Try, try again

So... it's been a crazy week.

On Friday the 4th of January, I left work early. I felt sick and thought I had the flu. I had been sleeping mad long hours (I usually sleep 4 or so hours a night... I was sleeping 8-9).

On Saturday, I still felt gross. On Sunday morning at 4 a.m., I woke up and asked myself... might I be pregnant?

I took a test and peed all over the floor while I did so. Irritably, groggy at 4 a.m. and still feeling awful, I cleaned up the floor. The test had a faint pink line and another, almost imperceptible line crossing it. I felt sure that you could always see the 2nd line... it wasn't even colored in... dammit, it was day 39 and where the hell is my period when I am expecting it anyway?!

I went to throw away the test and a little voice in my head stopped me. "But there's a 2nd line."

So I did the sensible and kindly thing and woke up Pat. "Just tell me this fucker is negative so I can go back to bed. I don't feel good."

He staggered in to the bathroom and studied it blearily while he peed. "It's positive, man. You're pregnant, I told you so."

"Nahhh." I went back to bed.

Ten minutes later, I heard his voice, soft and thin and drowsy, through the wall. "It's positive, honey. It says no matter how faint the second line is, if you see one, it's positive."

"I want a second opinion. I want one of those digital tests, the ones that tell you in no uncertain terms."

"Me too."

Wide awake, we tried to wait until WalMart opened to get one of these digital newfangled hoo-dads. We eventually passed out at about 6:30 and woke at 8. We went to IHOP for breakfast (and I think we saw Nick Cage... I heard his voice, looked at the birthday party assembling at the next table and what do you know? Since it was his birthday, not too improbable... even less so since the person in question winked... weird!) Then we went and got a test.

I came home and peed on a stick again (and the toilet seat, the floor, my hands, passing motorists, and probably the Frisbee on the roof... this is not my gift, people). I slammed the pee-stick onto the counter, growled, cursed, and mopped up pee. When I straightened, nauseated beyond bearing, my eye fell on the test.

"PREGNANT." All caps. No doubt. No remorse.

I dropped my wad of tissue. "Pat, helllllp!"

We called my folks. We told many of our friends. I told my boss and office mates. I was gloriously morning sick. I had swollen boobs and I could feel weird tensions in my abdomen and I felt like a superhero and any little nicks and cuts practically healed in minutes and I glowed and everyone went happily mad and I've never eaten so many greens in my life.

Thursday the 10th, I started bleeding. I called the doctor for an earlier appointment and they told me I could come in Friday. All Thursday night, I cried, tried in vain to clench my cervix, and knew.

On Friday morning, Fran the wonderful nurse told me not to get my hopes up. We were probably miscarrying, not to worry, nature knows and there must have been something wrong.

When I went to the doctor, he confirmed it with an exam and ultrasound (and do you know you can feel the pulses of the sonic probe? It's like ground penetrating radar or something... whump! Whump!) It was probably a blighted ovum, which would never have developed into a person. The body eventually notices that it's spending lots of hormones and activity for nothing and pulls the plug on such a pregnancy.

Ah so. Or as I told Pat halfway through Black Friday, "fuuuuuuuck."

Oh, well. At least we know we're (kinda) fertile. There's always a next time.