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Wednesday, December 2, 2009

One Year Ago

One year ago today I found out I was pregnant. I came home from school that night, opened a nice bottle of red wine, and drank a glass while sitting on the couch watching TV.

For weeks I'd been waiting for Aunt Flow to arrive. I had told myself I would wait until December 10 to take a pregnancy test--I figured there was NO WAY I was pregnant and waiting until then would just show me that I was crazy to think I was pregnant. How could I be pregnant? I was on birth control, not to mention that my husband only lived at home 3 days a week. So my chances were pretty low.

Something told me to just take a test that night after enjoying my glass of wine. When the digital reading said "pregnant" I just stared at it in disbelief. (And the remainder of that delicious bottle of wine sat on our counter for a long time...until I finally made risotto with it since I couldn't drink it anymore.)

Later that night Dave was finally online so we could chat over Gmail. This is how our conversation went:
me: um, you definitely need to ask your dad about paternity leave...
David: !
me: !!
10:10 PM i took a test since i couldn't stand it anymore
David: !!!

Only weeks before that fateful night my mom had been diagnosed with stage four breast cancer and had spent 5 weeks in the hospital. My stress level was through the roof and I was probably a little depressed, too. I think that stress got the best of my hormonal equilibrium and overpowered my birth control.

Getting pregnant seemed like the last thing I needed at the time: my lab had lost funding so I was going to be out of a job, my mom was diagnosed with cancer, and Dave didn't even live with me. I remember being worried about the financial impact a baby would bring into our household, the disappointment from my dad when I would have to tell him I was pregnant before finishing my degree, how we'd handle a baby with Dave living/working away from me, and mostly how my sister-in-law would react to the news. All those thoughts swirled around in my head in the moments after I read the word "pregnant" on the pregnancy test stick sitting on the bathroom counter.

Lucky for me, everything has worked out and getting pregnant turned out to be the best "oops" of my life.

2 comments:

Kaitlin said...

:) x10

steph.kelley said...

This modern world...preggie announcements by gChat! I'm glad that your initial fears have been replaced by the glow of having a successful, joyful family. You deserve it, working so hard for it.