"hey...guess what we did..."

Newly overwhelmed with our future as parents to a child that was obviously concieved with wine and conversations of how cool we were back in college, we decided that only a doctor could really tell us what to do next.
My nursing education had literally been thrown out the window. Along with my insecurities about a life of infertility when I decided to have babies one day when I turned 30. I couldnt even comprehend the physics of conceiving a child much less what to do after you do ...that.
To the walk in we go, because we just moved here and didnt have a family MD. 2 hours of waiting later, we finally get in. But i have to pee again. So im uncomfortable. And im still in shock.  My body was waging a war on me. bladder and all. I mean...lets be honest...it wasnt just mine apparently anymore. And if my car just "let" someone sit in the trunk without any means of security, i wouldnt trust it either...but it wouldnt do that...my car has locks. apparently my uterus, did not.

So the doctor comes in, FINALLY lets me pee, and as i leave the little yellow cup of fluid that is, ironically now, the only part of me that really always has known and keeps telling both me and other people that im pregnant, i take a breath. Im assuming the doctor has some super special urine specificity test that maybe can even tell me how this all came to be. Like perhaps a story will come out of the cup: “yes madi, you are pregnant, it happened that night that you drank the cabernet before the pinot....”
However, I walk away from the cup, the nurse enters the room i leave, and before i even get back into the little safe room where the doctor and me have nice private conversations, the nurse follows me back out and says to the MD, "definately positive, I didnt even have to wait"
great.
maybe thats not mine...
He walks into the room and smiles, "yep, you're very pregnant"
Very pregnant.
what is that supposed to mean?
"no sir" i want to say, "medically speaking, Im NEWLY pregnant" but i dont. I cant seem to find my words at that point.
He proceeds to tell me that I can expect this newly attached fetus to be a full fledged child born and breathing on November 25.
November 25.
Im pretty sure I had other plans that day.
Well, now thats the day Im going to become a mother.
Annnnd the hyperventilating starts.
Okay, so. we leave the doctors office. How can this baby be growing in there without me ever knowing about it? Its just been setting up camp inside me and I had no idea? Man, I usually have such good intuition about my body...like, when i feel a cold coming..im always right.
I guess feeling a baby coming is different. Only pee can tell you that.
So. We do the obvious thing. We eat lunch. Its emotional and I can feel that Im happy but I definately also feel that nagging overwhelming, paralyzing fear.
We decide that its best to just tell people and stop worrying/thinking about HOW to tell people. Either way, we're going to drop bombs allllll over this province today, and its gonna happen no matter how we say it.
Jakes parents first, since they are on our way home. Jake says, "if they are home on our drive by, then we will tell them"
I pray that nobodys home.
Obviously they are. Noooothing goes my way this weekend apparently.
They are shocked, Im shocked we say the words, "we're going to have a baby for christmas this year"
but everyones excited. surprised, and excited.
I feel relief finally, thats new.
We get home, I pace the living room thinking about how to call my parents, do i come out with it like im excited/thrilled/cant wait to be a mom? or do I tell them, you know....i guess i cant drink at my wedding...
The phone rings.
Its them.
Of course.
So I just tell them. Initially they think im getting a dog.
I tell them its significantly more responsibility.
My dad tells Jake he should have gotten me the puppy i wanted.
That'll teach Jake.
So the big news has been dropped on my family. And I felt ten times better. Not a hundred times better, because the reality of the fact is still very there...very present, and very terrifying.
But I finally feel like this is something I can feel good about, this is, at the end of the day, a wonderful thing.
So....now we have to figure out how to do it.
Apparently anyone can just ...make them....but now, i figure i better put some kind of effort into this.I mean, there is a baby in there somewhere....
woah. getting a little overwhelmed again.

How this all started...

I should have known this was coming. I should have known on that warm day in Maui on the beach with the waves when Jake told me " See, I always thought a surprise pregnancy would be fun, you know, trying to figure it out and making it work" . My face told him I didnt agree, Little did I know, my ovaries were listening, and glued to every word Jake said. But that was ages ago. This is now.

I had recently started a brand new job as an RN in BC , it had taken me weeks to find work, and I finally felt like our life was coming together after our recent move, and my new, unwelcomed unemployment. As it turned out being on EI and staying home waiting for something to spark my interest...like maybe i would learn to sew...or bake...instead I worked on getting so bored that by the time Jake got home all i had done that day was sweep t he floor buy chips and 2 bottles of wine. Unemployment didn’t fit me just right.

 So I had started work. It was overwhelming, and I had just started my first stint of 12 hour shifts, trying to figure out how nurses in BC survive without the technology I had grown so accustomed to in Calgary. If any of you have ever done an orientation week as an RN to a new unit...you know the deal. Worst week ever. I was overtired, overwhelmed, and over stressed. So the lack of a period in my life that week, seemed at the time like a blessing.
 I mean I had enough to worry about, and obviously god was just giving me a helping hand, telling me, “ you know what madi, you have had a pretty heavy week with all this work saving lives and kicking ass so why dont I tell mother nature to just hold off for a couple days” and I was thinking, “Hey, thanks big guy” And Id high five him (theoretically of course) next week when my period came after my orientation was done.
So it was Friday night, and I was now officially 8 days late. No big deal, id been late before, and Id been much safer these past couple months since we had a scare early in the year. So I brushed it off, and made big plans for a wine soaked weekend in kamloops with a girlfriend from Calgary, because, obviously, I wasn’t pregnant.
So, Im making plans, and planning on following through when it occurs to me, its probably bad of me to just pretend like i havent missed my period. I mean, I AM a nurse. So this conversation goes on in my head:

“Yes yes, i know im not pregnant, but you know, its not exactly good karma to pretend nothing has happened and tap into a weekend full of wine and fun if something IS growing in there...which its not...”
So,that annoying  nursing training kicks in, and tells me that Im a huge hypocrite if i dont just check it out. I mean, if I was having shortness of breath and chest pain and pretended I didn’t..that would also chalk up to “did you NOT go to school for that?”
SO, we go into town that night, to pick up some dinner food, some wine, and a pregnancy test. Just a typical night in a long term relationship.
Jake at one point, pulls into an expectant mothers parking stall because he thinks its hilarious to poke at me until I break wide open. I tell him to knock it off, and that he’s going to feel really bad if I am pregnant and he just jinxed me...

So we get the usual, the 2 lines mean you’re pregnant, and the one line means you aren’t, and proceed to pick up some vegetables, some potatoes and check ourselves out of Safeway without a care in the world.
We drive the 15km out to our house, and I step into the bathroom before making dinner to have a quick pee, and some quick reassurance before I open my bottle of wine.
Line one comes up. Just like it always has before, I breathe a sigh of relief and place it down on the sink, happily flush away my worries and stand up wash my hands.
Thats when it happened.
The second line.
The little innocent pink  line that shouldn’t have the weight that it really REALLY does. Of all the lines I’ve seen before in my life...that one was not only the most significant...but also the most daunting. Most of the lines in my life have, for the most part, been pretty forgettable. Not heavy, thick lines that held my entire life on the edge of them...nope I hadn’t met any lines like that...until this pink one.
My new thought is that these lines should be made to appear as intimidating as they really are...even if you are expecting and hoping for that line, its still a big one...it should be flashing, or should make noise or sing a song, or even a jingle..Id even settle for a metallic colored line at least. something that seems better in a story than...well...the line was about as long as a fingernail and it was...a blush pink color....and it was life changing.

“Umm....the last time i took one of these it...it didnt have...you know..that faded ..that faded other line...”
A quick dash to the instructions.

Even though, I already know that just because its lighter than the other one, doesn’t mean its not there. It actually means the opposite. There is REALLY something there. On the test, and in my uterus.
So back in the car. back to the now seemingly 100km drive into town again.
My anxiety increasing, and Jake remaining ghostly calm. It’s as if we are a see saw. The more up I get the more calm  he gets, which in most cases is ideal....in this case, I just couldn’t understand why he wasn’t going though what birth plans, family vacations, behavioural medications and colleges we would have to figure out now that  that “other pink line” had emerged.
So. We emerge from london drugs with 2 digital read pregnancy tests. No more line fooling around. Jake bought them. I was too anxious thinking that if Im already judging me, that little old lady at the counter is also judging. oh, and i was going to throw up on something.
Back into the car. Back onto the longest drive Ive ever been on to get back to a toilet and a safe place to freak out.

Into the house and into the bathroom.

I talked to this one before I peed on it. “come on stick...you know the deal...we don’t just “get” pregnant...its actually a scientifically tricky thing to pull off...according to my nursing education...however..”

Pee. Wait. 2 Minutes. Jake takes the test away from me so i cant stare at it.
Pregnant-2-3 weeks.
So. The panic sets in. the tears start and the overwhelming feeling that Im suddenly 18 and knocked up by my highschool boyfriend lingers. How am I going to tell people what has happened! everyone is going judge us, i mean how could we have done this.....
then jake sets it straight. We’re 25, not 18. We’ve been together for 3 years, and are married. we have a house, we have degrees and careers, and were planning on a family sometime in the next year or two anyways.
Oh right.
This is something I did say I wanted....I forgot about that..
And yet, the fear is still there.
So. we order pizza.
I dont calm down. But I pretend I do....Jake is excited and happy, hes making peace with this pregnancy and Im considering driving back into town to get another 5 digital tests....im sure one of them will come out right.
Different places for sure.
Maybe thats normal....
and so we go to bed. To the first of many a  sleepless night for the next nine months