AGAIN

If you had told me eighteen months ago that I would be pregnant AGAIN, less than a year after my youngest had been born, I would have laughed in your face. And possibly hit you (but that would have been the pregnancy rage hitting you, and I’m sure I would have felt badly about it. Sort of).

   

If you had told me eighteen months ago that not only would I be pregnant AGAIN less than a year after my youngest had been born, but that it would not be an “Oops!” baby (or the more PC term “surprise!” baby. It’s okay, I understand. Can I introduce you to my third born and resident "oops/surprise" baby?), but rather a planned and hoped for pregnancy, I would have immediately cut off all contact with you because I have a policy about not letting crazy liars speak into my life.

The point being here: I WAS DONE. Finito. Dan and I had discussed the possibility of four kids, but eventually we become more comfortable with the idea of three (and then sometimes felt like even that was too much when the two that we already had were being little terrors). Then I found out I was expecting our third baby, and that pregnancy…ooph. It cemented the deal.

I know there are some women who have lovely, magical pregnancies free from the horrors of morning sickness. In fact, one of my best friends is experiencing that very thing right now (and quite frankly, if anyone deserves a morning sickness free pregnancy it’s her). I, however, am not one of those mythical unicorns. I am so far removed from that ideal that I’m basically Gollum, pale and sickly, muttering nonsense to myself while threatening to end Dan’s life for eating my precious Butterfingers. In short, it’s not pretty and it’s very hard.

So, during the first (First. As in, just the beginning in a long series) visit to the ER to replenish my fluids and get some sweet, sweet meds to hopefully stop the ever present morning sickness, I very adamantly told my husband, "This is IT. I'm done. We're done. No. More. Babies." And my husband agreed. Really, what else can you do but agree when your wife’s blood is spurting all over the hospital floor because she can’t stop throwing up long enough to hold still for the nurse to get an IV to stick. TMI? I don't even care, y'all. That nightmare of a situation happened and it's seared into my brain forever. And now possibly yours. You're welcome. Don't we all feel closer now? Great. Moving on.

I said this, this bold statement, this "Our family is complete now" declaration and I meant it. Our babies were worth every late night ER visit and standing order at the IV clinic, but I was worn out. I needed to know there was an end in sight. I claimed that end as my own. I said it out loud and it constantly echoed in my head. "This is it. After this you are done. Just make it through this last pregnancy and you are done."

But a small, calm voice always echoed back, "This isn't it. You're not done. This family isn't done."

I could feel the heft of this truth in my gut. Every time I heard it, I wanted to scream. Sometimes I actually audibly groaned. I was in the depths of some serious hyperemesis gravidarum nonsense and those words felt like weights on my chest.

How could we not be done? How could I survive another pregnancy of throwing up every half hour, unable to keep even water down, until I finally went to the hospital for more fluids and medication, only to start the cycle all over again? How could I ask my husband to (again) bear the full weight of both his job and running our household while I basically shut down for an undetermined amount of time? Only a crazy person would willingly put themselves and their family through that again (if this sounds overly dramatic, it’s only because I’ve not done an accurate job describing just how sick I was during my third pregnancy. It was really, really bad).

Turns out I’m crazy. Thankfully, so is Dan.

Within a few months (MONTHS. This is the first sign of losing our minds, as we normally don’t even broach the subject of pregnancy until the youngest is near 2. Except for the time I gave birth to Ella and while still in the hospital Dan said, “That was fun! We should do that again!” and I would have Darth Vader force choked him if I had the ability) of Matthew’s birth, things like “Another one wouldn’t be so bad” and “Three is slightly easier than I thought…how bad can four be?” started being casually dropped into our conversations. Then the conversations became more serious and the truth of those words, “You are not done” were too big to ignore. And then, as my friend Becky explains, we just thought about it and boom! I was pregnant.*

*Please note: Becky does not have a medical degree and this is not actually how pregnancy is caused.

 

So, here we are. 15 weeks into Crazyville. Lots of morning all the time sickness, lots of “Wait, why are we doing this again?” but no ER visits…so win, I guess? So far, the only real set back is that I can’t even think about tacos without getting nauseous (Literally. Last week I tried to write about them and threw up). TACOS, GUYS (but I also got really sick when I ate a salad so at least I know this baby has some of my DNA)

So, we are crazy. And excited (so, SO excited). We are crazy/excited.