"I'm What?!?"

Let's rewind.

March 24th, 2007, Andrew and I went to a party.  We had a disagreement on the way home, but we made up.  We made up very, very well.  VERY well.  Ahem.

So, we finally went to sleep a little after 3am, and yet before 10am even rolled around, I woke up feeling happier and more complete than I could ever remember feeling.  Lately I had been thinking a lot about a story my mother had told me.  Apparently when she woke up the morning after I was conceived, she rolled over and told my father she was pregnant.  I was the second child, so I thought it was reasonable enough that she would remember, since it had then only been 9 months since she'd given birth to my older sister.

With my own feelings on waking that morning most likely (says my hindsight) in a cloud of excessive oxytocin production, I rolled over and told Andrew I was pregnant.  He was too exhausted to share my cheerful exuberance, nor did he remember this statement.  I let him sleep for a few more hours, and in the interim, I made an effusively loving entry about Andrew in my diary.  It's sickeningly dripping with adoration, and I reread it now and again.  (I still feel the same way, really, but I have to be careful not to fluff his ego TOO much.)

Fast forward 4 weeks.  My period was late.  Only 4 days late, mind you, but late all the same.  My previous period had been 13 days late, which was abnormal for me, and in the end it just came down to me stressing too much over the possibility of being pregnant.  So, I told myself I was just going to take a pregnancy test to resolve the issue so I could stop worrying.

By this time, I had been feeling really fatigued and had just explained it away with a variety of excuses.  My cheese crackers tasted funny, all of a sudden, and so did my apple juice.  At first I thought perhaps a power outage had caused the drastic flavor changes, but that seemed ridiculous when I considered the crackers.  Strangely enough, I had also been craving sappy old movies and musicals, and it was a rare thing for me to watch a movie (I haven't owned a TV in 7 years; don't miss it a bit!), so I was watching DVDs every night on my PC.

All those abnormalities were forgotten by the time I was taking this test, quite casually, by myself before preparing to go to a Pampered Chef party at the same house as 4 weeks prior.  I looked at the result.  Then I looked at it again.  "I'm what?!?"

Without panicking, I quickly fired off a text message to Andrew to go outside at work and call me.  He did, and in the most serious and skeptical manner, my darling Andrew whom I love and adore said, "Go take another test, and call me back."

Well, I didn't have a chance until after the party, and we agreed not to discuss it with anyone else until we were sure.  My mom became the exception, as she was the one to attend the party with me, and Andrew and I were currently unmarried and traveling 2+ hours each weekend for our "dates".  We had also only been dating for 4 months at the time of discovery.

I finally did take another pregnancy test at Andrew's insistence, making a late-night run to the pharmacy.  It confirmed things.  (I still have these dear little mementos--my Jackson "piss sticks"--stored away, though I don't really know why.)

Now what?  Luckily Andrew and I were in the process of having me move in with him, and I had already secured full-time employment in town and begun to tell all my clients (being then self-employed in a variety of capacities; see About Me) that a replacement would need to be found.  This did not help resolve my feelings of panic about the idea of moving away from all my relatives just when I was about to sprout a family of my own.

There is a happy continuation (eventually) to this story, but for now, I will leave you.