I’m pregnant!

September 2, 2011

I woke up at 7 a.m. on October 10, 2010 when my cell phone alarm went off. My first reaction was annoyance. It was Sunday, why the hell was my alarm going off so early? Then I remembered….I set the alarm so that I could get up and take a home pregnancy test.

It was 10 days since our embryo transfer procedure and one day before I was scheduled to go into the clinic for an official pregnancy blood test. Our doctors made no recommendations about whether to take a home test or not. Since they are not 100% accurate or can be misread, some doctors will advise against taking them, but the decision was up to us. D was not really for it, for the same reasons above, but I knew I was going to take one (even if my doctor had advised against).

I stumbled down the hall to our bathroom where I had set up the test the night before. Months of doing ovulation tracking had prepared me for the inconvenience of peeing on sticks in the morning. Still bleary-eyed, I placed the test on the flat surface and began the long wait to see if I was pregnant.

But I already knew what the result would be. Within a minute, the word “pregnant” became clearly visible, and I still don’t know how to describe the feelings: joy, of course, but with healthy, heaping helpings of panic, terror, and fright thrown in, too. We (especially I) had been working for this for more than 2 years. I had a million opportunities to call it off anywhere along the line, and I hadn’t. But I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t admit that I had my doubts and fears. Were we too old? Were we financially secure enough? Was I going to be able to carry a baby full-term, and would I survive the birth? Did D really understand the drastic change our lives would undergo? Did I? Does anyone?

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