No Way

I had been away for a few days at an event for work and was happy to finally be back with Jason. It was the Friday morning after Valentines Day and neither one of us wanted to get out of bed. We weren't tired, we were just having a great time laying there talking and joking around. Then out of the blue Jason asked me if I had had my period while I was gone because he remembered that we should be testing again soon. I hadn't, but I told him that it had to be coming soon because I had been feeling all of the symptoms (crampy, tender, tired, etc.) for the past week or more. Then he laughed and said, "haha, what if you were pregnant?"

Funny thought and even funnier that I hadn't thought it. I had spent the last four years diagnosing any little feeling in my body as a pregnancy symptom. I am sure that many times I even created symptoms in hopes that they were real and I would be pregnant. Every single month for the past four years I charted, calculated, hoped, prayed, pleaded, tested, cried, committed to let it go and not think about it for a few months only to start the cycle over a few weeks later. But ever since the IVF didn't work either time I assumed something was truly broken and I let it go for real. Although I had said it eight hundred times before, for the first time I believe that I actually handed it over to God and wanted whatever He wanted for us. And when I did that, it happened. Bailey chose us to adopt her baby and we were going to become parents in four short months! That's all we had ever wanted and it was going to come true. So when Jason joked about me being pregnant, and that's all it was was a joke, I was shocked that my mind hadn't even gone there yet. Wow, I had actually let it go! What a relief! But of course now I was thinking about it! Thanks a lot, Jase!

It wasn't possible, I mean how could it be? Both tries of IVF failed so it's not like my body was just going to magically get pregnant on it's own with one tiny dose of clomid... right? I said to Jason, "Maybe I'll stop at the dollar store and get a pregnancy test on my way to work just to see since it is a little weird that I haven't started yet." He immediately responded, "uh-uh, Sare, no way. Don't do what you always do and start obsessing over this and go  buy a bunch of pregnancy tests just to get your heart broken. Wait one more week and if you still haven't started then you should go buy a test, but only then." Of course I agreed to wait a week, and of course I didn't. =) I stopped at the dollar store on my way to work a few hours later and bought two tests. I know, I'm so bad, but it was like a habit! I had done this so many times before it had become like mindless eating! I knew that I wasn't pregnant and it's not like my hopes were up, I just bought them to calm that tiny curious bug in my mind that Jason had set off. See, it's his fault, really. His comment drove me to go get a test, so could he really blame for buying a test right after he said not to? I don't think so either.

I got to work and focused on my responsibilities, which is totally against the norm for me when I have two pregnancy tests sitting in my purse. An hour or so later I even got half way to the bathroom before remembering that I had them and turned around to sneak one into my pocket. This test was a different brand than I normally buy at the dollar store and one I had never used before. I took the test, set it on the little, silver garbage can attached to the wall and threw away the wrapper. By the time I looked back at it (probably 10 seconds later) there was a magenta line where the test line usually is on the other tests I've taken from the dollar store. I was so confused and I grabbed the box out of the trash and read the back to assure myself that this test must be different than the other brand. Usually the second line appears and then I stare for ten minutes at the test hoping for even the faintest first line to show up, though it never does. I read the box. It showed that the first line would prove a pregnancy. I looked back at the test and there were two bright pink lines staring back at me. There was nothing faint about this. According to the test I was definitely pregnant! I freaked out, couldn't believe that the dollar store had sold me a faulty test because surely that's what was happening here, wrapped the test up in toilet paper, stuck it deep down into the garbage and locked myself in my office. There's no way. There's NO way! That's all I could think, there is just no way! Luckily I was able to squeeze out a little more 30 minutes later and I took the second test to prove that the first test was a fluke. Sure enough two bright lines popped up instantly. Holy crap, I was pregnant!

I couldn't believe it. This didn't mean that I was going to have a baby, it just meant that I was pregnant and that could be a scary thing. Because my last pregnancy was ectopic I was told that if I were to get pregnant again on my own it would first, be a miracle, and second, have a 75% chance of being ectopic again. So there was a 75% chance that I was going to be having surgery very soon and go back to not being pregnant. I had only lived in St. George a month and didn't know any doctors so I googled OBGYN St. George, UT. I called the first one that came up and told them my situation. The doctor said he could see me in 20 minutes and I left work right then. I called Jason on my drive and told him that I had done something that he told me not to do.

"You took a pregnancy test, didn't you?" I told him that I actually took two and they were both positive. He laughed out loud and said "No way!" and I could hear the smile on his face. I told him I was on my way to the doctor and to not expect anything until I got home. The doctor did an ultrasound and to my surprise and relief I saw the most beautiful little dot in my uterus. It was in the right place!! I was only 6 weeks along and he couldn't say that it would stick for sure, but it was in the right place. He asked me to come back in two weeks so we could check it out again, but he said as far as he could tell everything looked good and I was definitely pregnant.

I was pregnant! Imagine me trying to think of anything else! I rushed home and showed Jason the sonogram of our dot in the right place. He was so happy. We were going to have TWO babies!!! Wait a second, what was Bailey going to think? Finding out that I was pregnant never once made us question our decision to adopt. Bailey was carrying our daughter and we felt that super strongly from the beginning so not once did we wonder if it's still what we should do. But how was Bailey going to feel about it? I know it made her happy to know that she was able to give us something that we couldn't do ourselves and was this going to change things? What if she changed her mind? What if she chose to find another family who wasn't going to have a baby on their own? What if the agency wouldn't even allow us to adopt anymore since we had to prove infertility? These thoughts made me sick (well, everything made me sick day and night for the first 12 weeks but these thoughts made me especially sick.) How was I going to tell her? I decided to wait until after the next ultrasound so we'd know if it was still going well before telling her. When that came and went and all was well I still couldn't tell her. I decided to wait until 12 weeks when I felt a little more secure that I wasn't going to lose this pregnancy because of my crazy history. At 12 weeks I ran out of reasons to wait to tell her. I felt like I was lying by keeping this from her and if she was going to choose another family because of this it wasn't fair that she didn't already know.

I tried to prepare my heart for the worst but I wasn't exactly sure how to do that. Jason suggested that we call her together so I left work early and met him at home. We said a prayer together and called her on speaker phone. As it rang Jason put his arms around me and pointed out that I was shaking. I had never felt more nervous. I hoped that she wouldn't answer because I didn't know what I was going to say, but she answered. After some friendly chit chat, some pauses, a few nudges from Jason, and a huge deep breath I told her that the unthinkable happened. I told her that I was pregnant.