirs in order to get what she wants. In Chakotay's case, the baby is used as bait for a ''literal'' trap, as she's counting on ''Voyager'' to come rescue him so that the Kazon can seize the ship. [[spoiler:It's Culluh's, and Seska's manipulations end when she's mortally wounded in an explosion, and Culluh escapes with his son.]]
* In ''Series/{{Smallville}}'', there's a male example in which [[spoiler:Lex Luthor]] does this to [[spoiler:Lana Lang]]. It's even more of a dick move than most because [[spoiler:the baby isn't real; he's been slipping her hormones to make her ''think'' she's pregnant, likely intending to play the ConvenientMiscarriage card on her after the wedding]].
** Not to mention that the doctor who reveals this to [[spoiler:Lana]] accuses ''[[spoiler:her]]'' of trying this on ''[[spoiler:Lex]]''. Admittedly it would make more sense that way to an outsider...
* Terri on ''Series/{{Glee}}'' discovers she's suffered a hysterical pregnancy and continues to lie to her husband about it in order to keep him. Meanwhile [[AlphaBitch Quinn]] discovers she's pregnant and lies to her boyfriend Finn by telling him it's his [[spoiler:when in actuality it's his best friend Puck's and she and Finn haven't even had sex. The two stories then merge when Terri contacts Quinn and tries to secretly take the baby.]] Needless to say, both relationships ended when the truth came out.

* A woman tries this in an episode of ''Series/{{Monk}}''. In a twist, [[spoiler:she isn't actually pregnant, although her receptionist is. The woman used the receptionist's urine to get a positive pregnancy test for the trap. Regardless, it doesn't end well.]]
* Anya tries to do this with Sav on ''Series/DegrassiTheNextGeneration'', but she ends up telling him and taking the morning after pill.
* Sophie, Mark's baby-desperate (ex?) wife on ''Series/PeepShow'' tries to trap Mark and/or his roommate Jez this way, although it was pretty clear that [[MyBiologicalClockIsTicking having a baby]] was her first priority, not a romantic relationship with either of the guys.

** When Lilly left him, Marshall laments that he should have 'knocked her up when he had the chance'.

* On ''Series/TheSecretLifeOfTheAmericanTeenager'', [[spoiler:Adrian plans to try this on Ben]] in an attempt to save their marriage since [[spoiler:they only got married because [[ShotgunWedding Adrian was pregnant]], and their relationship started to deteriorate after their daughter was stillborn]]. Since things were great [[spoiler:when she was pregnant, she seems to think [[BabiesMakeEverythingBetter another baby will fix things]]]]. Ultimately, [[spoiler:she gives up on the plan when her doctor talks her out of it]] and when [[spoiler:Ben finds out her plan, keeps rejecting her advances, and finally confronts her about it. Though it seems he was willing to go along with it and genuinely sad when she really "wanted out".]]
* In ''Series/TheOfficeUS'', Kelly tells Ryan she is pregnant to get him to agree to go out with her again. Immediate cut to Kelly silently shaking her head at the camera.
-->'''Ryan:''' You lied about being pregnant.\\
'''Kelly:''' Right. So?\\
'''Ryan:''' You really don't understand why that might make me kind of angry?\\
'''Kelly:''' No!\\
'''Ryan:''' We are ''never'' getting back together.\\
'''Kelly:''' ''[whining]'' Why not?
* Subverted in ''Series/{{Coupling}}'': Susan tells Steve, "don't worry about it" when he asks about whether they're using contraception. He later learns in an infertility specialist's office that unbeknownst to him, they've been "trying" for six months [[LawofInverseFertility without success]]. Of course, [[spoiler:Susan later discovers that she is pregnant, in what is debatable either playing it straight or a double subversion.]]

* On ''Series/{{Revenge}}'', Victoria apparently faked a pregnancy to get Conrad to marry her and then faked a ConvenientMiscarriage to cover it up.
** Emily later does the same thing when Daniel decides to call off the wedding because he realized that he was still in love with his ex-girlfriend. It shows how far into RevengeBeforeReason Emily has slipped. When Daniel finds out the truth, he takes it very badly [[spoiler:and shoots Emily]].
* ''Series/BostonLegal'' came up with a pretty good, if extremely far fetched argument for a court-ordered abortion, possibly inspired by one of the real life examples below. A woman gave her boyfriend oral sex (to which he "barely consented"), then spat the semen into a cup and used it to impregnate herself and didn't tell him until she knew it worked. The man argued that he was tricked into impregnating the woman, and additionally, it imposed a dilemma upon him, as he was known to be outspoken on the issue of absentee black fathers and would have to choose between being a hypocrite or help raise a baby he didn't want. The judge admitted that the case was compelling, but not quite enough to warrant the extreme measure of ordering the woman to undergo an abortion.
* Stacey attempts this in ''Series/GavinAndStacey''; they're already married, but were living a long distance apart, and she wanted him to move to Wales to live with her. To make it worse, she's been trying to get pregnant for a ''year'' without his knowledge.
* This happened to Mork on an episode of ''Series/MorkAndMindy''. The woman was trying to extort child-support hush money from Mork, and poor Mork was too naive to know that Earth women don't get pregnant if you don't have sex with them.
* Early in ''Series/SingleFather'', Rita mentions to Sarah that she wants another baby and intends to have one without talking to her partner about it. Sarah expresses shock, but it's revealed at the end of the series that Sarah purposely got pregnant by Dave and didn't intend to tell him.

* In ''Series/{{Grimm}}'', after Adalind gets pregnant with Sean Renard's child, she tries to pass it off as the child of Sean's half-brother Eric, the rightful son of the King, especially since she's currently sleeping with Eric in order to get in the Royals' good graces. After Eric's death, some of the Royals wonder who the real father is, but, in the end, it doesn't matter to them, since the child is still a Renard and has Royal blood. Later, after she finds out she's pregnant with [[spoiler:Nick]]'s baby, she tries to pass it off as Viktor's (Eric's cousin) child, despite the fact that they never had sex. Kenneth (another Royal) tells her, in a "by the way" manner, that Viktor is sterile.
* Every daytime SoapOpera ever, and nine-tenths of every Hispanic telenovela made. Often paired with FakePregnancy,(in)ConvenientMiscarriage (and if the woman was faking the pregnancy, she will fake this too in order to avoid any suspicions about why she's not showing. In an ironic twist, she will ''still'' use this to ensnare the man, as his guilt will force him to stay with her and bond over their supposed shared grief), and LawOfInversePaternity (at the very least, even if she isn't certain that the baby is another man's, she will ignore the possibility so as to get her hooks into the one she wants).
** ''Series/SantaBarbara'''s Kirk Cranston successfully impregnated his rich wife Eden Capwell after replacing her birth control pills with placebos. He wanted his child to receive the largest share of the Capwell inheritance, and he also believed that through his child, he would become related to the Capwell family by blood.
** ''Series/AllMyChildren'''s An Li tries to pull this on Brian as she knows that their CitizenshipMarriage is ending now that she has her green card. While it works temporarily, friend Terrence browbeats her into admitting that she's lying, telling her that she is not the kind of cruel, deceitful person to pull a stunt like this.
*** Allie tries to pull this on Jake by not wearing her diaphragm. It backfired in two ways -- when he found it after they had sex and dumped her, angry at her attempt at pulling this trope, and when she failed to conceive.
*** Speaking of Jake, when ex-girlfriend Liza asks him to father her baby (the very reason that the jealous Allie tried to pull the above-mentioned stunt), her ex-husband Adam enlists Allie to switch Jake's sperm sample for his. Liza unwittingly ends up pregnant with Adam's baby and not until after they've remarried and she's given birth does she learn the truth. She's horrified and outright says that Adam raped her.
*** Kendall tries to pull this with Anton... and, of course, it doesn't work. He doesn't believe her for a second, given how diligent she was about taking the pill. She caves in pretty quickly and tells the truth once he drags her to the doctor, who needs to give her a full set of tests ''and'' a needle, but Kendall is AfraidOfNeedles and freaks out, admitting she's lying.
*** Taylor tries to pull this on Noah, but it fails--he leaves her for Julia anyway, even though he makes it clear that he's not abandoning her and the baby. She desperately seduces a friend of hers hoping that ''he'll'' get her pregnant and she can pass the baby off as Noah's, but she fails to conceive from that either and ultimately has to resort to lying that she miscarried.
** A male version on ''Series/TheBoldAndTheBeautiful'' had Sly poking a hole in the condom so that he could "do the right thing" and marry his girlfriend Jessica -- and get his hands on her money. It failed when he was too drunk to complete the deed.
*** A variation when Sheila did not intentionally get pregnant and is genuinely shocked to learn that she is. But sure enough, she uses her pregnancy to successfully drive a wedge between the baby's father and his wife.
** A rare version on ''Series/DaysOfOurLives'', where the man ''knew'' that he wasn't the father. After a teenage girl was raped, she only confided in her friend. When she learned she was pregnant, he claimed he was the father to spare her the humiliation of telling everyone what had happened to her. Desperate for some [=TLC=] after her ordeal, she began using the pregnancy to draw closer to him. When she miscarried after falling down, she blamed it on his girlfriend, putting the final nail in the coffin of their relationship, until she finally admitted that she'd tripped on her own, rather than being shoved.
** Like the ''All My Children'' example, ''Series/GuidingLight'' had Annie damaging her diaphragm rather than the condom. It backfired for the same reason -- husband Josh had told her he wanted to wait to have kids and her deception was the last straw. She miscarried and framed his ex Reva for manslaughter by making it look like she'd pushed her down the stairs.
** ''Series/OneLifeToLive'' had Blair ensnaring Todd this way to get her hands on his money. Todd became suspicious after her ex-husband Asa warned him that Blair had pulled the same stunt on him and demanded that she take a pregnancy test. Much to her shock and relief, it was positive--Blair had in fact conceived at some point. But she was still found out months later when she miscarried and Todd realized she wasn't as far along as she should have been.
** ''Series/TheYoungAndTheRestless'': Sharon technically does this to Nick even though they're actually very HappilyMarried. But she's insecure about the relationship (his mother dislikes her) and figures this is the best way to hang onto him. It pays off, as her mother-in-law finally warms up to her once news of the pregnancy gets out.
* In an early episode of ''Series/{{Bones}},'' this is what got the victim killed. She was sleeping with a foreign diplomat's husband, who showered her with gifts until he got bored with it. Her mother advised her that he'd do the right thing, so she attempted to reseduce him. When that didn't work, she went after his son instead.
* An unusual version on ''Series/BigLove''. Despite already being married to Bill and having two children with him, Nikki claims she wants another baby, even though she doesn't. This is because she knows that Bill is technically fooling around with his first wife Barb (he's not supposed to sleep with her on nights designated for the other wives) and is desperate to secure some of his affection (Nikki is fully aware that out of his three wives, she's TheUnfavorite.)
* Another unusual version on ''Series/TheCosbyShow'', where the friend that Denise is planning a bridal shower for admits that she got pregnant on purpose, but not to make her boyfriend marry her, but so that their parents would allow them to (the couple was madly in love but both sets of parents were insisting that they wait to complete college before marrying).
* ''Series/JaneTheVirgin'': Petra planned to have a baby with her infertile-due-to-cancer husband's last sperm sample in order to save their marriage so [[GoldDigger she could get the money specified in their prenup]]. Unfortunately for her, her gynecologist and sister-in-law accidentally inseminates Jane instead. Later, [[spoiler:upon learning that there's ''another'' sperm sample after Rafael breaks up with her, Petra uses it to impregnate herself in what she admits is a ploy to get him back. This time the pregnancy takes.]]
* This was the subject of a ''Series/DoctorPhil'' episode and one couple involved a man having sex with his wife ''while she was asleep'' to get her pregnant. In the same episode, another woman deliberately sabotaged/stopped taking her birth control so she'd get pregnant. Of course, in both cases, the doctor tore right into them.
* There are times that some of the women on ''Series/{{Maury}}'' seem this way. Although, instead of convincing the man to marry them, they usually seem to just want to extract child support out of them, since more than a few basically say they want nothing to do with him except for a check every month.

* ''Series/CriminalMinds'' features this with Kat Adams, revealing she's pregnant with [[spoiler:Reid's]] child while playing mind games with him. There's been no sexual relationship, but he did have a blackout period after being drugged several months earlier, which is when she claims she had an accomplice... "get him in the mood." The paternity isn't technically proven, but the team determines the real father is a prison guard, since that would allow her to leverage him for months whereas she only needed to unsettle [[spoiler:Reid]] for a few hours.
--> '''JJ:''' Here's the thing? Do we believe her or not? On the one hand, getting pregnant is straight out of the female psychopath's handbook....
--> '''Prentiss:''' But on the other hand, that would mean she sent her lesbian lover down to Mexico to... ''[[{{Squick}} Ew.]]''

* Sae of ''Manga/PeachGirl'' believes herself to be pregnant (this is later proved to be psychological) and tries to use this to bind Ryo to her who she loved who loved Misao instead. When Ryo refuses her and tries to leave with Misao she blurted out that she was pregnant.

* In the sequel to ''Literature/HalfPrince'' Lan's brother pokes a hole in a condom to force Lolidragon to marry him when she's hesitant to commit.
* In ''Manga/OishiiKankei'', [[spoiler:Kanako tries to pull this on Keiji to force him to marry her. She was, in fact, pregnant, but the baby wasn't his, but from her boss.]]
* ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamIronBloodedOrphans'' plays around quite a bit with this in a rare example of this being done for non-selfish reasons. After a particularly nasty battle in the second season, [[PluckyGirl Atra]] gets it in her head to have a child with the protagonist [[AntiHero Mikazuki]] to give him a reason to live and snap him out of his self-destructive tendencies. And if it's not with her, then him impregnating [[TheOjou Kudelia]] is another option. [[spoiler:Hilariously, when she finally does ask Mika about it, his response is basically "Yeah, sure"... Unfortunately, he winds up dying in the end anyway, leaving Atra to raise little Akatsuki [[HasTwoMommies with Kudelia]].]]
* ''Manga/NagasareteAirantou'': Ayane once planned doing this to Ikuto to make him more unwilling to leave the island. [[ButtMonkey For once]] her plan works and she manages to pin down Ikuto under her while being half naked. Unfortunately she has no idea what they are suppposed to do next. [[spoiler:At least she gets their FirstKiss out of it!]]

* In ''ComicBook/TheSandman'', [[ShakespeareInFiction Shakespeare's]] wife implies she did this to Will and Will seems to think his eldest daughter is planning the same for her boyfriend.
* It's been {{Retcon}}ned that ComicBook/{{Spawn}}'s widow Wanda purposely stopped taking her birth control pills in hopes that a baby would change Al, who back in the day was a ruthless assassin. He ends up punching her in the stomach, killing the baby as well as all speculation that Cyan is his daughter.
* In ''[[http://comicboxcommentary.blogspot.com.es/2013/12/back-issue-holiday-box-dcu-infinite.html DCU Infinite Holiday Special issue #1]]'', ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} must reunite a little girl with her father, a jerkass drunk who thinks his ex-wife got pregnant to force him into a marriage.
-->'''Fred:''' Or that he never would have married that witch if she hadn't skipped her pill on purpose--!
* In ''Comicbook/XFactor'', Rahne, who is very Protestant and pregnant with a mutant-Wolf God hybrid baby, lets ex-boyfriend Rictor assume that he's the father of her baby after returning to find him about to get busy with [[HoYay Shatterstar]].

* Mariella Zabini from ''Fanfic/BlackSky'' is purely motivated by her desire to escape her life as a prostitute when she engages herself into an affair with the Prince of Sabina, whom she ''knows'' is without a male heir to succeed her. Unusually for this trope, the baby's birth would have been a boon for every party involved: Sabina gets an Heir and Mariella as the mother gets to spend her life in comfort and safety. Unfortunately, the Prince wasn't keen on acknowledging he fathered a bastard, [[spoiler:so he brutally mind-wiped Mariella and abandoned her to die in a slum, with her son who later grows up to become Xanxus of the Vongola.]]
* A male version occurs in ''[[Fanfic/TheHeartTrilogy Heart of Ashes]]''. Smaug decides to get an offspring with Kathryn to make sure she won't leave him ever again. He copulates with her in his human form several times, but her menstrual period occurs soon after. When he blurts out his intentions in anger, Kathryn is hurt and furious with him for not first talking with her about getting a child.
* Part of the [[InfoDump backstory dump]] Selina tells Damian in ''Batman: Angel of Death'' is that her mother Isabella was mistress to a wealthy man ([[MythologyGag implied to be mafia don Carmine Falcone]]), and got pregnant hoping he would leave his real family for her. It didn't work at all, so Isabella quickly pulled this on Selina's "legal" father, Brian Kyle, who did marry her. This is what first comes close to endearing her to Damian, who is [[CommonalityConnection the product of similar circumstances]].
* ''Fanfic/ThePiecesLieWhereTheyFell'': In the sequel ''Picking up the Pieces'', some of Deep Blade's past lovers have tried to do this via FakePregnancy in order to have an excuse to marry into his family. When Sergeant Summer Nights finds out, she notes that such actions are a crime.
* In the ''VideoGame/AHatInTime'' [[AlternateUniverse AU]] fic ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/24654493/chapters/59615725#workskin What to Expect When You're On the Run]]'', [[{{Yandere}} Vanessa]] purposely got herself pregnant because she wanted her husband to leave his university and be with her more permanently.

* One weird example: In the movie ''French Twist'', a lesbian asks her girlfriend's husband to get her pregnant. The film then picks up again after she's had the baby, and ends with [[spoiler:the four of them (lesbian, girlfriend, husband, and baby) living together happily.]]

** Another weird example: in the movie ''A Home At The End Of The World'' a gay man named Johnathan is attempting to get his best friend, a straight woman named Clare, pregnant so they can both raise the baby together. When Jonathan's old boyfriend Bobby enters their life and also begins a sexual relationship with Clare, it obviously creates huge discourse within the trio. When Johnathan has finally had enough a threatens to leave them both, Clare reveals that she's pregnant, [[spoiler:although she doesn't mention who the father is]]. This causes both Bobby and Johnathan to [[BabiesMakeEverythingBetter put aside their differences and they all raise the baby together as a family unit]].
* In ''Film/DropDeadFred'', the reason Lizzie's mother Polly was so cruel to her was because she used this trick to try and save her marriage. When it didn't work, [[NeverMyFault she placed the blame squarely on her daughter's shoulders]].

* Lynette is the aspiration for Caitlyn [=McNabb=], one of the main antagonists of the TV movie ''Revenge of the Bridesmaids''. When her mom grows too old to snag her fourth husband, Caitlyn [[GoldDigger carries on the family tradition.]] After an impulsive one-night stand with her friend Racheal’s super-rich ex-boyfriend Tony, she fakes a pregnancy to trick him into marriage, even though he’s still in love with Racheal and vice versa. She even cheats on a doctor’s test using her best friend’s sister's urine, who’s constantly pregnant due to being married to an Irish-Catholic. [[spoiler: Of course, by the end of the movie, Tony’s suspicious of her true motives, and lies about his family losing his fortune to test her. Once she thinks that Tony’s broke, Caitlyn loses all interest and reveals her lie, and the wedding is called off.]]
* In the film version of ''Film/InterviewWithTheVampire'', Lestat seems to first see Claudia as the "baby" for his version of this, to force Louis to stay with him. [[HoYay It's interesting.]]
* When Julianne Moore's character gets pregnant in ''Nine Months'', her boyfriend and his best friend ponder the possibility of her using this trope, as he's much happier in their childless, unmarried relationship than she is.
* Subverted in the film ''Film/WatchIt''; [[spoiler:Ellen, who had been happily seeing Rick until he started acting like a jerk toward her, tells Rick she's pregnant and is keeping the baby. However, it turns out to be a practical joke she and John (his roommate) cooked up to get Rick to grow up and be a man]].

* At the start of ''Film/EightMile'', Rabbit says his girlfriend might be pregnant. She later says she just said that in an effort to make him stay.
* ''Film/BigDaddy'' features a rare GenderFlip variant: through a clerical mix-up, the protagonist Sonny Koufax becomes the legal guardian for a small child, but rather than attempt to amend the situation decides to adopt the child in hopes that this will help fix his failing relationship with his girlfriend. One of his friends [[DiscussedTrope explicitly compares]] the situation to a woman who attempts to get pregnant in hopes of fixing a failing marriage.
* ''Film/GoneGirl'' has an interesting variant. Nick wants to have children with Amy, to the point of starting fertility treatments, but Amy changes her mind and has the sperm samples destroyed.[[spoiler:... or so Nick thinks. Amy turns out to have kept the sample on ice. After she frames Nick for her murder, he naturally wants nothing more to do with her, but she impregnates herself with his stored sperm, believing that he'd rather stay with her than abandon his child. It works.]]
* The [[{{Golddigger}} gold-digging]] titular Film/BadTeacher mentions that she tried doing something like this to basketball players (as mentioned below), but that they were always smart enough to make sure that the condom was intact ''and'' to take it with them after the deed was complete.
* Diana, the mother in ''Too Close to Home'', believes that this was pulled on her son to get him to marry his child's mother. This was averted since the son's wife confessed to her pregnancy after he asked her to marry him.

* In ''Film/TheInvisibleMan2020'', Cecilia had a secret stash of birth control pills because she knew Adrian, her abusive husband, wanted to have a baby to enact this trope. However, Cecilia [[spoiler: gets committed to a mental hospital]] after Adrian [[spoiler: killed her sister while wearing his invisible suit in the restaurant she and Cecilia were eating dinner]]. When she gets a medical check up she finds out that she's [[spoiler: pregnant with Adrian's child, and finds out that he replaced her secret birth control pills with placebos]] shortly before she ran away from the house as away to ensure [[spoiler: that she would return to him]].

* Parade's End: in England before WWI, a beautiful but manipulate socialite tricks a wealthy aristocrat into marrying her when she discovers she's pregnant after having a quickie with him after a chance meeting on a train. Worst still the baby may not even be his due to the woman's promiscuous ways, though he does leave her for another woman he actually loves in the end.
* Subverted in ''Egalia's Daughters'' - men are the ones responsible for oral contraception and have to earn a woman's approval to become social fathers to a child. There is a very tragic male character who works as a teacher, and one of the boys in his class is his biological son, with whom he had no contact prior to that.
* Mentioned at the beginning of the first ''Literature/SwordOfTruth'' book.
** Used by Drefan Rahl's mother with [[BigBad Darken Rahl]]. Her theory was that if she could give birth to a magically gifted child and heir, Darken Rahl would shower her with riches and status. When Drefan was born and found to be non-gifted, his mother [[OhCrap began to realize]] that her new son was now a liability and that her master plan was probably not the smartest thing she'd ever done. Before Darken Rahl found out about the child, she brought him to a remote monastery to be raised by monks and, in perpetual fear of the infinitely creative ways Darken Rahl would end her life if she were found, poisoned herself. [[spoiler:Drefan [[TurnOutLikeHisFather turned out like his father]].]]
* Quite a few romance novels have this trope, usually with a BabiesMakeEverythingBetter ending.
** However, one case that [[{{Deconstruction}} deals with the aftermath of this]] is ''Sisters Found'', where one of the lead characters had been adopted for just this reason. When it wasn't enough for the adoptive father to stay, the adoptive mother became an alcoholic and resented the hell out of her daughter. To make things worse, said daughter later finds out [[spoiler:that she was the only one of identical triplets to be given up - one of the other two had a medical problem and the cost of hospital bills was such that it was either give up one child or lose them all when Social Services saw they couldn't support their family]]. Not surprisingly, she has ''major'' commitment/abandonment issues.
** In ''The Secret Love Child'', the hero either sabotages the condom or simply chooses not to tell the heroine that it broke. Naturally, she gets pregnant. Naturally, they get together and it is All Very Romantic. Luckily she apparently really really wanted to have babies.
* In ''Literature/GoneWithTheWind'', the novel at least, Scarlett kicks herself for not thinking of this as a means of marrying Ashley after someone tells her about Rhett refusing to marry a girl he "ruined".
* From Thomas Hardy's ''Literature/JudeTheObscure'': Arabella, acting on the advice of her friends, uses this ploy to get Jude Fawley to marry her. It works but, oddly enough, she forgets about the baby till Jude reminds her months later. She just makes up a miscarriage and he believes her. At first.
** Though she's certainly not above doing it, it's a bit more ambiguous than that, since she tells her friends (to whom she has no reason to lie) that she genuinely thought herself pregnant. It gets weirder though when eight years later, [[spoiler:after they've divorced, she tells him that they did indeed have a child together, born after they were separated, and could he please look after the kid now?]]
* A male example: in ''Morality Meat'' by James Tiptree Jr., a woman gets pregnant because her boyfriend pokes holes in the condoms. She found out about it after she heard him tell a friend to "keep his women a little bit pregnant". Classy.

* In ''Literature/BraveStory'' we eventually learn that [[spoiler:Wataru's mom]] faked a pregnancy to get her ex (who was already in a relationship with another woman) to marry her. He does, but it doesn't end well.

* In the second book of ''Literature/TheSisterhoodOfTheTravelingPants'' series, [[spoiler:a girl that Kostos slept with does this in order to guilt him into marrying her.]] In the fourth book, it's revealed that [[spoiler:she faked the pregnancy.]]

* In ''Literature/{{Accelerando}}'' Mannfred Macx's girlfriend ''rapes'' him to have his child and force him to be what she sees as a responsible adult. Ultimately subverted; while she does have a daughter, and Mannfred does what he can to be a part of her life, he continues his lifestyle as before.
* ''Literature/DarkHeart'': Wyre claims to be pregnant by Raine after they have sex, so he feels duty-bound to marry her. It turns out she's isn't, and was just lying to manipulate him.
* In the Creator/MaeveBinchy novel ''Circle Of Friends'', after being ditched by her lover and not wanting to have an abortion, a desperate Nan seduces Jack—''her best friend's boyfriend''—and tells him he's the baby's father, knowing that he'll do the right thing and offer to marry her.
* In ''Literature/TheAgeOfInnocence'', Newland Archer expresses his desire to give up his law practice and travel the world (what he really wants to do is escape his loveless marriage and follow his wife's cousin Ellen to Paris). His wife May gently tells him, "I'm afraid you can't, dear. Not unless you take me with you. That is if the doctors will let me go..." thus revealing that she's pregnant.
* The third book of the ''Literature/TheSchoolForGoodAndEvil'' series reveals [[spoiler:the main characters, Sophie and Agatha, are the result of this. Their mother Vanessa orchestrated a one-night stand with Stefan, the man she was obsessed with, so he would have to marry her. When she could only give birth to stillborns, Vanessa took a fertility potion and had twin girls, abandoning the ugly one but keeping the beautiful one to save her marriage. While Stefan stayed for his daughter's sake, like all Vanessa's past and future attempts, it failed to make him love his wife.]]

* Sae of Manga/PeachGirl believes herself to be pregnant (this is later proved to be psychological) and tries to use this to bind Ryo to her who she loved who loved Misao instead. When Ryo refuses her and tries to leave with Misao she blurted out that she was pregnant.

* In the manga version of ''Manga/KareKano'', [[spoiler:Souichiro Arima's birth mother Ryouko does this to squeeze child support money out of his father Reiji because she knows Reiji is the son of a rich doctor. (What she doesn't know is that Reiji is illegitimate, much younger than his father's legitimate children, and actively hated by all of them except Souji, the eldest). She leaves Soichiro to ''[[OffingTheOffspring die]]'' sometime after finding this out, but Soichiro is saved by Reiji's timely arrival and ends up being adopted soon after by Souji and his wife Shizune, who can't have children of their own.]]

* Crosses over into ChildByRape territory with abusive men who intentionally impregnate their female partner in order to make her stay, as DateRape is common in abusive relationships. The reverse is possible as well.

** It's also speculated that this was the reason the Muggles of Tom Riddle Sr.'s village used to explain why he inexplicably abandoned his previous girlfriend and ran off with a poor girl who lived in a shack - that Merope lied to him that she was pregnant with his child.