February Was Morning Sickness Month

I found out I was pregnant after I'd already poured myself a glass of wine.

I'd spent a chilly Friday night supervising a high school soccer game and was looking forward to a glass of red and some time on the couch with my husband.  My period was due today, I recalled as I drove up the hill to our neighborhood, thinking that just to be safe, I could grab both a pregnancy test and wine at the drugstore.

So confident was I that I couldn't be pregnant, I poured myself a glass of Cabernet before I headed to the bathroom.

The wine, and my relatively simpler life, went down the drain that night, January 11.

Of course, I didn't feel immediately pregnant.  I felt, instead, alternately disbelieving, giddy, panicky, hopeful, selfish, unprepared, worried, old, young, wary, nervous, excited, embarrassed, irresponsible, defensive, strong, determined, gleeful and guilty: conflicted.

I was 41, soon to be 42.  I'd recently had a miscarriage.  Only a week earlier, I'd half-purged the house of baby and toddler gear, ready to accept that we wouldn't have a third.  Our house was small. Money wasn't growing on our big tree in the front yard.  Husband didn't see this coming, now.  No one would, I thought, though having another child was a not-so-secret long indulgent wish of mine.

The risks, all of them, and the potential of raising our little girls' hopes (one of whom had asked for a baby for her birthday) and having them ultimately dashed them made keeping this pregnancy secret paramount.

Meanwhile, I began feeling tired.  And then, hungry.  And then... blergggggghhhhhhhhaaaaggggghhhhhh.

Flu season had struck at school with a vengeance, so I fit right in, though I resisted curling up on the nurse's office cot and going home. I groaned through weeks of what felt like the flu and also like the world's longest hangover, bearing all the same characteristics, including internal wails of why oh why did I do this to myself?  I never threw up, at least outside my mouth.  But I entered many classrooms and meetings with an escape plan in mind.  I conjured images of pregnant women around the globe, sicker than I felt, plowing fields and chasing toddlers.  So I rallied.  

But I lacked oomph. 

And I could smell your breath, and your perfume, or lack thereof.  Also your socks.  

Nothing sounded good.  And then everything sounded tempting until I put in my mouth or smelled it. I ate to fill my stomach with a feeling other than nausea.  I craved sandwiches.  I craved sleep.  I spent most afternoons and evenings lying in bed, feeling like a terrible mother and wife.  The girls grew used to me doing little.  We read books together in bed, but I hardly wanted to play.  Husband patiently tolerated and tended to me, tempering his excitement and unspoken anxiety.  

I became a boring and absent and unavailable friend.  I really did want to meet you for that beer! But.  And I'm pretty sure I was in bed by 7:30 that night.

I felt duplicitous and sneaky as I engaged in conversations with others, including my sister-in-law, about their pregnancies.  "Nope, nothing new or big going on in my life," I fibbed to unsuspecting and remote friends and family members.  I kept Big and Little Sis in mind, figuring I'd ask for forgiveness and understanding later.  

But here we are now at 12 weeks, with some assurance that a healthy little bean is sprouting inside me.  And my growing belly (why yes, I have had a big lunch!  A foot-long sub, in fact!) is ready for its debut.  We have some very excited big sisters and new landscapes ahead. 

Yeehaw!