Problems

You hope for a trouble-free pregnancy. Often it doesn't turn out that, and on January 26th things started to go a bit pear-shaped. K reported that she had some minor bleeding. This didn't really worry us, and a quick call to the doc confirmed this. But one week later, with no change, we started to worry. Another call to the doc, more questions from her, and once again we were told that there was no big cause for concern. By Thursday we had had enough. The doc told us to come in that afternoon. Suddenly it seemed that there *was* cause for concern. Now we were truly worried. We started thinking about ectopic pregnancies or simply imminent failure.

They were squeezing us in at 4pm, so we arrived a few minutes early. There were a couple of women in the waiting room with their glorious big bellies, looking all pregnant and happy, whilst we cowered in the corner, terrified for the worst, feeling like outsiders who were about to told whether we could or couldn't join some kind of special club.

Other women came and went and we continued to wait. Obviously we were having to wait for all the regular appointments to go first, but it got more and more excruciating. K and I were working each other into a frenzy of worry, doubt and fear, and all these other women were rubbing salt into a big, open wound. This hour was perhaps the worst hour of either of our lives. That's not an exaggeration. The way we saw it at the time, the life of our baby hung in the balance.

Finally we got called in. It was the first time we got to meet our OB doc, Dr. U. She was young, friendly and her smile was pure sunshine. K "assumed the position" and the doc started poking around. Almost immediately there was bleeding. This was fabulous news, and indicated that her cervix was the source of the blood. In pregnancy, often some of the cells on the inside of the cervix get forced to the outside, where they bleed easily. This is what was going on in this case, and it posed no threat to the baby. Relief flooded the tiny room.

Dr. U took the opportunity to do an ultrasound, even though we would be back for our first scheduled appointment the next week. We peered at the screen and saw nothing until Dr. U pointed out a completely nondescript blob on the screen. This, apparently, was the fetus. A measurement confirmed the due date, and with that we were done, armed with the advice from Dr. U that included no hanky panky until the second trimester. Damn! Oh well, it could be worse...

A hike and some discussions

Not long after we found out that we were expecting, we went for a hike at Point Reyes. It was Martin Luther King Day, the weather was lovely and it seemed like a good way for us both to get some exercise.


It was really lovely up there, perched on the edge of the Pacific. We took a picnic and chatted over lunch about the challenges that lay ahead. We talked about what we might do if any of the tests turned revealed major issues with the fetus. K, who has always been a fervent supporter of women's reproductive rights admitted that terminating a pregnancy might not be the decision she would make, but that she was glad to have the choice. I fully agree of course.

After lunch, as we got further around the loop, the conversation turned to happier topics. Although we didn't want to make too many decisions or make too many preparations in the first trimester, we did pick a colour scheme and a theme. We weren't sure if we wanted to know the sex so we picked a colour scheme that would work for both genders, pale blue and orange. Being motor racing geeks, we were inspired by the classic Gulf Oil livery on Le Mans sportscars throughout the years from Steve McQueen's Porsche, to the McLarens I saw there in 1997 to this year's Aston Martins.

As for a theme, we thought about my niece, who had ladybugs on everything. K and I are both very into birds (being parrot owners) so we thought owls would make a very cute theme. Who doesn't like owls? Well, fieldmice I suppose, but apart from that....

Two Pink Lines - The Aftermath

People asked us what it felt like to get married last year after being together for nine years, and we always said that "nothing changes, but everything changes", hinting at the ethereal nature of the marriage bond. Pregnancy on the other hand is totally different. There is no doubt that everything changes.

We immediately started thinking about who would be our OB doctor, how would we redo the office to turn it into a nursery, what to do about leave from work and all the other crap. The biggest decision up-front was to keep it a secret for the first trimester. K is in a higher-risk category being 37, so our biggest fear was failure of the pregnancy. Being the control freaks we are, we started reading voraciously and soon learned that 1 in 5 pregnancies fails. My attention also quickly turned to the risk of Down Syndrome, uncovering stats that indicate a 1 in 128 chance of the fetus having DS. These odds were too short for comfort, and I began to obsess about it. I was determined to hold my excitement and defer any big planning until the end of the first trimester.

We scheduled the first appointment with the OB, referred by K's gyn, for 8 weeks in, and I quickly learned that a pregnancy is measured from the start of the last normal period (LMP). It felt like we got two extra weeks for free! We figured out some dates: LMP was Dec 14th, ovulation Dec 30th and birth would be Sept 20th. We also figured out the probable date of conception and it was fun to reflect on the where/what/how!

K bought a book. Not the typical "What to Expect When You're Expecting" which was too touchy-feely for her taste but the more down-to-earth "The Pregnancy Book" which communicated in a straightforward fashion what is going on with both her body and the developing being inside her.

Tea-drinking habits immediately changed, as we switched to one decaf teabag and one regular in the pot of tea everyday, and K limited herself to one small cup instead of a more typical large mug. All other caffeine was cut out, as was all alcohol.

We also booked one last "not for pregnant women" activity, believing it would be okay this early (confirmed by the OB). When I bought a new car last year, one of the agreements I made was that K would get to do a track day in it, since it's definitely a high-performance car. We figured that it was now or never, so we scheduled it for Jan 25th.

It wasn't long before she started to feel the effects of the pregnancy...

I'm going to be a Dad

I've proved that I can maintain a blog, so impending parenthood seems like a good time to start another.

Yes, I'm three months late, but we've only just told everyone, so it's not like I could be publishing blog posts at the beginning. So I'll spend the next few days catching up.

Seems like this would be as good a place to start as any (taken on January 15th I think). Two tests, just to be sure: