1. the act of meditating.
2. continued or extended thought; reflection; contemplation.
While unproven in any medical journals, it has been proven with the birth of our beautiful Godson, Liam. Of what do I speak? Meditation. More specifically, post-transfer in-vitro meditation. What does that mean in real people terms? It means that Heidi spent the two days after the transfer in a state of stress-free, positive thinking meditation. She imagined purple ribbons in her uterus softly grasping onto the newly added embryos, helping them implant into her perfectly prepared uterus. She stared at a picture of the embryos, replete with purple ribbon, angel and baby rattle, tucked onto our wedding picture, to help her maintain her positive thinking.
She kept her little legs propped up and watched The Baby Story on TLC for forty-eight hours. Positive thinking was the theme for the week. No stress. Happy thoughts. Comfort. And healthy eating. Oh yea, we were back to healthy, organic food. Heidi's favorite thing to do...eat lots of fruits and veggies (meaning, not just corn!). The fruit bowl is full! The dinner actually had spinach in it..and she ate it! That prayer from Dr. Welden must have worked because it would take a miracle to make Heidi eat spinach! Yet...there she was, eating healthy!
So, through all of our positive thinking and meditation, we had ten long, loonnngggg days to wait before we could take a HPT (home pregnancy test, for you non-fertility challenged peeps). Now, during all of her "meditation" time, my betrothed had managed to search every possible web page involving the recommended time frame for taking a HPT after in-vitro. We had consulted our wise nurse, Pam, via text (the best way to get medical advice, by the way!). All of them said to wait the ten days. So, we did the only thing we could logically do...we took a test early. We fully expected a negative because, well, Heidi had read the entire Internet and it said not to take it too early. But we did it anyway. And it was a BFN (big fat negative, infertility acronym again). We vowed that we would ABSOLUTELY NOT take another test until the blood draw on August 12. We had learned our lesson and this time, we were committing to waiting. We vowed. That's serious stuff, people. You don't "vow" and then not stick with it. It's bad karma. So, the vow was out there and we were destined to wait.
Funny thing about the vow. Apparently, it is open to interpretation. On Thursday, August 11th, at approximately 6:00 in the a.m., I am rustled from sleep by the ever so soft sound of a paper wrapper opening. Now, for those of you who know me, you know that I can sleep through a tornado without so much as rolling over. But for some reason, this morning, the r-i-i-p-p-p of a wrapper stirred me from a deep slumber. I sat trying to realize what was happening on the other side of the bathroom door and it came to me. Heidi was in that room breaking a vow. BREAKING A VOW!!! I sat there, well, layed there...it was still six in the morning, I wasn't quite ready to actually sit up, I sat there and well, I got a little mad. I was mad because I knew, knew that if the test was negative, she wouldn't tell me. I was mad because I knew she would keep her disappointment to herself. She would be sad alone. As I sat there, I began thinking about what I would say when she crept back into bed. All of a sudden, the bathroom door flies open and Heidi comes racing into the room, screaming "Baby, it's positive, it's positive". Holy shit. Pardon my french, but holy shit. She's crying and holding the HPT, hands shaking, heart pounding and I'm confused, but not mad anymore, that's for sure. I'm shocked. Amazingly shocked. It's positive. Thank you, God. It's positive. We are going to be mommies. WE ARE GOING TO BE MOMMIES!!!!
So, we sat shocked. What now? We can't tell anyone until the blood test is done the next day. It would be just silly to announce it so early. Irresponsible really. So, of course, we do what any responsible mommy-to-be would do at 6:00 a.m. We call family. Everyone manages to answer the phone that early, likely for fear that something is wrong. Why else would someone else be calling so early? Jessica was slightly panicked, especially since I called from Heidi's phone...just to add to the suspense. I spoke in a low voice, announcing that there was something I had to tell her. She said, in a very pensive way, obviously concerned, obviously worried. Then, I said it..."Heidi's pregnant". Silent pause...then a scream of excitement. Calls to Heidi's mom and sister are similar...soft, groggy voices, then excitement, although no screams. :-) We decide we really need to wait to tell any more people. We made it until 7:00 and then called our besties, Laura and Tootie. That was it! No more people, at least not until after the blood test. Of course, it would only be fair if we told Pam. I mean, you almost have to...she has been there since step one. She was almost as vested in this as us. We debated it most of the morning. We made it until about lunch time before we broke down and texted her. Now for real, this was it! It was so hard not to tell everyone we saw at work our good news. This was the happiest we'd been in this process and we had to keep it on the DL (down low for you nerdy, non-hipsters).
So, Friday arrives. We are up bright and early to go take our blood test. We didn't actually have an early appointment, we just needed to be there early. We had already taken the day off of work, just in case. Well, jokes on them, we knew! Well, we were pretty sure we knew. Anywho...we stopped at Dunkin' Donuts to buy the girls at the doctor's office some breakfast because, well, we were just in a fabulous mood. When we got there, we were met with hugs and smiles from our two favorite nurses. It was about time...we had already cried with them, it was time to rejoice with them now. The Lab Corp dude was waiting for us when we got there. Pam took blood and put it in the magical spinner thingamajingie and waa-la...off it went for the super official results. The Lab Corp dude even called the lab to let them know he was on his way with Heidi's blood and that there was a rush! I think our cheeks were actually hurting by now from smiling so much.
Despite all of these things falling into place, it still takes about two hours to get the results back. Really? Two more hours??? So, we find a way to pass the time. We shop. We wander around a mall in Tampa because we aren't ready to cross the bridge to go back home. Still waiting. Fine. We cross the bridge and now we are at the mall in Clearwater. Walking through the mall and the phone rings. Heidi is too scared to answer it. I, being the dudely one, must man up and take the call. Caller ID confirms it's Pam.
We call and/or text those few people we have told and let them know it's official. Nancy was already texting every ten minutes to find out when that damn nurse was going to call us back. :)
We decide to have a little celebratory dinner with some family and close friends. It was our first celebration feast to honor the beginning of our pregnancy.
Heidi surprises me with an early birthday gift in honor of our little baby/babies. There's a little back story to one of the gifts. When we were in Target before the aspiration, waiting for a prescription to be filled, we wandered around and made our way to the book section. I saw a book I remembered from childhood and told Heidi that when we get pregnant, this was the first gift I was buying for the baby. Well, the love of my life bought me this book as our celebration. Shel Silverstein's "Where the Sidewalk Ends". She also included a little giraffe and a onesie.
Now, we wait. My birthday is coming up and if all goes well, we plan on announcing our little secret at my big 40th bash. We can't wait. A few more blood tests to make sure everything is progressing as it should be. Again, for those of you who are fertility lingo challenged, Heidi's HCG has to double every three days. And so every three days we go back to the doctor for blood tests. Oh, and her little meds aren't over just yet. Still daily shots in the boom-boom-pow. Still a regimen of pills. We have to do all the stuff necessary to make her uterus the most perfect of places for the baby/babies to live. Yes, until we know otherwise, we refer to them as the babies. After all, there were two embryos placed back so there's a chance that both took. And we don't want to give either of them a complex later in life by not acknowledging both of them now. So the belly talking begins...we spend each day talking to her belly, encouraging the babies to grow, letting them know how happy we are that they have decided to join our little family.
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