I’m not going mad (written 11th February 2015)

Am I? Could yesterday have all been a dream? I still can’t believe that this could actually be real. Lucky for me we bought an extra pregnancy test yesterday so bright and early this morning (ok, not so bright and early at 7:20am – my boss said I could have a sleep in) I test a third time just to be sure. 3 minutes later those two lines appear again. This might actually be happening but I don’t think I’ll believe it until the clinic tells me it’s so….and even then I might not believe.

I thought the anxiety would recede a little with a positive result but it hasn’t, it’s just changed. Now, instead of being worried that we might get a negative result, I’m panicking that the positive result we have might disappear. Cue the pregnancy test madness. With three positive tests in 24 hours I email both the clinic in San Diego and our New Zealand clinic to beg to bring my OTD forward. It’s scheduled for Monday but I’m hoping for a pre-weekend test so I can not only put my mind at ease a little, but also start telling those close to me.

It’s a strange position we’re in. So many people that I know in real life read my blog, they know we’ve been away, and they know exactly why. This makes it hard when it comes to the pregnancy announcement, they’re all going to know that we are aware of the outcome long before the time any normal/fertile pregnancy would be announced. I’m not sure how I feel about this. There are of course some people I would tell straight away regardless, but there are others I would probably have waited to tell, especially as the gossip in this town spreads like wildfire. It’s almost like we won’t have the luxury of this being ours for those 8-12 weeks that others get. But I guess that’s the decision I made when I shared this blog.

So back the pregnancy tests. I hear back from our New Zealand clinic reasonably promptly. They’re excited, assuring me that it’s not likely to be a false positive (yes, I asked), and after a bit of backwards and forwardsing on what my dates are, my blood test is bought forward to Friday. WOOHOO! Now I just need to keep this little Bumble or Bee (or both) happy inside me. And I need to reassure myself that everything is ok.

I stock up on home pregnancy tests at the supermarket, one for tonight, and two for tomorrow (morning and night), which will bring us to the Friday morning time for my blood test. In the last 36 hours we’ve spent $80 on pregnancy tests, but don’t judge me too harshly, they’re expensive in New Zealand. The cheapest I could find was $7.99! So all up I’ve purchased only six tests. This may seem excessive to some but I’m comfortable with that, knowing that it’s easing some of the extra tension.

Now to just keep up this charade of pretending I know nothing. I think I did ok today. The stress of my “this pregnancy is going to disappear” paranoia is reasonably easy to morph into “I’m worried this isn’t going to work” fear for the sake of others. I did have a look around the baby section of a shop today though so that might have tipped off my colleague who was with me. Not long to go now…only two more sleeps.