‘Twas the Night before Christmas
A BFP story
This time of year is always special to me. I’m
a fall baby and l love the fall and winter seasons. I particularly love all the
holidays from Halloween right on through Easter (in the spring, but it’s always
cold here so I think of it as a winter holiday).
Christmas is especially special to me. I
love the pomp and circumstance even though our families don’t really gather
together as much as in years past.
For us the road to baby was long and littered.
Even Christmas had been tainted by the stain of our infertility. In 2012 we were quietly optimistic about a
holiday pregnancy. Unfortunately, by the New Year we were back to the drawing
board.
In our quest to procreate we had one rule
that we followed, we’d take a break through the fall and winter month. No
drugs, no timing just sit back and relax and enjoy the holidays. Now, for some people that might be odd
considering all the time, money and effort that we were putting into making a
baby, but the holidays are already such a busy and stressful time it just
seemed like a great time to relax and relate. And really people, we live in
Texas were summer dominates ten months of the year. Gone were the days of my youth when the first
snow flurries started in October and you went trick or treating with sweats and
snow suites under your costume and winter parkas on top. I am practically famous for saying “I absolutely
don’t want to be pregnant in the height of Texas summer. Let me before the
triple digits hit.”
Last year was no exception. After a summer
book conference in Austin, Big CWB and I spent what is normally a 3 hour drive
( it turned into nearly 8 because of a major rainstorm, traffic and traffic
accidents) discussing how we’d spend the fall and winter. The decision was made
to attempt using a sperm donor and of course our “break”. We also made a hard line— 2015 was the
end. We’d been on this journey for so
long and for me as I was approaching my 34th birthday I was ready to
do something other than track my period, chart my cervical mucus (tmi…sorry)
and make mad dash road trips to Odessa (a 400 mile drive one way) because “my
temp spiked”. I was over it. CWB not so much. Where my excitement and
determination was waning his was just ramping up.
By October were definitely ready for our
break. We’d been informed that there had been a mix up at the sperm bank we’d
been planning to use and our donor was no longer available. As well as informed that the transfer we’d
been waiting on with CWB’s job was not going to happen. I decided that turning 34 was going to be a
blast. I along with our roommate hit the streets and much to my husband’s
relief started really exploring the DFW metroplex (he had been concerned that I
was being too much of a hermit and my focus on the fertility was wearing on
both of our sanities).
With the Roomie in tow, I put miles and miles
on Whitey Mclighting and when I wasn’t doing my best impression of a spoiled
oilfield wife I was making casual visits to the “Basin” to have lunch with the
hubster without the pleasure of having to pop doses of femara and clomid. Or
check my temperature or “omg there aren’t any rooms to rent can you meet me at
the truck stop and hope no one mistakes me for a lot lizard picking up johns.”
CWB was able to make a trip home for both
Thanksgiving and my birthday. Life was fun. I ate. I drank and I even managed
to start and stick to a diet (I know, I know, I am supposed to call it a life
style change.)
At Christmas the Roomie remarked off
handedly about the fact that shortly after my birthday I had begun sleeping and
inordinate amount. CWB casually brushed
it off “She does that. Her insomnia will cycle back around and then she’ll
sleep a few days straight.”
The Roomie raised an eyebrow and said “Like
16 hours a day for the last nearly three weeks.” That was a lot even for me, but we all
shrugged it off.
Twas the day before Christmas. Really, it was quite early in the morning on
Christmas Eve. The Roomie needed a tire
iron. CWB was playing with the dogs in the back yard, so out to my car I went
to investigate my trunk in search of said tool. I lifted the insert in my trunk
and where a spare tire should be was a bag from The Dollar Store. Inside said
bag were three forgotten pregnancy tests. Hidden from a time when testing was
as compulsory as breathing.
I grabbed the bag and the tire iron and made
my way inside. Without speaking I handed The Roomie the tire iron and walked
straight to my room, closed the door then into the en suite and closed that
door as well. I rummaged under the sink for the pee cup (if you’ve ttc’d for
any length of time you know exactly what a pee cup is and why it’s under the
sink).
Constitutions finished (fancy way of saying I
peed…hey I am a writer), I checked the expiration dates and opened the first
test. On auto pilot I used the little dropper collected the sample and applied
it to the test( did I mention I also used to work for a couple of companies
that ran urine screens for everything from pregnancy tests to drug testing for
employees? I’m an expert at conducting
urine screens).
Here’s where I screwed up. I dumped my sample!
Yes, knowing in my little brain that I simply wasn’t pregnant I poured the
urine into the toilet and flushed. Then I washed the cup and as I was drying it
I looked down at the test. The test that my hand was automatically reaching for
to brush into the trash can because surely it was negative. The test that was
sailing through the air as my brain registered that there were two lines
instead of one. It seemed as if the test
hung there, suspended in air halfway from the counter and half way to the
toilet side trash can as I Wyle E
Coyoted my calculations. I counted back the days and weeks from my last
cycle. Something I normally let the
little app on my phone due because frankly I’m so regular that one period
bleeds into the next (no pun intended) and they all feel the same to me. I just assumed I was days away from the December
cycle. It was then that the little piece
of plastic bounced off my toilet and into the trash can with a world shaking thud.
I sat on the side of the tub and stared into
the mirror. What was I doing around my
birthday (December 7th)? When had CWB come home? When had I last
been down to Odessa? The movie in my mind was a fast forward replay from my
period in November right up to the moment that little test rattled into the
trash can like a basketball through a chain link net. My life didn’t flash before my eyes; it
played like a grainy old reel to reel projector film. There was whiskey and
beer and wine—lots and lots of wine. Cupcakes, steaks, potatoes, cake—lots and
lots of cakes. And sex. Tons of none scheduled, non calculated sex. Sex that didn’t require timing. Sex that didn’t end me in some awkward prone
position( again if you’ve been a long time ttc-er you know what I’m talking
about: legs in the air, pillows under butt, head over the side of a surface).
Sex that was just good old fun…the way it was intended to be.
I swallowed a lump in my throat and reached for
the trash can. I wasn’t sure if I was going to need to puke or not. Once the
trash can was in front of me I thanked the stars that I had emptied it the
night before changed the liner. With one hand I reached for the test and the
other my phone. Sure enough, there it was. A strong positive.
I threw up.
I needed to retest, but I got rid of my
sample. So I snapped a picture of the test with my phone and fired off a
message to CWB who by now was helping The Roomie change his tire, pushed it
back on the counter and opened the other two. With them lined up like little
soldiers I sat on the toilet, pants around my ankles willing myself to go in my
most calm and encouraging voice “You just need a trickle. Relax. Think Niagara.
Think the Amazon. Think of all the oceans. JUST PEE DAMMIT.”
The text conversation with CWB was classic.
“Don’t panic. Do you have another test?”
“Yes, but I can’t pee.”
“Drink some water and relax. How many tests
do you have?”
“Two more.”
“Okay, let me know.”
“REALLY. LET you know. Its freaking positive!
BRIGHT FUCHIA LINE.”
“Okay, don’t get worked up. Just pee.”
Needless to say I barely squeezed out enough
to get it done and because the samples where “less” the next two test were consecutively
lighter however there they were positive.
Now came the whispered conversation by the
fence as The Roomie cast furtive glances our way before leaving for work.
We decided…and by we I mean CWB that we
would wait a few days and test again. We’d been here before. Positive test and
then days later negatives and the arrival of that maddening aunt that every
female laments. I pasted on a smile while I internally panicked. Yo, I did
thirty four the way most people do 21. I
drank…A LOT. Should I take the
progesterone pills that I’ve got stashed in the back of the bathroom cabinet?
What about those suppositories in the fridge?
Christmas day came and CWB and I celebrated
by taking a trip to the FT. Worth Botanical Gardens. I was literally sick the
entire drive over. We argued in the parking lot in front of the Japanese Garden
and never made it out of the car. Back in town we picked up a few odds and ends
to complete our Christmas day steak dinners and came home. Unbeknownst to him I
also purchased a twin pack of digital pregnancy tests. The super deluxe pack
that has the timer so you don’t wait too long to read the results. I waited till after dinner before texting my
sister in the fertility battle…whose progesterone pills I had stashed in my
bathroom. She and I weighed my options and decided to be on the safe side I’d
start popping said pills. I could have
done the suppository but in my addled mind I couldn’t see how inserting
something in my rear was going to help (why the instructions were for anal
insertion for a vaginal medication I will never understand). *NB I know someone
is reading that thinking “Wait, she has someone else’s pills? That’s crazy.”
Listen. I’ve spent thousands upon thousands trying to not just get pregnant but
stay that way. There is a whole circle of women out there who know just what I was
going through. Not only being prescribed pills at a whopping cost on top of
insurance rates, but the culture that drives us to order pills from the UK and
Canada when insurance won’t cover them. I am just being honest. Don’t judge me
for my journey.
Dinner eaten I sat teary eyed as CWB packed
up to head back to work. I had one more meal to prepare for The Roomie as he
was spending most of the day with his family but was going to come back to town
and open gifts with me.
I waited anxiously as I always do for CWB to
complete his trip back to work. Then I had to wait for until I was alone in the
wee hours of the morning the day after Christmas. Why I tiptoed through the
house when it was just me and the dogs here I still don’t know. I snagged the
hidden digital tests and with bladder nearly bursting, proceeded to pray like
and pee on the stick. No special pee cup needed.
It didn’t even wait for the timer to go off.
Before I had finished relieving myself the thing was beeping and the block
letters looked as if there were in bold 60 point font to my sleep and fear
hazed eyes.
Pregnant
I snapped a picture sitting on the side of
my bed with the test on my lap and text it to CWB knowing he’d just be arriving
for his shift at work. The response was immediate.
“Get your ass to the dr.”
Luckily, my obgyn's office was open that
frosty Friday morning. I had to wait till 8 am to call and because they know me
(I used to work there doing what else…urine drug/pregnancy screenings) I was in
before the office was actually opened for business. By 9 am I had yet another positive
urine test and two blood tests drawn. One to be completed by the in house lab
in a rush and one sent off by the lab in my dr's office. I paid out of pocket
for the rush job one down stairs. It two was positive. I also had my first sonogram…the first of a
billion. There was nothing on the
image. No egg floating anywhere. No follicles, diminishing or otherwise.
Nothing. But still all signs pointed to go. I followed up the next Monday with
another blood test to compare the hormone levels and yes another sonogram that
showed nothing but a murky screen.
Tuesday I got the results of the comparison blood work. The hormones had
more than quadrupled over the weekend. I was definitely on my way to pregnancy
but technically not exactly pregnant.
You aren’t pregnant till the egg is in the womb. That didn’t happen for
me until the following Friday when at yet another sonogram there it was: a swirly
little wisp of white matter just tucked to the inside of my uterus. My own little scientific visual of a BIG FAT
POSITIVE.
I called CWB on the drive home and we cried.
Then The Roomie went shopping with me to plan the announcement that CWB insisted
we do quickly (something in all our years of near misses and losses we’d never
done before).
The rest, as they say, is HIStory.
