The Second Line

Today I’m 15 weeks pregnant. Officially second trimester by anyone’s definition.

But let me back up a little bit.

It seems like a lot of people merely need to think about having a baby and BAM, they’re pregnant…

I’m not one of those people.

Here’s what happened when that notorious positive sign finally made an appearance:

The infamous second line materialized so fast I had to scramble for the long ago memorized instructions telling me just how to interpret the seemingly obvious result.

I did everything the box says not to: I didn’t wait until I was a full day late; I didn’t take the test first thing in the morning; I chugged a glass of water in a sad attempt to make myself pee on demand.

But despite my stubborn tendencies to think the rules don’t apply, there it was staring me in the face. The plus sign appeared almost before I even had a chance to look, making me think it must be the control square. How rude to make the control a plus sign. And as I thought the words ‘plus sign’ in my head, I realized exactly what had just happened.

You would think my reaction would be obvious: delight, excitement, glee. When you’re used to month after month of disappointment, you imagine the reaction you’d have when it finally happens is one of pure exuberation. But no. My first thought? ‘Holy shit. What the heck did we just get ourselves into?’ Babies crying in the middle of the night, toddlers with snotty noses…

When you convince yourself month after month that you don’t really want it and there’s other things you’re meant to be doing with your life, somewhere along the way you actually start believing it. For a half a millisecond. And then you get over it, and get really, really excited.

Then you try to explain to your husband why you’re randomly going to the grocery store at rush hour trying not to crack a goofy grin. To buy pickles & ice cream, of course.

I’d like to recommend here that attempting to sharing the news with your husband by serving him said pickles and ice cream is not the most succinct way of spilling the beans. Who knew men had no idea of the overused pregnant-woman-craving stereotype?

Just the first of many things I was to learn about how little men know about babies and pregnancy…