Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Introduction to me

I think I will start with a bit of background. I am 27, have been married to my husband, 30,(der, who else would I be married to?) for 2 1/2 years. We had our beautiful baby boy on 19/12/05. He is our first, although we did suffer a miscarriage at almost 8 weeks at the end of November 04. We had decided in the September that is was baby-making time and, wouldn't you know it, we got it right the first time! DH was actually in WA for work when I found out (we live in Sydney), after many, many tests just to make sure that those two lines stayed blue. I had zero pg symtoms, so I assumed I would just be one of the lucky ones who would zoom through the whole thing. When DH came home (the two months he was supposed to be away for miraculously turned into one, he was very homesick poor bubby) we were just at the end of the 4th week, so of course we told the world. My parents, his parents, friends, the used car salesman (we of course bought a new car straight away, a family size one). Basically everyone. Then came week 6 (the day after we bought the car), and the spotting. Just a little bit, but every day there was just a little bit. It started on the Monday, and by the Wednesday I was at the doctors, slightly hysterical. He got me in for an ultrasound the next morning where I was slightly reassured when the heart beat was found, but I was measuring I think 2 weeks smaller than my dates. The details are a bit hazy now, that's why I think I feel I have to get them all down now, before I forget even the big things. Even though it was a totally crappy time I don't think I should forget it, and if anyones reads this that may be going through the same thing it might be of a little comfort. I know that when it happened I read everything I could on the internet, got every book from the library, just to try and come to grips with it all and realise that I wasn't the only one in the world it had happened to (what a sad library record I must have had, going from the pregancy books to the positive sounding "Miscarriage".) So anyway, I hadn't even told DH that I was bleeding when he came home that Thursday to find me more than slightly hysterically crying waving the ultrasound report around. It said something about the size, blah blah, but the worst bit was the part about assessing the viability of the embryo ( I think it was still an embryo, you would think that with the amount of preggo books I have read I could be an OB, but now I have 'mummy memory'. I'm lucky if I can remember to wash my hair). The spotting was relentless, and after a weekend on Google doing searches like 'bleeding, pregnancy', I went back to my GP on the Thursday, he got me in for another u/s on the Friday. I spent all Thursday night in tears (and it was a stinking hot night for November, I remember that distinctly) then went with DH to the hospital for the u/s. I had started bleeding a lot by then, so I only had a little glimmer of hope that things might be OK, but the technician couldn't find a heartbeat through my tum, and then the vaginal thing couldn't find one either. The next 5 days were a blur of tears (I could bawl just writing about it now) and another doctors appointment and another u/s, but the worst bit was telling people. We definitely didn't tell as many people the bad news as we did the good, I sort of assumed the grapevine would do it's job, so we had a few people congratulate us afterward and I think that was the hardest bit.

**** take a breath ****

While DH was in WA, he thought he got pricked by a needle while he was at the beach. He had a test while he was over there, and then had to have another one in the following January. I am sort of glad that happened, because it obviously meant we had to postpone the baby making. I am sure that if it wasn't the case I would have wanted to get cranking straight away and I absolutely know I wasn't ready. Once we got the all clear I was raring to go. We had missed O for Jan, so the serious business didn't start until Feb. I had always been pretty regular since coming off the pill at the start of Jan 04, so I guessed when I would be ovulating and just went for it. Nothing happened that month, so I researched as much as I could about taking your temperature to predict ovulation and started religiously making my little chart. I didn't have to do it for long because March was the month DH's smallest cell met my biggest cell and gave us the sqirming purple creature we were to meet in December.

My fingers are getting tired (I haven't typed this much since I was at Uni), so I will start the day to day stuff another time. I think I will also put a bit about my pregnancy into each entry. I really regret not keeping a diary all through it, because I definitely don't want to forget it.

Just quickly now:

Pregnancy Week 1-4

Hmm, don't really now I am pregnant yet. Since the m/c have been a little irregular so don't think too much of it. Spotting on the Thursday of week 4, assume is AF and start a detox. Poo all weekend but still only have that one day of spotting. Do test on Mon, BFP! Tell DH in the following way: Me - (crying and waving preg test around) "There's two lines!"
Him - "It's alright, we'll keep trying."
Me - (still crying) "No, we're having a baby!" (or something to that effect, I wished I had taped it)

Week 5-8

At GP, in tears, after another spot. Get HCG test (and a massive bruise from the needle, thanks Doc) and the follow up (much less painful). Get results, levels are perfect. No moe bleeding. Feel very relieved, but still don't want to get excited. Get morning (or should I say all day) sickness. I was never actually sick, but just a constant nausea. There were many times I took refuge in the work toilets just resting my head on the toilet roll (very relaxing). I was quite upset when I got too preggo to be able to bend over to do it! Went away for the weekend at about 6 weeks. Pretty uneventful month. Stepbrother and his girlfriend announce they are pregnant. My mum guesses that I am too (few signals, biggest one being I didn't drink at DH's 30th birthday party). Tell her not to tell anyone (turns out she told my uncle, apparently he was the only one).