Big Fat Positive!

The anticipated blog is finally here! Yes. We are officially expecting! It’s been announced at many places and I feel pretty confident but it’s still early and I have had a loss so naturally, there is some anxiety over this pregnancy. I will say the anxiety is nothing like the anxiety I had during my pregnancy with Ruby. I would consider my anxiety level…NORMAL for someone who has had a loss.

I am both elated and nervous, more elated than anything. It’s been such a long journey to get here. This was such an unexpected surprise and I pray every day that this baby continues to grow strong, healthy, and to full-term!

How did we get here? Well, as many of you read, I opted for exploratory surgery in August. I was quite nervous and wasn’t sure if anything would be found. Nothing significant was found at all but I secretly felt like the surgeon may have “tickled” my ovaries enough to work. Recovery from the air bubble was difficult but otherwise my recovery was uneventful. The surgeon removed a bit of scar tissue from a mesh implant I had to repair a hernia when I was a teenager. Unbelievably, that took away the pain I had had for over seven years!

Then, about three weeks ago, I was talking with my husband and told him that it looked like I might be ovulating. After charting my fertility signs for years, I was pretty sure although I have been wrong in the past. With PCOS, your body can trick you into thinking it’s working. It had been four weeks since my last period so I was pretty shocked to see the signs of ovulation so late. Normally, my body remains dormant. We decided to take on the opportunity and did was “normal” people do in order to get pregnant. Yup. Sex!! It happened to be Joey’s birthday as well.

Even though I wasn’t sure that I was ovulating, I remained on the bed…post coitus, like anyone going through infertility treatments would. I joked with Jason about doing headstands and other silly things in order for the “deposit” to make its way to the correct location for the best outcome. Of course, we were laughing about it with no expectation that we would actually be successful. After all, we had tried for many months utilizing many methods (mostly in the doctor’s office) and we were never successful.

Needless to say, I felt the desire to test on the morning of The Walk to Remember. I thought it might be of some significance finding out I was pregnant on the same morning I was honoring the loss of Ruby. I had started charting my temperature following the signs of ovulation and confirmed that I ovulated based on my elevated temperatures. The morning of the walk, I counted back the days. I speculated I was approximately 12 days past ovulation. I have never had a positive pregnancy test that early before but I expected a negative anyway.

It was about 6:15am on a Saturday morning and I removed one of two, cheap pregnancy tests I bought on the internet. I grabbed a little pee cup I had and did my deed into the cup. As I finished up, I dipped the test into the little cup filled with yellow liquid. One-one thousand, two-one thousand, three-one thousand and I removed the stick and set it on the wood stool that was somehow trapped in my bathroom.

I watched the liquid flow across the test and began to observe the control line turning dark. “Ugh! That figures! Another negative test.” I picked up the stick and held the stick in my right hand and proceeded to wait the full three minutes. “Just in case,” I thought. As I flushed the toilet I thought my eyes were deceiving me. “What?! Is that a second line appearing on the test?” My heartbeat began to beat fast. I stood up and began to pace in the bathroom, staring at the test, waiting to see how dark the line got. It had only been two minutes at minimum.

I began to scratch my head. How can this be? Is this an evaporation line? It can’t be an evaporation line, the test is still wet. It’s too early for this to be positive. I am only 12 days past ovulation…I think. It slowly started to sink in that the test I was holding was positive and I thought to myself, “I want to surprise Jason but I can’t hold this in. I have to tell him.”

So, instead of planning some elaborate scheme to tell him, I walked into his bathroom with the little stick in my hand. Jason was in the shower. I said, “Jay?” and waited for his reply. “Yeah?” he said. I replied, “This pregnancy test says I am pregnant.” He bolted out from behind the shower curtain and screamed, “Which one?!!!” I said, “The one that’s in my hand.” He said, “Are you serious?” I said, “it looks like it.”

He grabbed me and gave me a big hug. I could see how excited he was. I knew he wanted to pull me into the shower but I didn’t want to get wet. I am not sure why, as I still needed to shower myself but for some reason I told him not to pull me into the shower. He was jumping up and down like a little girl, all excited and quite frankly, that’s what my body was doing inside as well. I was totally excited! Shocked, but excited.

We had too much to do that morning. There was no telling anyone, we needed to get Joey up and ready, my stuff packed in the car and begin the 45 minute drive to the park while stopping for breakfast along the way. We talked about stopping at Walgreens for another test but I soon realized we wouldn’t have time. I didn’t feel nervous or anxious like last time, I was just excited. This was a new feeling. Well, not new, but just like when I was pregnant with Joey.

Later that night, I had stopped to get another test and double checked. I knew that if the test came back positive that late in the day, it was a sure thing. Sure enough, when I dipped the stick and watched the liquid move up the stick, both lines appeared instantly. There was no doubt. Two lines meant…PREGNANT!