Bristol Palin says she's pregnant again

Maria Puente | USA TODAY

Now don't lecture her and don't smother her in sympathy, but unmarried Bristol Palin says she's pregnant again.

Seven years after her first unwed pregnancy caused some problems for her mother Sarah Palin's Republican vice-presidential campaign in 2008, Bristol announced via her blog that she's expecting again.

She also tweeted her "big news."

"(I'm announcing this news a lot sooner than I ever expected due to the constant trolls who have nothing better to talk about!!!)," she started out. "I wanted you guys to be the first to know that I am pregnant.

"Honestly, I've been trying my hardest to keep my chin up on this one."

She acknowledged that a second pregnancy would likely lead to criticism.

"I know this has been, and will be, a huge disappointment to my family, to my close friends, and to many of you."

She did not name the father. Instead, she warned all to leave her alone.

"But please respect (son) Tripp's and my privacy during this time. I do not want any lectures and I do not want any sympathy."

She said that "with God by my side," she can handle anything "with dignity and grace."

"Tripp, this new baby, and I will all be fine, because God is merciful," she said.

Bristol, 24, who has become a TV personality via her family's reality show and by becoming a contestant on Dancing With the Stars, had been due to marry U.S. Marine and Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer on May 23.

A week before the wedding, her mother announced that it was off. No explanation was given.

Bristol later called it a "painful time."

She met Meyer when he went to Alaska to film the Amazing America reality show with Sarah Palin last year.

Both Sarah and Bristol Palin were in the news recently when they defended the Duggar reality-show family, accused of covering up a child molestation scandal, by attacking Lena Dunham for allegedly doing the same thing.

Sarah Palin had been selected as John McCain's running mate when news emerged that Bristol, then 17 and unmarried, was pregnant and planned to keep the baby she later named Tripp.

Tripp's father, Levi Johnston, became Bristol's fiancé, then her ex-fiancé, then her fiancé again, then her enemy in a long legal struggle over child support and recriminations over his unflattering remarks about the Palins.

Bristol later became an "ambassador for abstinence," even though she admitted in an interview on Fox News that abstinence is "not realistic" in the modern era, especially among young people. Still, she said, teens should avoid having sex.