Week 17 and Counting

Here we are.  Week 17.  My belly is starting to grow.  I'm starting to think that I will have a permanent indentation on my gut of that little hidden button that they put on the inside of dress pants.  So, God bless my cousin Ashley, who has offered me some maternity clothes until she's ready for her little blessing number two.

I wish our country instituted that pregnant women received a nickel for each question of "How are you feeling?" and "Do you know what you're having?"  I'm not wanting to sound ungrateful.  I really am happy with people asking these questions, and I appreciate that people seem to genuinely want to find out my status on all things baby in my life.  It just seems that in an effort to truly help out a waddling pregnant lady, we could get a little cash.  After all, in addition to our physical state which is quickly morphing into a blob, my mental state is constantly spinning with worries of our baby's health, how to teach him or her to deal with peer pressure, and acquiring a proper education (which, of course, includes college-and by the year 2040, I'm sure tuition will be approximately 14 bazillion dollars per year).  I digress...

On a more positive front, I've learned some very valuable items that I will pass along to everyone-mother or not.  While browsing websites full of information on pregnancy, I decided to do a little research on receiving an epidural while in labor.  I will not yet post my opinion on this matter, as I got distracted by some videos of women giving birth.  Note-I didn't even turn the sound on.  Here's what I learned:

1) Some women obviously have either no modesty or no idea that YouTube is viewable by anyone on the web.  Why you'd put a video of your naked (why always naked?!) body- hoo haa and all - on the internet for everyone's viewing (dis)pleasure is beyond me.  I don't want to discount the miracle of a new life entering the world, nor ignore a family's excitement at such an awesome event, but my Lord, have some freaking decency.

2) This is a bit graphic-but I was always under the impression that the nether region just kind of snapped back immediately after delivery like a rubber band.  Not according to the one video that I could stomach all the way through.  Umm...there's no polite way to say this.  How the heck can it get, and remain, that large?  

3) Lastly, and most importantly, it is absolutely imperative to try approximately 75 awkward positions to alleviate the pain of childbirth.  Why pregnant women decide to pursue a career of becoming a contortionist when they are most likely at the largest size their body has ever been has become another mystery to me...but, according to my research, it is just a necessary part of the process. 

So mothers-to-be: flaunt your stuff for the world to see in the most painful and unflattering scenario possible (and don't forget that clothes are strictly prohibited), limber up for more positions than what landed you here to begin with, and recognize that never again will tampons be your feminine needs product of choice-unless they start making them into the size of a small missile.

I'm so grateful that I have approximately 23 weeks to try and debunk these new findings.  And I'm glad I was too smart to look up this stuff prior to my present state, or adoption would have been Travis' only option.  My greatest relief at this point is that not only do women pursue all of this once, but many have gone on to have children two, three, four, etc.  Either we have a load of lunatic women in our society, or I'm making it sound much worse than it truly is.  My fingers are crossed that it's the latter.

Playing Catch Up

I've had some friends and family ask me if the posts I put up were actually written at the time that the dates indicate.  The answer is yes.  Which means that I recognized the importance of writing every single thing at the very beginning...and it also means that in the last seven weeks I have done absolutely nothing to remind myself of all of the miracles taking place.

So, I am reminded today of my pregnant condition.  It is the 4th of July.  I have spent the afternoon eating (and eating...followed by Tums...and more eating) with family around.  While I am very happy that I can now eat at a fairly normal rate compared to weeks 8-13 (in which I was either nauseous or gagging from the smell of dogs and then puking after gag number three), I am now kicking myself for the snacking that was followed with a large meal.  Shall I put it in perspective?  Pinterest and Facebook...my favorite ways to waste time...have led me to actually play catch up because there are too many food posts and pins.  If I see one more ounce of anything even pretending to be edible, I may lose it.  I'll stop talking about it now because in explaining my disgust it's making me think of it, and I'm turning green in the process.

Let's take a step back in time.  My grandmother noted that she was disappointed in my prior posts how I had left out the part where our family officially became aware of what was going on.  Two nights before the initial sonogram, I had sent out a mass text to family saying that we wanted to go out to Cleo's (a local ice cream stand) to grab a bite to eat the next night.  I didn't tell each one receiving the text, however, that it was a mass message.  When everyone showed up for ice cream, they slowly pieced together as in-laws, sister, cousin, grandparents, etc. showed up that something more than ice cream was going on.  Because a few of my texts were sent to a few wrong people, suspicion had already been raised. In the garage full of picnic tables behind the rural novelty, we told everyone that I was expecting.  We also asked everyone to pray and explained the scary news we had received after the blood tests.  Everyone was positive.  My mother's mother said she would be praying...that it was twins :). And this would help explain why everyone had been able to respond with positive messages of "woo hoo" and "congratulations" after that first ultrasound turned out to be okay.

Between week 7 and 13 everyone seemed to find out though we (eh...I) was selective in who found out.  My dear husband decided that every coworker and customer and acquaintance should know.  My father told a dear church member, and the news went through the church like wild fire (and I should add here that I am hopeful if the news was about something negative in my life it would be prayed over and kept confidential), and finally our family was having a tough time reigning it in as well.  By the next church gathering, I had several people congratulate me and ask how I was feeling.  It was never that I didn't want people to know because I was ashamed or anything like that...I had just so many stories of miscarriages or pregnancy gone wrong, and I didn't want these same questions about how I was feeling to have to be addressed with my tearful explanation of my loss.  On the news traveled, and we let it go as it would naturally, but I told only my coworkers who were directly affected by my doctor's appointments, deciding that after week 13, I would inform everyone else...facebook would be the official medium that would show I was ready to take it public.

Allow me to be human and emotional here-while we have decided to share with family, friends, and acquaintances all about our new discovery and joy, there is also that small nagging voice buried deep in my mind that reminds me we are not fully out of the woods.  We may still have to face that day of explaining tragedy and loss...so I ask for your prayers for health for all of us through this pregnancy and beyond. Thank you for your thoughts!!

  

Hearing it from Shawna's POV

I flipped it over and my mind started to whir.  It's a Friday; I have to go to work today...but the plus sign starts my day off on a very different note than expected.  May 3rd, 2013.  Positive pregnancy test.  I stalk down the stairs in zombie mode and tell him to look at it.  He tells me he doesn't know what it means.  After 8 years of marriage and 2 years of failed attempts, I would have thought he'd have this part down pat.  What he would say or do.  I tell him to look at the diagram at the left side of the stick.  Pregnancy tests for dummies...but trust me, my brain was never so mushy as it is at this moment.  He comments, "I think we're having a baby."  I'm 29 years old.  The last several years people have been telling me it's time, but I suppose this settles it.  It is our time, at last.  I immediately burst into a frenzied sentence.  "Oh my gosh, that means we have to pay off our debt, build a new house, and buy a minivan."  Nothing like remaining calm for the sake of our new baby who has been alive in my world for approximately 5 minutes.  My husband hugs me and simply says, "Your car will be fine for a car seat."  He's unbelievably calm.  He has been planning this moment.  I guess I was just at a point where I thought adoption would be our answer.  I never expected to see the little plus sign showing our efforts as fruitful.  My husband wanders away, already late for work.  I say, "Oh  my gosh, Travis, I'm going to have a baby coming out from between my legs in nine months."  

It's not like I'm a total moron.  I've known the mechanics of it since third grade when I stupidly asked my parents what sex was.  I got "the talk" while my mother took a bath.  She took out her anatomy and physiology book, from when she was acquiring her LPN certification, and showed me how a man "gets excited" by extending her index finger from a relaxed position.  Even now I get squeamish thinking of my 8 year old self enduring this too-in-depth explanation.  I get the picture by the end of her explanation.  I don't actually remember exactly what happened after that traumatic event, but I probably didn't look my mom in the eye for years after that.  As her first child, I understood that "the talk" didn't come with a how-to manual.  

Oh my gosh...I will now be responsible for giving my child "the talk".  Note to self-start planning now.

5/4/13

I went through the rest of my Friday with little thought bursts here and there of, "I'm pregnant."  It still hadn't sunk in.  Saturday was a day of previous obligations.  The ladies Bible study at 7:30 (that is, AM) followed by a meeting with some of the same women to discuss the upcoming women's retreat.  So, I'm an old 29 year old.  Most of my social circles are surrounded by women of at least 40 and older.  It's alright.  It's tough to be this age and childless, yet have the hobbies of women in their 80s.  I quilt on Monday nights too..just to make my case a bit stronger.  So, I'm the mentality of a 60 year old trapped in the body of someone not yet 30...and I'm pregnant.

I don't tell anyone...not yet.  The second pregnancy test I took this morning reconfirmed yesterday's discovery.  I just want to make sure everything is fine before I go out and blurt it to the world.  I'm cautious...conscientious....I want to look at this from every angle before I make a move.  

Lia Sophia party at 1 PM hosted by yours truly.  I cut up cheese and veggies.  Lay out everything.  I call my husband before anyone arrives.  "Travis, I think we should tell our parents.  Would you please call yours and invite them for dinner?"  I pull the hamburger out of the freezer.  I never cook hamburger, but tonight is a grill night.  It's gorgeous.

The party comes and goes.  Everyone leaves, and I ask my mom if she and my father will join us for dinner.  She doesn't think Dad will be interested, so I tell her to wait a minute.  I go upstairs and get the test, still with a droplet or two of urine dried on.  I should've wiped it off...but again, I'm not thinking 100% clearly these days.  She says, "Is that what I think it is?  Is this what I think it means?"  I tell her yes and she repeatedly asks, "Really?"  

Let me interject here.  For the first three or four years of our marriage, we told everyone that kids weren't for us.  We'd go home from other people's houses and talk about their wild, heathen children.  My uncle, with three girls of his own, would tell us, "Don't worry; you raise your children to act the way you want them to."  I responded with, "Well, then tell me why everyone else wants their children to be disrespectful and crazy?"

Time marches on, and Travis decides he's ready.  He's four years older than I am.  I don't know if he hears his little guys screaming about their inability to swim uphill, or if he's just matured to a point where he knows it's time.  Maybe he's sick of the calm quietness in our newly renovated two bedroom.  I savor my ability to come home and do what I want.  Relax, make dinner, watch a movie, take a walk.  So we decide puppies will fill the silence.  Boy, do they.  We are exhausted with semi-consistent poop piles, chewed furniture and molding, and just the responsibility of having two little creatures looking to you for entertainment, food, and the walk outside for the potty.  One night after having them for a couple of weeks, we both collapsed into bed.  I told Travis, "You know children will be more difficult, right?"  He obviously had been thinking about the same thing at the same moment (this happens frequently with us) and responds with a quick, "Yes."  The puppies are five months old at this point, born the day after Travis, November 26th.  They have calmed down...but I think back to the tears shed when they wouldn't stop wrestling or chewing or whining and my exhaustion point had hit its max.  I would joke, "That's why we got puppies.  We can put them in a kennel if they're being naughty."  WIth the implication, of course, that children should not be caged...at least, not according to the majority of our cultural standards.  I'm pretty sure someone somewhere remarked on the fact that they understood why crocodiles ate their young from time to time.  And this is what makes me just a little bit nervous when I think about what I've plunged myself into...

Travis' parents are informed later that evening about our new curve ball.  They seem moderately excited, but his family isn't over exuberant unless they are shouting insults at each other, so it's kind of expected.  I do wonder why, after years and years of being told that I was ruining their plans of being grandparents, they aren't a bit more expressive with their excitement, but I feel that their apprehension is similar to my own.  It's scary.  My mother-in-law experienced two still-born births when married to her first husband.  I'm sure pregnancy conjures up many images and feelings within her.  I can't even imagine.

5/5/13-

My cousin, Ashley, was hosting her son's second birthday.  It's always a bit awkward with the many divorces between her parents and her husband's parents.  Lots of in-laws and out-laws type stuff.  Ashley's stepmother hardly knows me, but makes it her mission each and every time she sees me to ask when I'm having children.  I thought I had ended that trend when I saw her at Colton's first birthday party with my response of, "I don't know that it will ever happen."  Her expression softened...and I realize that my answer held a cryptic element that could mean one of two things.  Either 'I don't want children...so stop asking' or 'I can't have children...so stop asking.'  I hadn't thought about the possibility of leading people on to think that there was a chance I couldn't get pregnant.  While in the back of my mind that thought was there, I didn't have to voice it to anyone but my husband who was starting to draw the same conclusions.  Most people knew that I had proclaimed for a long time that I just wasn't cut out for having kids...end of story.  Carol never took that as truth and was insistent.

The party was about half over, but Travis and I decided to sneak out to get home and let our five month old shepherd/lab adoptees out of their kennels.  I went in the house to throw away a freaking fork, of all things, to have Carol corner me.  "So, when are you going to have kids?"  I stalled a bit, trying to think of a quick-witted answer to get me out of the confession that only our parents knew.  She was a little too quick and responded, "Oh my God, you're pregnant."  Ashley's husband, who happened to be standing there eating his hot dog, looked at me as I turned bright red.   I said, "Yes, but no one else even knows, so you're not to tell anyone!"  I could immediate see that Josh was in a dilemma that was leading to panic.  "If Ashley finds out that I knew before her, she's going to kill me.  I have to tell her."  I just looked at Travis.  Ashley's coworker and best friend then enters the kitchen from the living room, asking how many pregnancy tests I had taken.  Where are these people coming from? I tell them I have a blood test coming this week...so to keep it under their hats until I get some confirmation.

I later get a text from my mother that Cheryl, my aunt and former wife of Carol's new beau, had been sitting at the picnic table after our departure when Carol came out and started taunting, "I know something you don't know."  

What is it about a pregnancy that people can't keep their mouths shut?  Parties, picnics, pregnancy, and nosy people are bound to cause a stir.

5/7/13-

I skip out on going into work at my normal 8 AM to instead head over to the medical center for the official test-getting my blood drawn.  I walk in, fill out the clipboard, and notice that the girl taking the paperwork is a long-lost acquaintance.  Now she's in the inner circle of people who know.  It's followed by the nurse, a longtime friend of my grandparents, asking for a urine sample before they proceed.  I'm so glad for the laws that protect my privacy-not because I care if people know eventually-but because I want to be the first one to tell them.  We do the whole pee in a cup thing.  (By the way, could anyone invent something for women so that the urine actually makes it in the cup and not all over your hand?)  They walk back into the room-yes, it's positive.  Thank goodness!  It's a big let-down to go from two positives to an "Oops, you screwed up."  Next step?  The blood test.  I walk the small corridor to the lab.  I wait in the waiting room.  They call me back quickly.  After I ask where to sit, commenting that I don't get blood drawn very often, the young girl laughingly tells me that I better get used to it if they're saying I'm pregnant.  She draws the small vial; I thank my lucky stars that I'm not ready to pass out.  She tells me that the results will be ready by the afternoon.  I thank her and leave.

Work is rather uneventful.  The last week of the semester.  My finals are planned, so I'm working on getting ready for the summer classes I'll be teaching and the other projects that come along with my tutoring job description.  I am a little nervous about what the blood tests will say-but hopeful that everything will again be confirmed. 

The number comes up on my cell.  Cool, now I don't have to figure out when and who to call.  Mary Barbara is at the other end, the Physician's Assistant who I've seen regularly over the past few years.  She tells me, "So, your levels are higher than expected (insert numbers here about 15,000 something).  We think you're 14 weeks.  When did you say you had your last period?"  I go through it again.  I know the family history.  My great-grandmother never stopped through her whole pregnancy.  The curse that is passed down...awesome.  Mary goes on.  "The other possibility is that it is twins, but it seems a bit low for that to be the case.  It's also a little low to be ectopic.  We need to get you in for an ultrasound as soon as possible.  I'll be calling the gynecologist you were looking into, and I'll let you know if I get anywhere."

Panic ensues...I text my husband and my mother.  I start googling ectopic pregnancies, which I was calling eptopic after getting off the phone.  I had an idea what it was about-but not fully.  I knew they weren't good.  I ask a coworker if I can speak with her.  She's busy, so I ask her to visit my cubicle when she finishes up.  She agrees.  I explain to her the news...because if I truly am 14 weeks, then we have some planning to do as far as my job goes.

5/10/13-

The morning comes where Travis and I are heading to Fulton to the St. Joe's Imaging center to find out what's truly going on.  We both have lost some sleep over the past few nights worrying about the news.  We show up right on time for the appointment after a little bit of an issue with the directions.  We show up to the small building, find the door to go into, and check in.  My insurance card has never gotten such a workout.  We sit and wait for the nurse to call.  She asks if my bladder is full, and I tell her I haven't been to the bathroom for a few hours.  I tell her why I'm there, and she gets started.  She asks me to pull down my pants a bit and tuck a towel into the top-most seam.  I apparently don't pull them down far enough and she forces them down a bit more, exposing a bit more of me than I had originally planned.  She runs the sonogram thing (the technical term) over my lower abdomen, pushing hard enough to leave a bit of a red mark on each pass.  She starts talking about "fetal pole" and other terminology that I would have to grab a medical dictionary to translate.  She stops moving the wand...and shows us the heartbeat...located in the uterus.  I ask her, "So does that mean everything is okay?"  She responds that everything looks fine.  That it's the egg sac and that there is only one that she is seeing.  My due date is New Year's Eve; I am 6 weeks along.   She does a transvaginal sonogram as well, to ensure that all is as she's said.  She prints out two pictures.  It's amazing to me how a black and white blob will someday become a living, breathing human being, but I know that everyone is going to ooh and aah over this little blob as well.

We get in the car, and I text all family and friends giving them the good news and thanking them for their prayers.  "Woo hoos" and "Congratulations" all around...Thank you, Lord, for your goodness.