My husband and I have been married for four years before we had our baby. We wanted to enjoy being a couple before having kids. We’ve been told to travel as much as we can while it’s just still the two of us.
One day, I took a urine pregnancy test because my period was delayed for 5 days. I didn’t expect it to be positive because sometimes when I’m under a lot of stress, it could cause delays with my monthly guest. Being paranoid as I was, when I saw the two lines, I did not want to believe that I was pregnant. I was thinking what if I have a health condition or problem that’s causing the test to be positive?! My husband was with me and we were both unsure if we should believe the positive result or not. So I ended up repeating the test for 2 more days until I told my doctor and scheduled an appointment with an OB/Gyn. How ironic it is that I’m a nurse but I never saw an OB/Gyn all my life and I’m already 30. We decided not to tell anybody until we were sure.
At my eighth week, I had my OB appointment and my pregnancy was confirmed via vaginal ultrasound. At that time, our baby was just the size of a raspberry! He was the tiniest thing but he already had a heart which was beating healthily. Hearing his heartbeat and seeing that there’s a tiny human being growing inside of me, at that moment was when it all became so real to me! I could not describe what I felt. It was an emotional moment for me and my husband. Right there and then, we knew our lives are going to change forever!
We wanted to enjoy the moment to ourselves so decided to keep it as a secret until we reached the second trimester. The exception was my job. I had to tell my boss in confidence because I needed to ask some changes to my schedule in order for me to make it to my OB appointments. It was fun keeping such a beautiful secret. I was lucky not to experience any morning sickness. Nobody could really tell that I was pregnant until when I was nearing the second trimester. I felt really fatigued. My husband’s sisters were already guessing that I was pregnant and it was difficult to convince them otherwise. But we managed to delay the announcement (despite their interrogation) until the second trimester.
We told our families before we announced it on social media. When we finally let the cat out of the bag, it felt so wonderful and liberating! Everybody was so excited. I never really realized how people are so extra nice to pregnant people until I became pregnant. It was nice to be treated like a VIP all the time. Everybody kept checking on me and making sure I was okay, may it be at my workplace, or family and social gatherings, and even in public places! I felt so special!
As a first time preggo, I didn’t have any idea what to expect or do so I picked up the book “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” and I’m so glad I did! It had all the information I needed. I’ve found that not everything that’s available online is accurate. So the book was really helpful because it’s based on facts and research. I felt that somebody googled all the answers to my questions and organized them per month/trimester of pregnancy in chronological order up to labor and delivery! I was really nervous and scared at first because I didn’t feel that I was ready but the more I kept myself informed about pregnancy and parenthood, the less I felt anxious. It’s true indeed as said by Ralph Waldo Emerson that “Knowledge is the antidote to fear”.
At my 16th week, our OB confirmed the gender of our baby. My sister in law wanted to throw a gender reveal so we had it sealed in an envelope and it took all our strength to stop ourselves from opening it. I will be writing about our gender reveal in a separate post.
Our baby boy, was due on Christmas day but he decided to meet us on December 15th 2018. I had a normal delivery and everyday with our little prince charming, (although we’re still sleep deprived) has been a great blessing!
