Week 4: I'm Pregnant

Contents: unintentional pregnancy, fear surrounding viability ultrasound, mention of abortion, mention of miscarriage

A Note on Contents

Dear reader, you may have noticed that I have a contents section at the beginning of each post. If you have never been pregnant, you may not understand why these sort of things are relevant. 

I am here to tell you that pregnancy is something many people feel very strongly about. I don't mean politically, either. 

Miscarriages, losses, spontaneous abortions, stillbirths, fetal demises, they go by many names (in part, because each term has subtle distinctions from the other in terms of timing, or the gestational age of the pregnancy when lost). And more women than you think have experienced them. Even if you have never experienced one, trying to conceive (TTC) can put you in a sore spot, emotionally. 

Hearing about someone else's unintentional pregnancy when you have had an unlucky run can be difficult, and I want everyone to have the tools at all times to know whether my silly little life is worth reading about. 

Call the Midwife Office

By the time I found out I was pregnant, on September 9th, I was about three weeks along. Gestational age is often based on one's last menstrual period (LMP); however, some women may not experience regular cycles for a variety of reasons. Sometimes, an estimated date of delivery (EDD) or due date is calculated based on date of conception or an ultrasound (US). [ACOG] 

Anyway, I am a meticulous record keeper, and I knew the exact date of my LMP. 

Now, Dear Reader, I am not a role model. It is recommended that you get your first pap smear at twenty-one years old. [Mayo Clinic Health System] However, I did not make my first appointment until I was twenty-three. 

In my area, we have a few different options for women's health offices: the medical doctor (MD) private practice, the certified nurse midwife (CNM) practice, and the public medical doctor (MD) practice. 

One of my mother's close friends is a CNM; so, of course, that's where I wanted to go. Some of you may not be comfortable, having a friend of your mother's take a look inside your vagina at your cervix, but I simply am not that shy. I probably should be, though. A bit more modesty may have kept me out of trouble, if you know what I mean. 

Anyway, I had to call this office and tell them that I needed to cancel my pap smear appointment to schedule my first prenatal appointment. 

I did this while holding back tears, mind you. 

It took me a while to say the words "I'm pregnant" without crying. It was an overwhelming thing to learn and cope with. And I could tell that the receptionist on the other side could tell that I was a bit of a mess. 

Here's a tip for if someone tells you that they are pregnant: do not say "Congratulations!" right away unless you are one thousand and twelve percent sure that they are excited. 

For us, we were not there yet. Not at this point. 

Anyway, she was very gentle, asking my questions about my personal identifying information and my LMP. She didn't even ask for my insurance information, and I believe that to be because she could hear that I was about to break down into tears at any second. 

And here's a fun fact about pregnancy: unless you insist (which you can do), your first appointment will be scheduled when you are about eight weeks along. 

That left me with four weeks to sit and be pregnant with no midwife to guide me or tell me what to do. Now, you may be thinking that some of the things about pregnancy are common sense: prenatal vitamins, quit drinking and smoking the legal stuff, especially stop smoking the illegal stuff, etc. But when you're in a state of simmering shock, your brain sort of...turns off. 

Luckily, my mom was there to remind me that I should get a prenatal vitamin. 

The Maiden Voyage

The next time I went to Sam's Club to do our weekly shopping, I went to the medicine aisle to get a prenatal vitamin, Tums, and Tylenol supply that could last until the sun exploded. 

While I was shopping, I saw a mother pushing a stroller and almost cried. Then, I couldn't find the goddamned prenatals and almost cried. Then, I got to my car and just let myself cry. 

It was a lot, shopping for things this way. This was the first time I had ever gone shopping for things related to my pregnancy. And that was a scary thing. At this point, I had not seen the product of my pregnancy on an ultrasound, and I knew enough then about women's health to know that sometimes, that first ultrasound is when you find out that there's no heartbeat. So, I was pregnant. But I did not think of myself as having a baby quite yet. 

Despite not intentionally getting pregnant, I always knew I wanted children, and I knew, even then with all my fears, that if I lost this pregnancy, it would be devastating. 

I could argue the finer points of how devastated I would be, compared to someone pregnant with a rainbow baby or someone who had been TCC for months or years before getting pregnant, but I won't. Because, if you want to know that, fuck you! Just a little. 

Basically, we were still coping. 

We Who Copulate Together, Cope Together

I say "we" because my boyfriend was also going through a simmering shock. 

The first few nights after finding out, neither one of us slept much. 

I distinctly remember one night, I just couldn't lie in bed anymore, so I got up and went to sit on the couch. I flipped on a light and zoned out at my phone, just to give myself something else to focus on. 

By this point, I felt like I was out of tears. I felt like I needed to be alone, but I also desperately wanted him to wake up and come sit with me. But I also didn't want him to do that. I didn't know what I needed. 

My boyfriend came out about fifteen minutes later anyway, not being able to sleep himself. 

So, we talked about how we were feeling. We talked about our options, and I made it clear that I did not want to have an elective abortion; we had jobs, we had our own place, and we could make it work. I would make it work, and I would love my baby.  

You may note my use of the word "elective" here. The medical term "abortion" means loss of a pregnancy. This can be elective/therapeutic/induced, a deliberate choice. It can also be medical, a treatment for a pregnancy with complications. And finally, it can be spontaneous, which is what the layman would call a miscarriage. [ACOG]

The term "elective" when it comes to the first type I describe is controversial; many raise concerns that it implies a moral judgment on the part of the person ending their pregnancy. I would argue, however, that the term should be taken at face value: it is a choice. And I use this term only in reference to myself as this is the language commonly used in my town's local medical lexicon. 

Anyway, we talked. We talked about all the things we were too flabbergasted to talk about when the test popped positive. And let me tell you, Dear Reader, I was not out of tears, and neither was he. By the time we finally went to bed, I believe it was about three in the morning. 

Are You Real? 

But the receptionist does not tell you the fine points of making it to your first appointment because receptionists are not qualified to give medical advice, especially over the phone. 

And before that appointment, you're just left with yourself and a theoretical reality, staring at your tummy like, "Are you real?"

Here is the short version of what I would tell myself, knowing what I know now: 

• get a prenatal vitamin that is chewable
• understand what is safe to eat 
• understand what medications are safe to take 
• understand there is no "correct" reaction to discovering that you are pregnant 
• download The Bump app to track your pregnancy 

I emphasize chewable prenatal vitamins because A) the gummy prenatal vitamins don't have iron—anemia in pregnancy is a serious health concern—and B) prenatal vitamins are the size of horse pills, and swallowing them whole can exacerbate morning sickness. 

Anyway, you can't take ibuprofen or Motrin in pregnancy for several reasons. [NIH] Luckily, I already knew this, hence the lifetime supply of Tylenol. 

If you are newly pregnant and aren't sure what is safe to ingest, ask a healthcare provider, or find a reputable source online. No Mommy Blogs, okay? At least not as a primary source, okay? You can look at Mommy Blogs, but don't take medical advice from them and them alone. This includes this blog, okay? 

Okay. 

My Dress!

Shortly after finding out about the pregnancy, my boyfriend and I went with our two very close friends to a local Renaissance Faire. 

One of the first changes I noticed in my body was my boobs. They grew huge, and I couldn't get them into the dress I had thrifted a few weeks ago. Not comfortably, at least. Instead, I changed my outfit and made sure I brought my emotional support, thirty-ounce, insulated water bottle. 

And while we're on the subject of my boobs, I would like you to know, Dear Reader, that while this was appealing to my boyfriend, it was also accompanied with soreness. It was very similar to premenstrual soreness except that it was worse. If you have never experienced this kind of boob pain, I don't even know how to describe it to you. 

I think the closest thing I can think of is a sore muscle after a hard workout, but even then, it's more tender. To have someone touch them when they're like that is not fun. Imagine a ball of needles inside your boob, and when someone squeezes them, your flesh is pushed into the needles. It's sort of like that. 

Anyway, back to the Renaissance Faire. 

This is the first one I had ever been to, and I told everyone I was pregnant. I wasn't telling anyone aside from my immediate family and these two close friends in case I had a complication. I didn't want to have to double back and announce to my entire social net that I was pregnant and then lost it, obviously. But a bunch of strangers in wizard costumes? Why not? 

For context, a coworker of mine had discovered at her first ultrasound that there was no heartbeat, and she had to take medication to pass the products of conception to prevent sepsis. They had been trying, and they had wanted their baby so much, and I felt like finding out that I was pregnant was a deeply cruel version of accidentally picking up someone else's Starbucks order. God's sick sense of humor, right? 

Anyway, my boyfriend and I were very conscious of this, and I did my best not to allow myself to feel attached to this pregnancy until it was confirmed. 

But I still needed to cope with the reality that I was, in fact, pregnant. And I did this by telling nearly everyone at this fair that I was pregnant. 

One of the vendors said she had extra diapers that her son had grown out of, and if I message her on Facebook, she would give them to me! 

Kids grow out of diapers relatively quickly, if you didn't know. Some babies are born smaller, even if they're not premature, and only fit into preemie diapers. Newborns of typical size are usually a size one, but they grow fast! They stay in twos and threes a bit longer, but some take to potty training before they need size fours. 

I did not know this, so I jumped at the chance to get any size diapers without paying for them. 

Free Diapers & a Show

We ended up texting a few times before, and I figured a woman selling cat earrings at a Ren Faire probably wouldn't murder me. 

So, I went to this woman's apartment to collect some diapers, a nursing cover, some maternity clothes, and some baby clothes. At this point, we didn't know what we were having, boy or girl. But I've also never met a baby who complained about the color of their little baby sweatpants. 

The first thing that happens is we walk into her apartment, and her eight-ish year old child is sitting at the counter doing homework with her head down, which appears to be a cardinal sin in the household. 

The mama tells her that this is a strike and gives her child a rundown of the strike chart on the fridge. This chart takes up almost that entire half of the fridge, by the way. 

And then the mama does something that I never understood parents doing, as a child and as an adult; she asks her child if she thinks she deserves all the strikes. 

Now, I am a fan of conversations during disciplinary hearings with your offspring. But the trick questions never sat quite right with me. The child did the things, so she probably doesn't see anything wrong with the things that she did. It seems crazy to expect any rational human being to be completely complicit and see the justice in their own punishment, especially small human beings whose brains aren't finished cooking. 

This makes this mama very mad, as you may have expected. 

After watching this display of yelling, swearing, (the mama) and crying (the child), she tells her child to go take a shower. She apologizes for me having seen this display and laments that her husband will be none too pleased about dolling out the discipline before an audience (me). 

As she starts to pack up this suitcase of things, I think, I would like very much not to be here anymore. 

She tells me I can keep the suitcase as well, tells me about her high-risk pregnancy with her son, and then she invites me to sit and hang out at her apartment. 

I declined politely, explaining that I had plans afterward to meet my mom for something. 

Once in my car, I called my boyfriend to tell him how the diaper pickup went, assuring him I had not been murdered. He also found the story a bit strange, and we agreed we likely would not attend the Halloween party that this woman was planning to throw and invite us to. 

An hour or so later, I'm sitting in the Starbucks drive-through for a refresher when I see a text from her. 

She once again apologized for the thing with her kid and for swearing, so I assured her that both I and the father of my baby were raised in military families, and swear words are kind of par for the course. Which, for the record, is true for my boyfriend's family since they're Navy, but my classy Air Force parents tried to keep it pretty clean. There was no sense in telling her that, though. 

This mama went on to tell me that she's just a little paranoid, has a touch of PTSD, because she has been investigated by Child Protective Services before. 

It was at this moment that I made up my mind to not talk to her anymore. 

I know that things happen, that CPS makes mistakes, okay? I've seen it at my job. However, I had no loyalty or previous friendship with this woman to fall back on. I figured I could continue to live my life, mind my own business, and thank her for the baby supplies, and we could all just keep living in our own lanes. 

A few weeks later, she texted me, asking to call me to ask me a question that she "couldn't word" over text, and I just never answered. 

Anyway, diapers are cool, but if you stock up too much on any one size, you may find yourself in a position to give them away. If you find yourself in that predicament, I recommend using Facebook Marketplace and arranging for a porch pickup.