Round Two -- the Waiting

At this stage in the game, we were unpacked and getting settled into our new home in Alabama. I have to admit, though, that the kids and I were having a bit of trouble feeling at home. Did you know? It is FREAKING HOT in Alabama in August. I had the kids enrolled in a Mother’s Day Out program, and had a playgroup lined up, but those things wouldn’t begin until after Labor Day. In the meantime, we hadn’t met any new friends yet, so we just sat in our air-conditioned living room and looked at one another. (Hot, I’m telling you, melt into a little puddle on the sidewalk kind of hot, and there was no way to go outside and entertain ourselves. When it’s too hot to go swimming? That is stinking hot!!!) The kids were one, three and four years old, and we never left the house – just how many games of Candy Land could I be expected to play? How many episodes of Bear in the Big Blue House could I watch before my brains oozed out of my ears?

So, homesick for our friends and Mother’s Group back in Ohio, I loaded the kids up in the van, gave Blaine a kiss goodbye, and took off for a week’s impromptu vacation. We stayed with my girlfriend Kim, who of course knew about the surrogacy and knew that I was in the middle of the dreaded two week wait.

I had done a home pregnancy test five days after the transfer and it was negative. I was trying really hard not to be pessimistic in my thinking …. But I was already worried this would be a repeat of our previous failed cycle.

I had brought one more home pregnancy test with me on the trip, and was able to contain myself only until day eight. I took the test mid-afternoon, and had convinced myself that even if it were negative – again -- that I was still testing too early, and it wasn’t concentrated urine, and perhaps the moon of Venus was not in alignment with the star from Uganda, or whatever, so not to be too disappointed.

All those years I was trying to get pregnant, I never, EVER, had a home pregnancy test turn positive, so as I waited there in Kim’s bathroom, I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for. I was sitting on the lid of the toilet, holding this stick in my hand, watching for a pink line, expecting nothing, when all of a sudden a faint, thin line began to appear. I started squinting, and turning the stick this way and that, holding it up to the light. The line did not look like the “pregnant” example on the box, but there was definitely something there. Oh, geez, was it defective???

I went running downstairs and made my girlfriend look at it (that’s a true measure of friendship, isn’t it, that she didn’t reflexively jerk away in disgust when I shoved a stick I had just URINATED ON right under her nose???) She kept saying, “I think you’re pregnant!” but I couldn’t be sure. It just didn’t feel right to get too excited this early. So I waited 24 hours, took another test, and hot damn if that line wasn’t back, and darker!

I was thrilled, and terrified at the same time that it might be a mistake. The first person I called was Blaine, to tell him what I hoped was great news, and ask his opinion about whether or not I should call the IP’s. At first he said no, it was still too early and we shouldn’t get their hopes up, in case it was wrong. Plus, my counselor was very clear to discourage me from telling them the results. Not to be all negative Nancy, but positive home tests don't always equal a viable pregnancy. But, then, Blaine reconsidered and said this news was too exciting to keep to ourselves, but make sure they understood it was ONLY a home test.

So I immediately called my IM at home, with butterflies in my stomach. She didn’t answer, and I remembered that they were going out to dinner that night with family. I thought that surrounded by family, this would either be a great time, or a lousy time, to tell them. Again, not having the stamina to keep news like this to myself, I hoped for the first option and called her on her cell.