And Finally, the Fun Update

We're pregnant!

Glad that's out of the way ;)

The truth is, we found out I was pregnant when I was admitted to the hospital back in October (for OHSS). In fact, we had an idea even before that, from the blood test in the E.R. two days before. My hcg was a 7. (Anything over a 5 is considered a pregnancy.) But nobody could know 100% that it wasn't just leftover in my system from the trigger/Ovidrel shot.. since that's just an injection of hcg. Still, my fertility specialist told the E.R. doc over the phone, "I don't think it's the shot. I think she's a little bit pregnant."

That phrasing made me giggle, I'll admit.

But two days later, when things got really bad and I had to be admitted, they did another blood draw.. and my hcg had gone up. I was preggo. Doc kept joking, "I just don't know with how many."

But we wouldn't find that out for a few weeks. And it was hard to celebrate or be excited in the way one who is trying to conceive always envisions. I had all these ideas on how to announce to my husband when we finally found out. Instead, I had to mutter it from a hospital bed with an IV in my arm. And neither one of us wanted to get too attached to the idea, given everything that was going on at the time.

And a couple days into my hospital stay, I started spotting. I freaked out. Of course I acted like I wasn't too concerned with the nurses and doctors. No idea why. Guess I didn't want to be the emotional/irrational patient.. since I know that, logically, spotting can be completely normal. But I would start to cry whenever I was alone the room. And it wasn't so much that I was 'attached' to the pregnancy, but I didn't want to have to go through it all again, and I didn't want to tell my husband that something had gone wrong.

Luckily, it subsided after just a little more than a day, and my doctor had no concerns whatsoever. "If this wasn't a relatively strong pregnancy, you wouldn't be having this extreme hyperstimulation."

And that's the part I couldn't tell you in the previous chapters, since we hadn't announced yet. If a woman gets hyperstimulation, and she ends up being pregnant, the symptoms and degree of it become much worse. The hormones released during early pregnancy actually prolong the condition. (Yay me!)

So, it was definitely a strange place to be in. "Yes, you're pregnant. But because of that, you're going to feel TERRIBLE for a few weeks, and take a few months to completely recover."

Two weeks after being discharged from the hospital, we had our first ultrasound. And as Brad and I just tried to take it all in, having no idea what this part was going to be like, the doc immediately says, "Oh yeah, there's two."

My husband's face had no reaction. Shock, I'm guessing. I laughed, but inside I was scared shitless. No, really. I don't want to sound ungrateful, but I was terrified. I immediately knew my chances of a natural birth just went down greatly; a home birth was all but out of the question. Two things that I really, really wanted. Finances were going to be hit hard -- really hard. And I was completely overwhelmed with the idea of trying to feed, bathe, soothe, etc. two babies at once.

I'm not sure I'm any less panicked at this point, but I'm trying to just roll with it and accept it. I know that all new soon-to-be parents get a little anxious. I just feel like my anxiety is squared :P

But at the same time, I'm so excited. To see my husband as a father for the first time. To hear a giggle fit down the hallway. To hear someone call me "Mommy."

At this point, I want to send out a HUGE thanks to every person who donated, wished us well, prayed, or provided any level of support. It meant the world to us. And as it turned out, the first cycle of injections that we raised money for.. clearly worked ;)

So, fingers crossed and knock on wood... Our little wish has been answered. Twice. <3

And these are our video announcements: