Positive Response

I finally worked up the courage to email my father. This is the response that I received on waking this morning:

Wow! What incredible news. Congratulations. It will take me a little time to synthesize this information. I will talk to you tomorrow.
Love Dad.

This is more than I ever hoped for. So I’m extremely relieved. And a lot less nervous about the prospect of talking to him later tonight.

Everyone we have told so far has been completely supportive and happy for us. A few curly questions, but I think we have handled them fairly well and not had to compromise our own privacy too much. I even called my brother (who is difficult and troubled and a lot of other things that I really don’t want to go into) and he was incredibly excited for us. I texted my sister after my mother pointed out that she wouldn’t read a letter if she even suspected it may be from me and as expected, got no response. But at least I tried to tell her myself.

Princess is super excited. She just keeps randomly saying, ‘I’m going to be a big sister!’ with a big grin on her face. She is enthusiastically announcing to all and sundry ‘Mum’s pregnant!’ and has already decided that it HAS to be a girl. She was especially proud to tell her dad, who was blown away but very supportive and full of congratulations. R2 however was a bit puzzled and was full of questions, some of them completely inappropriate, so I just told her to ask Princess about the details – cos she knows exactly how lesbians make babies. I was surprised that they were both so shocked (but in a good way) – I have never hidden that I wanted more babies one day. R2 just kept saying how completely unexpected it was. I’d love to be a fly on the wall when Princess babbles on about things to them – she’s just so blunt.

My cousin was adorable and only a bit hurt that we hadn’t told her earlier – she said that the only thing that made it acceptable was that we told her on the same day as Princess, and she conceded that she cannot keep a secret. She was also very excited about the new baby.

So about the scan:

• The verdict was that I have a 1 in 5490 risk of the baby having Down Syndrome. Which is really good.
• We saw the brain and the heart and the placenta and the umbilical cord with blood flowing, and the stomach and bladder with liquid in. We saw the spine very well because WB was very keen to show us how beautiful that was. Everything was exactly as it should be.
• The due date has now been moved back until the 11 October (incidentally one day after my sister’s…). This means that we went from 12 weeks 1 day to 13 weeks in a single day. Wish the rest of the time would go that quickly! Obviously the final due date will be settled at the 20 week scan, and of course is only a guide anyway. I just seem to need a date to work with.
• WB was much less active this time and had to be prodded a lot to move from its preferred position of head down, back facing frontwards so that we could see everything we needed to.
• WB is SO much bigger and more formed this time. We knew that this would be the case but it was still kind of mind blowing. Is a tiny fully formed baby! Wow!

It was lovely to be able to share seeing Weeny Beany with both Lazyboo and Princess. It’s amazing to not have to hide it anymore, and to share my excitement with my first baby.

Princess has already said, ‘but I’ll still be your baby girl, right Mum?’ so we’ll be have to be careful to make sure she understands that she’s not being replaced… for that reason sometimes I think it would be easier if Weeny Beany is a boy…. I told her that she’ll be my baby girl when she’s 10 and 25 and 30 and 50 – no matter what else happens.

Since the scan I have been incredibly exhausted. So much so that I couldn’t get out of bed yesterday at all, and still felt crushed after a 3 hour nap and watching lots of movies. I slept a lot last night now and feel a bit better though. Although I did struggle along to training yesterday morning where I discovered that I feel like I’m dying whenever I run more that 20 metres, and that I cannot lie comfortably on my stomach anymore. And today I feel like an old woman with stiff and sore muscles all over. Especially my lower back. Does anyone know when I should stop doing sit ups and other ab stuff? I really need to talk to my trainer about that.

I have two assignments due on Wednesday, so it is time that I stopped procrastinating and actually started to do some work. Feeling a bit more awake is a good thing for that reason! Owlie (who has posted pictures of her beautiful belly full of baby girl) commented that the energy of the 2nd trimester is a myth and it’s just that the mind numbingly bone aching tiredness goes away. I wish that would happen!

Chips, who has just recently got a BFP for her birthday (YAY!), has blogged about the terror of pregnancy – It doesn’t really go away! I’m still terrified that something will happen, that it’s all been a wonderful dream, entering the 2nd trimester has only lessened that a tiny amount. And even after they’re born, there’s always the terror that something will happen to that precious child – It’s kind of like having your heart walking around independently. But oh so worth it.

Lots of BFPs in blogland this week (Easter was obviously a fertile time!) – but I’m hoping and praying (if an atheist’s prayers actually mean anything ) that there will be at least two more this week.

Lazyboo will post some scan pictures some time soon….